The Hoyden Part 32

"You certainly seemed to enjoy it," says Sir Maurice with a cold smile, as he pa.s.ses her.

CHAPTER XVIII.

HOW t.i.tA GETS A SCOLDING, AND HOW SHE REBELS AND ACCUSES SIR MAURICE OF BREACH OF CONTRACT.

"Can I come in?"

Rylton's voice is a little curt as he knocks at his wife's door. It is not the door opening into the corridor outside, but the inner door that leads from her room to his, and to the dressing-room beyond.

"Yes, of course," cries t.i.ta pleasantly.

She is just on the point of dismissing her maid for the night--the maid who has so little to do; no long hair to brush, only the soft little curly locks that cover her mistress's head. She has taken off t.i.ta's evening gown, and, now that the little locks have been carefully seen to, has taken off her dressing-gown also. It occurs to t.i.ta that she might as well take _herself_ off as well, and as soon as possible.

This thought makes her laugh.

"You can go now, Sarah," says she to the maid, who loves her; "and don't bring me my tea before eight to-morrow, because I'm as sleepy as sleepy can be."

She nods kindly to the dismissed maid, and, going to the door where Rylton is presumably standing, lets him in.

"How early you are!" says she, thinking of the glories of the smoking-room below.

"How late you are!" returns he. "I half fancied you would have been asleep by this time!"

"Oh, well, I soon shall be!" says she. "I was just going to say my prayers as you came in; after that it won't take me a minute to get out of my clothes, and," with a little laugh, "into my bed."

Her clothes, as she stands at present, are so becoming that it seems quite a pity that she should ever get out of them. Her neck and arms--soft and fair and round as a little child's--are shining in the lamplight, and beneath them the exquisite lace petticoat she wears gives her the air of one who is just going to a fancy ball. It is short enough to show the perfect little feet and the slender ankles beneath it.

"How inhospitable of you to desert your friends so soon!" says she.

"Why, you never come up till two, do you?--at least, so you tell me."

"You will catch cold if you stay like that," says he.

It is a somewhat irrelevant remark; but, for the first time in all his knowledge of her, the tender charm that is her own becomes clear to him. It seems to him that she is a new being--one he has never seen before; and, with this fresh knowledge, his anger towards her grows stronger.

"I!--in this weather! Why, it is hardly chilly even yet, in spite of the rain; and, besides, I have this fire!" She catches his hand, and draws him towards the hearthrug. "I am sure you have something to say to me," says she. "Come and sit by the fire, and tell me all about it."

"It is nothing, really," says Rylton, resisting her pretty efforts to push him into a luxurious lounging chair. "It is only a question about your cousin."

He leans his elbow on the chimney-piece, and looks down at her--a dainty fairy lying now in the bosom of some soft pink cushions, with her legs crossed and her toes towards the fire. She has clasped her arms behind her head.

"About Minnie?"

"No."

His heart hardens again. Is this duplicity on her part? How small, how innocent, how girlish, how--reluctantly this--beautiful she looks! and yet----

"About Tom, then?"

"About Mr. Hescott"--coldly--"yes."

"What! you don't like him?" questions t.i.ta, abandoning her lounging att.i.tude, and leaning towards him.

"So far as he is concerned," with increasing coldness, "I am quite indifferent to him; it is of you I think."

"Of me! And why of me? Why should you think of me?"

"I hardly know," somewhat bitterly; "except that it is perhaps better that _I_ should criticise your conduct than--other people."

"I don't know what you mean!" says t.i.ta slowly.

Her charming face loses suddenly all its vivacity; she looks a little sad, a little forlorn.

"There is very little to know," says Rylton hurriedly, touched by her expression.

"But you said--you spoke of my _conduct!"_

"Well, and is there nothing to be said of that? This cousin----" He stops, and then goes on abruptly: "Why does he call you t.i.tania?"

"Oh, it is an old name for me!" She looks at him, and, leaning back again in her chair, bursts out laughing. She has flung her arms over her head again, and now looks at him from under one of them with a mischievous smile. "Is _that_ the whole?" says she. "He used to call me that years ago. He used to say I was like a fairy queen."

"Used he?"

Rylton's face is untranslatable.

"Yes. I was the smallest child alive, I do believe." She springs to her feet, and goes up to Rylton in a swaying, graceful little fashion. "I'm not so very big even _now_, am I?" says she.

Rylton turns his eyes from hers with open determination; he steels his heart against her.

"About this cousin," he says icily. "He is the one who used to say you had hands like iron, and a heart like velvet?"

"Yes. _Fancy_ you remembering that!" says t.i.ta, a sudden, quick gleam of pleasure dyeing her pretty cheeks quite red.

"I always remember," returns Rylton distantly.

His tone is a repulse. The lovely colour fades from her face.

"I'm tired," says she suddenly, petulantly. She moves to the other end of the room, and, opening a wardrobe, pretends to make some rearrangements with its contents. "If you have nothing more to say"--with perhaps more honesty than politeness--"I wish you would go away."

"I _have_ something more to say." The very nervousness he is feeling makes his tone unnecessarily harsh. "I object to your extreme intimacy with your cousin."

t.i.ta drops the dress she has just taken from the wardrobe, and comes back once more into the full light of the lamp. Her barer and slender arms are now hanging straight before her, her fingers interlaced; she looks up at him.

"With _Tom?"_