UNDER THE CHESTNUTS.
Vane Trevor was rather good-looking; a young gentleman of the slender
and delicate type; his dark hair curled, and on his small forehead one
of those tresses, twisted, barber-fashion, into a neat little Ionic
volute, and his glossy whiskers were curled on each cheek into little
rolls like pistol barrels. There was in his toilet something of
elaboration and precision which was uncomfortable, and made one fear to
shake hands with him, and wish him safely back again in his band-box.
He approached simpering. There was a general air of May Fair—cameo
studs, varnished boots, and lavender gloves—that had nothing of the
rough and careless country in it.
“How do, Miss Darkwell—charming day, is not it? Everything really so
fresh; you can’t imagine—as I came along, and a—this, now really this
little—a—_place_, it looks quite charming—quite, really, now—a—as you
turn off the road, there’s _every_thing you know to _make_ it charming.”
This latter period was delivered in a low tone, and with a gracious
significance.
“How d’ye do, Maubray?”
“Quite well, thank you,” said William, with a smile that had a flicker
of unconscious amusement in it. Perhaps without knowing it, he was
envying him at that moment. “He’s a worse fool, by Jove! than I thought
he was,” was his mental criticism; but he felt more conscious of his
clumsy shoes, and careless get-up. “That’s the sort of thing they
admire—why should a fellow be vexed—they can’t help it—it’s pure
instinct.”
“What delicious ground for croquet; positively I never saw anything so
beautiful in my life. Do you play, Miss Darkwell?”
“Sometimes, at the Rectory—not here. The Miss Mainwarings play, and once
or twice I’ve joined their party.”
“But they have no ground there,” insisted Mr. Trevor; “it’s all on a
slope. I happen to know it very well, because, in fact, it belongs to
me. Old Mainwaring pays me a pretty smart rent for it, at least he
thinks so. Ha! ha! ha!” and Vane Trevor cackled gaily over his joke,
such as it was.
“Do you play?” demanded Violet of William.
“Croquet?—no, not much—just a little—once or twice—I’ll do to fill a
place if you want a very bad player.”
“Oh, never mind, we’ll pull you through, or push you—ha, ha, ha!—we
will, indeed. You’ll learn it a—in no time, it’s so simple—isn’t it,
Miss Darkwell? And then if you can get up one of those Miss
Mainwarings—awfully slow girls, I’m told, but they will do to play with
_you_, Maubray, just by way of ballast, he’s such a fast fellow—ha, ha,
ha! You’ll want a—a slow partner, eh?”
“Yes, and _you’ll_ want a clever one, so I surrender Miss Darkwell, just
to balance the game,” answered William, who was a little combative that
morning.
“Egad, I should like uncommonly to be balanced that way, I can tell you;
much better, I assure you, Miss Darkwell, than the sort of balancing
I’ve been at the last two days, with my steward’s books—ha, ha, ha!
Awful slow work, figures. A regular dose of arithmetic. Upon my honour
you’d pity me if you knew; you really would.”
“You really would,” echoed William, “if you knew how little he knows of
it.”
“Come, now, old fellow, none of your chaff, but get the balls and hoops,
if Miss Darkwell will allow you, and we will choose the ground.”
“Lots of ground—I’ll choose that if you like—only _you’ll_ just run and
get the hoops and balls, for we have none here,” answered Maubray.
“No croquet!” ejaculated Mr. Trevor, expanding his lavender kid fingers,
and elevating his eyebrows. “I thought everyone had croquet now—I mean,
you know, the mallet-things, and hoops and balls,—and—and those little
painted sticks, you know—and what are we to do, Miss Darkwell?”
“I really don’t know. It’s quite true; and besides we have not got Miss
Mainwaring, you forget.”
“Oh! you’ll send Maubray, won’t you, to fetch her?”
“Yes,” said Maubray, “I’ll go with great pleasure, if Miss Darkwell
wishes; but as I never saw the young lady before, I’m not quite sure
that she’ll come away with me.”
“Well no—ha, ha, ha!—I don’t think she’d run away with Maubray at _first
sight_.”
