human
Won't you sit down? said obtuse man, giving the worst possible advice to overstrung woman.
gpt
A little sal volatile----
human
I'm sick of sitting down, and lying down, and sal volatile, and listening to humbug, and wearing black, and being bothered. I've had more trouble over Jim in his death than I ever allowed him to give me in his life. You say the same silly things every one else says--you--you parrot! Can't you be original?
gpt
Death is such an old-established institution that it is difficult to be original,
human
Then I shall talk myself. Yes; I wish to speak plainly, and to you I intend to speak plainly, since you are the only man I respect.
gpt
Thank you!
human
I daresay you are priggish, went on Lady Jim, finding it a marvellous relief to speak loudly and without reserve;
gpt
You are in trouble now,
human
Eh! What? Yes, of course, Jim's dead. She choked over the lie, and returned to laugh at ease in her chair.
gpt
Where has he gone, Lionel?
human
Don't, Lady James! I admit that he had his faults.
gpt
Be honest. He had nothing else but faults.
human
No, no! We all have our good points.
gpt
Give me a list of Jim's,
human
For the moment, I can't think----
gpt
No; nor you wouldn't if you thought for a century. Jim is as bad as they make 'em.
human
Oh yes, I forgot. Well, then, Jim _was_ bad; and I don't know if you call telling the truth abuse.
gpt
Of the most virulent sort, on occasions. Are we not all sinners?
human
Speak for yourself, Mr. Humility.
gpt
You don't call yourself immaculate, surely,
human
Did I?
gpt
By inference; and if no sinner, you must be saint.
human
Ah! I see. Lamp-black or snow-white; grey does not exist. Parsons see the horizon, the doorstep, but no middle distance. Woman is Lucrece or Jezebel, with you. I am neither; but a simple woman, as God made me.
gpt
And as the devil has marred.
human
Foh! In this very room, when we spoke last, I scouted that bogie's existence.
gpt
If you don't believe in evil existing, you can't in good. No devil, no God, Lady James.
human
I never knew that the Deity depended upon Satan for his being, said Leah, dryly;
gpt
I'll talk money, if you call that sense.
human
Of course I do; uncommon sense, as there is so little of it. Money?
gpt
The insurance on your late husband's life.
human
Oh! Well?
gpt
The Duke asked me to interview the lawyers.
human
Very unnecessary. I know all about the twenty thousand pounds. Jim left it to me, by will.
gpt
You underestimate by ten thousand.
human
What! Thirty thousand pounds? Then, in answer to a nod,
gpt
Oh, you--you must be--be mistaken.
human
No; your husband's life was insured, when he was a child, for twenty thousand pounds with profits, at an annual premium. Mr. Jarvey Peel and his executors paid the money to keep the insurance in force----
gpt
Yes, yes; and the principal was payable to Jim at sixty, or to any one he might leave it to at death, I, as the widow, take all--all--all
human
Exactly, assented the curate, thinking she betrayed over-plainly horse-leech parentage;
gpt
That's three hundred a year,
human
Quite so. Jim was thirty-five when he died. So three hundred a year for thirty-four years comes to ten thousand.
gpt
Two hundred, supplemented Lady Jim, correcting his arithmetic.
human
Oh, Lord! Thirty thousand two hundred pounds, and Jim never knew that he was worth his weight in this gold.
gpt
He never inquired, since the money would not come to him till he attained the age of sixty.
human
It would have been almost double then, commented the lady, pensively.
gpt
What a pity Jim did not live till---- But no; we should have both been old then, and there would have been no fun. I am content with thirty thousand--really I am, Lionel. It doesn't do to be greedy.
human
You are not, said the curate, ironically,
gpt
That will do for lawyers' costs, said she, airily,
human
She sprang up, with dithyrambic utterance, scarcely refraining from a war-dance.
gpt
Thirty thousand golden sovereigns! Six thousand lovely, lovely Bank of England notes! Oh, Vanderbilt! Oh---- The sight of her relative's disgusted face curbed her ecstasy:
human
You think that my exultation over this money is vulgar.
gpt
Heartless, at least, since it is the price of your husband's death. To you, apparently, Jim is more valuable dead than alive.
human
I entirely agree with you, confessed Leah, candidly; then added with impatient anger,
gpt
Do you expect me to tell you lies?
human
You might show some grief.
gpt
Heavens! What else have I been doing for the past three weeks?
human
Assuming a virtue which you have not.
gpt
That remark is too clever to be original, my dear man. How impossible you are! I wear mourning and cry at the right time, and say things I don't believe about Jim to his father and the rest of them; while to you, who blame me for behaving decently outside, I speak as I feel, only to be condemned. What do you expect?
human
To see you exhibit some real grief, said Lionel, who was really angered by her callous behaviour.
gpt
You show more genuine emotion over this miserable money than over poor Jim.
human
Poor Jim, she mocked scornfully;
gpt
He was not so bad as you make him out to be,
human
Then he must have revealed a side of his nature to you which he never showed to me, snapped Leah, sharply.
gpt
Foh! what's the use of acting to empty benches? Go downstairs if you want an audience. We are behind the scenes here.
human
Very allegorical and needless. Can't you be more womanly?
gpt
If I were, the sal volatile yon recommend would be needed, I can tell you. Being a parson you will not understand; being a man, you cannot. Womanly! womanly!--does that imply cant and shams? Am I to mourn with spurious lamentations that selfish profligate, who would have broken my heart had he ever possessed it? To be womanly is to excuse a man's faults, to lie down and be trodden upon, to condone unfaithfulness, and to be grateful for the shreds and patches of an egotistic life. Never! never! Her lips twisted scornfully, her nostrils dilated, and she clenched her hands to restrain an outburst of that wrath which had consumed her during five years of holy matrimony. Lionel, astonished by her sudden transition from gay to grave, forbore interruption, and she declaimed her marital wrongs in a Boadicean vein.
human
I have read in that Bible of yours of the casting of pearls before swine. Jim was a Gadarene pig, who would have rent me had I loved him, as I admit a wife should love her husband. My coldness, and what you consider my selfishness, was my sole safeguard against ruin and sorrow and outrage. You know that I speak the truth--I defy you to say otherwise. Jim! oh, Jim, she laughed unpleasantly;
gpt
Jim--that rag doll of his family, who is placed on a pedestal and worshipped, as though he were the golden idol he never was and never could be! I respect the Duke much more than I ever respected my husband, for he is genuinely blind to Jim's faults and mourns honestly. But you--you, who knew the man, and rebuked the man--oh, it would be amusing were it not so shameful.
human
I thank God that the man is out of my life, was her passionate cry.
gpt
Yes--I thank God.
human
Did you believe in God you would not say that.
gpt
Bah! Theology again.
human
And truth.
gpt
Which is not theology and never will be.
human
That depends upon belief. The science which treats of God, and of man's duty to God, cannot be understood by you, who have neither hope nor faith.
gpt
At least I have charity, the greatest of the three, which you lack.
human
Give me an example.
gpt
I credit you with honesty, while you cry me down as a bad woman.
human
Pardon me. I do not say that you are bad. Misguided, rather.
gpt
And why--according to your lights? Because I do not put up Jim as a pig-idol, to worship with crocodile tears?