Charity Girl Part 2

"Oh, by Jupiter, wouldn't I just?" exclaimed Christian, the ready colour flooding his cheeks in gratification.

"Well, I will, then," promised Desford. "But not just at this moment, if those ducks are not to be overroasted!"

"Oh, no, no! Whenever it is perfectly convenient to you!" Christian stammered.

He then went off to his own bedchamber, more than ever convinced that Des was a bang-up fellow, not by half as top-lofty as his own brothers; and filled with an agreeable vision of stunning these censorious seniors by appearing before them in a neckcloth which they must instantly recognize as being slap up to the mark.

When the Viscount went back to the drawing-room, he found that the party was rather larger than his aunt had led him to expect, for besides the persons she had mentioned, it included Miss Montsale; both the married daughters of the house, with their spouses; a rather nebulous female of uncertain age, in whom he vaguely recognized one of Lady Emborough's indigent cousins; and the Honourable Rachel Emborough, who was the eldest of the family, and seemed to be destined to fill the roles of universal confidant, companion of her parents, wise and reliable sister of her brothers and sisters, and beloved aunt of their offspring.

She had no pretensions to beauty, but her unaffected manners, her cheerfulness, and the kindness that sprang from a warm heart made her a general favourite. And finally, because Lady Emborough had discovered almost at the last moment that her numbers were uneven, the Honourable Clara Emborough had also been included. This damsel, who had not yet attained her seventeenth birthday, was not considered to have emerged from the schoolroom but, as her mama told the Viscount: "It don't do girls any harm to attend a few parties before one brings 'em out in the regular way. Teaches 'em how to go on in Society, and accustoms 'em to talking to strangers! Of course I wouldn't let her appear at formal parties until I've presented her! And I can depend on Rachel to keep an eye on her!"

The Viscount, who had been watching Rachel check, in the gentlest way, Miss Clara's mounting exuberance, intervene to give her brothers'

thoughts a fresh direction when an argument which sprang up between them threatened to become acrimonious, and attend un.o.btrusively to the comfort of the guests, said impulsively: "What a good girl Rachel is, ma'am!"

"Yes, she's as good as wheat," agreed Lady Emborough, in a somewhat gloomy voice. "But she ain't a girl, Desford: she's older than you are! And no one has ever offered for her! Heaven knows I shouldn't know what to do without her, but I can't be glad to see her dwindling into an old maid!

It ain't that the men don't like her: they do, but they don't fall in love with her. She's like Hetta Silverdale-except that Hetta's a very well-looking girl, and my poor Rachel-well, there can be no denying that she's something of a Homely Joan! But each of them would make any man an excellent wife-a much better wife than my Theresa there, who is so full of whims and crotchets that I never expected her to go off at all, far less to attach such a good bargain as John Thimbleby!"

Aware that Mr Thimbleby was seated well within earshot, the Viscount shot an involuntary glance at him. He was relieved to see a most appreciative twinkle in this gentleman's eye, and to receive from him something suspiciously like a wink. He was thus able to reply to his aunt with perfect equanimity: "Very true, ma'am! But there is no accounting for tastes, you know! However, you're out when you say that Hetta has no suitors! I could name you at least four very eligible partis whom she might have had for the lifting of a finger. Indeed, when I saw her this morning I found her entertaining two more of them! Perhaps neither she nor my cousin Rachel wishes to become a mere wife!"

"Gammon!" said her ladyship crudely. "Show me the female who doesn't hope for marriage, and I'll show you a lunatic past praying for!

Yes, and if you wish to know what I think-not that I suppose you do!- you're a shuttlehead not to have married Hetta when I daresay she was yours for the asking!"

The Viscount was annoyed, and betrayed it by a slight contraction of his brows, and the careful civility with which he said: "You are mistaken, my dear aunt: Hetta was never mine for the asking. Neither of us has ever wished for a closer relationship than that of the friendship we have always enjoyed-and, I trust, may always enjoy!"

