Uncle Max Part 48

CHAPTER x.x.x

WITH TIMBRELS AND DANCES

Aunt Philippa and Sara came to meet me at Victoria. They both seemed unfeignedly glad to see me.

Aunt Philippa was certainly a kind-hearted woman. Her faults were those that were engendered by too much prosperity. Overmuch ease and luxury had made her lymphatic and indolent. Except for Ralph's death, she had never known sorrow. Care had not yet traced a single line on her smooth forehead; it looked as open and unfurrowed as a child's. Contentment and a comfortable self-complacency were written on her comely face. Just now it beamed with motherly welcome. Somehow, I never felt so fond of Aunt Philippa as I did at that moment when she leaned over the carriage with outstretched hands.

'My dear, how well you are looking! Five years younger.--Does she not look well, Sara?'

Sara nodded and smiled, and made room for me to pa.s.s her, and then gave orders that my luggage should be intrusted to the maid, who would convey it in a cab to Hyde Park Gate.

'If you do not mind, Ursula, we are going round the Park for a little,'

observed Sara, with a pretty blush.

Her mother laughed: 'Colonel Ferguson is riding in the Row, and will be looking out for us. He is coming this evening, as usual, but Sara thinks four-and-twenty hours too long to wait.'

'Oh, mother, how can you talk so?' returned Sara bashfully. 'You know Donald asked us to meet him, and he would be so disappointed. And it is such a lovely afternoon,--if Ursula does not mind.'

'On the contrary, I shall like it very much,' I returned, moved by curiosity to see Colonel Ferguson again. I had never seen him by daylight, and, though we had often met at the evening receptions, we had not exchanged a dozen words.

I thought Sara was looking prettier than ever. A sort of radiance seemed to surround her. Youth and beauty, perfect health, a light heart, and satisfied affections,--these were the gifts of the G.o.ds that had been showered upon her. Would those bright, smiling eyes ever shed tears? I wondered. Would any sorrow drive away that light, careless gaiety? I hoped not. It was pleasant to see any one so happy. And then I thought of Lesbia and Gladys, and sighed.

'You do not look at all tired, Ursie,' observed Sara affectionately, laying her little gloved hand on mine. 'She looks quite nice and fresh: does she not, mother?--I was so afraid that you would have come up in your nurse's livery, as Jocelyn calls it,--black serge, and a horrid dowdy bonnet.'

'Oh no; I knew better than that,' I returned, with a complacent glance at my handsome black silk, one of Uncle Brian's presents. I had the comfortable conviction that even Sara could not find fault with my bonnet and mantle. I had made a careful toilet purposely, for I knew what importance they attached to such things. Sara's little speech rewarded me, as well as Aunt Philippa's approving look.

'It has not done her any harm,' I heard her observe, _sotto voce_. 'She certainly looks younger.'

I took advantage of a pause in Sara's chatter to ask after Jill. Aunt Philippa answered me, for Sara was bowing towards a pa.s.sing carriage.

'Oh, poor child, she wanted to come with us to meet you, but it was Professor Hugel's afternoon. He teaches her German literature, you know.

I was anxious for her not to miss his lesson, and she was very good about it. She is coming down to afternoon tea, and of course we shall see her in the evening.'

'Poor dear Jocelyn! she was longing to come, I know. You and Miss Gillespie are terribly severe,' observed Sara, with a light laugh. She was so free and gay herself that she rather pitied her young sister, condemned to the daily grind of lessons and hard work.

'Nonsense, Sara!' returned her mother sharply. 'We are not severe at all.

Jocelyn knows that it is all for her good if Miss Gillespie keeps her to her task. My dear Ursula, we are all charmed with Miss Gillespie,--even Sara, though she pretends to call her strict and old-fashioned. She is a most amiable, ladylike woman, and Jocelyn is perfectly happy with her.

'I am very pleased with Jocelyn,' she went on. 'You have done her good, Ursula, and both her father and I are very grateful to you. She is not nearly so wayward and self-willed. She takes great pains with her lessons, and is most industrious. She is not so awkward, either, and Miss Gillespie thinks it will be a good plan if I take her out with me driving sometimes when Sara is married. I shall only have Jocelyn then,' finished Aunt Philippa, with a regretful look at her daughter. I was much interested in all they had to tell me, but I was not sorry when we entered the Park and the stream of talk died away.

I almost felt as though I were in a dream, as the moving kaleidoscope of horses and carriages and foot-pa.s.sengers pa.s.sed before my eyes.

Yesterday at this time I was sitting in poor Robert Lambert's whitewashed attic, listening to the sparrows that were twittering under the eaves.

When I had left the cottage I had walked down country roads, meeting nothing but a donkey-cart and two tramps.

Now the sunshine was playing on the rhododendrons and on the green leaves of the trees in Hyde Park. A bra.s.s band had struck up in the distance.

