The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols Part 19

'Mr. Jacomb,' said Nan, 'do you know the lady who left a minute ago?'

'No,' said he, wondering a little at the earnestness--or rather the absentness--of her manner. 'I only caught a glimpse of her. She belongs to one of the visiting sisterhoods.'

Nan was silent for a second or two.

'You came to the wedding, of course?' continued Mr. Jacomb, cheerfully.

'A capital match, that, for young De la Poer. She will have 18,000 pounds a year when her mother dies; and she is pretty too. She puts a little side on, perhaps, when she's talking to strangers; but that's nothing. His brother was at Oxford when I was there, I remember--an awfully fast fellow; but they say all the sons of clergymen are; the other swing of the pendulum, you know. There's a medium in all things; and if one generation gives itself over too much to piety, the next goes as far the other way. I suppose it's human nature.'

This air of agreeable levity--this odour of worldliness (which was in great measure a.s.sumed)--did not seem to accord well with Nan's present mood. She was disturbed--uncertain--yearning for something she knew not what--and the echoes of that strange cry in the music were still in her soul. Mr. Jacomb's airs of being a man of the world--of being a clergyman who scorned to attach any esoteric mystery to his cloth, or to expect to be treated with a particular reverence--might put him on easy terms of friendship with Nan's sisters; but they only made Nan regretful, and sometimes even impatient. Did he imagine the a.s.sumption of flippancy made him appear younger than he really was? In any case it was bad policy so far as Nan was concerned. Nan was a born worshipper.

She was bound to believe in something or somebody. And the story she had heard of the Rev. Charles Jacomb's a.s.siduous, earnest, uncomplaining labour in that big parish had at the very outset won for him her great regard. He did not understand how he was destroying her childlike faith in him by his saturnine little jokes.

'Mr. Jacomb,' said Nan, timidly, 'I should be so greatly obliged to you if you could find out something more for me about those sisterhoods.

They must do a great deal of good. And their dress is such a protection; they can go anywhere without fear of rudeness or insult. I suppose it is not a difficult thing to get admission----'

He was staring at her in amazement.

'But not for you--not for you!' he cried. 'Why, it is preposterous for you to think of such a thing. There are plenty who have nothing else in the world to look forward to. You have all your life before you yet.

My dear Miss Anne, you must not indulge in day-dreams. Look at your sister Madge. Oh, by-the-way, she said something about your mamma having sent me a note this morning, asking me to dine with you on Friday evening; and then remembering, after the note was posted, that on that evening you had taken a box for the pantomime. Well, there needs be no trouble about that, if I may join your party to go there also.'

Nan said nothing; but perhaps there was the slightest trace of surprise, or interrogation in her look. Immediately he said--

'Oh, I very much approve of pantomimes, from a professional point of view--I do, really. You see, the imagination of most people is very dull--it wants a stimulus--and I am perfectly certain, if the truth were known, that the great majority of people in this country have derived their pictorial notions of heaven from the transformation-scenes in pantomimes. I am certain of it. John Martin's pictures--the only other alternative--are not striking enough. So, on the whole, I very much approve of pantomimes; and I shall be very glad to go with you on Friday, if I may.'

Nan made some excuse, shook hands with him, and went. She walked home hurriedly, she knew not why; it almost seemed as though she wanted to leave something well behind her. And she was very kind to her sisters for the remainder of that day; but somewhat grave.

Meanwhile, Madge's letter to her married sister in London had been sent.

And the first answer to it was contained in a postscript to a letter addressed by Mary Beresford to her mother. This was the postscript:--

'_What is this nonsense Madge writes to me about herself and Holford King? Has Captain King got it into his head that he would like to marry his deceased wife's sister?_'

Lady Beresford threw the letter aside with a sigh, wishing people would not write in conundrums.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE ACCEPTED SUITOR.

'Oh, Nan, here is the cab. What shall I say to him? What am I to say to him?'

'I think you ought to know yourself, dear,' said Nan, gently, and then she slipped away from the room, leaving Madge alone and standing at the window.

But after all it was not so serious a matter. Some one came into the room, and Madge turned.

