VI.
WHICH SHALL IT BE?
It was a charmingly mild and balmy day. The sun shone beyond the
orchard, and the shade was cool inside. A light breeze stirred
the boughs of the old apple tree under which the philosopher sat.
None of these things did the philosopher notice, unless it might
be when the wind blew about the leaves of the large volume on his
knees, and he had to find his place again. Then he would exclaim
against the wind, shuffle the leaves till he got the right page,
and settle to his reading. The book was a treatise on ontology;
it was written by another philosopher, a friend of this
philosopher's; it bristled with fallacies, and this philosopher
was discovering them all, and noting them on the fly leaf at the
end. He was not going to review the book (as some might have
thought from his behavior), or even to answer it in a work of his
own. It was just that he found a pleasure in stripping any poor
fallacy naked and crucifying it.
Presently a girl in a white frock came into the orchard. She
picked up an apple, bit it, and found it ripe. Holding it in her
hand she walked up to where the philosopher sat, and looked at
him. He did not stir. She took a bite out of the apple, munched
it, and swallowed it. The philosopher crucified a fallacy on the
fly leaf. The girl flung the apple away.
"Mr. Jerningham," said she, "are you very busy?"
The philosopher, pencil in hand, looked up.
"No, Miss May," said he, "not very."
"Because I want your opinion."
"In one moment," said the philosopher apologetically.
He turned back to the fly leaf and began to nail the last fallacy
a little tighter to the cross. The girl regarded him, first with
amused impatience, then with a vexed frown, finally with a
wistful regret. He was so very old for his age, she thought; he
could not be much beyond thirty; his hair was thick and full of
waves, his eyes bright and clear, his complexion not yet divested
of all youth's relics.
"Now, Miss May, I am at your service," said the philosopher, with
a lingering look at his impaled fallacy. And he closed the book,
keeping it, however, on his knee.
The girl sat down just opposite to him.
"It's a very important thing I want to ask you," she began,
tugging at a tuft of grass, "and it's very--difficult, and you
mustn't tell anyone I asked you; at least, I'd rather you
didn't."
"I shall not speak of it; indeed, I shall probably not remember
it," said the philosopher.
"And you mustn't look at me, please, while I'm asking you."
"I don't think I was looking at you, but if I was I beg your
pardon," said the philosopher apologetically.
She pulled the tuft of grass right out of the ground and flung it
from her with all her force.
"Suppose a man----" she began. "No, that's not right."
"You can take any hypothesis you please," observed the
philosopher, "but you must verify it afterward, of course."
"Oh, do let me go on. Suppose a girl, Mr. Jerningham--I wish you
wouldn't nod."
"It was only to show that I followed you."
"Oh, of course you `follow me,' as you call it. Suppose a girl
had two lovers--you're nodding again--or, I ought to say, suppose
there were two men who might be in love with a girl."
"Only two?" asked the philosopher. "You see, any number of men
MIGHT be in love with----"
"Oh, we can leave the rest out," said Miss May, with a sudden
dimple; "they don't matter."
"Very well," said the philosopher. "If they are irrelevant, we
will put them aside."
"Suppose, then, that one of these men was--oh, AWFULLY in love
with the girl--and--and proposed, you know----"
"A moment!" said the philosopher, opening a notebook. "Let me
take down his proposition. What was it?"
"Why, proposed to her--asked her to marry him," said the girl,
with a stare.
"Dear me! How stupid of me! I forgot that special use of the
word. Yes?"
"The girl likes him pretty well, and her people approve of him
and all that, you know."
"That simplifies the problem," said the philosopher, nodding
again.
"But she's not in--in love with him, you know. She doesn't
REALLY care for him--MUCH. Do you understand?"
"Perfectly. It is a most natural state of mind."
"Well, then, suppose that there's another man--what are you
writing?"
"I only put down (B.)--like that," pleaded the philosopher,
meekly exhibiting his notebook.
She looked at him in a sort of helpless exasperation, with just a
smile somewhere in the background of it.
"Oh, you really are----" she exclaimed. "But let me go on. The
other man is a friend of the girl's; he's very clever--oh,
fearfully clever; and he's rather handsome. You needn't put that
down."
"It is certainly not very material," admitted the philosopher,
and he crossed out "handsome." "Clever" he left.
"And the girl is most awfully--she admires him tremendously; she
thinks him just the greatest man that ever lived, you know. And
she--she----" The girl paused.
"I'm following," said the philosopher, with pencil poised.
"She'd think it better than the whole world if--if she could be
anything to him, you know."
"You mean become his wife?"