The riders were cantering up and down the Row, to the admiration of the well-dressed crowds that sauntered under the trees or lingered by the railings. Carriages were pa.s.sing and repa.s.sing. A four-in-hand drove past us, followed by a tandem. Beautiful young faces smiled out of the carriages. A few of them looked weary and careworn. Now and then under the smart bonnet one saw the pinched weazened face of old age,--dowagers in big fur capes looking out with their dim hungry eyes on the follies of Vanity Fair. One wondered at the set senile smile on these old faces; they had fed on husks all their lives, and the food had failed to nourish them; their strength had failed over the battle of life, but they still refused to leave the field of their former triumphs. Everywhere in these fashionable crowds one sees these pale meagre faces that belong to a past age. They wear gorgeous velvets, jewels, feathers, paint: like Jezebel, they would look out of the window curiously to the last. How one longs to take them gently out of the crowd, to wash their poor cheeks, and lead them to some quiet home, where they may shut their tired eyes in peace!

'What is the world to you?' one would say to them. 'You have done all your tasks,--well or badly; leave the arena to the young and the strong; it is no place for you; come home and rest, before the dark angel finds you in your tinsel and gewgaws.' Would they listen to me, I wonder?

Sara's soft dimples came into play presently. A pretty blush rose to her face. A tall man with a bronzed handsome face and iron-gray moustache had detached himself from the other riders, and was cantering towards the carriage that was now drawn up near the entrance: in another moment he had checked his horse with some difficulty.

'I have been looking out for you the last three-quarters of an hour,' he said, addressing Sara. 'I could not see the carriage anywhere.--Miss Garston, we have met before, but I think we hardly know each other,'

looking at me with some degree of interest. Sara's cousin was no longer indifferent to him.

I answered him as civilly as I could, but I could see his attention wandered to his young _fiancee_, and he soon rode round to her side of the carriage. It was evident, as Lesbia said, that the colonel was honestly in love with Sara. She looked very young beside him, but there must have been something very winning in her sweet looks and words to the man who had known trouble and had laid a young wife and child to rest in an Indian grave.

Before the evening was over I felt I liked Colonel Ferguson immensely, and thought far more of Sara for being his choice; there was an air of frankness and _bonhomie_ about him that won one's heart; he was sensible and practical. In spite of his fondness for Sara, he would keep her in order: one could see that. I heard him rebuke her very gently that first evening for some extravagance she was planning. They were standing apart from the others on the balcony, but I was near the open window, and I heard him say distinctly, in a grave voice,--

'I am very sorry to disappoint you, but I must ask you to give up this idea, my darling; it would not be right in our position: surely you must see that.'

'No, Donald, I do not see it a bit,' she answered quickly.

'Then will you be satisfied with my seeing it, and give it up for my sake, dear?'

I knew when they came back into the room that he had got his way. Sara was smiling as happily as usual: her disappointment had not gone very deep. Her future husband would have very little trouble with her. She was neither self-willed nor selfish. She wanted to be happy herself and make other people happy; she would be easily guided.

When we left the Park Colonel Ferguson rode off to his club, and we drove home rather quickly. There were some visitors waiting for Sara in the drawing-room, so I went up to my old room to take off my bonnet. Martha would unpack my boxes, Aunt Philippa told me, as she gave me another kiss in the hall.

I had not been there for five minutes when I heard flying footsteps down the pa.s.sage, and the next moment Jill's strong arms had taken me by the shoulders and turned me round.

'Now, Jill, I don't mean to be strangled as usual'; but she left me no breath for more.

'Oh, my dear, precious old bear, this is too good to be true! I nearly cried with joy this morning at the idea of seeing you in your old room and knowing you will be here a whole fortnight. I declare, after all, Sara is very nice to get married.'

No, Jill was not changed; she was as real and big and demonstrative as usual, but somehow she looked nicer.

'You must be quick,' she continued, 'for father has come in, and Clayton has taken in the tea. We must go down directly; but I want you to see Miss Gillespie first.' And Jill looked proud and eager as she led me down the pa.s.sage.

The schoolroom was still the same dull back room that Aunt Philippa thought so conducive to her young daughter's studies, but it certainly looked more cheerful this evening.

The window was opened. There was a window-box full of gay flowers. A great bowl of my favourite wall-flowers was on the table, and another vase, with trails of laburnum and lilac, was on Jill's little table. The fresh air and sunshine and the sweet scent of the flowers had quite transformed the dingy room. There was new cretonne on the old sofa, a handsome cloth on the centre-table, and a new easy-chair.

Miss Gillespie was sitting by the window, reading. She had an interesting face and rather sad gray eyes, but her manner was decidedly prepossessing.

She looked at her pupil with affection. Evidently Jill's abruptness and awkwardness were not misunderstood by her.

'I want you two to like each other,' Jill had said, without a pretence of introduction; and we had both laughed and extended our hands.

'I seem to know you already, Miss Garston,' she said, in a pleasant voice. 'Jocelyn talks about you so much that you cannot be a stranger to me.--Do you know your father has come in, dear?' turning to Jill.

'Yes, and I must take my cousin downstairs. Good-bye for the present, Gypsy.'

Miss Gillespie smiled again when she saw my astonishment at Jill's familiarity.

'Jocelyn thinks my name too long, and has abbreviated it to Gypsy. Mrs.

Garston was terribly shocked at first, but I told her that it did not matter in the least: in fact, I like it.'