An Altercation.
Almost at the same moment Sir Jekyl entered the hexagon, or, as it was
more pleasantly called, the Window dressing-room, from the lobby. He was
quite radiant, and, in that warm evening light, struck Lady Alice as
looking quite marvellously youthful.
"Well, Jekyl Marlowe, you see you have brought me here at last," said
the old lady, extending her hand stiffly, like a wooden marionette, her
thin elbow making a right angle.
"So I have; and I shall always think the better of my eloquence for
having prevailed. You're a thousand times welcome, and not tired, I
hope; the journey is not much after all."
"Thanks; no, the distance is not much, the fatigue nothing," said Lady
Alice, drawing her fingers horizontally back from his hospitable
pressure. "But it is not always distance that separates people, or
fatigue that depresses one."
"No, of course; fifty things; rheumatism, temper, hatred, affliction:
and I am so delighted to see you! Trixie, dear, would not grandmamma
like to see her room? Send for--"
"Thank you, I mean to stay here," said Lady Alice.
"_Here!_" echoed Sir Jekyl, with a rather bewildered smile.
"I avail myself of the privilege you give me; your postscript to
Beatrix's note, you know. You tell me there to choose what rooms I like
best," said the old lady, drily, at the same time drawing her bag toward
her, that she might be ready to put the documents in evidence, in case
he should dispute it.
"Oh! did I?" said the Baronet, with the same faint smile.
Lady Alice nodded, and then threw back her head, challenging
contradiction by a supercilious stare, her hand firmly upon the bag as
before.
"But this room, you know; it's anything but a comfortable one--don't you
think?" said Sir Jekyl.
"I like it," said the inflexible old lady, sitting down.
"And I'm afraid there's a little difficulty," he continued, not minding.
"For this is General Lennox's dressing-room. Don't you think it might be
awkward?" and he chuckled agreeably.
"General Lennox is absent in London, on business," said Lady Alice, grim
as an old Diana; "and Jane does not use it, and there _can_ be no
_intelligible_ objection to my having it in his absence."
There was a little smile, that yet was not a smile, and a slight play
about Sir Jekyl's nostrils, as he listened to this speech. They came
when he was vicious; but with a flush, he commanded himself, and only
laughed slightly, and said--
"It is really hardly a concern of mine, provided my guests are happy.
You don't mean to have your bed into this room, do you?"
"I mean to sleep _there_," she replied drily, stabbing with her long
forefinger toward the door on the opposite side of the room.
"Well, I can only say I'd have fancied, for other reasons, these the
very last rooms in the house you would have chosen--particularly as this
really belongs to the green chamber. However, you and Lady Jane can
arrange that between you. You'd have been very comfortable where we
would have put you, and you'll be very _un_comfortable here, I'm afraid;
but perhaps I'm not making allowance for the affection you have for Lady
Jane, the length of time that has passed since you've seen her, and the
pleasure of being so near her."
There was an agreeable irony in this; for the Baronet knew that they had
never agreed very well together, and that neither spoke very handsomely
of the other behind her back. At the same time, this was no conclusive
proof of unkindness on Lady Alice's part, for her goodwill sometimes
showed itself under strange and uncomfortable disguises.
"Beatrix, dear, I hope they are seeing to your grandmamma's room; and
you'll want candles, it is growing dark. Altogether I'm afraid you're
very uncomfortable, little mother; but if _you_ prefer it, you know, of
course I'm silent."
With these words he kissed the old lady's chilly cheek, and vanished.
As he ran down the darkening stairs the Baronet was smiling
mischievously; and when, having made his long straight journey to the
foot of the back stairs, he re-ascended, and passing through the two
little ante-rooms, entered his own homely bedchamber, and looked at his
handsome and wonderfully preserved face in the glass, he laughed
outright two or three comfortable explosions at intervals, and was
evidently enjoying some fun in anticipation.
When, a few minutes later, that proud sad beauty, Lady Jane, followed by
her maid, sailed rustling into the Window dressing-room--I call it so in
preference--and there saw, by the light of a pair of wax candles, a
stately figure seated on the sofa at the further end in grey silk
draperies, with its feet on a boss, she paused in an attitude of sublime
surprise, with just a gleam of defiance in it.
"How d' y' do, Jenny, my dear?" said a voice, on which, as on the tones
of an old piano, a few years had told a good deal, but which she
recognised with some little surprise, for notwithstanding Lady Alice's
note accepting the Baronet's invitation, he had talked and thought of
her actually coming to Marlowe as a very unlikely occurrence indeed.