"Well, of course I do--at least suppose I do."
"You spoke rather vaguely, you know."
The girl cast one glance at the philosopher as she replied:
"Well, yes. I did mean, become his wife."
"Yes. Well?"
"But," continued the girl, starting on another tuft of grass, "he
doesn't think much about those things. He likes her. I think he
likes her----"
"Well, doesn't dislike her?" suggested the philosopher. "Shall
we call him indifferent?"
"I don't know. Yes, rather indifferent. I don't think he thinks
about it, you know. But she--she's pretty. You needn't put that
down."
"I was not about to do so," observed the philosopher.
"She thinks life with him would be just heaven; and--and she
thinks she would make him awfully happy. She would--would be so
proud of him, you see."
"I see. Yes!"
"And--I don't know how to put it, quite--she thinks that, if he
ever thought about it all, he might care for her; because he
doesn't care for anybody else; and she's pretty----"
"You said that before."
"Oh, dear! I dare say I did. And most men care for somebody,
don't they? Some girl, I mean."
"Most men, no doubt," conceded the philosopher.
"Well, then, what ought she to do? It's not a real thing, you
know, Mr. Jerningham. It's in--in a novel I was reading." She
said this hastily, and blushed as she spoke.
"Dear me! And it's quite an interesting case! Yes, I see. The
question is, Will she act most wisely in accepting the offer of
the man who loves her exceedingly, but for whom she entertains
only a moderate affection----"
"Yes. Just a liking. He's just a friend."
"Exactly. Or in marrying the other, whom she loves ex----"
"That's not it. How can she marry him? He hasn't--he hasn't
asked her, you see."
"True. I forgot. Let us assume, though, for the moment, that he
has asked her. She would then have to consider which marriage
would probably be productive of the greater sum total of----"
"Oh, but you needn't consider that."
"But it seems the best logical order. We can afterward make
allowance for the element of uncertainty caused by----"
"Oh, no! I don't want it like that. I know perfectly well which
she'd do if he--the other man, you know--asked her."
"You apprehend that----"
"Never mind what I `apprehend.' Take it just as I told you."
"Very good. A has asked her hand, B has not."
"Yes."
"May I take it that, but for the disturbing influence of B, A
would be a satisfactory--er--candidate?"
"Ye--es. I think so."
"She, therefore, enjoys a certainty of considerable happiness if
she marries A?"
"Ye--es. Not perfect, because of--B, you know."
"Quite so, quite so; but still a fair amount of happiness. Is it
not so?"
"I don't--well, perhaps."
"On the other hand, if B did ask her, we are to postulate a
higher degree of happiness for her?"
"Yes, please, Mr. Jerningham--much higher."
"For both of them?"
"For her. Never mind him."
"Very well. That again simplifies the problem. But his asking
her is a contingency only?"
"Yes, that's all."
The philosopher spread out his hands.
"My dear young lady," he said, "it becomes a question of
degree. How probable or improbable is it?"
"I don't know. Not very probable--unless--unless----"
"Well?"
"Unless he did happen to notice, you know."
"Ah, yes. We supposed that, if he thought of it, he would
probably take the desired step--at least that he might be led to
do so. Could she not--er--indicate her preference?"
"She might try--no, she couldn't do much. You see, he--he
doesn't think about such things."
"I understand precisely. And it seems to me, Miss May, that in
that very fact we find our solution."
"Do we?" she asked.
"I think so. He has evidently no natural inclination toward
her--perhaps not toward marriage at all. Any feeling aroused in
him would be necessarily shallow and in a measure artificial--and
in all likelihood purely temporary. Moreover, if she took steps
to arouse his attention, one of two things would be likely
to happen. Are you following me?"
"Yes, Mr. Jerningham."
"Either he would be repelled by her overtures--which you must
admit is not improbable--and then the position would be
unpleasant, and even degrading, for her. Or, on the other hand,
he might, through a misplaced feeling of gallantry----"
"Through what?"
"Through a mistaken idea of politeness, or a mistaken view of
what was kind, allow himself to be drawn into a connection for
which he had no genuine liking. You agree with me that one or
other of these things would be likely?"
"Yes, I suppose they would, unless he did come to care for her."
"Ah, you return to that hypothesis. I think it's an extremely
fanciful one. No. She needn't marry A, but she must let B
alone."
The philosopher closed his book, took off his glasses, wiped
them, replaced them, and leaned back against the trunk of
the apple tree. The girl picked a dandelion in pieces. After a
long pause she asked:
"You think B's feelings wouldn't be at all likely to--to change?"
