MORE NEWS FROM ITALY.
Mr. Houghton took Lady George down to dinner; but Jack De Baron sat on
his left hand. Next to him was Augusta Mildmay, who had been consigned
to his care. Then came Lord George sitting opposite to his host at a
round table, with Mrs. Houghton at his right hand. Mrs. Mildmay and
Miss Hetta Houghton filled up the vacant places. To all this a great
deal of attention had been given by the hostess. She had not wished to
throw her cousin Jack and Miss Mildmay together. She would probably
have said to a confidential friend that "there had been enough of all
that." In her way she liked Guss Mildmay; but Guss was not good enough
to marry her cousin. Guss herself must know that such a marriage was
impossible. She had on an occasion said a word or two to Guss upon the
subject. She had thought that a little flirtation between Jack and her
other friend Lady George might put things right; and she had thought,
too,--or perhaps felt rather than thought,--that Lord George had
emancipated himself from the thraldom of his late love rather too
quickly. Mary was a dear girl. She was quite prepared to make Mary her
friend, being in truth somewhat sick of the ill-humours and
disappointments of Guss Mildmay; but it might be as well that Mary
should be a little checked in her triumph. She herself had been obliged
to put up with old Mr. Houghton. She never for a moment told herself
that she had done wrong; but of course she required compensation. When
she was manoeuvring she never lost sight of her manoeuvres. She had had
all this in her mind when she made up her little dinner-party. She had
had it all in her mind when she arranged the seats. She didn't want to
sit next to Jack herself, because Jack would have talked to her to the
exclusion of Lord George, so she placed herself between Lord George and
Mr. Mildmay. It had been necessary that Mr. Mildmay should take Miss
Houghton down to dinner, and therefore she could not separate Guss
from Jack De Baron. Anybody who understands dinner-parties will see it
all at a glance. But she was convinced that Jack would devote himself
to Lady George at his left hand; and so he did.
"Just come up to town, haven't you?" said Jack.
"Only last week."
"This is the nicest time in the year for London, unless you do a deal
of hunting; then it's a grind."
"I never hunt at all; Lord George won't let me."
"I wish some one wouldn't let me. It would save me a deal of money, and
a great deal of misery. It's all a delusion and a snare. You never get
a run nowadays."
"Do you think so? I'd rather hunt than do anything."
"That's because you are not let to do it; the perversity of human
nature, you know! The only thing I'm not allowed to do is to marry, and
it's the only thing I care for."
"Who prevents it, Captain de Baron?"
"There's a new order come out from the Horse Guards yesterday. No one
under a field officer is to marry unless he has got L2,000 a year."
"Marrying is cheaper than hunting."
"Of course, Lady George, you may buy your horses cheap or dear, and you
may do the same with your wives. You may have a cheap wife who doesn't
care for dress, and likes to sit at home and read good books."
"That's just what I do."
"But then they're apt to go wrong and get out of order."
"How do you mean? I shan't get out of order, I hope."
"The wheels become rusty, don't you think? and then they won't go as
they ought. They scold and turn up their noses. What I want to find is
perfect beauty, devoted affection, and L50,000."
"How modest you are."
In all this badinage there was not much to make a rival angry; but Miss
Mildmay, who heard a word or two now and then, was angry. He was
talking to a pretty woman about marriage and money, and of course that
amounted to flirtation. Lord George, on her other hand, now and then
said a word to her; but he was never given to saying many words, and
his attention was nearly monopolised by his hostess. She had heard the
last sentence, and determined to join the conversation.
"If you had the L50,000, Captain De Baron," she said, "I think you
would manage to do without the beauty and the devoted affection."
"That's ill-natured, Miss Mildmay, though it may be true. Beggars can't
be choosers. But you've known me a long time, and I think it's unkind
that you should run me down with a new acquaintance. Suppose I was to
say something bad of you."
"You can say whatever you please, Captain De Baron."
"There is nothing bad to say, of course, except that you are always
down on a poor fellow in distress. Don't you think it's a grand thing
to be good-natured, Lady George?"
"Indeed I do. It's almost better than being virtuous."
"Ten to one. I don't see the good of virtue myself. It always makes
people stingy and cross and ill-mannered. I think one should always
promise to do everything that is asked. Nobody would be fool enough to
expect you to keep your word afterwards, and you'd give a lot of
pleasure."
"I think promises ought to be kept, Captain De Baron."
"I can't agree to that. That's bondage, and it puts an embargo on the
pleasant way of living that I like. I hate all kind of strictness, and
duty, and self-denying, and that kind of thing. It's rubbish. Don't you
think so?"
"I suppose one has to do one's duty."
"I don't see it. I never do mine."
