'That is prompt.'
'Ah! I have no time to lose; besides I have been leading too smooth a life with you. I want something unpleasant to keep me in order. Something famously horrid,' repeated he, smacking the whip with a relish, as if he would have applied that if he could have found nothing else.
'You think you live too smoothly at Hollywell,' said Mrs. Edmonstone, hardly able, with all her respect for his good impulses, to help laughing at this strange boy.
'Yes. Happy, thoughtless, vehement; that is what your kindness makes me. Was it not a proof, that I must needs fly out at such a petty provocation?'
'I should not have thought it such a very exciting life; certainly not such as is usually said to lead to thoughtlessness; and we have been even quieter than usual since you came.'
'Ah, you don't know what stuff I am made of,' said Guy, gravely, though smiling; 'your own home party is enough to do me harm; it is so exceedingly pleasant.'
'Pleasant things do not necessarily do harm.'
'Not to you; not to people who are not easily unsettled; but when I go up-stairs, after a talking, merry evening, such as the night before last, I find that I have enjoyed it too much; I am all abroad! I can hardly fix my thoughts, and I don't know what to do, since here I must be, and I can't either be silent, or sit up in my own room.'
'Certainly not,' said she, smiling; 'there are duties of society which you owe even to us dangerous people.'
'No, no: don't misunderstand me. The fault is in myself. If it was not for that, I could learn nothing but good,' said Guy, speaking very eagerly, distressed at her answer.
'I believe I understand you,' said she, marvelling at the serious, ascetic temper, coupled with the very high animal spirits. 'For your comfort, I believe the unsettled feeling you complain of is chiefly the effect of novelty. You have led so very retired a life, that a lively family party is to you what dissipation would be to other people: and, as you must meet with the world some time or other, it is better the first encounter with should be in this comparatively innocent form. Go on watching yourself, and it will do you no harm.'
Yes, but if I find it does me harm? It would be cowardly to run away, and resistance should be from within. Yet, on the other hand, there is the duty of giving up, wrenching oneself from all that has temptation in it.'