A Rencontre in the Gallery.
It was time now; however, that they should make their appearance in the
drawing-room; so, for the present, Varbarriere departed. He reached his
dressing-room in an undefined state--a sort of light, not of battle
fires, but of the dawn in his perspective; when, all on a sudden, came
the image of a white-moustached, white-browed, grim old military man,
glancing with a clear, cold eye, that could be cruel, from the
first-class carriage window, up and down the platform of a gas-lit
station, some hour and a half away from Slowton, and then sternly at his
watch.
"The stupid old fogey!" thought Varbarriere, with a pang, as he revised
his toilet hurriedly for the drawing-room. "Could that episode be
evaded?"
There was no time to arrive at a clear opinion on this point, nor,
indeed, to ascertain very clearly what his own wishes pointed at. So, in
a state rather anarchic, he entered the gallery, _en route_ for the
drawing-room.
Monsieur Varbarriere slid forth, fat and black, from his doorway, with
wondrous little noise, his bulk considered, and instantly on his retina,
lighted by the lamp at the cross galleries, appeared the figure of a
tall thin female, attired in a dark cloak and bonnet, seated against
the opposite wall, not many steps away. Its head turned, and he saw
Donica Gwynn. It was an odd sort of surprise; he had just been thinking
of her.
"Oh! I did not think as you were here, sir; I thought you was in
Lunnon."
"Yet here I am, and you too, both unexpectedly." A suspicion had crossed
his mind. "How d'ye do, Mrs. Gwynn?"
"Well, I thank you, sir."
"Want _me_ here?"
"No, sir; I was wrote for by missus please."
"Yes," he said very slowly, looking hard at her. "Very good, Mrs. Gwynn;
have you anything to say to me?"
It would not do, of course, to protract this accidental talk; he did not
care to be seen _tête-à-tête_ with Donica Gwynn in the gallery.
"No, sir, please, I han't nothing to say, sir," and she courtesied.
"Very well, Mrs. Gwynn; we're quite secret, hey?" and with another hard
look, but only momentary, in her face, he proceeded toward the head of
the staircase.
"Beg parding, sir, but I think you dropt something." She was pointing to
a letter, doubled up, and a triangular corner of which stuck up from the
floor, a few yards away.
"Oh! thank you," said Varbarriere, quickly retracing his steps, and
picking it up.
A terrible fact for the world to digest is this, that some of our
gentlemen attorneys are about the most slobbering men of business to be
found within its four corners. They will mislay papers, and even lose
them; they are dilatory and indolent--quite the reverse of our sharp,
lynx-eyed, energetic notions of that priesthood of Themis, and prone to
every sort and description of lay irregularity in matters of order and
pink tape.
Our friend Pelter had a first-rate staff, and a clockwork partner beside
in Crowe, so that the house was a very regular one, and was himself, in
good measure, the fire, bustle, and impetus of the firm. But every
virtue has its peccant correspondent. If Pelter was rapid, decided,
daring, he was also a little hand-over-hand. He has been seen in a hurry
to sweep together and crunch like a snowball a drift of banknotes, and
stuff them so impressed into the bottom of his great-coat pocket! What
more can one say?
This night, fussing out at his bed-room door, he plucked his scented
handkerchief from his pocket, and, as he crossed his threshold, with it
flirted forth a letter, which had undergone considerable attrition in
that receptacle, and was nothing the whiter, I am bound to admit,
especially about the edges, for its long sojourn there.
Varbarriere knew the handwriting and I. M. M. initials in the left-hand
lower angle. So, with a nod and a smile, he popped it into his trowsers
pocket, being that degree more cautious than Pelter.
Sir Jekyl was once more in high spirits. To do him justice, he had not
affected anything. There had been an effervescence--he hardly knew how
it came about. But his dangers seemed to be dispersing; and, at the
worst, were not negotiation and compromise within his reach?
Samuel Pelter, Esq., gentleman attorney and a solicitor of the High
Court of Chancery, like most prosperous men, had a comfortable
confidence in himself; and having heard that Lady Alice Redcliffe was
quarrelling with her lawyer, thought there could be no harm in his
cultivating her acquaintance.
The old lady was sitting in a high-backed chair, very perpendicularly,
with several shawls about and around her, stiff and pale; but her dusky
eyes peered from their sunken sockets, in grim and isolated observation.
Pelter strutted up. He was not, perhaps, a distinguished-looking
man--rather, I fear, the contrary. His face was broad and smirking, with
a short, broad, blue chin, and a close crop of iron-grey on his round
head, and plenty of crafty crow's-feet and other lines well placed
about.
