Peter's Mother Part 36

But when he looked at Lady Mary, he knew that he would have been better able to dispense with that holiday interval than she was to have endured it.

She had always been considered marvellously young-looking for her age.

The quiet country life she had led had bestowed that advantage upon her; and her beauty, fair as she was, had always been less dependent on colouring than upon the exquisite delicacy of her features and general contour. But now a heaviness beneath the blue eyes,--a little fading of her brightness--a little droop of the beautifully shaped mouth,--almost betrayed her seven and thirty years; and the soft, abundant, brown hair was threaded quite perceptibly with silver. Her sweet face smiled upon him; but the smile was no longer, he thought, joyous--but pathetic, as of one who reproaches herself wonderingly for light-heartedness.

John looked at her in silence, but the words he uttered in his heart were, "I will never leave you any more."

Perhaps his face said everything that he did not say, for Lady Mary had turned from him with a little sob, and leant her forehead on her hands, looking out at the rain which swept the valley. She felt, as she had always felt in John's presence, that here was her champion and her protector and her slave, in one; returned to restore her failing courage and her lost self-confidence.

"So you saw something of Peter in London?" she said tremulously, breaking the silence which had fallen between them after their first greeting. "Please tell me. You know I have seen almost nothing of him since he came home."

"So I gather," said John. "Yes, I saw something--not very much--of Master Peter in London. You see I am not much of a society man;" and he laughed.

"Was Peter a society man?" said his mother, laughing also, but rather sadly.

"He went out a good deal, and was to be met with in most places," John answered.

"I read his name in lists of dances given by people I did not know he had ever heard of. But I did not like to ask him how he managed to get invited. He rather dislikes being questioned," said Lady Mary, describing Peter's prejudices as mildly as possible.

"I fancy Miss Sarah could tell you," said John, with twinkling eyes.

"I did not know--just a girl--could get a stranger, a boy like Peter, invited everywhere," said Lady Mary, innocently.

John laughed. "Peter is a very eligible boy," he said, "and Sarah is not 'just a girl,' but a very clever young woman indeed; and Lady Tintern is a ball-giver. But if he had been the most ordinary of youths, a bachelor's foothold on the dance-lists is the easiest thing in the world to obtain. It means nothing in itself."

"I think it meant a good deal to Peter," said his mother, with a sigh.

"If only I could think Sarah were in earnest."

"I don't see why not," said John.

Then he came and took Lady Mary's hand, and led her to a seat next the fire.

"Come and sit down comfortably," he said, "and let us talk everything over. It looks very miserable out-of-doors, and nothing could be more delightful than this room, and n.o.body to disturb us. I want the real history of the last few months. Do you know your letters told me almost nothing?"

The room was certainly delightful, and not the less so for the Chill rain without, which beat against the windows, and enhanced the bright aspect of the scene within.

A little fire burned cheerfully in the polished grate, and cast its glow upon the burnished fender, and the silver ornaments and trifles on a rosewood table beyond. The furniture was bright with old-fashioned glossy chintz; the rose-tinted walls were hung with fine water-colour drawings; the windows with rose-silk curtains.

The hardy outdoor flowers were banished to the oaken hall. Lady Mary's sense of the fitness of things permitted the silver cups and Venetian gla.s.ses of this dainty apartment to be filled only with waxen hothouse blooms and maidenhair fern.

She could not but be conscious of the restfulness of her surroundings, and of John's calm, protecting presence, as he placed her tenderly in the corner of the fireside couch, and took his place beside her.

"I don't think the last months have had any history at all," she said dreamily. "I have missed you, John. But that--you know already. I--I have been very lonely--since--since Peter came home. I think it was Sarah who persuaded him to go away again so soon. I believe she laughed at his clothes."

"I suppose they _were_ a little out of date, and he must surely have outgrown them, besides," said John, smiling.

"I suppose so; anyway, I think it must have been that which put it into his head to go to London and buy more. It was a little awkward for the poor boy, because he had just been scolding _me_ for wishing to go to London. But he said he would only be a few days."

"And he stayed to the end of the season?"

"Yes. Of course the aunts put it down to Sarah. I dare say it _was_ her doing. I don't know why she should wish to rob me of my boy just for--amus.e.m.e.nt," said Lady Mary, rather resentfully. "But I have not understood Sarah lately; she has seemed so hard and flippant. You are laughing, John? I dare say I am jealous and inconsistent. You are quite right. One moment I want to think Sarah in earnest--and willing to marry my boy; and the next I remember that I began to hate his wife the very day he was born."