As little as Lady Emborough resented the quiet checks her husband imposed upon her exuberance did she resent a deserved snub. She replied, laughing: "That's the hammer! Quite right to give me a setdown, for what you do is no business of mine! Emborough is for ever scolding me for being too wide in the mouth! But, wit-cracking apart, Desford, isn't it time you were thinking of matrimony? I don't mean Hetta, for if you don't fancy each other there's nothing to be said about that, but with Horace still in France, and Simon, from all I hear, sowing even more wild oats than your father did, in his day, I can't but feel that you do owe it to your father to give him a grandson or two-legitimate ones, I mean!"

This made the Viscount burst out laughing, and effectually banished his vexation. "Aunt Sophronia," he said, "you are quite abominable! Did anyone ever tell you so? But you are right, for all that, as I've lately been brought to realize. It is clearly time that I brought my delightfully untrammelled life to an end. The only difficulty is that I have yet to meet any female who will both meet with Papa's approval, and inspire me with the smallest desire to become riveted to her for life!"

"You are a great deal too nice in your requirements," she told him severely; but added, after a moment's reflection: "Not but what I don't wish any of my children to marry anyone for whom they don't feel a decided preference. When I was a girl, you know, most of us married to oblige our parents. Why, even my bosom-bow in those days did so, though she positively disliked the man to whom her parents betrothed her! And a vilely unhappy marriage it was! But your grandfather, my dear Ashley, having himself been forced to contract an alliance which was far from happy, was resolute in his determination that none of his children should find themselves in a similar situation. And nothing, you will agree, could have been more felicitous than the result of his liberality of mind! To be sure, there were only three of us, and your Aunt Jane died before you were born, but when I married Emborough, and Everard married your dear mama, no one could have been more delighted than your grandfather!"

"I am sorry he died before I was out of short coats," Desford remarked. "I have no memory of him, but from all I have heard about him from you, and from Mama, I wish that I had had the privilege of knowing him."

"Yes, you'd have liked him," she nodded. "What's more, he'd have liked you! And if your father hadn't waited until he was more than thirty before he got married to your mama you would have known him! And why Wroxton should glump at you for doing exactly what he did himself is something I don't understand, or wish to understand! There, you be off to play billiards with your cousins, and the Montsale girl, before I get to be as cross as crabs, which they say I always do when I talk about your father!"

He was very ready to obey her, and she did not again revert to the subject. He stayed for a week in Hampshire, and pa.s.sed his time very pleasurably. After the exigencies of the Season, with its ceaseless breakfasts, b.a.l.l.s, routs, race-parties at Ascot, opera-parties, convivial gatherings at Cribb's Parlour, evenings spent at Watier's, not to mention the numerous picnics, and al fresco entertainments ranging from quite ordinary parties to some, given by ambitious hostesses, so daringly original that they were talked of for at least three days, the lazy, unexacting life at Hazelfield exactly suited his humour. If one visited the Emboroughs there was no need to fear that every moment of every day would have been planned, or that you would be dragged to explore some ruin or local beauty spot when all you wished to do was to go for a strolling walk with some other like-minded members of the party. Lady Emborough never made elaborate plans for the entertainment of her guests. She merely fed them very well, and saw to it that whatever facilities were necessary to enable them to engage in such sports or exercises as they favoured were always at hand; and if any amus.e.m.e.nt, such as a race-meeting, happened to be taking place she informed them that carriages were ready to take them to it, but if anyone felt disinclined to go racing he had only to say so, and need not fear that she would be offended.

She adhered strictly to this admirable course when she disclosed to Desford that she had promised to attend a party on the last night of his visit, taking with her her two elder sons, as many of her daughters as she thought proper, and any of the guests she would no doubt have staying with her at Hazelfield and who did not despise quite a small, country ball. "I shall be obliged to go," she said, in the resigned voice of one who did not expect to derive any pleasure from the offered festivity.

"And Emma and Mortimer mean to go too. Theresa has cried off, but that won't surprise Lady Bugle, for she knows very well that Theresa is increasing. The Montsales don't wish to go either, and there's no reason why they should when I must go, and can chaperon Mary for them. Ned and Gil mean to go, but Christian don't: he hasn't started to dangle after pretty girls yet. And if you don't fancy it, Desford, there's no reason why you shouldn't remain here, and play whist with the Montsales and John Thimbleby! In fact, I strongly advise you to do so, because it's my belief you'll think the Bugles' party a dead bore."

