The moment I entered the drawing-room, where Winifred Lloyd had been
doing her utmost to amuse her various guests till we came, and where
undoubtedly the ladies' faces grew brighter when we appeared, I felt
conscious that the remark of the hoydenish Dora had done me some
little mischief. I could read this in the face of the haughty Estelle,
together with her fear that _others_ might have heard it; thus,
instead of seating myself near her, as I wished and had fully
intended, I remained rather aloof, and leaving her almost exclusively
to the industrious Guilfoyle, divided my time between listening to
Winifred, who, with Caradoc, proceeded to perform the duet he had sent
her from the barracks, and endeavouring to make myself agreeable to
the Countess--a process rather, I am sorry to say, somewhat of a task
to me. Though her dark hair was considerably seamed with gray, her
forehead was without a line, smooth and unwrinkled as that of a
child--care, thought, reflection, or sorrow had never visited _her_.
Wealth and rank, with a naturally aristocratic indolence and
indifference of mind, had made the ways of life and of the world--at
least, the world in which she lived--easy, soft, and pleasant, and all
her years had glided brilliantly but monotonously on. She had married
the late earl to please her family rather than herself, because he was
undoubtedly an eligible _parti_; and she fully expected their only
daughter to act exactly in the same docile manner. Her mien and air
were stately, reserved, and uninviting; her eyes were cold, inquiring,
and searching in expression, and I fancied that they seemed to watch
and follow me, as if she really and naturally suspected me of "views,"
or, as she would have deemed them, _designs_.
Amid the commonplaces I was venturing to utter to this proud, cold,
and decidedly unpleasant old dame, whose goodwill and favour I was
sedulously anxious to gain, it was impossible for me to avoid hearing
some remarks that Sir Madoc made concerning me, and to her daughter.
"I am so glad you like my young friend, Lady Estelle," said the bluff
baronet, leaning over her chair, his rubicund face beaming with smiles
and happiness; for he was in best of moods after a pleasant dinner,
with agreeable society and plenty of good wine.
"Who told you that I did so?" asked she, looking up with fresh
annoyance, yet not unmixed with drollery, in her beautiful face.
"Dora and Winny too; and I am so pleased, for he is an especial friend
of ours. I love the lad for his dead mother's sake--she was an old
flame of mine in my more romantic days--and doesn't he deserve it?
What do you think the colonel of his old corps says of him?"
"Really, Sir Madoc, I know not--that he is quite a ladykiller,
perhaps; to be such is the ambition of most young subalterns."
"Better than that. He wrote me, that young Hardinge is all that a
British officer ought to be; that he has a constitution of iron--could
sleep out in all weathers, in a hammock or under a tree--till the
fever attacked him at least. If provisions were scanty, he'd share his
last biscuit with a comrade; on the longest and hottest march he never
fell out or became knocked up; and more than once he has been seen
carrying a couple of muskets, the arms of those whose strength had
failed them. 'I envy the Royal Welsh their acquisition, and regret
that _we_ have lost him'--these were the colonel's very words."
Had I fee'd or begged him to plead my cause, he could not have been
more earnest or emphatic.
"For heaven's sake, Sir Madoc, do stop this overpowering eulogium,"
said I; "it is impossible for one not to overhear, when one's own name
is mentioned. But did the colonel really say all this of me?"
"All, and more, Harry."
"It should win him a diploma of knight-bachelor," said Lady Estelle,
laughing, "a C.B., perhaps a baronetcy."
"Nay," said Sir Madoc; "such rewards are reserved now for toad-eaters,
opulent traders, tuft-hunters, and ministerial tools; the days when
true merit was rewarded are gone, my dear Lady Estelle."
The duet over, Phil Caradoc drew near me, for evidently he was not
making much progress with Miss Lloyd.
"Well, Phil," said I, in a low voice, "among those present have you
seen your ideal of woman?"
