In spite of all the entreaties of the Larramie family, I persisted in
my intention of going on to Walford the next morning, and, in reply to
their assurances that I would find it dreadfully dull in that little
village during the rest of my vacation, I told them that I should be
very much occupied and should have no time to be dull. I was going
seriously to work to prepare myself for my profession. For a year or
two I had been deferring this important matter, waiting until I had
laid by enough money to enable me to give up school-teaching and to
apply myself entirely to the studies which would be necessary. All
this would give me enough to do, and vacation was the time in which I
ought to do it. The distractions of the school session were very much
in the way of a proper contemplation of my own affairs.
"That sounds very well," said Miss Edith, when there was no one by,
"but if you cannot get the Holly Sprig Inn out of your mind, I do not
believe you will do very much 'proper contemplation.' Take my advice
and stop at the Putneys'. It can do you no harm, and it might help to
free your mind of distractions a great deal worse than those of the
school."
"By filling it with other distractions, I suppose you mean," I
answered. "A fickle-minded person you must think me. But it pleases me
so much to have you take an interest in me that I do not resent any of
your advice."
She laughed. "I like to give advice," she said, "but I must admit that
I sometimes think better of a person if he does not take it. But I
will say--and this is all the advice I am going to give you at
present--that if you want to be successful in making love, you must
change your methods. You cannot expect to step up in front of a girl
and stop her short as if she were a runaway horse. A horse doesn't
like that sort of thing, and a girl doesn't like it. You must take
more time about it. A runaway girl doesn't hurt anybody, and, if you
are active enough, you can jump in behind and take the reins and stop
her gradually without hurting her feelings, and then, most likely, you
can drive her for all the rest of your life."
"You ought to have that speech engraved in uncial characters on a slab
of stone," said I. "Any museum would be glad to have it."
I had two reasons besides the one I gave for wishing to leave this
hospitable house. In the first place, Edith Larramie troubled me. I
did not like to have any one know so much about my mental interior--or
to think she knew so much. I did not like to feel that I was being
managed. I had a strong belief that if anybody jumped into a vehicle
she was pulling he would find that she was doing her own driving and
would allow no interferences. I liked her very much, but I was sure
that away from her I would feel freer in mind.