He stood on the hearthrug, within easy earshot of Lady Alice, whom he
eyed with a shrewd glance, "taking her measure," as his phrase was, and
preparing to fascinate his prey.
"Awful smash that, ma'am, on the Smather and Sham Junction," said
Pelter, having fished up a suitable topic. "Frightful thing--fourteen
killed--and they say upwards of seventy badly hurt. I'm no chicken, Lady
Alice, but by Jove, ma'am, I can't remember any such casualty--a regular
ca-tas-trophe, ma'am!"
And Pelter, with much feeling, gently lashed his paunch with his
watch-chain and bunch of seals, an obsolete decoration, which he wore--I
believe still wears.
Lady Alice, who glowered sternly on him during this speech, nodded
abruptly with an inarticulate sound, and then looked to his left, at a
distant picture.
"I trust I see you a great deal better, Lady Alice. I have the pleasure,
I believe, to address Lady Alice Redcliffe--aw, haw, h'm," and the
attorney executed his best bow, a ceremony rather of agility than grace.
"I had the honour of seeing you, Lady Alice Redcliffe, at a
shower-flow--flower-show, I mean--in the year--let me see--egad, ma'am,
twelve--no--no--_thirteen_ years ago. How time does fly! Of course all
them years--_thirteen_, egad!--has not gone for nothing. I dare say you
don't perceive the alterations in yourself--no one does--I wish no one
else did--that was always my wish to Mrs. P. of a morning--_my_ good
lady, Mrs. Pelter--ha, ha, ha! Man can't tether time or tide, as the
Psalm says, and every year scribbles a wrinkle or two. You were
suffering, I heard then, ma'am, chronic cough, ma'am--and all that. I
hope it's abated--I know it will, ma'am--my poor lady is a martyr to
it--troublesome thing--very--awful troublesome! Lady Alice."
There was no reply, Lady Alice was still looking sternly at the picture.
"I remember so well, ma'am, you were walking a little lame then, linked
with Lord Lumdlebury--(we have had the honour to do business
occasionally for his lordship)--and I was informed by a party with me
that you had been with Pincendorf. I don't think much of them jockeys,
ma'am, for my part; but if it was anything of a callosity--"
Without waiting for any more, Lady Alice Redcliffe rose in solemn
silence to her full height, beckoned to Beatrix, and said grimly--
"I'll change my seat, dear, to the sofa--will you help me with these
things?"
Lady Alice glided awfully to the sofa, and the gallant Mr. Pelter
instituted a playful struggle with Beatrix for possession of the shawls.
"I remember the time, miss, I would not have let you carry your share;
but, as I was saying to Lady Alice Redcliffe--"
He was by this time tucking a shawl about her knees, which, so soon as
she perceived, she gasped to Beatrix--
"Where's Jekyl?--I can't have _this_ any longer--call him here."
"As I was saying to you, Lady Alice, ma'am, our joints grow a bit rusty
after sixty; and talking of feet, I passed the Smather and Slam
Junction, ma'am, only two hours after the collision; and, egad! there
were three feet all in a row cut off by the instep, quite smooth, ma'am,
lying in the blood there, a pool as long as the passage up-stairs--awful
sight!"
Lady Alice rose up again, with her eyes very wide, and her mouth very
close, apparently engaged in mental prayer, and her face angry and pink,
and she beckoned with tremulous fingers to Sir Jekyl, who was
approaching with one of his provoking smiles.
"I say, Mr. Pelter, my friend Doocey wants you over there; they're at
logger-heads about a law point, and I can't help them."
"Hey! if it's _practice_ I can give them a wrinkle maybe;" and away
stumped the attorney, his fists in his pockets, smirking, to the group
indicated by his host.
"Hope I haven't interrupted a conversation? What can I do for you?" said
Sir Jekyl, gaily.
"What do you _mean_, Jekyl Marlowe--what _can_ you mean by bringing such
persons here? What pleasure can you _possibly_ find in low and
_dreadful_ society?--none of your family liked it. Where did you find
that man? How on earth did you procure such a person? If I _could_--if I
had been well enough, I'd have rung the bell and ordered your servant to
remove him. I'd have gone to my bed-room, sir, only that even there I
could not have felt safe from his intrusions. It's utterly intolerable
and preposterous!"
"I had no idea my venerable friend, Pelter, could have pursued a lady so
cruelly; but rely upon me, I'll protect you."
"I think you had better cleanse your house of such persons; at all
events, I insist they shan't be allowed to make their horrible sport of
me!" said Lady Alice, darting a fiery glance after the agreeable
attorney.