"Can't say," said he, rather curtly; "but _you_ have, at all events,
old fellow, and I think Sir Madoc has done a good stroke of business
for you by his quotation of the colonel's letter. I heard him all
through our singing--the old gentleman has no idea of a _sotto voce_,
and talks always as if he were in the hunting-field. By Jove, Harry,
you grow quite pink!" he continued, laughing. "I see how the land lies
with you; but as for '_la mère_ Cressingham,' she is an exclusive of
the first water, a match-maker by reputation; and I fear you have not
the ghost of a chance with her."
"Hush, Caradoc," said I, glancing nervously about me "remember that we
are not at Winchester, or inside the main-guard, just now. But see,
Lady Estelle and that fellow Guilfoyle are about to favour us," I
added, as the pale beauty spread her ample skirts over the
piano-stool, with an air that, though all unstudied, seemed quite
imperial, and ran her slender fingers rapidly over the white keys,
preluding an air; while Guilfoyle, who had a tolerable voice and an
intolerable amount of assurance, prepared to sing by fussily placing
on the piano a piece of music, on the corner of which was written in a
large and bold hand, evidently his own--"To Mr. H. Guilfoyle, from
H.S.H. the Princess of Catzenelnbogen."
"You must have been a special favourite with this lady," said Estelle,
"as most of your German music is inscribed thus."
"Yes, we were always exchanging our pieces and songs," said he,
languidly and in a low voice close to her ear, yet not so low as to be
unheard by me. "I was somewhat of a favourite with her, certainly; but
then the Princess was quite a privileged person."
"In what respect?"
"She could flirt farther than any one, and yet never compromise
herself. However, when she bestowed this ring upon me, on the day when
I saved her life, by arresting her runaway horse on the very brink of
the Rhine, I must own that his Highness the Prince was the reverse of
pleased, and viewed me with coldness ever after; so that ultimately I
resigned my office of attaché, just about the time I had the
pleasure--may I call it the joy?--of meeting you."
"O fie, Mr. Guilfoyle! were you actually flirting with her?"
"Nay, pardon me; I never flirt."
"You were in love then?"
"I was never in love till--"
A crash of notes as she resumed the air interrupted whatever he was
about to say; but his eye told more than his bold tongue would perhaps
have dared to utter in such a time or place; and, aware that they had
met on the Continent, and had been for some time together in the
seclusion of Craigaderyn, I began to fear that he must have far
surpassed me in the chances of interest with her.. Moreover, Dora's
foolish remark might reasonably lead her to suppose that I was already
involved with Winifred; and now, with a somewhat cloudy expression in
my face (as a mirror close by informed me), and a keen sense of pique
in my heart, I listened while she played the accompaniment to his
pretty long German song, the burden of which seemed to be ever and
always--
"Ach nein! ach nein! ich darf es nich.
Leb wohl! Leb' wohl! Leb' wohl!"
Sir Madoc, who had listened with some secret impatience to this most
protracted German ditty, now begged his fair guest to favour him with
something Welsh; but as she knew no airs pertaining to the locality,
she resigned her place to Winifred, whom I led across the room, and by
whose side I remained. After the showy performances of Lady Estelle,
she was somewhat reluctant to begin: all the more so, perhaps, that
her friend--with rather questionable taste, certainly--was wont, in a
spirit of mischief or raillery--but one pardons so much in lovely
woman, especially one of rank--to quiz Wales, its music and
provincialism; just as, when in the Highlands, she had laughed at the
natives, and voted "their sham chiefs and gatherings as delightfully
absurd." Finding that his daughter lingered ere she began, and half
suspecting the cause, Sir Madoc threatened to send for Owen Gwyllim,
the butler, with his harp. Owen had frequently accompanied her with
his instrument; but though that passed well enough occasionally among
homely Welsh folks, it would never do when Lady Naseby and certain
others were present.
"It is useless for an English girl to sing in a foreign language, or
attempt to rival paid professional artists, by mourning like Mario
from the turret, or bawling like Edgardo in the burying-ground, or to
give us 'Stride la vampa' in a fashion that would terrify Alboni,"
said Sir Madoc, "or indeed to attempt any of those operatic effusions
with which every hand organ has made us familiar. So come, Winny, a
Welsh air, or I shall ring for Owen."
