HOW SIR JOHN DERING WENT A-WOOING
My Lord Sayle’s abrupt departure sufficed to break up the assembly;
my lords and ladies having been very delightfully amused, interested,
thrilled and shocked by the varied incidents of the last crowded hour,
hasted to be gone, eager to recapitulate the whole story (with numerous
additions, to be sure) to the astounded ears of those unfortunates who
had missed so singular an occasion.
Thus, while my lady bade adieu to her guests (each and all more her
doting friends and obedient humble servants than ever), Sir John
presently found himself alone with the Duchess in a curtained alcove, and
stooping, took her so small hand ere she was aware to kiss it with such
reverence that she actually flushed.
“O heavens, sir!” she exclaimed. “Pray, why so—so infinite impressive?”
“Madam,” he answered gravely, “despite the evil that is told of me, with
more or less truth, alas, you were generous! Having the power to abase
me, you mercifully chose to lift me up. Pray believe that my gratitude is
yours, now and ever!”
“Indeed,” said she, noting his earnest face, “you are strangely unlike
the Sir John Dering I anticipated. Your—your reputation, sir——”
“Aye, my reputation!” he repeated wearily. “’Faith, madam,’tis my incubus
that hath me in a strangle-gripe. For years I have endured it with a
fool’s content, but now when I would be rid on’t I may not. ’Tis a
haunting shadow, a demon mocking my best endeavours. Evil is naturally
expected of me, virtue—never. Indeed, you behold in me the poor victim
of a relentless fate——”
“Fate, sir?” cried a scornful voice, and my Lady Herminia stepped into
the alcove.
“Even so, madam!” he answered, rising to bow.
“Heaven preserve us!” she exclaimed. “Do you dare put the onus of your
own misdemeanours upon Fate?”
“Nay, then,” he answered, “let us call it Fortune, madame, since Fortune
is—feminine, and esteemed ever a fickle jade!”
“So, sir, having contrived yourself an evil notoriety, you would turn
cynic and rail upon Fate, it seems!”
“Nay, madam, cursed by cruel Fortune, I am become a Man o’ Sentiment and
find in simple things the great and good content: the carolling bird, the
springing flower, the rippling brook, these have charms the which——”
“Tush, sir, you grow lyrical, which becometh you most vilely.”
“Fie, Herminia!” cried the Duchess. “Hold thy teasing tongue, miss.
Sir John is right, indeed—I myself love to hear the carolling brook—I
mean the rippling bird—— There, see how you ha’ fluttered me! Sit down,
Herminia—do! And you, Sir John! Be seated—both o’ you, instead of
standing to stare on each other like—like two fond fools foolishly fond!
So! Now, surely, Sir John, a man’s reputation is his own, to make or mar?”
“Nay, ’faith, your Grace, doth not a man’s reputation make or mar him,
rather? And whence cometh reputation but of our friends and enemies who
judge us accordingly. So the world knows us but as they report. Thus, he
or she that would be held immaculate should consort solely with dogs or
horses that ha’ not the curse of speech.”
Here my lady sighed wearily and began to tap with impatient foot.
“Herminia, hush!” exclaimed the Duchess. “Hush and flap not fidgeting
foot, miss. How think you of Sir John’s argument?”
“I think, aunt, that Sir John, according to Sir John, doth make of Sir
John a creature so unjustly defamed that one might look to see Sir
John sprout wings to waft good Sir John from this so wicked world. And
pray, Sir John, may we ask to what we owe the unexpected honour of your
presence here?”
“Alas, madam,” he sighed, “to what but matrimony! I am here in the matter
of marriage.”
The Duchess gasped and strove to rise, but her niece’s compelling hand
restrained her.
“Pray, sir, whose marriage?”
“My own, madam. You behold me ready to wed you how, when and where you
will.”
“Oh, then,” quavered the Duchess, “oh, pray, sir, ere you continue—I’ll
begone.... Herminia, suffer me to rise——”
“Nay, dear aunt, rather shall you suffer along with me——”
“Loose me, love!” implored the Duchess. “Unhand me, Herminia; I will not
remain.... I cannot—so awkward for Sir John ... for me! Oh, horrors,
Herminia!”
“Horrors indeed, dear aunt, but we’ll bear ’em together.”