"That depends on the sort of man he is. But if he is an able
man, with intellectual interests which engross him--a man who has
chosen his path in life--a man to whom women's society is not a
necessity----"
"He's just like that," said the girl, and she bit the head off a
daisy.
"Then," said the philosopher, "I see not the least reason for
supposing that his feelings will change."
"And would you advise her to marry the other--A?"
"Well, on the whole, I should. A is a good fellow (I think we
made A a good fellow); he is a suitable match; his love for her
is true and genuine----"
"It's tremendous!"
"Yes--and--er--extreme. She likes him. There is every reason to
hope that her liking will develop into a sufficiently deep
and stable affection. She will get rid of her folly about B and
make A a good wife. Yes, Miss May, if I were the author of your
novel, I should make her marry A, and I should call that a happy
ending."
A silence followed. It was broken by the philosopher.
"Is that all you wanted my opinion about, Miss May?" he asked,
with his finger between the leaves of the treatise on ontology.
"Yes, I think so. I hope I haven't bored you?"
"I've enjoyed the discussion extremely. I had no idea that
novels raised points of such psychological interest. I must find
time to read one."
The girl had shifted her position till, instead of her full face,
her profile was turned toward him. Looking away toward the
paddock that lay brilliant in sunshine on the skirts of the apple
orchard, she asked, in low, slow tones, twisting her hands in her
lap:
"Don't you think that perhaps, if B found out afterward--
when she had married A, you know--that she had cared for him so
very, very much, he might be a little sorry?"
"If he were a gentleman, he would regret it deeply."
"I mean--sorry on his own account; that--that he had thrown away
all that, you know?"
The professor looked meditative.
"I think," he pronounced, "that it is very possible he would. I
can well imagine it."
"He might never find anybody to love him like that again," she
said, gazing on the gleaming paddock.
"He probably would not," agreed the philosopher.
"And--and most people like being loved, don't they?"
"To crave for love is an almost universal instinct, Miss May."
"Yes, almost," she said, with a dreary little smile. "You see,
he'll get old and--and have no one to look after him."
"He will."
"And no home."
"Well, in a sense none," corrected the philosopher, smiling.
"But really, you'll frighten me. I'm a bachelor myself, you
know, Miss May."
"Yes," she whispered just audibly.
"And all your terrors are before me."
"Well, unless----"
"Oh, we needn't have that `unless,'" laughed the philosopher
cheerfully. "There's no `unless' about it, Miss May."
The girl jumped to her feet; for an instant she looked at the
philosopher. She opened her lips as if to speak, and, at the
thought of what lay at her tongue's tip, her face grew red. But
the philosopher was gazing past her, and his eyes rested in calm
contemplation on the gleaming paddock.
"A beautiful thing, sunshine, to be sure," said he.
Her blush faded away into paleness; her lips closed. Without
speaking she turned and walked slowly away, her head drooping.
The philosopher heard the rustle of her skirt in the long grass
of the orchard; he watched her for a few moments.
"A pretty, graceful creature," said he, with a smile. Then he
opened his book, took his pencil in his hand, and slipped in a
careful forefinger to mark the fly leaf.
The sun had passed mid-heaven, and began to decline westward
before he finished the book. Then he stretched himself and
looked at his watch.
"Good gracious, two o'clock! I shall be late for lunch!" and he
hurried to his feet.
He was very late for lunch.
"Everything's cold," wailed his hostess. "Where have you been,
Mr. Jerningham?"
"Only in the orchard--reading."
"And you've missed May!"
"Missed Miss May? How do you mean? I had a long talk with her
this morning--a most interesting talk."
"But you weren't here to say goodby. Now, you don't mean to say
that you forgot that she was leaving by the two o'clock
train? What a man you are!"
"Dear me! To think of my forgetting it!" said the philosopher
shamefacedly.
"She told me to say good-by to you for her."
"She's very kind. I can't forgive myself."
His hostess looked at him for a moment; then she sighed, and
smiled, and sighed again.
"Have you everything you want?" she asked.
"Everything, thank you," said he, sitting down opposite the
cheese, and propping his book (he thought he would just run
through the last chapter again) against the loaf; "everything in
the world that I want, thanks."
His hostess did not tell him that the girl had come in from the
apple orchard, and run hastily upstairs lest her friend should
see what her friend did see in her eyes. So that he had no
suspicion at all that he had received an offer of marriage--and
refused it. And he did not refer to anything of that sort
when he paused once in his reading and exclaimed:
"I'm really sorry I missed Miss May. That was an interesting
case of hers. But I gave the right answer. The girl ought to
marry A."
And so the girl did.
