Queechy Volume I Part 73

"I will see," he said, rising, "whether some other service cannot be had more satisfactory than that of fairies!"

"Now, Charlton," said Fleda, with a sudden change of manner, corning to him and laying her hand most gently on his arm, "please don't speak about these things before uncle Rolf or your mother ? please do not, Charlton. It would only do a great deal of harm, and do no good."

She looked up in his face, but he would not meet her pleading eye, and shook off her hand.

"I don't need to be instructed how to speak to my father and mother; and I am not one of the household that has submitted itself to your direction."

Fleda sat down on her bench and was quiet, but with a lip that trembled a little and eyes that let fall one or two witnesses against him. Charlton did not see them, and he knew better than to meet Hugh's look of reproach. But for all that, there was a certain consciousness that hung about the neck of his purpose and kept it down in spite of him; and it was not till breakfast was half over that his ill-humour could make head against this gentle thwarting and cast it off. For so long the meal was excessively dull; Hugh and Fleda had their own thoughts; Charlton was biting his resolution into every slice of bread-and-b.u.t.ter that occupied him; and Mr. Rossitur's face looked like anything but encouraging an inquiry into his affairs. Since his son's arrival he had been most uncommonly gloomy; and Mrs. Rossitur's face was never in suns.h.i.+ne when his was in shade.

"You'll have a warm day of it at the mill, Hugh," said Fleda, by way of saying something to break the dismal monotony of knives and forks.

"Does that mill make much?" suddenly inquired Charlton.

"It has made a new bridge to the brook, literally," said Fleda gaily; "for it has sawn out the boards; and you know you mustn't speak evil of what carries you over the water."

"Does that mill pay for the working?' said Charlton, turning with the dryest disregard from her interference, and addressing himself determinately to his father.

"What do you mean? It does not work gratuitously," answered Mr. Rossitur, with at least equal dryness.

"But, I mean, are the profits of it enough to pay for the loss of Hugh's time?"

"If Hugh judges they are not, he is at liberty to let it alone."

"My time is not lost," said Hugh; "I' don't know what I should do with it."

"I don't know what we should do without the mill," said Mrs.

Rossitur.

That gave Charlton an unlucky opening.

"Has the prospect of farming disappointed you, father?"

"What is the prospect of your company?" said Mr. Rossitur, swallowing half an egg before he replied.

"A very limited prospect!" said Charlton, "if you mean the one that went with me. Not a fifth part of them left."

"What have you done with them?"

"Showed them where the b.a.l.l.s were flying, Sir, and did my best to show them the thickest of it."

"Is it necessary to show it to us too?" said Fleda.

"I believe there are not twenty living that followed me into Mexico," he went on, as if he had not heard her.

"Was all that havoc made in one engagement?" said Mrs.

Rossitur, whose cheek had turned pale.

"Yes, mother; in the course of a few minutes."

"I wonder what would pay for _that_ loss," said Fleda, indignantly.

"Why, the point was gained! and it did not signify what the cost was, so we did that. My poor boys were a small part of it."

"What point do you mean?"

"I mean the point we had in view, which was taking the place."

"And what was the advantage of gaining the place?"

"Pshaw! the advantage of doing one's duty."

"But what made it duty?" said Hugh.

"Orders."

"I grant you," said Fleda; "I understand that ? but bear with me, Charlton ? what was the advantage to the army or the country?"

"The advantage of great honour if we succeeded, and avoiding the shame of failure."

"Is that all?" said Hugh.

"All!" said Charlton.

"Glory must be a precious thing, when other men's lives are so cheap to buy it," said Fleda.

"We did not risk theirs without our own," said Charlton, colouring.

"No; but still theirs were risked for you."

"Not at all; why, this is absurd! you are saying that the whole war was for nothing."

"What better than nothing was the end of it? We paid Mexico for the territory she yielded to us, didn't we, uncle Rolf?"

"Yes."

"How much?"

"Twenty millions, I believe."

"And what do you suppose the war has cost?"

"Hum ? I don't know ? a hundred."

"A hundred million! Besides ? how much besides! And don't you suppose, uncle Rolf, that for half of that sum Mexico would have sold us peaceably what she did in the end?"

"It is possible ? I think it is very likely."

"What was the fruit of the war, Captain Rossitur?"