This rather blundering speech caused Lady Estelle to smile, and
Guilfoyle, whose "Leb' wohl" had been something of the style objected
to, coloured very perceptibly. Thus urged, Winifred played and sang
with great spirit "The March of the Men of Harlech;" doubtless as much
to compliment Caradoc and me as to please her father; for it was then
our regimental march; and, apart from its old Welsh associations, it
is one of the finest effusions of our old harpers. Sir Madoc beat
time, while his eyes lit up with enthusiasm, and he patted his
daughter's plump white shoulders kindly with his weather-brown but
handsome hands; for the old gentleman rather despised gloves, indoors
especially, as effeminate.
Winifred had striven to please rather than to excel; and though
tremulous at times, her voice was most attractive.
"Thank you," said I, in a low and earnest tone; "your execution is
just of that peculiar kind which leaves nothing more to be wished for,
and while it lasts, Winny, inspires a sense of joy in one's heart."
"You flatter me much--far too much," replied Miss Lloyd, in a lower
and still more tremulous tone, as she grew very pale; for some girls
will do so, when others would flush with emotion, and it was evident
that my praise gave her pleasure; she attached more to my words than
they meant.
An undefinable feeling of pique now possessed me--a sensation of
disappointment most difficult to describe; but it arose from a sense
of doubt as to how I really stood in the estimation of the fair
Estelle. Taking an opportunity, while Sir Madoc was emphatically
discussing the points and pedigrees of certain horses and harriers
with Guilfoyle and other male friends, while the Countess and other
ladies were clustered about Winifred at the piano, and Dora and
Caradoc were deep in some affair of their own, I leaned over her
chair, and referring--I forget now in what terms--to the last time we
met, or rather parted, I strove to effect that most difficult of all
moves in the game of love--to lead back the emotions, or the past
train of thought, to where they had been dropped, or snapped by
mischance, to the time when I had bid her lingeringly adieu, after
duly shawling and handing her to the carriage, at the close of a late
rout in Park-lane, when the birds of an early June morning were
twittering in the trees of Hyde Park, when the purple shadows were
lying deep about the Serpentine, when the Ring-road was a solitude,
the distant Row a desert, and the yawning footmen in plush and powder,
and the usually rubicund coachmen, looking weary, pale, and impatient,
and when the time and place were suited neither for delay nor
dalliance. Yet, as I have elsewhere said, an avowal of all she had
inspired within me was trembling on my lips as I led her through the
marble vestibule and down the steps, pressing her hand and arm the
while against my side; but her mother's voice from the depths of the
carriage (into which old Lord Pottersleigh had just handed her)
arrested a speech to which she might only have responded by silence,
then at least; and I had driven, _viâ_ Piccadilly, to the Junior U.S.,
when Westminster clock was paling out like a harvest moon beyond the
Green Park, cursing my diffidence, that delayed all I had to say till
the carriage was announced, thereby missing the chance that never
might come again. And then I had but the memory of a lovely face,
framed by a carriage window, regarding me with a bright yet wistful
smile, and of a soft thrilling pressure returned by an ungloved hand,
that was waved to me from the same carriage as it rolled away
westward. The night had fled, and there remained of it only the memory
of this, and of those glances so full of tenderness, and those soft
attentions or half endearments which are so charming, and so
implicitly understood, as almost to render language, perhaps, un
necessary.
"You remember the night we last met, and parted, in London?" I
whispered.
"Morning, rather, I think it wash" said she, fanning herself; "but
night or morning, it was a most delightful ball. I had not enjoyed
myself anywhere so much that season, and it was a gay one."
"Ah, you have not forgotten it, then," said I, encouraged.
"No; it stands out in my memory as one night among many happy ones.
Day was almost breaking when you led me to the carriage, I remember."
"Can you remember nothing more?' I asked, earnestly.
"You shawled me most attentively--"
"And I was whispering--"
"Something foolish, no doubt; men are apt to do so at such times," she
replied, while her white eyelids quivered and she looked up at me
with her calm, bright smile.
"Something foolish!" thought I, reproachfully; "and then, as now, my
soul seemed on my lips."
