A Civil Contract Read Free Page A

unobserved!’
    She twinkled responsively. ‘I like you the best of all my family,’ she confided, coming across the room to the chair lately occupied by Wimmering.
    ‘Thank you!’
    ‘Not that that’s saying much,’ she added reflectively, ‘for I don’t count aunts and uncles and cousins. So there are now only four of us. And to tell you the truth, Adam, I only loved Papa in a dutiful way, and Stephen not at all! Of course, I might have loved Maria, if she hadn’t died before I was born, but I don’t think I should have, because from what Mama tells us she was the most odious child!’
    ‘Lydia, Mama never said such a thing!’ protested Adam.
    ‘No, exactly the reverse! She says Maria was too good for this world, so you see what I mean, don’t you?’
    He could not deny it, but suggested, with a quivering lip, that Maria, had she been spared beyond her sixth year, might have outgrown her oppressive virtue. Lydia agreed to this, though doubtfully, observing that Charlotte was very virtuous too. ‘And I am most sincerely attached to Charlotte,’ she assured him.
    ‘To Mama also, surely!’
    ‘Of course: that is obligatory!’ she answered, with dignity.
    He was taken aback, but after eyeing her for a moment he prudently refrained from comment. He was not very well-acquainted with her, for she was nine years younger than he; and although, during his weary convalescence, she had frequently diverted him with her youthful opinions, her visits to his sick-bed had been restricted by the exigencies of education. Miss Keckwick, a governess of uncertain age and severe aspect, had rarely failed to summon Lydia from her brother’s room at the end of half-an-hour, either for an Italian lesson, or for an hour’s practice on the harp. The fruits of her painstaking diligence had not so far been made apparent to Adam, for although there was a good deal of intelligence in his sister’s lively face she had as yet vouchsafed no sign of the erudition to be expected in one educated by so highly qualified a preceptress as Miss Keckwick.
    He was wondering why she was so much more taking than her elder, and far more beautiful, sister, when she emerged from some undisclosed reverie, and disconcerted him by demanding: ‘Are we ruined, Adam?’
    ‘Oh, I trust it won’t be as bad as that!’
    ‘I had better tell you at once,’ interrupted Lydia, ‘that although I have always set my face resolutely against Education, which I very soon perceived would be of no use to me whatsoever, I am not at all stupid! Why, even Charlotte has known that we stood on the brink of disaster for years , and no one could say that her understanding is superior! And also, Adam, I am turned seventeen, besides having a great deal of worldly knowledge, and I mean to help you, if I can, so pray don’t speak in that nothing-to-do-with-you voice!’
    ‘I beg pardon!’ he apologized hastily.
    ‘ Is it ruin?’
    ‘Something uncomfortably like it, I’m afraid.’
    ‘I thought so. Mama has been saying for weeks that she expects at any moment to find herself without a roof over her head.’
    ‘It won’t be as bad as that,’ he assured her. ‘She will have her jointure – do you know what that is?’
    ‘Yes, but she says it is a paltry sum, and that we shall be obliged to subsist on black-puddings – and that, Adam, will never do for Mama!’
    ‘She exaggerates. I hope she will be able to live in tolerable comfort. She will have about eight hundred pounds a year – not a fortune, but at least an independence. With a little economy –’
    ‘Mama,’ stated Lydia, ‘has never studied economy.’
    He smiled. ‘Have you?’
    ‘Only Political Economy, and that’s of no use! I may not know a great deal about it, but I do know that it has to do with the distribution of wealth, which is why I decided not to tease myself with it, on account of not having any wealth to distribute.’
    ‘Didn’t the learned Miss Keckwick teach you household