'May I call you Madge?' said he, holding both her hands.

She answered, with her eyes cast down--

'I suppose I must call you Frank.'

That was all, for at the same moment Mr. Tom was heard calling to his mother and sisters that Captain King had arrived; and directly after, Lady Beresford and Edith entered the room, followed by Mr. Tom, who was declaring that they must have dinner put forward to six o'clock, if they were all to go to the pantomime.

There was a little embarra.s.sment--not much. Frank King kept looking towards the door. He wondered why Nan had not come with the others.

He was curious to see how much she had changed. Perhaps he should not even recognise her? Without scarcely knowing why, he was hoping she might not be quite like the Nan of former days.

Mr. Tom consulted his watch again.

'Shall I ring and tell them to hurry on dinner, mother?'

'We cannot alter the dinner hour now,' Lady Beresford said, plaintively. 'It has already been altered once. Both Mr. Roberts and Mr. Jacomb promised to come at half-past six, so that you might all go to the pantomime together in good time.'

'What?' cried Mr. Tom. 'Jacomb? Did you say Jacomb, mother?'

'I said Mr. Roberts and Mr. Jacomb,' said his mother.

'And what the etcetera is he doing in that gallery!' exclaimed Mr. Tom.

'Well, I guess we shall have a high old time of it at dinner.

Soda-water and incense. But there's one thing they always agree about.

Get them on to port-wine vintages, and they run together like a brace of greyhounds.'

Here Captain King begged to be excused, as there was but little time for him to go along to his hotel and get dressed for this early dinner.

When--being accompanied to the door by Mr. Tom himself--he had left, Madge said--

'How do you like him, mamma? Are you pleased with him?'

'He has not spoken to me yet, you know,' said the mother, wearily; she had had to go through several such scenes, and they worried her.

'Oh, but it's all arranged,' Madge said, cheerfully. 'He won't bother you about a solemn interview. It's all arranged. How did you think he looked, Edith? I do hope he won't lose that brown colour by not going back to sea; it suits him; I don't like pastey-faced men. Now, Mr.

Jacomb isn't pastey-faced, although he is a clergyman. By-the-way, what has become of Nan?'

Nan had been quite forgotten. Perhaps she was dressing early, or looking after the dinner-table; at all events, it was time for the other sisters to go and get ready also.

Punctual to the moment, Captain King arrived at the door, and entered, and went upstairs. He was not a little excited. Now he would see Nan--and not only her, but also this clergyman, whom he was also curious to see. At such a moment--arriving as Madge's accepted suitor--it was not Nan that he ought to have been thinking about. But it was Nan whom his-first quick glance round the drawing-room sought out; and instantly he knew she was not there.

Everybody else was, however. Mr. Roberts, with his conspicuous red opal and diamonds, was standing on the hearth-rug with his back to the fire, talking to Lady Beresford, who was cushioned up in an easy-chair.

Mr. Jacomb was entertaining the two sisters, Edith and Madge, who were laughing considerably. Mr. Tom was walking about with his hands in his pockets, ferocious, for dinner was already eighteen seconds late.

Frank King had not much time to study the looks or manners of this clergyman, to whom he was briefly introduced; for already his attention, which was at the moment exceedingly acute, was drawn to the opening of the door. It was Nan who slipped in, quietly. Apparently she had seen the others before; for when she caught sight of him, she at once advanced towards him, with a grave, quiet smile on her face, and an outstretched hand.

'Oh, how do you do, Captain King,' she said, in the most friendly way, and without the least trace of embarra.s.sment.

Of course she looked at his eyes as she said so. Perhaps she did not notice the strange, startled look that had dwelt there for an instant as he regarded her--a look as if he had seen some one whom he had not expected to see--some one whom he almost feared to see. He could not speak, indeed. For the moment he had really lost command of himself, and seemed bewildered. Then he stammered--

'How do you do, Miss Anne? I am glad to see you looking so well.

You--you have not altered much--anything--during these last three or four years.'

'Oh, Nan has altered a great deal I can tell you,' said Mr. Tom; 'and for the better. She isn't half as saucy as she used to be.'