"Think it a dead bore when that glorious creature will be present?"

e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr Gilbert Emborough, who had entered the room in time to hear the last part of this speech. "Nothing could be a bore when she is there!"

"Come, this is most promising!" said Desford. "Who is this glorious she? Am I acquainted with her?"

"No, you ain't acquainted with her," replied Gilbert, "but you have seen her! What's more, you were much struck-well, anyone would be!- and you asked Ned who she was."

"What, the ravishing girl I saw at the races?" exclaimed Desford. "My dear aunt, of course I will go with you to this ball! The most exquisite piece of nature I've seen in a twelve-month! I hoped Ned might present me to her, and very unhandsome I thought it of him that he didn't do so."

Gilbert gave a crack of laughter. "Afraid you'd cut him out! See if I don't roast him for it!"

"But who is she?" demanded the Viscount. "I didn't properly hear what Ned said, when I asked him that question, for at that moment we were joined by some friends of his, and by the time we had parted from them the next race was about to start, and I thought no more about the Beauty."

"Shame!" said his cousin, grinning at him.

"Her name is Lucasta," said Lady Emborough. "She's the eldest daughter of Sir Thomas Bugle: he has five of 'em, and four sons.

Certainly a very handsome girl, and I daresay she may make a good marriage, for she has all the men in raptures. But if her portion is above five thousand pounds I shall own myself astonished. Sir Thomas's fortune is no more than genteel, and he hasn't the least notion of trying to sconce the reckoning."

"Poor Lucasta!" said the Viscount lightly.

"You may well say so! Her mama brought her out in the spring, and there was never anything so unfortunate! Would you believe it?-within three days of her being presented at Court Sir Thomas received an express letter from Dr Cromer, informing him that old Lady Bugle had been suddenly taken ill! So, of course, they were obliged to post home in a great hurry, because she was very old, and even though one knew she was as tough as whitleather there is always the chance that such persons will be perfectly stout one day, and dead the next. Not that she did die the next day: she lasted for more than two months, which naturally made it impossible for her mama to take Lucasta to b.a.l.l.s and a.s.semblies until they are out of black gloves. This dance Lady Bugle has got up is to be quite a small affair. She gives it in honour of Stonor Bugle's engagement to the elder Miss Windle. A good enough girl in her way, but it's not an alliance I should welcome for one of my sons!"

"I should think not indeed!" said Gilbert. "Why, she's downright knocker-faced!"

Lady Emborough called him sharply to order for so rudely exaggerating Miss Windle's appearance; but when, on the following evening, the Viscount was presented to the lady he could not feel that Gilbert had been unjust. But he felt also that her homeliness would not have struck him so forcibly had not Lady Bugle caused her to stand side by side with Lucasta Bugle, to receive the guests.

Lucasta was certainly something quite out of the ordinary way, for besides a countenance of cla.s.sic beauty her figure was good, and her teeth, when she smiled, were seen to be very even, and as white as whalebone. She had luxuriant hair, which only jealous rivals stigmatized as gingery: it was, in fact, the colour of ripening corn; and her proud mama had frequently been known, when accepting compliments on her burnished curls, to whisper confidentially that they had never to be papered. She seemed to have acquired habits of easy intercourse, in spite of the abrupt curtailment of her first season, for she betrayed none of the signs of shyness which so often made it difficult for their partners at a ball to talk to girls who had only just emerged from the schoolroom.

Her manners were a.s.sured; she had a fund of social chitchat at her tongue's end; she was all delight and cordiality towards her mama's guests; she was animated, and laughed a great deal; and seemed to be an expert in the art of light-hearted flirtation.

