THE HOUSE PARTY
"My dear Emmeline," said the Judge, "if I hadn't such a profound
contempt for Edward's intellect and for everything represented or
misrepresented by him, I could feel it in my heart to be very sorry for
him."
"My dear Herbert," replied Lady Birkett, "if you weren't as deeply
sorry for him as you actually are, you wouldn't be your own kind,
sympathetic, would-be-cynical self."
Sir Herbert and Lady Birkett with their two daughters and their
son-in-law had arrived at Kencote that afternoon to make part of the
company gathered there for the South Meadshire Hunt Ball. Other guests
had arrived by a later train, but there had been an interval during
which the Judge had been closeted with his brother-in-law, the Squire,
and heard from him everything that had taken place within the past
month, which was the interval that had elapsed since Dick had abruptly
left Kencote. He had now come into his wife's bedroom, where she was
in the later stages of dressing for dinner, although dinner was as yet
half an hour off.
"I know you want to tell me everything," she said, "and although the
lady who is doing my hair does not understand a word of English as yet,
you will probably be able to talk more freely if she is not present.
If you will come back in five minutes she will have gone to Angela."
So the Judge went into his dressing-room and, finding his clothes
already laid out, dressed and repaired again to his wife, not quite in
five minutes, but in little more than ten.
"I suppose you have heard all about it from Nina?" he said, taking up
the conversation where he had left it. "Have you seen this Lady George
Dubec?"
"Yes," said Lady Birkett. "She is not in the least what Edward
pictures her, according to Nina. As far as her looks tell one
anything, I should say she was a charming woman."
"Edward paints her as a voluptuous siren of the ballet. I suppose one
may put that down as one of his usual excursions of imagination."
"She certainly isn't that, and it was news to me that she had ever been
on the stage. Poor Nina is very distressed about it. She says that
they have had no word from Dick since he left the house, that Edward
has only heard through Humphrey that he has sent in his papers, but
even Humphrey doesn't know where he is or what he is doing."
"I had the same news from Edward, with the additions which might be
expected of him. He takes it hard that after all he has done for Dick
he should be treated in that way, and I don't know that I shouldn't
take it hard in his place. It makes me increasingly thankful that I
haven't any sons."
This was a polite little fiction on the Judge's part which his wife
respected. It was the chief regret of his life that he had no son.
"Nina says he is fretting himself into a fever," said Lady Birkett,
"lest Dick should be raising money on his expectations."
"Fretting himself into a fever," replied the Judge, "is not the
expression I should use of Edward. But he certainly feels deep
annoyance, and expresses it. He had not thought of that when he
delivered his ultimatum, and, as he says, it would be the easiest
possible thing for Dick to do. But I was mercifully able to relieve
his mind on that point. I did not exactly tell him that Dick, although
he has more brains in his little finger than his father has in his
head, is so much like him that he would shrink from taking so sensible
a step as much as Edward himself would; but I gave him the gist of it.
My dear Emmeline, to men like Edward and Dick, land--landed
property--is sacrosanct. Dick would give up _any_ woman rather than
embarrass an acre of Kencote. Kencote is his religion, just as much as
it is Edward's. Edward gained comfort from my assuring him of the
fact. He said that Dick was behaving so badly that right and wrong
seemed to have no distinction for him for the time being, but probably
there were crimes that he would not commit, and this might be one of
them."
"I am glad you told him that," said Lady Birkett. "I should think it
is probably true. But what is he doing, or thinking of doing?"
"He may be thinking of doing a little honest work," said the Judge, who
had sat for some time in the House of Commons as a wicked Radical. "I
put the suggestion to Edward for what it was worth, but he scouted it.
As he indicated, there is nothing that a man who has been through a
public school and university training, and has been for ten or fifteen
years in a position of responsibility in His Majesty's army, can do.
He has no money value whatever. I did not contradict him."
"_She_ has money, I suppose," said Lady Birkett.
"She must have some. But there again I felt able to reassure Edward.
I know the Dicks of the world pretty well. They are not without their
merits, and there are certain things they don't do. Of course, if he
were working, and making some sort of an income, with his prospects it
would be different."
Lady Birkett let this go by. "Will Edward hold out, do you think?" she
asked.
"Well," said the Judge reflectively, "I'm bound to say it surprises me,
but there is every sign of his holding out till Doomsday, or, which
puts a more likely period to it, till something unforeseen happens."
"Till he hears that Dick has married her, for instance."
