The Unknown Ajax Read Online Free PDF

know why you should not! Not that I mean ...” Aware that two pairs of fine grey eyes were fixed on her face, she found herself unable to finish this sentence, and tried hurriedly to begin another. “Dear me, how late it is! Anthea, my love,—” “Mama!” uttered Anthea accusingly. “If you don’t tell me precisely what it was that my grandfather said to you I’ll go to the library and ask him!”
    This dreadful threat threw Mrs. Darracott into instant disorder. She scolded a little, wept a little, asseverated that my lord had said nothing at all, and ended by divulging to her children that my lord had conceived the happy notion of bringing about a match between his shabby-genteel heir and his only unmarried granddaughter. “To keep him in the Family!” she explained earnestly.
    That was all that was needed to send Richmond into shouts of laughter. His sister, in general a girl with a lively sense of the ridiculous, found herself easily able to withstand the infection of his laughter. She waited in ominous silence until his mirth abated, and then, transferring her gaze from him to her mother, asked with careful restraint: “Does it ever occur to you, Mama, that my grandfather is a lunatic?”
    “Frequently!” Mrs. Darracott assured her. “That is—oh, dear, what am I saying? Of course not! Perhaps he is a trifle eccentric!”
    “Eccentric! He’s a mediaeval bedlamite!” said Anthea, not mincing matters. “Upon my word, this is beyond everything!”
    “I was afraid you would not quite like it,” agreed her mother unhappily. “Now, Richmond—! You will be in whoops if you don’t take care! Foolish boy! There is nothing to laugh at!” “Let him go into whoops, Mama! They may choke him!”
    Mrs. Darracott was shocked by this unfeeling speech, but thought it wisest, after one glance at Anthea’s stormy face, to beg Richmond to go away. He did go, but it was a moment or two before Anthea’s wrath abated. She had jumped up from the footstool, and now look several turns about the room in a hasty, impetuous way which filled Mrs. Darracott with foreboding. However, she soon recovered her temper, and, although still incensed, was presently able to laugh at herself. “I should know better than to fly up into the boughs for anything that detestable old man could say or do! I beg your pardon, Mama, but it puts me in such a rage when he behaves as though he were the Grand Turk, and we a parcel of slaves—! So I am to marry the weaver’s son, am I? I collect that I have nothing to say in, the matter: has the weaver’s son? Has he been informed of the fate that awaits him?” “Oh, no! That is—I did venture to suggest to your grandfather—But he said—you know his way!—that the poor young man would do as he was bid!”
    “And he will!” said Anthea. “That’s to say, he’ll try! Wretched, wretched man! I pity him with all my heart! He will be miserably ill-at-ease, miserably out of place, , and will arrive to find himself under fire! Grandpapa will overawe him within five minutes! Mama, it is infamous! Did you tell my grandfather that I shouldn’t consent to such a scheme?” “Well—well, I didn’t say that, precisely!” confessed Mrs. Darracott, in acute discomfort. “To own the truth, my love, I was so much taken-aback that—”
    “Then I will, and immediately!” declared Anthea, going towards the door. She was halted by a small, anguished shriek. “Anthea, I forbid you—I implore you!—He would be so angry! He will say that he told me not to say one word to you about it, and he did!”
    Anthea could not be impervious to this appeal. She paused; and, pursuing her advantage, Mrs. Darracott said: “My dearest, you have so much good sense! I know you will consider carefully before you—Not that I would urge you to marry him if you felt you couldn’t like him! I promise you I would never, never—But what will you do, Anthea? Oh, my dearest child, I’m cast into despair whenever I