The Viscount had the honour of standing up with her for the dance that was forming when the Emborough party arrived, and since he was more expert in this art than she was he gratified her by responding in the most obliging way to the encouragement he received to pay her just the sort of compliments he judged likely to be the most acceptable. His cousin Edward, indignantly observing the progress he was making into the Beauty's good graces, and the arch, laughing looks which she threw at him, was torn between envy of his address, and cynical reflections on the advantages attached to being the heir to an Earldom. For these he took himself severely to task, telling himself, with dogged loyalty, that the divine Lucasta was merely trying to put a stranger at his ease. But when Gilbert, who had never contrived to grow higher in the Beauty's esteem than had his elder brother, encountered him for a fleeting moment, and said, with a malicious wink: "Des is devilish taken with her, ain't he?" he was unable to disagree. All he could think of to say was that he was sure it was no wonder. But when he saw his divinity waltzing, a little later in the evening, with Desford, he would, had he not been a very goodnatured young man, have taken his cousin in violent dislike. The waltz was still considered by old-fashioned persons to be an improper dance, and was seldom played at country a.s.semblies. One or two dashing hostesses has caused it to be played, but Ned, having painstakingly mastered the steps, had found that he had wasted his time: Lucasta never waltzed.

He had not expected that it would figure amongst the country dances and the boulangers offered to the company in the Bugles' establishment, but Lady Bugle, hopeful that Lady Emborough would bring to her little party her tonnish nephew, had warned the musicians to be prepared to strike up for one, and had told Lucasta that if the Viscount did happen to ask her to dance it with him she might do so.

"For there can be no objection to your doing so here, my love, amongst our particular friends. In London, of course, the case would be different-until, as I need scarcely remind you, you have been approved by the Patronesses of Almacks; but I should be excessively mortified if any of our guests thought it a dowdy party, and if dear Lady Emborough does bring Lord Desford to it you may depend upon it that he will expect to hear waltzes played, for he is quite one of the Pinks of the Ton, you know!"

Lord Desford did ask her, saying, as he led her off the floor at the end of the country dance, that he hoped she would stand up with him again, and adding, with his attractive smile: "Dare I ask you to waltz with me?

Or do you frown on the waltz in Hampshire? I wonder if my aunt does?

How stupid it was of me not to have asked her! Now, don't, I do beg of you, Miss Bugle, tell me that I've committed a social solecism!"

She laughed, and said: "No, indeed you have not! I do waltz, but whether Mama will permit me to do so in public is another matter!"

"Then I shall instantly ask Mama's permission to waltz with you!" he said.

This having been granted, he was presently seen twirling round the room with an arm lightly encircling Lucasta's trim waist: a spectacle which Lady Bugle regarded with complacency, but which was watched by the Viscount's two cousins, and by several other young gentlemen equally enamoured of the Beauty, with no pleasure at all.

After this, the Viscount did his duty by Miss Windle, and Miss Montsale, and then asked his cousin Emma to stand up with him.

"For heaven's sake, Ashley, don't ask me to dance, but take me out of this insufferably hot room!" replied Mrs Redgrave, who had inherited much of her mother's forthrightness.

"With the greatest pleasure on earth, cousin!" he replied, offering his arm. "I've been uneasily aware for the past half-hour that my shirt-points are beginning to wilt! We will walk over to the doorway, as though we wished to exchange a word with Mortimer, and slip out of the room while the next set is forming. I daresay no one will notice our absence."

"I don't care a rush if they do notice it!" declared Mrs Redgrave, vigorously fanning herself. "People have no business to hold a.s.semblies on such a sultry night as this! They might at least have opened a window!"

"Oh, they never do!" said Desford. "Surely you must know, Emma, that it is only imprudent young people who open windows on even the hottest of nights! Thereby causing their elders to suffer all the ills which, I am a.s.sured, arise from sitting in a draught, and exposing themselves to even worse dangers. Mortimer, why are you not doing your duty like a man, instead of lounging there and holding up your nose at the company?"

"I wasn't!" said Mr Redgrave indignantly. "The thing is that it's a dashed sight too hot for dancing-and no one thinks anything of it when we old married men don't choose to dance!"

"Quoth the graybeard!" murmured Desford.

"Be quiet, wretch!" Emma admonished him. "I won't have poor Mortimer roasted! Recollect that although he is not so very many years older than you he is much fatter!"

"There's an archwife for you!" said Mr Redgrave. "If you take my advice, Des, you'll steer wide of parson's mousetrap!"

"Thank you, I mean to! The melancholy sight of you living under the cat's foot is enough to make any man beware!"

Mr Redgrave grinned, but said that Des had hit the nail on the head, adding that he had grown to be a regular Jerry-sneak. Emma knew very well that this inelegant expression signified a henpecked husband, but said with dignity that she didn't understand cant terms. She then said, as both gentlemen laughed, that they were a couple of horrid rudesbys.