“Particularly to come to _you_,” replied Maubray.
“There now, let’s be serious—there’s a little fellow I saw at your
gate—yes, there he is, Miss Darkwell. Suppose you let me send him to
Revington. I’ve no end of those things there; and I’ll give him a note
to Sparks, and we shall have them in no time.”
“A long time, I’m afraid,” objected Violet.
“No, I assure you; a mere nothing; not twenty minutes. Do, pray, allow
me.”
And he wrote with a pencil, on the back of a card, an order to Sparks
for the croquet apparatus, and away trotted the messenger.
“Three can play, you know, or two for that matter, as well as twenty,
and so we can do quite well without troubling Miss Mainwaring.”
There was now a knocking at the drawing-room window, where William had
seen dimly through the glass, the form of Aunt Dinah at her knitting,
with Psyche in her new collar, seated by her. All looked towards the
signal, and Miss Perfect threw up the window and said:
“How do you do, Mr. Trevor? what a sweet morning.”
“Perfectly charming,” responded the master of Revington, with a tender
emphasis and smiling toward Miss Perfect with his hat in his hand; and
Aunt Dinah smiled and nodded again in return.
“William, I want you for a moment—here, dear, you need not come in.”
The instinct which makes old ladies afford a dole now and then of a few
minutes to lovers, is in harmony with the general rule of mercy and
mitigation which alleviates every human situation.
As soon as Miss Dinah raised the window, William saw standing in the
chiaro-oscuro of the apartment, a tall and rather handsome old
clergyman. A little rusty was his black suit—a little dust was on his
gaiters. It must have been he whom William had mistaken for the attorney
who was to have visited his aunt that morning. He had seen him walk his
nag up to the door about an hour ago, and dismount.
The old clergyman was looking observantly and kindly on William; and,
nodding to him, and with her thin hand extended toward her nephew, she
said, “This is he!” with a proud smile in her old eyes, for she thought
William the handsomest fellow alive.
“Happy to make your acquaintance, Sir,” said the cleric stepping forward
and shaking William’s hand. “I knew your father, and grandfather, and
your aunt and I are very old friends; and I’ve just been telling her how
happy I shall be⸺”
“This is Doctor Wagget, my very good and kind old friend; you may have
heard me speak of him often, I dare say,” interposed my aunt.
“And your reading, Sir, has been rather desultory, your aunt tells me,
like my own, Sir—ha, ha, ha! We had rather give our time than pay it;
read what is not exacted of us than what is. But I don’t know, Miss
Perfect,” continued the doctor, turning to that lady, as if they were in
consultation upon William’s case, “reading—that is in the case of a man
who thinks—and I am sure our young friend here thinks for
himself—resembles the browsing of cattle: they choose their own herbage,
and the particular flowers and grasses that answer their special
conditions best, eh? and so they thrive. Instinct directs us creatures,
in the one as in the other; and so we read, he and I—ha, ha! what best
nourishes, you see—what we can assimilate and enjoy. For plodding
fellows, that devour the curriculum set before them—neither more nor
less—are, you see, stall-fed, bulkier fellows; higher priced in the
market; but they haven’t our flavour and texture. Oh, no—ha, ha!—eh?”
The ecclesiastic was cheery and kindly, and in his manner was a curious
mixture of energy and simplicity which William Maubray liked.
The conclusion of this little harangue he had addressed to William
Maubray; and I am afraid that Miss Perfect was more interested by the
picture on the lawn; for without reference to the doctor’s subject, she
desired to know, looking with a pleased inquisitiveness at the young
people, whether they were going to take a walk, or _what_? And prolonged
her little _tête-à-tête_ with William over the window-stool.
When William Maubray looked up again at Doctor Wagget, that divine had
picked up a book, a trick of his, like that of the cattle from whom his
illustration was borrowed, and who employ every moment’s pause at the
wayside, in a pluck at the nearest foliage or turf of grass; and with
the intimation, “you may as well join them,” Miss Perfect dismissed her
nephew.
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