Heartsease; Or, The Brother's Wife Part 11

'No doubt she is highly pleased to sport it. The first time of wearing anything so becoming must be charming at her age. I could envy her.'

'Poor old pony!' was all Theodora chose to answer.

'There, they are leaving off,' as Arthur led away the pony, and Violet began to ascend the steps, turning her head to look after him.

Miss Gardner came to meet her, asking how she liked riding.

'Oh, so much, thank you.'

'You are a good scholar?'

'I hope I shall be. He wants me to ride well. He is going to take me into the woods to-morrow.'

'We have been admiring your hat,' said Miss Gardner. 'It is exactly what my sister would like. Have you any objection to tell where you bought it?'

'I'll ask him: he gave it to me.'

'Dressing his new doll,' thought Theodora; but as Violet had not been personally guilty of the extravagance, she thought amends due to her for the injustice, and asked her to come into the gardens.

'Thank you, I should like it; but will he, will Mr.--will Arthur know what has become of me?'

'He saw you join us,' said Theodora, thinking he ought to be relieved to have her taken off his hands for a little while.

'Have you seen the gardens?' asked Jane.

'Are not these the gardens?' said Violet, surprised, as they walked on through the pleasure-ground, and pa.s.sed a screen of trees, and a walk trellised over with roses.

There spread out before her a sweep of shaven turf, adorned with sparkling jets d'eau of fantastic forms, gorgeous ma.s.ses of American plants, the flaming or the snowy azalea, and the n.o.ble rhododendron, in every shade of purple cl.u.s.ter among its evergreen leaves; beds of rare lilies, purely white or brilliant with colour; roses in their perfection of bloom; flowers of forms she had never figured to herself, shaded by wondrous trees, the exquisite weeping deodara, the delicate mimosa, the scaly Himalaya pines, the feathery gigantic ferns of the southern hemisphere.

Violet stood gazing in a silent trance till Arthur's step approached, when she bounded back to him, and clinging to his arm exclaimed, so that he alone could hear, 'Oh, I am glad you are come! It was too like enchanted ground!'

'So you like it,' said Arthur, smiling.

'I did not know there could be anything so beautiful! I thought the pleasure-ground finer than anything--so much grander than Lord St.

Erme's; but this! Did you keep it to the last to surprise me!'

'I forgot it,' said Arthur, laughing to see her look shocked. 'It is not in my line. The natives never have any sport out of a show-place.'

'It is simply a bore,' said Theodora, 'a self-sacrifice to parade.'

'To the good of visitors,' replied Miss Gardner, smiling, to Violet, who, fearing her own admiration was foolish, was grateful to hear her say, 'And in that capacity you will allow Mrs. Martindale and me to enjoy.'

'Did not I bring you to make the grand tour!' said Theodora. 'Come, prepare to be stifled. Here are all the zones up to the equator,' and she led the way into the conservatory.

Arthur's protection and his satisfaction in Violet's pleasure set her at ease to enter into all the wonders and beauties; but he did not know one plant from another, and referred all her inquiries to his sister, who answered them in a cold matter-of-fact way that discouraged her from continuing them, and reduced her to listening to the explanations elicited by Jane Gardner, until a new-comer met them, thus greeted by Arthur--'Ah! here is the authority! Good morning, Harrison. Mrs.

Martindale wants to know the name of this queer striped thing.'

He bowed politely, and Violet, as she bent and smiled, supposed they were too familiar for the hand-shake, while he went on to name the plant and exhibit its peculiarities. Her questions and remarks seemed to please him greatly, and while he replied graciously with much curious information, he cut spray after spray of the choicest flowers and bestowed them upon her, so that when the tour was completed, and he quitted them, she said, with smiling grat.i.tude, 'It is the most exquisite bouquet I ever saw.'

'A poor thing, 'was the proud humility answer, 'but honoured by such hands!'

'Well done, Harrison!' e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Arthur, as soon as he was out of ear-shot.

'Who is he?' asked Violet, still blushing; then, as the truth dawned on her, 'can he be the gardener? I thought him some great botanist allowed to study here.'

'Pray tell Miss Piper, Theodora,' said Arthur. 'If it goes round to him, Violet will never want for flowers.'

'It is so exactly what he considers himself,' said Jane.

'Except his being allowed,' said Arthur. ''Tis we that are there on sufferance.'

Miss Piper was seen advancing on the same walk, and Violet was uncomfortable, dreading to see her treated as an inferior; but to her great satisfaction, Arthur addressed the little lady in his cordial manner, and Theodora congratulated her on being out of doors on this fine evening.

'Mrs. Nesbit wished me to ask Mr. Harrison for a frond of the new Trichomanes,' said Miss Piper.

'You will find him somewhere near the forcing-house,' said Theodora; 'but pray don't hurry in. I am going to my aunt's room, and you should go and look at the j.a.pan lilies, they are fine enough to make even me admire them.' Then running after her to enforce her words, 'mind you stay out--be quite at rest till dinner-time--I have scarcely been with my aunt to-day. I am sure a walk will do you good.'

The kind solicitude went deep into the affections of the lonely little woman. Violet longed for anything like such notice; then, in a state between wonder, delight, and disappointment, went to her room to attempt a description of the fairy land which she had been visiting, and to enjoy the splendours by thinking how much it would gratify her mother and sisters to hear of her sharing them.

Mrs. Nesbit greeted Theodora with exclamations on Miss Piper's tardiness, and she explained in the authoritative way which she alone ventured to use towards her aunt; then, in a tone of conciliation, spoke of the garden and the beauty of the j.a.pan lilies.

'Harrison grows too many; they are losing their rarity, and look like a weed.'

'They are hardy, are they not?' said Theodora, maliciously. 'I shall get some for my school garden.'

'That is your way of making everything common, and depreciating all that is choice.'

'No,' said Theodora, 'I would have beauty as widely enjoyed and as highly appreciated as possible.'

'And pray, if all privileges are extended to the lower cla.s.ses, what is left to the higher orders?'

'Themselves,' said Theodora, proudly. 'No, aunt, we only lower ourselves by exclusiveness. It is degrading to ourselves and our tastes to make them badges of vanity. Let them be freely partaken, we shall be first still. The ma.s.ses cannot mount higher without raising us.'

'A levelling theory,' said Mrs. Nesbit.

'No, exalting. Has Latin and Greek made Harrison a gentleman? Can even dress in better taste make Pauline look as much a lady as Miss Piper?'

'There is a good deal in that,' said Mrs. Nesbit. 'Even Lady Elizabeth Brandon cannot hide her good blood, though she does her best to do so.'

'And so does Emma,' said Theodora.

'Foolish girl,' said Mrs. Nesbit, 'I would have given anything to see her attractive.'

'Too late now!' said Theodora, with a look of repressed scorn and triumph.

'Too late for ARTHUR,' replied Mrs. Nesbit, with emphasis. 'And you'll never, never succeed in the other quarter!'

'Young people always have those fancies. I know what you would say, but John is not so young now. It is just the time of life when men take a turn. Depend upon it, now he has had his boy's romance, he is not going to play the disconsolate lover for the rest of his life. No! that girl shall never be Lady Martindale.'