"To be sure we are!" cordially agreed her life's companion. "You know, if you mean to take part in this dance, the pair of you, you'd best join the set before it's too late!"

But when he learned that so far from joining the set they were going in search of a little fresh air he instantly said, with considerable aplomb, that having watched Des desperately flirting with Miss Bugle he was dashed well going to see to it that he didn't get the chance to make up to Emma too.

So the three of them pa.s.sed through the wide double-doors which stood open into the hall. Several people were gathered there, in small groups, most of the ladies fanning themselves, and the gentlemen surrept.i.tiously wiping their heated brows; but Mrs Redgrave had the advantage over them in knowing the geography of the house, and she led her two cavaliers past the stairway to the back of the hall, and through a door which gave access to the gardens. The air was rather more oppressive than it had been during the day, but in comparison to the conditions within the house it was refreshing enough to cause Mr Redgrave to draw a deep breath, and let it go in a vulgar: "Phew!" He then expressed a wistful desire for a cigarillo, but as his wife recognized this as a mere attempt to hoax her into begging him not to do anything so improper as to light a cigarillo at a ball she paid no attention to it, but tucked her hand in his arm, and strolled on to the lawn. The moon was at the full, but was every now and then hidden by clouds drifting across the sky. Summer lightning flickered, and Mr Redgrave said that he wouldn't be surprised if they were in for a storm. A few minutes later a distant rumble made Emma think that perhaps it was time they returned to the ballroom. Her disposition was in general calm, but she had a nervous dread of thunderstorms. Any of her brothers would have scoffed at her fears, but her husband and her cousin were more understanding, and neither scoffed nor tried to convince her that the storm was not imminent.

When they re-entered the house there was no one in the hall, but just as Mr Redgrave softly shut the door into the garden Stonor Bugle came out of the ballroom, and exclaimed: "So there you are! I've been looking for you all over!"

"Oh, dear!" said Emma guiltily. "I hoped no one would notice it if I slipped away for a few minutes! It is such a hot night, isn't it?"

He laughed heartily at this. "Ay! Devilish, ain't it? I only wish I could sherry off into the garden, but I can't, you know! My mother would comb my hair with a joint-stool if I did! The thing is that old Mrs Barling has been asking for you, ma'am: says she hasn't seen you since time out of mind, and has been peering round the room after you ever since someone told her you was here,"

"Oh-! Dear Mrs Barling! I'll come at once!" Emma said, and went back into the ballroom, bearing her reluctant spouse with her.

Stonor followed them, but the Viscount lingered in the hall to adjust his neckcloth, having caught sight of himself in a mirror that hung beside the double-doors into the drawing-room. He was not a dandy; he would have repudiated without hesitation Lady Bugle's a.s.sertion that he was a Pink of the Ton; but he was undeniably one of the Smarts, and the glimpse of himself in wilting shirt-points, and a slightly disarranged neckcloth came as a disagreeable shock to him. There was little he could do to restore their starched rigidity to the points of his shirt-collar, but a few deft touches were all that was needed to repair the folds of his neckcloth. Having bestowed these upon it, he turned away, gave his shirt-bands a judicious twitch or two, and was just about to go back into the ballroom when a feeling that he was not alone, as he had supposed himself to be, made him look up, and cast a swift glance round the hall.

No one was in sight, but when he raised his eyes towards the upper floor he found that he was being watched by a pair of wondering, innocent eyes which were set in a charming little face, framed by the bannisters through which its owner was looking. He smiled, guessing that it belonged to one of the younger daughters of the house: possibly a member of the schoolroom-party, but more probably one of the nursery-children, and said, as he saw that she was about to run away in evident alarm: "Oh, don't run away! I promise I won't eat you-or tell tales of you to your mama!"

The big eyes widened, in mingled fear and doubt. "You couldn't!" said the lady. "I haven't got a mama! She's been dead for years! I don't think I have a papa either, though that is by no means a certain thing! Oh, don't come up! Pray don't come up, sir! They would be so vexed!"