"Suppose there were a battle to fight."
"I should get invalided at once. I made up my mind to that long ago.
Fancy the trouble of it. And when they shoot you they don't shoot you
dead, but knock half your face away, or something of that sort. Luckily
we live in an island, and haven't much fighting to do. If we hadn't
lived in an island I should never have gone into the army."
This was not flirting certainly. It was all sheer nonsense,--words
without any meaning in them. But Mary liked it. She decidedly would not
have liked it had it ever occurred to her that the man was flirting
with her. It was the very childishness of the thing that pleased
her,--the contrast to conversation at Manor Cross, where no childish
word was ever spoken. And though she was by no means prepared to flirt
with Captain De Baron, still she found in him something of the
realisation of her dreams. There was the combination of manliness,
playfulness, good looks, and good humour which she had pictured to
herself. To sit well-dressed in a well-lighted room and have nonsense
talked to her suited her better than a petticoat conclave. And she knew
of no harm in it. Her father encouraged her to be gay, and altogether
discouraged petticoat conclaves. So she smiled her sweetest on Captain
De Baron, and replied to his nonsense with other nonsense, and was
satisfied.
But Guss Mildmay was very much dissatisfied, both as to the amusement
of the present moment and as to the conduct of Captain De Baron
generally. She knew London life well, whereas Lady George did not know
it at all; and she considered that this was flirtation. She may have
been right in any accusation which she made in her heart against the
man, but she was quite wrong in considering Lady George to be a flirt.
She had, however, grievances of her own--great grievances. It was not
only that the man was attentive to some one else, but that he was not
attentive to her. He and she had had many passages in life together,
and he owed it to her at any rate not to appear to neglect her. And
then what a stick was that other man on the other side of her,--that
young woman's husband! During the greater part of dinner she was
sitting speechless,--not only loverless, but manless. It is not what
one suffers that kills one, but what one knows that other people see
that one suffers.
There was not very much conversation between Lord George and Mrs.
Houghton at dinner. Perhaps she spoke as much to Mr. Mildmay as to him;
for she was a good hostess, understanding and performing her duty. But
what she did say to him she said very graciously, making allusions to
further intimacy between herself and Mary, flattering his vanity by
little speeches as to Manor Cross, always seeming to imply that she
felt hourly the misfortune of having been forced to decline the honour
of such an alliance as had been offered to her. He was, in truth, as
innocent as his wife, except in this, that he would not have wished her
to hear all that Mrs. Houghton said to him, whereas Mary would have had
not the slightest objection to his hearing all the nonsense between her
and Captain De Baron.
The ladies sat a long time after dinner, and when they went Mrs.
Houghton asked her husband to come up in ten minutes. They did not
remain much longer, but during those ten minutes Guss Mildmay said
something of her wrongs to her friend, and Lady George heard some news
from Miss Houghton. Miss Houghton had got Lady George on to a sofa, and
was talking to her about Brotherton and Manor Cross. "So the Marquis is
coming," she said. "I knew the Marquis years ago, when we used to be
staying with the De Barons,--Adelaide's father and mother. She was
alive then, and the Marquis used to come over there. So he has
married?"
"Yes; an Italian."
"I did not think he would ever marry. It makes a difference to
you;--does it not?"
"I don't think of such things."
"You will not like him, for he is the very opposite to Lord George."
"I don't know that I shall ever even see him. I don't think he wants to
see any of us."
"I dare say not. He used to be very handsome, and very fond of ladies'
society,--but, I think, the most selfish human being I ever knew in my
life. That is a complaint that years do not cure. He and I were great
friends once."
"Did you quarrel?"
"Oh, dear no. I had rather a large fortune of my own, and there was a
time in which he was, perhaps, a little in want of money. But they had
to build a town on his property in Staffordshire, and you see that did
instead."
"Did instead!" said Lady George, altogether in the dark.
"There was suddenly a great increase to his income, and, of course,
that altered his view. I am bound to say that he was very explicit. He
could be so without suffering himself, or understanding that any one
else would suffer. I tell you because you are one of the family, and
would, no doubt, hear it all some day through Adelaide. I had a great
escape."
"And he a great misfortune," said Mary civilly.
"I think he had, to tell you the truth. I am good-tempered,
long-suffering, and have a certain grain of sagacity that might have
been useful to him. Have you heard about this Italian lady?"
"Only that she is an Italian lady."
"He is about my age. If I remember rightly there is hardly a month or
two between us. She is three or four years older."
"You knew her then?"
"I knew of her. I have been curious enough to enquire, which is, I dare
say, more than any body has done at Manor Cross."
"And is she so old?"
