“But still it _may_ be all true,” said Kate, solemnly. “It may be--as Miss Martin writes--that 'there is a blight on the land.'”
“What's to be done, then?” asked he, in deep embarrassment.
“The first step is to ascertain what is fact,--the real extent of the misfortune.”
“And how is that to be accomplished?” asked he.
“Can you not think of some means?” said she, with a scarcely perceptible approach to a smile.
“No, by Jove! that I cannot, except by going over there one's self.”
“And why not that?” asked she, more boldly, while she fixed her large full eyes directly upon him.
“If _you_ thought that I ought to go,--if you advised it and would actually say 'Go'--”
“Then I'd set off to-night; though, to say truth, neither the journey nor the business are much to my fancy.”
“Were they ten times less so, sir, I'd say, 'Go,'” said she, resolutely.
“Then go I will,” cried the Captain; “and I'll start within two hours.”
Worthy reader, you are neither weak of purpose nor undecided in action; as little are you easily moved by soft influences, when aided by long eyelashes. But had you been so, it would have been no difficult effort for you to comprehend the state of mind in which Captain Martin repaired to his room to make preparation for his journey. There was a kind of half chivalry in his present purpose that nerved and supported him. It was like a knight-errant of old setting out to confront a peril at the behest of his lady-love; but against this animating conviction there arose that besetting sin of small minds,--a sense of distrust,--a lurking suspicion that he might be, all this while, nothing but the dupe of a very artful woman.
“Who can tell,” said he to himself, “what plan she may have in all this, or what object she may propose to herself in getting _me_ out of the way? I don't think she really cares one farthing about the distress of these people, supposing it all to be true; and as to the typhus fever and cholera, egad! if they be there, one ought to think twice before rushing into the midst of them. And then, again, what do I know about the country or its habits? I have no means of judging if it be poorer or sicklier or; more wretched than usual. To _my_ eyes, it always seemed at the lowest depth of want and misery; every one went half starved and more than half naked. I 'm sure there is no necessity for my going some few hundred and odd miles to refresh my memory on this pleasant fact; and yet this is precisely what I 'm about to do. Is it by way of trying her power over me? By Jove, I 've hit it!” cried he, suddenly, as he stopped arranging a mass of letters which he was reducing to order before his departure. “That's her game; there's no doubt of it! She has said to herself, 'This will prove him. If he do this at my bidding, he'll do more.' Ay, but will he, mademoiselle? that's the question. A young hussar may turn out to be a very old soldier. What if I were just to tell her so. Girls of her stamp like a man all the better when he shows himself to be wide-awake. I 'd lay a fifty on it she 'll care more for me when she sees I 'm her own equal in shrewdness. And, after all, why should _I_ go? I could send my valet, Fletcher,--just the kind of fellow for such a mission,--never knew the secret he could n't worm out; there never was a bit of barrack scandal he did n't get to the bottom of. He 'd be back here within a fortnight, with the whole state of the case, and I'll be bound there will be no humbugging _him_.”