"There wouldn't be much object in his holding out after that. But
there is seldom much object in Edward's divagations. He is swayed by
his prejudices and by the impulses of the moment. Still, I'll do him
justice: he is acting as sensibly as he knows how in this crisis. I
believe he loves Dick better than any being upon earth, with the
possible exception of himself. I really believe he loves him better
than himself. Of course Dick represents Kencote, and the family, and
the line, and all the whole clamjamphrie, which partly accounts for it.
At any rate he is causing his stupid old self an infinity of worry and
annoyance, and all for the sake of what he considers a principle. I
should say that Dick is acting foolishly in holding off altogether. I
dare say Nina told you he has not answered a single letter. It has
always struck me that he had Edward completely under his thumb, and I
should have said that he had only to hang on here and play his cards
well and Edward would have given way. Now he is stiffening himself up."
"I suppose they are both stiffening themselves up."
"You put it in a nutshell. Fancy Edward giving up his season's hunting
so that he shan't be obliged to set eyes on his aversion! That
impresses me. He is in dead earnest. He will stop this marriage if he
can."
"But Dick is just as obstinate."
"It is the case of the irresistible body and the immovable force."
"Didn't you make any suggestion?"
"Yes, I did. I suggested that he should stipulate for a year's delay.
I pointed out that if the lady was the bad character he supposes her to
be, Dick, with the sense he has inherited from his father--I said that,
God forgive me--would come to see it in that time."
"Did he take to the idea?"
"Not at all. When did Edward ever take to any idea at first sight?
But it will sink in, and I shall give Tom Beach a hint to follow it up."
"I believe it will be the best way, and Nina is going to try and see
Dick when she comes up with me next week."
The Judge stroked his chin. "H'm!" he said. "I'm afraid Nina has very
little power to help matters."
"I am much more sorry for Nina than I am for Edward."
"Oh, so am I," interpolated the Judge.
"It is the thing I can least forgive Dick--his treating his mother
practically in the same way as Edward treats her--as if she were of no
account. It doesn't promise well for the happiness of this Lady
George, or whoever he does come to marry."
"Let's hope for her own sake that she won't make Nina's mistake."
"You mean----"
"Oh, Nina laid herself down to be trampled on from the very first. She
had plenty of character. She could have stood out. Now, whatever
character she has has been buried under a mountain weight of stolid
stupidity. She can't call her soul her own."
"I think she would act--and against Edward--if she saw her way to act
effectively."
"She would be laying up a pretty bad time for herself if she did act
against Edward in any way."
"Oh, but she wouldn't mind that if she thought it was her duty."
"Well, she can try. And she might put that idea of mine to Dick. Let
him promise not to marry the lady for a year. He has been a bachelor
for thirty-five or so, and he can stand another. I believe it might be
the solution. I suppose we had better be going down now."
It was an unusually large party for Kencote that assembled at dinner.
The Squire took in Lady Aldeburgh, who must have been five-and-forty if
a day, but either by a special dispensation of Providence, or by
mysterious arts marvellously concealed, was still enabled to present
herself to the world as eight-and-twenty. The Squire did not quite
approve of this, but the illusion was so complete that he found himself
talking to her as if she were a girl. She was beautifully gowned in
blue and silver, and wore the Aldeburgh diamonds, which sparkled on the
clear white skin of her neck, on her corsage, and in the smooth ripples
of her hair. She was attractive enough to the eye to make it possible
for her to indulge in moods for the heightening of her charm.
Sometimes she was all childish gaiety and innocence; sometimes the deep
melancholy of her soul looked out of her violet eyes, which were so
good that they had to be given their chance; sometimes she was ice.
This evening she had begun on a pouting note, which she had often found
effective with elderly gentlemen, but finding the Squire impervious to
its appeal and plainly puzzled by it, remembering also that she had on
her diamonds, she had exchanged it for the air of a _grande dame_,
humanised by maternal instinct.
"Mother is telling Mr. Clinton how she has devoted herself to my
bringing-up," whispered Lady Susan to Humphrey. "Is he likely to be
impressed at all, do you think?"
"He is likely to be bowled over by the result," replied Humphrey
gallantly, and Lady Susan, who was not so pretty as her mother, and
only slightly more sensible, told him not to be an idiot.