He had mounted half-way up the first flight of stairs, but he paused at this urgent entreaty, saying, between amus.e.m.e.nt and curiosity: "No mama? But are you not one of Sir Thomas's daughters?"

"Oh, no!" she replied, still in that hushed, scared voice. "I'm not related to him, because being married to my aunt does not make him a true uncle-does it?"

"No, no!" he a.s.sured her. "It makes him nothing more than an uncle-in-law. But even so I find it hard to believe that he would be cross with you for peeping through those bannisters at the ladies in their smart ball-dresses, and the gentlemen trying to straighten their neckcloths!"

"It isn't him!" she said, with an apprehensive look over his head towards the drawing-room. "It's Aunt Bugle, and Lucasta! Oh, pray, sir, go away, before anyone sees you on the stairs, and asks you what you are doing there! You would be obliged to say that you had been talking to me, and that would get me into trouble again!"

His amus.e.m.e.nt grew, and also his curiosity. "Well, no one is going to see me on the stairs, because I am coming up to further my acquaintance with you, you engaging elf! Oh, don't look so scared! Recollect that I've promised I won't eat you! And talking of eating," he added, remembering his own childhood, "shall I bring you some of the tarts and jellies I've seen laid out for supper? I shall say I want them for my cousin, so you needn't be afraid that anyone will know you ate them!"

She had seemed to be on the point of scrambling to her feet, and beating a hasty retreat, but these words checked her. She stared at him for a moment, and then gave a soft little chuckle, and said: "No, thank you, sir! I had supper hours ago, with Oenone, and Corinna-and Miss Mudford, of course-and my aunt directed the cook to set aside some of the tarts and cakes for the schoolroom supper. So I am not at all hungry.

In fact, I'm never hungry, because my aunt doesn't starve me! But I am very much obliged to you for being so kind-which I thought you were, the instant you looked up, and smiled at me!"

"Ah, so you are one of the schoolroom-girls, are you?" he said, mounting the rest of the stairs till he stood at the head of the first flight, on the upper hall. "Then I owe you an apology, for I took you for one of the nursery-babies!" He broke off, for she was on her feet, and although the only light illuminating the scene came from the candles burning in the chandelier that hung in the hall below there was enough to show him that she was considerably older than he had supposed.

She smiled shyly up at him, and said: "People nearly always do. It is because I'm such a wretched little dab of a creature, and a severe mortification to me-particularly when I'm amongst my cousins, who are all so tall that I feel a mere squab beside them! At least Lucasta and Oenone and Corinna are tall, and Dianeme is very well grown, so I expect she will be too. Perenna is only just out of leading-strings, so one can't tell about her yet,"

Slightly stunned, he said faintly: "Are you sure you have your cousins'

names correctly? Did you say Dianeme? And Perenna?'

"Yes," she answered, with another of her soft chuckles. "You see, when she was very young my aunt was much addicted to poetry, and her papa had a library crammed with old books. That's how she came upon the poems of Robert Herrick. She has the book to this day, and she showed it to me once, when I ventured to ask her why my cousins have such peculiar names. She said she thought them so pretty, and not commonplace, like Maria, and Eliza, and Jane. She wished very much to call Lucasta Electra, but thought it more prudent to name her after her G.o.dmama, from whom Lucasta has Expectations. Though I shouldn't think, myself, that anything will come of it," she added, in a reflective tone, "because she's as cantankersome as old Lady Bugle was used to be, and she doesn't seem to me even to like Lucasta, or to admire her beauty, which one must own to be unjust, for Lucasta always behaves to her most obligingly, and it must be acknowledged that she is beautiful!"

"Very true!" he agreed, his voice grave, but his eyes full of laughter.

"And are-er-Oenone and Corinna beautiful too? They should be, with such names as those!"

"Well," she said temperately, "old Lady Bugle was for ever telling my aunt that neither of them has beauty enough to figure in London, but I think they are both very pretty, though not, of course, to compare with Lucasta. And as for their names-" She choked on a smothered giggle, and a mischievous gleam shone in her eyes. She raised them to his face, and confided: "Oenone doesn't dislike hers, but Corinna perfectly detests hers, because Stonor discovered the poem called Corinna's Going a Maying, and read it to the other boys, so that they instantly took to calling her Sweet Slug-a-bed, and shouting to her outside her door in the morning to Get up, get up for shame, which put her in such a flame that she actually tried to come to cuffs with her papa for having allowed my aunt to saddle her with such a silly, outmoded name. Which was improper, of course, but one can't but sympathize with her."