"Do you admire Mr. Guilfoyle's singing?" she asked, after a little
pause, to change the subject probably.
"His voice is unquestionably good and highly cultured," said I,
praising him truthfully enough to conceal the intense annoyance her
unexpected question gave me; "but, by the way, Lady Estelle, how does
it come to pass that he has the honour of knowing you--to be _here_,
too?"
"How--why--what _do_, you mean, Mr. Hardinge?" she asked, and I could
perceive that after colouring slightly she grew a trifle paler than
before. "He is a visitor here, like you or myself. We met him abroad
first; he was most kind to us when mamma lost all her passports at the
Berlin Eisenbahnhof, and he accompanied us to the Alte Leipziger
Strasse for others, and saw us safely to our carriage. Then, by the
most singular chances, we met him again at the new Kursaal of Ems, at
Gerolstein, when we were beginning the tour of the Eifel, and at
Baden-Baden. Lastly, we met him at Llandudno, on the beach, quite
casually, when driving with Sir Madoc, to whom he said that he knew
you--that you were quite old friends, in fact."
"Knew me, by Jove! that is rather odd. I only lost some money to him;
enough to make me wary for the future."
"Wary?" she asked, with dilated eyes.
"Yes."
"An unpleasant expression, surely. Sir Madoc, who is so hospitable,
asked him here to see the lions of Craigaderyn, and has put a gun at
his disposal for the twelfth."
"How kind of unthinking Sir Madoc! A most satisfactory explanation,"
said I, cloudily, while gnawing my moustache. Guilfoyle had too
evidently followed them.
"If any explanation were necessary," was the somewhat haughty
response, as the mother-of-pearl fan went faster than ever, and she
looked me full in the face with her clear, dark, and penetrating eyes,
to the sparkle of which the form of their lids, and their thick fringe
of black lash, served to impart a softness that was indeed required.
"Do you know anything of him?" she added.
"No; that is--"
"Anything against him?"
"No, Lady Estelle."
"What then?" she asked, a little petulantly.
"Simply that I, pardon me, think a good deal."
"More than you would say?"
"Perhaps."
"This is not just. Mamma is somewhat particular, as you know; and our
family solicitor, Mr. Sharpus, who is his legal friend also, speaks
most warmly of him. We met him in the best society--abroad, of course;
but, Mr. Hardinge, your words, your manner, more than all, your tone,
imply what I fear Mr. Guilfoyle would strongly resent. But please go
and be attentive to mamma--you have scarcely been near her to-night,"
she added quickly, as a flush of anger crossed my face, and she
perceived it. I bowed and obeyed, with a smile on my lips and intense
annoyance in my heart. I knew that the soft eyes of Winifred Lloyd had
been on us from time to time; but my little flirtation with _her_ was
a thing of the past now, and I was reckless of its memory. Was she so?
Time will prove. I felt jealousy of Guilfoyle, pique at Lady Estelle,
and rage at my own mismanagement. I had sought to resume the tenor of
our thoughts and conversation on the occasion of our parting after
that joyous and brilliant night in Park-lane, when my name on her
engagement card had appeared thrice for that of any one else; but if I
had touched her heart, even in the slightest degree, would she have
become, as it seemed, almost warm in defence of this man, a waif
picked up on the Continent? Yet, had she any deeper interest in him
than mere acquaintanceship warranted, would she have spoken of him so
openly, and so candidly, to me?
Heavens! we had actually been covertly fencing, and nearly
quarrelling! Yet, if so, why should she be anxious for me to win the
estimation of "mamma"? Lady Naseby had been beautiful in her time, and
the utter vacuity and calm of her mind had enabled her to retain much
of that beauty unimpaired; and I thought that her daughter, though
with more sparkle and brilliance, would be sure to resemble her very
much at the same years. She was not displeased to meet with attention,
but was shrewd enough to see, and disdainful enough to resent, its
being bestowed, as she suspected it was in my instance, on account of
her daughter; thus I never had much success; for on the night of that
very rout in London my attentions in that quarter, and their apparent
good fortune, had excited her parental indignation and aristocratic
prejudices against me.
