Love and Money Read Online Free PDF Page B

say.”
    â€œPerhaps because I do not like speaking to my own advantage,“ said Thomas. ”Nevertheless, to throw away the township of Annotsfield on the turn of a card seems to me—“ he paused, then blurted out: ”—unworthy of you.”
    â€œUnworthy of me?” said Sir Richard, affecting surprise. “Can it be that after all my follies you still hold a high opinion of your dissolute uncle?”
    Thomas was silent. The truth was he had always loved his uncle dearly. Sir Richard’s handsome aquiline face, his curling black hair and sparkling black eyes, his strong lean body, his elegant attire, his skill with horse and sword, his quick laugh and quicker courage, seemed to the young man exactly the qualities a gentleman of King Charles I’s reign should own. It was not within the power of his sober honest nature to express all this, however, so he said nothing and looked aside. Sir Richard observed him keenly, and presently laughed on a kindlier note.
    â€œTha’rt a good lad, Tom,” he said. “I never could abide thy father—if he’d lived I think I should have married out of mere spite to him—but I see there is some touch of honourable mettle in his son. Well—I’ll try to keep a slice of Annotsfield for thee to inherit, Tom. Come now, let us go and see my little Isabella, of whom you disapprove so strongly.”
    He took his nephew’s arm and urged him from the room.
    Between embarrassment and curiosity Thomas was very uncomfortable. He did not know how to behave in the presence of his uncle’s mistress—he had never met a woman before who was not virtuous, and what his mother would say when he told her of the encounter he shuddered to think. On the other hand he did not relish the prospect of appearing a raw home-keeping lad in front of his uncle; he wished to seem able to take such matters as mistresses, bastards and gaming in his stride. How to do this while at the same time adhering sternly to his principles, was a difficult problem. Before he had in the least solved it he found himself in a small warm room where in front of the fire a woman sat holding on her knee a young child with copper-coloured hair, who was gurgling happily and kicking its bare toes.
    â€œJoanna, this is Thomas Bellomont, who is something between a nephew and a cousin to me,” said Sir Richard.
    Thomas gave what he knew was a clumsy bow. His first feeling was one of acute disappointment, for Joanna,though not much above his own age, lacked beauty and was quite as embarrassed as himself. She nodded ungracefully and muttered a greeting in a Yorkshire tone—Thomas remembered he had heard her birth was low—and made the child stand up on her lap, so that she could bury her face in its little neck. But this manoeuvre was frustrated by Sir Richard, who picked the child up from her arms into his own.
    â€œThis is my little Isabella,” he cried—as proud, thought Thomas sourly, as if she were a legitimate offspring and heiress to half Annotsfield. “Now, my poppet! Give cousin Tom a kiss, eh?”
    He advanced the child towards his horrified nephew. But the little Isabella, frightened—as well she might be, admitted Tom crossly—by her newly acquired cousin’s long nose and scarlet cheeks, burst into tears and buried her face in her father’s shoulder.
    â€œThere, there!” soothed Sir Richard. “Now, my darling! Now, my sweetheart! Very well! Shall we look out of the window, then, eh? There’s Rufus, see! Dost see Rufus, Isabella? Woof, woof!”
    The extraordinary spectacle of his reckless and dissipated uncle barking like a dog in order to amuse his little love-child quite disconcerted Thomas, the more so as Isabella, her tears drying away abruptly, leaned forward to look out at the dog and clutched her father’s shoulder to preserve her balance. Her small hand resting trustingly on the slashings