"No, indeed! And what was her papa's reply to this very just rebuke?"

he enquired, much entertained by this artless recital.

"Oh, he merely said that she might think herself fortunate that she hadn't been christened Sappho, and that if it hadn't been for him she would have been. It doesn't sound to me any worse than Corinna, but I believe there was a Greek person of that name who wasn't at all the thing. Oh, pray don't laugh so loud, sir!"

He had uttered an involuntary crack of laughter, but he checked it, and begged pardon. He had by this time had time to a.s.similate the details of her dress and person, and had realized that her figure was elegant, and that her dress had been adapted rather unskilfully from one originally made for a much bigger girl. He also realized, being pretty well experienced in such matters, that it was a trifle dowdy, and that her soft brown ringlets had not enjoyed the ministrations of a hairdresser. It was the fashion for ladies to have their locks cropped and curled, or twisted into high Grecian knots from which carefully brushed and pomaded cl.u.s.ters of curls fell over their ears; but this child's hair fell loosely from a ribbon tied round her head, several strands escaping from it, which gave her a somewhat dishevelled appearance.

Desford said abruptly: "How old are you, my child? Sixteen?

Seventeen?"

"Oh, no, I am much older than that!" she replied. "I'm as old as Lucasta-all but a few weeks!"

"Then why are you not downstairs, dancing with the rest of them?" he demanded. "You must surely be out!"

"No, I'm not," she said. "I don't suppose I ever shall be, either. Unless my papa turns out not to be dead, and comes home to take care of me himself. But I don't think that at all likely, and even if he did come home it wouldn't be of the least use, because he seems never to have sixpence to scratch with. I am afraid he is not a very respectable person. My aunt says he was obliged to go abroad on account of being monstrously in debt." She sighed, and said wistfully: "I know that one ought not criticize one's father, but I can't help feeling that it was just a little thoughtless of him to abandon me."

"Do you mean that he left you in your aunt's charge?" he asked, his brows drawing together. "He can't have abandoned you!"

"Well, he did," she said. "And it was horridly uncomfortable, I can tell you, sir! I was still at school, in Bath, you see-and I must own that Papa did pay the bills, when he was in funds, and Miss Fletching was very kind, and she never told me that he had stopped doing so until she was obliged to realize that he wasn't going to remember that he owed her for a whole year. She disclosed to me afterwards that for a long time she expected to get a letter from him, or even a visit, for he did sometimes come down to see me. And it seems he had never been very punctual in paying Miss Fletching, so that she was quite in the habit of waiting. And I fancy she had a tendre for him, because she was for ever saying what a handsome man he was, and how particularly affable, and what distinguished manners he had. She was fond of me, too: she said it was because I had lived with her for such a long time, which I had, for Papa placed me in the school when my mama died, and I was only eight years old then, and lived at school all the year round."

"You poor child!" he exclaimed.

"Oh, no!" she a.s.sured him. "In the holidays my friends amongst the day-boarders often invited me to their parties, or took me with them on expeditions, and Miss Fletching several times took me to the theatre. I was perfectly happy-indeed, I don't suppose I shall ever be so happy again. But naturally I couldn't remain there for ever, so Miss Fletching was obliged to write to my grandfather. But it so happens that he had disowned Papa years and years before, and he wrote very uncivilly to Miss Fletching, saying that he wanted to know nothing about his ramshackle son's brats, and recommending her to apply to my mama's relations. Which-is how I come to be here."

She ended on a forlorn note, which made Desford say gently: "But you're not happy here, are you?"

She shook her head, but said, with a valiant attempt to smile: "Not very happy, sir. But I do try to be, because I know I am very much obliged to Aunt Bugle for-for giving me a home, when she held Papa in the utmost aversion, and had had a terrible quarrel with my mama when Mama eloped with him, and never forgave her. Which makes it my duty to be grateful to her, don't you think?"

"Who is your father?" he demanded, not answering this question.

"What is his name? And what is your name?"