The Evil Genius: A Domestic Story — page 183: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

172 THE EVIL GENIUS. Trees in the foreyround sat to him for likenesses that were never recognized; and hills submitted to unprovoked familiarities on behalf of brushes which were not daunted by distance. On the day after the dinner which had so deplorably failed, in respect of one of the guests invited, to fulfil Catherine’s antici- pations, there was a festival at the Palace. It had proved so generally attractive to the guests at the hotel that the grounds were almost deserted. As the sun declined, on a lovely summer evening, the few in: valids feebly wandering about the flower-beds, or resting under the trees, began to return to the house in dread of thedew. Cath- erine and her child, with the nurse-maid in attendance, were left alone in the garden. Kitty found her mother, as she openly declared, ‘‘not such good company as usual.” Since the day when her grandmother had said the fatal words which checked all further allusion to her father, the child had shown a disposi- tion to complain if she was not constantly amused. She com- plained of Mrs. Presty now. ‘‘T think grandmamma might have taken me to the Crystal Palace,” she said. ‘“My dear, your grandmamma has friends with her—ladies and gentlemen who don’t care to be troubled with a child.” Kitty received this information in a very unamiable spirit. ‘‘T hate ladies and gentlemen!” she said. ‘‘EKven Captain Bennydeck ?” her mother asked. ‘No; I like my nice captain. And I like the waiters. They would take me to the Crystal Palace, only they’re always busy. I wish it was bed-time; I don’t know what to do with myself.” ‘Take a little walk with Susan.” “Where shall I go?” Catherine looked toward the gate which opened on the road, and proposed a visit to the old man who kept the lodge. Kitty shook her head. There was an objection to the old man. ‘‘He asks questions; he wants to know how I get on with my sums. He’s proud of his summing. and he finds me out when I’m wrong. I don’t like the lodge-keeper.” Catherine looked the other way, toward the house. The pleasant fall of water in the basin of the distant fountain was just audible. ‘‘Go and feed the gold-fishes,” she suggested. This was a prospect of amusement which at once raised Kitty’s spirits. ‘‘ That’s the thing!” she cried, and ran off to the fount- ain, with the nurse-maid after her. Catherine seated herself under the trees, and watched in solitude the decline of the sun in a cloudless sky. The memory of the happy years of her marriage had never been so sadly and per- sistently present to her mind as at this time, when the choice of another married life waited her decision to become an accom- plished fact. Remembrances of the past, which she had such bitter reason to regret, and forebodings of the future, in which she was more than half inclined to believe, oppressed her at one and the same moment. She thought of the different circum- stances, so widely separated by time, under which Herbert (years ago) and Bennydeck (twenty-four hours since) had each COMICLOOKS. CO m