A Gamble with Life

"Oh, nothing in particular. Only father told me how he took some risks on your account, and I know that you are nothing if not grateful, and honestly I was half afraid lest the rascal had been in some way imposing on your good nature."

"You are quite sure that you know this Mr. Sterne?"

"I know of him, Madeline, which is quite enough for me. Of course, I have seen him dozens of times, but he is not the kind of man I should ever think of speaking to – except of course, as I would speak to a tradesman or a fisherman."

"Yes?"

"You see, those people who are too proud to work, and too ignorant and too poor to be gentlemen, and yet who try to ape the manners of their betters are really the most detestable people of all."

"Is that so?"

"It is so, I can assure you. As an American you have not got to know quite the composition of our English society. But you will see things differently later on. A good, honest working man, who wears fustian, and is not ashamed of it, is to be admired, but your working class upstart, with vulgarity bred in his bones, is really too terrible for words."

"And is there no vulgarity in what you call the upper classes?"

"Well, you see, the upper classes can afford to be anything they like, if you understand."

"You mean that they are a law unto themselves?"

"Well, yes, that is about the size of it. No one would think of criticising a duke, for instance, on a question of manners or taste."

"Well, now, that is real interesting," she said, with a cynical little laugh. "It explains a lot of things that I had not seen before."

"Then, too," he went on, warming to his theme, "it is largely a question of feeling. You can't explain some things; you can't say why they are wrong or right, only you feel they are so."

"That is quite true, Gervase," she answered, with a smile.

"For instance, I wear a monocle sometimes. Now that is quite right for a man in my position, and quite becoming."

"Most becoming, Gervase."

"But for Peter Day, the draper, for instance, to stand in his shop-door with a glass in his right eye would look simply ridiculous."

"You would conclude he was cross-eyed, wouldn't you?"

"You would conclude he was an idiot, and, between ourselves, that's just the trouble now-a-days. The common people seem to think that they have a perfect right to do what their betters do."

"But to copy their virtues – "

"That isn't the point exactly," he interrupted. "I don't pretend that we have any more virtues of the homely sort, than the cottage folk, but certain things belong to us by right."

"Do you mean vices?" she queried, innocently.

"Well, no, not in our case; but they might be vices if copied by the lower classes. I'm afraid I can't explain myself very clearly. But things that would be quite proper for the best people to do, would be simply grotesque, or worse, if the common orders attempted them."

"Really, this is most interesting," she said, half-banteringly, half-seriously. "Now, out in our country we have no varying standards of right and wrong."

"Ah! well, that is because you have no aristocracy," he said, loftily.

"And if I were to marry you, Gervase, and become a lady of quality I should be judged, as it were, by a different set of laws."

"You would become Lady Tregony when I succeeded to the title."

She laughed. "That, I fear, is scarcely an answer to my question."

"Not a full answer, but you see there are so many things that cannot be explained."

"Evidently. In the meanwhile I belong to the common herd – "

"No, no! Madeline," he interrupted, quickly.

"My father was only a working man," she went on, "and across the water we have no blue bloods; we have blue noses, but that's another matter, but we're all on the same footing there."

"Not socially, and dollars in America count for what name and titles count for here."

"But I haven't even the dollars," she said, with a laugh.

"But you have," he protested, quickly. "That is – I mean – you have not to work for your living. You are not a type-writer girl, or anything of that sort."

"And should I be any the worse if I were?"

"Well, of course, Madeline, you would be a lady anywhere, or under any circumstances," he said, grandiloquently.

"Thank you, Gervase, but suppose we get back again now to the point we started from."

"I'll be delighted," he said, eagerly. "I do want to start the new year with everything settled; that's the reason I pushed myself on to you, as it were, this afternoon. I hate beating about the bush, and all our friends are wondering why the engagement is not announced."

"Oh, dear! you have gone back miles further than I intended," she laughed. "I understood you wanted to warn me against somebody."

"I do, Madeline. I'm your best friend, if you'll only believe it. And I do beseech you, if you've been in the least friendly with that fellow Sterne, you'll drop him."

"You think he isn't a good man."

"Oh, blow his goodness. The point is, he's common, vulgar – bad form in every way, if you understand. Anyone in your position should never be seen speaking to him."

"But is there anything against his moral character?"

"Oh, confound his moral character," he said, with an oath, for which he apologised at once. "It isn't that I'm squeamish about. The point is, Madeline, he's no gentleman."

"He seemed to me to be quite a gentleman."

"I'm sorry to hear you say that," he said, mournfully, getting up and throwing another log on the fire. "It shows how you may be deceived by such scoundrels."

"But is that a nice word to use of any man against whose moral character you have no complaint to make?"

"No, it isn't a nice word, but he isn't a nice person. I don't care to mention such things, but you may not be aware that he is an infidel?"

"What is that, Gervase?"