“But—O child! A proposal—and I here! So indelicate! I’m all of a twitter,
I vow!”
“So am I, aunt. So shalt thou sit here with me and hear Sir John’s
comedy out, poor though it be. And Sir John ever performs better with an
audience, I’ll vow!”
“O sir,” wailed the little Duchess helplessly, “you see how I’m
constrained! Herminia is so—so strapping and strong! I may not stir,
indeed!”
“Aunt!”
“And brutishly brawny, sir.”
“Aunt Lucinda!”
“Ha!” exclaimed Sir John. “A most excellent phrase, your Grace!” And out
came his memorandum forthwith. “‘Bewitching but brutishly brawny is she!’
Here is metre with an alliterative descriptiveness very delightfully
arresting! And now, mesdames, I am hither come most solemnly to sue the
hand of my Lady Barrasdaile in marriage——”
“Then,” she retorted angrily, “all things considered, sir, I demand to
know how you dare?”
“Not lightly, madam, believe me,” he answered gravely; “but matrimony
no longer daunts me. Having made up my mind to’t, I am ready to face it
undismayed, to endure unflinching——”
“Sir, you insult me!”
“Madam, if I do, you are the first and only woman I have so insulted.”
“Remember the past, sir—its horrors——”
“Think of the future, madam, its joys. As my wife——”
“Heaven save and deliver me, sir!” she exclaimed scornfully. “Do you for
one moment imagine I would contemplate a situation so extreme horrid?”
“But indeed, my lady, despite what the cynics say, marriage hath much to
commend it. More especially a union ’twixt you and me, our natures being
so extreme the opposite of each other.”
“That, indeed, is true, I thank heaven!” she nodded.
“Alas, yes, my lady. You being of a somewhat violent, shall we
say—ungovernable temper——”
“Too tragically true!” murmured the Duchess behind her fan.
“Aunt, pray be silent!”
“The _armoire_, child!”
“Do not distract me, aunt. Sir, you are an insolent impertinent!”
“But of a nature serenely calm, madam, to temper your excessive cholers.
Indeed, we are each other’s opposites, for whiles you are something
ungentle, very headstrong, extreme capricious and vastly vindictive, I
am——”
“Utterly detestable, sir!” she cried indignantly. “Enough—enough! Good
Gad! must I sit and hear you thus abuse me? Forbid it, heaven! Is it
not enough affliction that my name should be coupled with yours in the
scandalous columns of an infamous journal?”
“Can you possibly mean _The Polite Monitor_, madam?” he sighed.
“What else, sir? And you ha’ read the hateful thing as a matter of
course!”
“No, my lady. I wrote it.”
“You, Sir John!” exclaimed the Duchess.
“You—’twas you?” cried my lady.
“Myself!” quoth Sir John. “’Twas writ in haste and hath small merit, I
fear, and little to commend it, but such as ’tis——”
“Commend it!” cried my lady. “Commend it! Oh, this is too much; you
are insufferable! Sir John Dering, you weary me; you may retire!” And
magnificently disdainful, she arose.
Sir John’s bow was Humility manifest.
“Madam,” sighed he, “I am now as ever your ladyship’s most obedient,
humble servant. I go—yet first o’ your mercy and in justice to myself,
pray tell us when ’twill be?”
“What, sir, in heaven’s name?”
“Our wedding. When will you marry me, Herminia?”
“Never—oh, never!” she cried passionately. “I had rather die first!”
“Alas, Herminia, for your so passionate refusal!” he mourned. “Tush, my
lady, for your choice o’ death! And for thy so arrogant, unruly self—fare
thee well. So must I to the country there to seek my Rose.... O Rose o’
love, my fragrant Rose.... God keep thee, my Lady Herminia, and teach
thee more of gentleness. Duchess, most generous of women—adieu!”
So saying, Sir John bowed, and, wistful and despondent, took his
departure.
“Aunt,” cried her ladyship, when they were alone, “in heaven’s name, why
did you?”
“Why did I what, miss?”
“Receive that—that—man?”
“Perhaps because he—is a man, Herminia. Perhaps because he is the man to
mould and master you. Perhaps because of his wistful, wondering, woman’s
eyes. Perhaps because you—wished me to—ha! Why must ye blush, child, pink
as a peony, I vow?”