CHAPTER XXI.

O what men dare do! what men may do! what men daily do! not knowing what they do!  MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

One morning, about these days, Mr. and Miss Haye were seated at the opposite ends of the breakfast-table.  They had been there for some time, silently buttering rolls and sipping coffee, in a leisurely way on Mr. Haye’s part, and an ungratified one on the part of his daughter.  He was considering, also in a leisurely sort of way, the columns of the morning paper; she considering him and the paper, and at intervals knocking with her knife against the edge of her plate, —­ a meditative and discontented knife, and an impassive and unimpressed plate.  So breakfast went on till Elizabeth’s cup was nearly emptied.

“Father,” said she, “it is very unsociable and stupid for you to read the paper, and me to eat my breakfast alone.  You might read aloud, if you must read.”

Mr. Haye brought his head round from the paper long enough to swallow half a cupful of coffee.

“Where’s Rose?”

“In bed, for aught I know.  There is no moving her till she has a mind.”

“’Seems to me, it is quite as difficult to move you,” said her father.

“Ay, but then I have a mind —­ which makes all the difference.”

Mr. Haye went back to his paper and considered it till the rest of his cup of coffee was thoroughly cold.  Elizabeth finished her breakfast, and sat, drawn back into herself, with arms folded, looking into the fireplace.  Finding his coffee cold, Mr. Haye’s attention came at length back upon his daughter.

“What do you want me to talk about?” he said.

“It don’t signify, your talking about anything now,” said Elizabeth.  “Everything is cold —­ mind and matter together.  I don’t know how you’ll find the coffee, father.”

Mr. Haye stirred it, with a discontented look.

“Rose is late,” he remarked again.

“That’s nothing new,” said Elizabeth.  “Late is her time.”

Mr. Haye drunk his cold cupful.

“You’re very fond of her, Lizzie, aren’t you?”

“No,” said Elizabeth.  “I don’t think I am.”

“Not fond of her!” said Mr. Haye in a very surprised tone.

“No,” said Elizabeth, —­ “I don’t think I am.”

“I thought you were,” said her father, in a voice that spoke both chagrin and displeasure.

“What made you think so?”

“You always seemed fond of her,” said Mr. Haye.

“I can’t have seemed so, for I never was so.  There isn’t enough of her to be fond of.  I talk to her, and like her after a fashion, because she is the only person near me that I can talk to —­ that’s all.”

“I am fond of her,” said Mr. Haye.

“It takes more to make me fond of anybody,” said his daughter.  “I know you are.”

“What does Rose want, to have the honour of your good opinion?”