"It appears to be the nature of mothers," said John, indulgently.

"But you will allow _me_ to hope for Peter's happiness, and quite incidentally, of course, for our own?"

She smiled. "Seriously, John, I wish you would tell me how he got on in London."

"He dined with me once or twice, as you know," said John, "and was very friendly. I think he was relieved that I made no suggestion of tutors or universities, and that I took his eyegla.s.s for granted. In short, that I treated him as I should treat any other young man of my acquaintance; whereas he had greatly feared I might presume upon my guardianship to give him good advice. But I did not, because he is too young to want advice just now, and prefers, like most of us, to buy his own experience."

"I hope he was really nice to you. You won't hide anything? You'll tell me exactly?"

"I am hiding nothing. The lad is a good lad at bottom, and a manly one into the bargain," said John. "His defects are of the kind which get up, so to speak, and hit you in the eye; and are, consequently, not of a kind to escape observation. What is obviously wrong is easiest cured. He has yet to learn that 'manners maketh man,' but he was learning it as fast as possible. The mistakes of youth are rather pathetic than annoying."

"Sometimes," said Lady Mary.

"He fell, very naturally, into most of the conventional errors which beset the inexperienced Londoner," said John, smiling slightly at the recollection. "He talked in a familiar manner of persons whose names were unknown to him the day before yesterday; and told well-known anecdotes about well-known people whom he hadn't had time to meet, as though they had only just happened. The kind of stories outsiders tell to new-comers. And he professed to be bored at every party he attended. I won't say that the _habitue_ is always too well bred, or too grateful to his entertainers, to do anything of the kind; but he is certainly too wise or too cautious."

"Perhaps he was bored?" said Lady Mary, wistfully. "Knowing n.o.body, poor boy."

"The first time I met him on neutral ground was at a dance," said John. "He looked very tall and nervous and lonely, and, of course, he was not dancing; but, nevertheless, he was the hero of the evening, or so Miss Sarah gave me to understand. But you can imagine it for yourself. The war just over, and a young fellow who has lost so much in it; the gallant nephew of the gallant Ferries; besides his own romantic name, and his eligibility. I took him off to the National Gallery, to make acquaintance with the portrait of our cavalier ancestor there; and I declare there is a likeness. Miss Sarah had visited it long ago, it appears. For my part, I am glad to think that these fashionable young women can still be so enthusiastic about a wounded soldier. Sarah said they were all wild to dance with him, and ready to shed tears for his lost arm."

"And was he much with Sarah?"

John laughed and shrugged his shoulders. "Miss Sarah is a star with many satellites. She raised my hopes, however, by appearing to have a few smiles to spare for Peter."

"And she must have got him the invitation to Tintern Castle," said Lady Mary. "That is why he went up to Scotland."

"I see."

"Then she got him another invitation, I suppose, for he went to the next house she stayed at; and to a third place for some yachting."

"What did Lady Tintern say?"

"That's just it. Sarah is in Lady Tintern's black books just now. She is furious with her, Mrs. Hewel tells me, because she has refused Lord Avonwick."

"Hum!" said John. "He has forty thousand a year."

"I don't think money would tempt Sarah to marry a man she did not love," said Lady Mary, reproachfully. "There was Mr. Van Graaf, the African millionaire. She wouldn't look at him, and he offered to settle untold sums upon her."

"Did he? What a brute!"

"Why?"

"Never mind. You've not seen him. I'm glad he found Sarah wasn't for sale. But doesn't all this look as if it were Peter, after all?"

"If only I could think she were in earnest," Lady Mary said again.

"But he is such a boy. She has three times his cleverness in some ways, and three times his experience, though she is younger than he. I suppose women mature much earlier than men. It galls my pride when she orders him about, and laughs at him. But he--he doesn't understand."

"Perhaps," said John, slowly, "he understands better than you think.

Each generation has a freemasonry of its own. I must confess I have heard sc.r.a.ps of chatter and chaff in ballrooms and theatres which have filled me with amazement, wondering how it could be possible that such poor stuff should pa.s.s muster as conversation, or coquetry, or gallantry, with the youths and maidens of to-day. But when I have observed further, instead of an offended fair, or a disillusioned swain, behold! two young heads close together, two young faces sparkling with smiles and satisfaction. And the older person, who would fatuously join in with a sensible remark, spoils all the enjoyment. The fact is, the secret of real companionship is not quality, but equality. There's a punning plat.i.tude for you."