CROQUET.
While William Maubray was thus employed, Mr. Trevor agreeably accosted
Miss Violet.
“Now we are to choose the ground, you know, Miss Darkwell—you are to
choose it, in fact. I think, don’t you, it looks particularly smooth
just there. By Jove it does!—really, now, just like a billiard-table,
behind those a—those a—what-d’ye-callem’s—the evergreens there.”
“I think it does, really,” said Miss Vi, gliding very contentedly into
his ambuscade. “There’s a little shade too.”
“Yes, lots of shade; I hate the sun. I’m afraid my deeds are darkness,
as Dr. Mainwaring says. There’s only one sort of light I really like,
now, upon my honour—the light—the light you—you know, the light that
comes from Miss Darkwell’s eyes—ha, ha! upon my honour.”
The idea was not quite original, perhaps, but Miss Darkwell blushed a
little, and smiled, as it were, on the leaves, and wondered how soon the
messenger with the croquet things would return. And Mr. Trevor consulted
his watch, and said he would allow him a quarter of an hour more, and
added that he would willingly allow the poor little beggar an hour, or
any time; for his part, the—the time, in fact, went only too fast for
him.
Miss Perfect, looking over her spectacles, and then with elevated chin
through them, said:
“Where have they gone to? can you see?”
“I don’t know—I suppose sauntering about—they can’t be very far,”
answered William, looking a little uneasily. And somehow forgetting that
he was in the midst of a dialogue with Aunt Dinah, he strode away,
whistling a little air, anxiously, in the direction in which he had left
them.
“We have such a charming piece of ground here,” exclaimed Violet, on
whose cheeks was a flush, and in whose beautiful eyes a light which
Maubray did not like.
“First rate; capital, by Jove! it is,” exclaimed Trevor in
corroboration.
“I don’t see anything very wonderful about it. I think the ground on the
other side of these trees better, decidedly; and this is out of sight of
the windows,” said William, a little drily.
“We don’t want a view of the windows—do we?” asked Mr. Trevor, with an
agreeable simplicity, of Miss Darkwell. “The windows? I really did not
think of them; but, perhaps, Mr. Maubray wishes to be within call for
lunch.”
Mr. Trevor laughed pleasantly at this cruel sally.
“Well, yes, that, of course,” said William, “and, beside, my aunt might
want to speak to me again, as she did just now; and I don’t want to be
out of sight, in case she should.”
This was very bitter of William; and, perhaps, Miss Violet was a little
put out, as she certainly was a little more flushed, and a short silence
followed, during which, looking and walking slowly toward the gate, she
asked, “Is that the boy with the croquet?”
“Yes—no—_yes_, by Jove, it _is_! What wonderful eyes yours are, Miss
Darkwell!”
The latter remark was in a tender undertone, the music of which was
accompanied by the long-drawn screak of the iron gate, as the boy
entered with a holland bag, mallets, and hoops.
The hoops were hardly placed, when Miss Perfect once more knocked at the
window and beckoned.
“Aunt Dinah wants me again,” said William, and he ran to the window,
mallet in hand.
The old clergyman had gone away, and I think Aunt Dinah only wanted to
give the lovers a few minutes.
“Villikens and his Dinah,” said Mr. Trevor, and exploded in repeated
cachinations over his joke. “I vote we call him Villikens—capital name,
isn’t it?—I really do. But, by Jove, I hope the old lady won’t go on
calling him up from his game every minute. We’d have been a great deal
better at the other side of the trees, where we were going to play,
don’t you think?”
“He is coming at last,” said Miss Violet.
“Shall we be partners, you and I? Do let us, and give him two balls,”
urged Mr. Trevor, graciously, and a little archly.
“Well, I think that’s dull, rather, isn’t it? one playing with two
balls,” remonstrated Miss Darkwell.
And before the debate could proceed William Maubray had arrived.
“Everyone for himself, eh?” said Trevor; and so the game set in, Trevor
and William Maubray playing rather acrimoniously, and making savage
roquets upon one another; and Miss Darkwell—though William dealt
tenderly with her—was hard upon him, and, so far as her slender force
would go, knocked him about inconveniently.
“Capital roquet, Miss Darkwell,” Trevor would cry, as William’s ball
bounded away into perspective, and his heart felt sore, as if her
ungrateful mallet had smitten it; and his reprisals on Trevor were
terrific.
Thus, amid laughter, a little hypocritical, and honest hard knocks, the
game proceeded, and Miss Darkwell, at its close, was the winner.
William Maubray could lose as good-humouredly as any fellow at other
games, but he was somehow sore and angry here. He was spited by Violet’s
partial dealing. Violet, how unnatural! Little Vi! his bird! his
property, it seemed, leagued with that coxcomb to whack him about—to
make a butt and a fool of him.
“I’m not going to play any more. I’ll sit down here, if you like, and
do”—_gooseberry_, he was on the point of saying, for he was very angry,
and young enough, in his wrath, to talk away like a schoolboy—“and do
audience, or rather spectator; or, if you choose, Trevor, to take that
walk over the Warren you promised me, I’m ready. I’ll do exactly
whatever Miss Darkwell prefers. If she wishes to play on with you, I’ll
remain, and if she has had enough of us, I’ll go.”
“I can’t play—there is not time for another game,” said Miss Vi, peeping
at her watch. “My aunt will want me in a few minutes about that old
woman—old Widow Grey. I—I’m afraid I must go. Good-bye.”
“Awfully sorry! But, perhaps you can? Well, I suppose, no help for it,”
said Trevor.
And they walked slowly to the door, where Miss Vi pronounced the
conventional invitation to enter, which was, however, wistfully
declined, and Trevor and William Maubray set out upon their walk, and
Miss Vi, in the drawing-room, sat down on the old-fashioned window-seat,
and looked out, silent, and a little sulkily after them.
Miss Perfect glanced over her spectacles, with a stealthy and grave
inquisitiveness, at the pretty girl.
“Well, dear, they went away?” she said, after a silence.
“Oh! yes; I was tired playing, and, I think, William wanted to go for a
walk.”
“There seemed to be a great deal of fun over the game,” said Aunt Dinah,
who wanted to hear everything.
“Yes, I believe so; but one tires of it. I do, I know:” and saying this,
Violet took up her novel, and Aunt Dinah scrutinised her, from time to
time, obliquely, over her crochet needles, and silence reigned in the
drawing-room.
“Very pretty Miss Darkwell is. I quite envy you. Your cousin, isn’t
she?” said Trevor, graciously. He felt that William would be flattered
by the envy, even playful, of Vane Trevor, Esq., of Revington.
“Cousin, or something, someway or other connected or related, I don’t
know exactly. Yes, I believe she is very well. She was prettier as a
child, though. Isn’t there a short way to the Warren?”
“Yes, I’ll take you right. She looks, I’d say, about seventeen.”
“Yes, I dare say,” answered William. “Do you know those Miss
Mainwarings—Doctor Mainwaring’s daughters?”
But it would not do. Vane Trevor would go on talking of Violet Darkwell,
in spite of William’s dry answers and repeated divergences,
unaccountably to that philosophical young gentleman’s annoyance.
------------------------------------------------------------------------