After all the visitors had withdrawn (as horses or carriages were
announced in succession), save one or two fox-hunters whom Guilfoyle
had lured into the billiard-room for purposes of his own, when the
ladies left us at night Lady Estelle did not give me her hand. She
passed me with a bow and smile only, and as she swept through the
gilded folding doors of the outer drawing-room, with an arm round
Dora's waist, her backward glances fell on all--but me. Why was this?
Was this coldness of manner the result of Guilfoyle's influence, fear
of her mamma, her alleged engagement with old Lord Pottersleigh, pique
at myself caused by Dora's folly, or what? It was the old story of
"trifles light as air." I felt wrathful and heavy at heart, and
repented bitterly the invitation I had accepted, and the leave I had
asked; for Lady Estelle seemed so totally unconcerned and indifferent
to me now, considering the _empressement_ with which we had parted in
London.
The "family solicitor," too! He had been introduced as a mutual friend
in the course of affairs--in the course of a friendship that had
ripened most wonderfully. Was this Hawkesby Guilfoyle a fool, or a
charlatan, or both? His various versions of the diamond ring would
seem to show that he was the former. What fancy had the Countess for
him, and why was he tolerated by Sir Madoc? Familiar though I was with
my old friend, I felt that I could not, without a violation of good
taste, ask a question about a guest, especially one introduced by the
Cressinghams. His voice was soft in tone; his manner, when he chose,
was suave; his laugh at all times, even when he mocked and sneered,
which was not unfrequent, silvery and pleasing; yet he was evidently
one who could "smile and smile and be"--I shall not exactly say what.
While smoking a cigar, I pondered over these and other perplexing
things in my room before retiring for the night, hearing ever and anon
the click of the billiard-balls at the end of the corridor. Had I not
the same chance and right of competition as this Guilfoyle, though
unknown to the "family solicitor"? How far had he succeeded in
supplanting me, and perhaps others? for that there were others I knew.
How far had he gone in his suit--how prospered? How was I to construe
the glances I had seen exchanged, the half speech so bluntly made, and
so adroitly drowned at the piano? Who was he? what was he? The attaché
of the mock embassy at a petty German Court! Surely my position in
society was as good, if not better defined than his; while youth,
appearance, health, and strength gave me every advantage over an "old
fogie" like Viscount Pottersleigh.
As if farther to inflame my pique, and confirm the chagrin and
irritation that grew within me on reflection, Phil Caradoc, smoothing
his moustache, came into my room, which adjoined his, to have, as he
said, "a quiet weed before turning in." He looked ruffled; for he had
lost money at billiards--that was evident--and to the object of my
jealousy, too.
"That fellow Guilfoyle is a thorough Bohemian if ever there was one!"
said he, as he viciously bit off the end of his cigar prior to
lighting it, "with his inimitable tact, his steady stroke at
billiards, his scientific whist, his coolness and perfect breeding:
yet he is, I am certain, unless greatly mistaken, a regular
free-lance, without the bravery or brilliance that appertained to the
name of old--a lawless ritter of the gaming-table, and one that can't
even act his part well or consistently in being so. He has been
spinning another story about that ring, with which I suppose, like
Claude Melnotte's, we shall hear in time his grandfather, the Doge of
Venice, married the Adriatic I am certain," continued Caradoc, who was
unusually ruffled, "that though a vainglorious and boasting fellow, he
is half knave, half fool, and wholly adventurer!"
"This is strong language, Phil. Good heavens! do you really think so?"
I asked, astonished to find him so boldly putting my own thoughts into
words.
"I am all but convinced of it," said he, emphatically. "But how in
such society?"
"Ah, that is the rub, and the affair of Sir Madoc, and of Lady Naseby,
and of Lady Estelle, too, for she seems to take rather more than an
interest in him--they have some secret understanding. . By Jove! I
can't make it out at all."
Caradoc's strong convictions and unusual bluntness added fuel to my
pique and chagrin, and I resolved that, come what might, I would end
the matter ere long; and I thought the while of the song of
Montrose--
"He either fears his fate too much,
Or his deserts are small,
Who dares not put it to the touch,
To gain or lose it all!"