"And a widow. They have been married, you know, over twelve months;
nearly two years, I believe."
"Surely not; we heard of it only since our own marriage."
"Exactly; but the Marquis was always fond of a little mystery. It was
the news of your marriage that made him hint at the possibility of such
a thing; and he did not tell the fact till he had made up his mind to
come home. I do not know that he has told all now."
"What else is there?"
"She has a baby,--a boy." Mary felt that the colour flew to her cheeks;
but she knew that it did so, not from any disappointment of her own,
not because these tidings were in truth a blow to her, but because
others,--this lady, for instance,--would think that she suffered. "I am
afraid it is so," said Miss Houghton.
"She may have twenty, for what I care," said Mary, recovering herself.
"I think Lord George ought to know."
"Of course I shall tell him what you told me. I am sorry that he is not
nice, that's all. I should have liked a brother-in-law that I could
have loved. And I wish he had married an English woman. I think English
women are best for English men."
"I think so too. I am afraid you will none of you like the lady. She
cannot speak a word of English. Of course you will use my name in
telling Lord George. I heard it all from a friend of mine who is
married to one of the Secretaries at the Embassy." Then the gentlemen
came in, and Mary began to be in a hurry to get away that she might
tell this news to her husband.
In the meantime Guss Mildmay made her complaints, deep but not loud.
She and Mrs. Houghton had been very intimate as girls, knew each
other's secrets, and understood each other's characters. "Why did you
have him to such a party as this?" said Guss.
"I told you he was coming."
"But you didn't tell me about that young woman. You put him next to her
on purpose to annoy me."
"That's nonsense. You know as well as I do that nothing can come of it.
You must drop it, and you'd better do it at once. You don't want to be
known as the girl who is dying for the love of a man she can't marry.
That's not your metier."
"That's my own affair. If I choose to stick to him you, at least, ought
not to cross me."
"But he won't stick to you. Of course he's my cousin, and I don't see
why he's to be supposed never to say a word to anyone else, when it's
quite understood that you're not going to have one another. What's the
good of being a dog in the manger?"
"Adelaide, you never had any heart!"
"Of course not;--or, if I had, I knew how to get the better of so
troublesome an appendage. I hate hearing about hearts. If he'd take you
to-morrow you wouldn't marry him?"
"Yes, I would."
"I don't believe it. I don't think you'd be so wicked. Where would you
live, and how? How long would it be before you hated each other?
Hearts! As if hearts weren't just like anything else which either you
can or you cannot afford yourself. Do you think I couldn't go and fall
in love to-morrow, and think it the best fun in the world? Of course
it's nice to have a fellow like Jack always ready to spoon, and sending
one things, and riding with one, and all that. I don't know any young
woman in London would like it better than I should. But I can't afford
it, my dear, and so I don't do it."
"It seems to me you are going to do it with your old lover?"
"Dear Lord George! I swear it's only to bring Mary down a peg, because
she is so proud of her nobleman. And then he is handsome! But, my dear,
I've pleased myself. I have got a house over my head, and a carriage to
sit in, and servants to wait on me, and I've settled myself. Do you do
likewise, and you shall have your Lord George, or Jack De Baron, if he
pleases;--only don't go too far with him."
"Adelaide," said the other, "I'm not good, but you're downright bad."
Mrs. Houghton only laughed, as she got up from her seat to welcome the
gentlemen as they entered the room.
Mary, as soon as the door of the brougham had been closed upon her, and
her husband, began to tell her story. "What do you think Miss Houghton
has told me?" Lord George, of course, could have no thoughts about it,
and did not at first very much care what the story might have been.
"She says that your brother was married ever so long ago!"
"I don't believe it," said Lord George, suddenly and angrily.
"A year before we were married, I mean."
"I don't believe it."
"And she says that they have a son."
"What!"
"That there is a baby,--a boy. She has heard it all from some friend of
hers at Rome."
"It can't be true."
"She said that I had better tell you. Does it make you unhappy,
George?" To this he made no immediate answer. "What can it matter
whether he was married two months ago or two years? It does not make me
unhappy;" as she said this, she locked herself close into his arm.
"Why should he deceive us? That would make me unhappy. If he had
married in a proper way and had a family, here in England, of course I
should have been glad. I should have been loyal to him as I am to the
others. But if this be true, of course, it will make me unhappy. I do
not believe it. It is some gossip."
"I could not but tell you."
"It is some jealousy. There was a time when they said that Brotherton
meant to marry her."
"What difference could it make to her? Of course we all know that he is
married. I hope it won't make you unhappy, George." But Lord George was
unhappy, or at any rate, was moody, and would talk no more then on that
subject, or any other. But in truth the matter rested on his mind all
the night.