"Oh! oh! Lady Alice Redcliffe!" exclaimed the young wife, setting down
her bed-room candle, and advancing with a transitory smile to her old
kinswoman, who half rose from her throne and kissed her on the cheek as
she stooped to meet her salutation. "You have only arrived a few
minutes; I saw your carriage going round from the door."
"About forty minutes--hardly an hour. How you have filled up, Jane;
you're quite an imposing figure since I saw you. I don't think it
unbecoming; your _embonpoint_ does very well; and you're quite well?"
"_Very_ well--and you?"
"I'm pretty well, dear, a good deal fatigued; and so you're a wife,
Jennie, and very happy, I hope."
"I can't say I have anything to trouble me. I am quite happy, that is,
as happy as other people, I suppose."
"I hear nothing but praises of your husband. I shall be so happy to make
his acquaintance," continued Lady Alice.
"He has had to go up to town about business this morning, but he's to
return very soon."
"How soon, dear?"
"In a day or two," answered the young wife.
"To-morrow?" inquired Lady Alice, drily.
"Or next day," rejoined Lady Jane, with a little stare.
"Do you _really_, my dear Jane, expect him here the day after
to-morrow?"
"He said he should be detained only a day or two in town."
Old Lady Alice shook her incredulous head, looking straight before her.
"I don't think he can have said that, Jane, for he wrote to a friend of
mine, the day before yesterday, mentioning that he should be detained by
business at least a week."
"Oh! did he?"
"Yes, and Jekyl Marlowe, I dare say, thinks he will be kept there
_longer_."
"I should fancy _I_ am a better opinion, rather, upon that point, than
Sir Jekyl Marlowe," said Lady Jane, loftily, and perhaps a little
angrily.
The old lady, with closed lips, at this made a little nod, which might
mean anything.
"And I can't conceive how it can concern Sir Jekyl, or even you, Lady
Alice, what business my husband may have in town."
It was odd how sharp they were growing upon this point.
"Well, Sir Jekyl's another thing; but _me_, of course, it does concern,
because I shall have to give him up his room again when he returns."
"What room?" inquired Lady Jane, honestly puzzled.
"_This_ room," answered the old lady, like one conscious that she drops,
with the word, a gage of battle.
"But this is _my_ room."
"You don't use it, Lady Jane. _I_ wish to occupy it. I shall, of course,
give it up on your husband's return; in the meantime I deprive you of
nothing by taking it. Do I?"
"That's not the question, Lady Alice. It is _my_ room--it is _my
dressing_-room--and I don't mean to give it up to _any_ one. You are the
last person on earth who would allow _me_ to take such a liberty with
_you_. I don't _understand_ it."
"Don't be excited, my dear Jenny," said Lady Alice--an exhortation
sometimes a little inconsistently administered by members of her
admirable sex when they are themselves most exciting.
"I'm not in the least excited, Lady Alice; but I've had a note from
you," said Lady Jane, in rather a choking key.
"You have," acquiesced her senior.
"And I connect your extraordinary intrusion here, with it."
Lady Alice nodded.
"I do, and--and I'm right. You mean to insult me. It is a shame--an
_outrage_. What do you mean, madam?"
"I'd have you to remember, Jane Chetwynd (the altercation obliterated
her newly-acquired name of Lennox), that I am your relation and your
senior."
"Yes, you're my cousin, and my senior by fifty years; but an old woman
may be very impertinent to a young one."
"_Compose_ yourself, if you please, _compose_ yourself," said Lady
Alice, in the same philosophic vein, but with colour a little
heightened.
"I don't know what you mean--you're a disgraceful old woman. I'll
complain to my husband, and I'll tell Sir Jekyl Marlowe. Either you or I
must leave this house to-night," declaimed Lady Jane, with a most
beautiful blush, and eyes flashing lurid lightnings.
"You forget yourself, my dear," said the old lady, rising grimly and
confronting her.
"No, I don't, but _you_ do. It's perfectly disgusting and intolerable,"
cried Lady Jane, with a stamp.
"One moment, if you please--you can afford to listen for one moment, I
suppose," said the old lady, in a very low, dry tone, laying two of her
lean fingers upon the snowy arm of the beautiful young lady, who, with a
haughty contraction and an uplifted head, withdrew it fiercely from her
touch. "You forget your maid, I think. You had better tell her to
withdraw, hadn't you?"
"I don't care; why should I?" said Lady Jane, in a high key.
"Beatrix, dear, run into my bed-room for a moment," said "Granny" to
that distressed and perplexed young lady, who, accustomed to obey,
instantly withdrew.