Of Lady Birkett's two daughters, Beatrice, the elder, had been
accompanied by her husband, Sir George Senhouse, the rising young
politician, whose handsome, intellectual head would have made him
remarked anywhere, but whose bent shoulders, grey temples, and
carelessness of dress made him seem older than his years. The younger,
Angela, sat by the man she was going to marry, Hammond-Watt, the
youngest K.C. at the Bar. The inclusion of these two men in the party
had caused Bobby Trench, Humphrey's friend, to ask if he had come to
Kencote for a ball or a political meeting, and to suggest the
advisability of clearing out again before he should be asked for a
speech. This young gentleman, to whom the accident of birth had
brought the privilege of taking in his hostess, and whose other
neighbour had been Beatrice Birkett, asked himself before dinner was
over what he had come for, ball or no ball. He was accustomed to shine
in smart country houses, and Kencote was not at all smart. He had
found Mrs. Clinton unresponsive to his light chatter, and Angela
Birkett so taken up with the conversation of her K.C. that she had
little attention to spare for him. George Senhouse, who sat opposite
to him, made no effort to follow his lead, and, in fact, ignored him as
far as possible, which secretly annoyed him. Lady Aldeburgh, who would
have permitted him to flirt with her, was beyond his reach, and her
daughter was too much taken up with Humphrey to do more than exchange a
light sally or two with him. He was reduced to eating his dinner,
which was a very good one, and, in large intervals of silence, to
gazing around upon the company and inwardly ejaculating, "Never again!"
When the ladies had left the room the Squire, with old-fashioned
courtesy, brought the decanters down to his end of the table and
engaged him in conversation about his father.
"I recollect very well," said the Squire, in his loud, confident tones,
"when Cane Chair won the Derby at thirty-to-one, by George!--dear me, I
should be afraid to say how many years ago. He belonged to your
grandfather, and of course we were all on him. Your father and I----"
"Oh yes, he's told me that story dozens of times," said Bobby Trench.
"Oh!" said the Squire, somewhat disconcerted. "Yes, I suppose he has."
"We haven't heard it dozens of times," said George Senhouse. "What was
the story, Mr. Clinton?"
The Squire turned towards him and his face lightened. "I haven't
thought about it for years," he said. "It's just come back to me. Jim
Trench and I made up our minds we would go and see the horse run, so we
got out of a window at four o'clock in the morning--did I say it was
when we were at Cambridge together?--and drove tandem to Hitchin, where
we got a train to London. I recollect we had sent on a change of
horses to--to some place half-way. We slunk about amongst the crowd,
as Jim's father was particular--wouldn't bet even on his own horses and
all that sort of thing, and I don't blame him; I haven't had a bet on a
horse since I was in the Blues;--and he wouldn't have taken it well to
see Jim at Epsom when he ought to have been at Cambridge. Well, we saw
the horse win, and, by George! I should be afraid to say how much
money your father"--here he turned again towards Bobby Trench--"took
off the bookies."
"Pots," said Bobby laconically. "But he lost it all over the Leger."
"Ah, well, the best thing he could have done," said the Squire. "I had
put on a tenner, and both of us had had a little ready-money
transaction on the course after we'd seen the horse canter; so we went
back to London with a pocketful each, and by George!"--here the Squire
laughed his great laugh--"we'd dropped it all to a pack of
card-sharpers before we got there. We were pretty green in those days,
and it was all our own fault, so we didn't quarrel with the
fellows--we'd tried to have them, and they'd had us instead. We made
'em show us how it was done, so that we shouldn't be had again, and I
recollect they said we were a couple of good sportsmen and gave us a
sovereign or two back to get us to Cambridge, or we should have had to
walk there, by George!
"But that wasn't the end of it," proceeded the Squire after he had done
justice to his youthful memories with a hearty laugh. "We celebrated
the occasion with a supper of the True Blue Club, in your father's
rooms--has he told you that?"
"I don't know whether he's ever told me the truth about it," admitted
Bobby Trench.
"Weil, it's a long time ago," said the Squire, "and we were all young
and foolish. It was a lively supper, and your father went out for a
little fresh air. They used to keep the college buttery stores in
barges on the river in those days, and after wandering about a bit and
climbing a few fences and gates for purposes of his own he found
himself on the St. John's barge. Then he thought he'd like a bath, and
it didn't somehow occur to him to go in over the side, so he knocked a
hole in the bottom of the barge and sank her, by George!"
Here the Squire interrupted himself to laugh again. "He had all the
bath he wanted, and the wonder is he wasn't drowned," he concluded.
"Well, we had some pretty lively times in those days, and it doesn't do
you any harm to recall them occasionally. I should like to see your
father again. It must be thirty years since I set eyes on him. Wonder
if he'd care to come and shoot one of these days?"
Bobby Trench said he was sure he would be delighted, and undertook to
deliver a message, which he fulfilled later on by informing his father
that his one-time friend had developed into a regular old turnip-hoer,
and if he wanted to sit and listen to long-winded yarns about nothing
Kencote was the place to go to.