“The creature’s at her dirty work again.”--POPE.
Amongst the infinite petty points of cunning of which that great
practical philosopher Bacon has in vain essayed to make out a list,
he notes that, “Because it worketh better when any thing seemeth to be
gotten from you by question than if you offer it of yourself: you may
lay a bait for a question, by showing another visage and countenance
than you are wont, to the end to give occasion to the party to ask what
the matter is of the change.”
“What is the matter, my dearest Mrs. Beaumont? I never saw you look so
sad before in all my life,” said Miss Hunter, meeting Mrs. Beaumont, who
had walked out into the park on purpose to be so met, and in hopes of
having the melancholy of her countenance thus observed. It was the more
striking, and the more unseasonable, from its contrast with the gay
scene in the park. The sound of music was heard, and the dancing had
begun, and all was rural festivity: “What is the matter, my dearest Mrs.
Beaumont?” repeated Miss Hunter; “at such a time as this to see you look
so melancholy!”
“Ah! my love! such a sad change in affairs! But,” whispered Mrs.
Beaumont, “I cannot explain myself before your companion.”
Mr. Lightbody was walking with Miss Hunter: but he was so complaisant,
that he was easily despatched on some convenient errand; and then Mrs.
Beaumont, with all her wonted delicacy of circumlocution, began to
communicate her distress to her young friend.
“You know, my beloved Albina,” said she, “it has been my most ardent
wish that your brother should be connected with my family by the nearest
and dearest ties.”
“Yes; that is, married to Amelia,” said Miss Hunter. “And has any thing
happened to prevent it?”
“Oh, my dear! it is all over! It cannot be--must not be thought of--must
not be spoken of any more; Mr. Palmer has been outrageous about it. Such
a scene as I have had! and all to no purpose. Amelia has won him over to
her party. Only conceive what I felt--she declared, beyond redemption,
her preference of Captain Walsingham.”
“Before the captain proposed for her! How odd! dear! Suppose he should
never propose for her, what a way she will be in after affronting my
brother and all! And only think! she gives up the title, and the great
Wigram estate, and every thing. Why, my brother says, uncle Wigram can’t
live three months; and Lord Puckeridge’s title, too, will come to my
brother, you know; and Amelia might have been Lady Puckeridge. Only
think! did you ever know any thing so foolish?”
“Never!” said Mrs. Beaumont; “but you know, my dear, so few girls have
the sense you show in taking advice: they all will judge for themselves.
But I’m most hurt by Amelia’s want of gratitude and delicacy towards
_me_,” continued Mrs. Beaumont; “only conceive the difficulty and
distress in which she has left me about your poor brother. Such a shock
as the disappointment will be to him! And he may--though Heaven knows
how little I deserve it--he may suspect--for men, when they are vexed
and angry, will, you know, suspect even their best friends; he might, I
say, suspect me of not being warm in his cause.”
“Dear, no! I have always told him how kind you were, and how much you
wished the thing; and of all people in the world he can’t blame you,
dearest Mrs. Beaumont.”
At this instant Mrs. Beaumont saw a glimpse of somebody in a bye-path
of the shrubbery near them. “Hush! Take care! Who is that lurking there?
Some listener! Who can it be?”
Miss Hunter applied her glass to her eye, but could not make out who it
was.
“It is Lightbody, I declare,” said Mrs. Beaumont. “Softly,--let us not
pretend to see him, and watch what he will do. It is of the greatest
consequence to me to know whether he is a listener or not; so much as he
is about the house.”
An irresistible fit of giggling, which seized Miss Hunter at the odd
way in which Lightbody walked, prevented Mrs. Beaumont’s trial of his
curiosity. At the noise which the young lady made, Mr. Lightbody turned
his head, and immediately advancing, with his accustomed mixture of
effrontery and servility, said, that “he had executed Mrs. Beaumont’s
commands, and that he had returned in hopes of getting a moment to say a
word to her when she was at leisure, about something he had just learned
from Mr. Palmer’s man Crichton, which it was of consequence she should
know without delay.”
“Oh, thank you, you best of creatures; but I know all that already.”
“You know that Mr. Palmer does not go to-morrow?”
“Yes; and am so rejoiced at it! Do, my dear Lightbody, go to Amelia and
my son from me, and tell them that charming news. And after that, pray
have the compassion to inquire if the post is not come in yet, and run
over the papers, to see if you can find any thing about Walsingham’s
prize.”
Mr. Lightbody obeyed, but not with his usual alacrity. Mrs. Beaumont
mused for a moment, and then said, “I do believe he was listening. What
could he be doing there?”
“Doing!--Oh, nothing,” said Miss Hunter: “he’s never doing any thing,
you know; and as to listening, he was so far off he could not hear a
word we said: besides, he is such a simple creature, and loves you so!”
“I don’t know,” said Mrs. Beaumont; “he either did not play me fair, or
else he did a job I employed him in this morning so awkwardly, that I
never wish to employ him again. He is but a _low_ kind of person, after
all; I’ll get rid of him: that sort of people always grow tiresome and
troublesome after a time, and one must shake them off. But I have not
leisure to think of him now--Well, my dear, to go on with what I was
saying to you.”
Mrs. Beaumont went on talking of her friendship for Sir John Hunter,
and of the difficulty of appeasing him; but observing that Miss Hunter
listened only with forced attention, she paused to consider what this
could mean. Habitually suspicious, like all insincere people, Mrs.
Beaumont now began to imagine that there was some plot carrying on
against her by Sir John Hunter and Lightbody, and that Miss Hunter
was made use of against her. Having a most contemptible opinion of her
Albina’s understanding, and knowing that her young friend had too little
capacity to be able to deceive her, or to invent a plausible excuse
impromptu, Mrs. Beaumont turned quick, and exclaimed, “My dear, what
could Lightbody be saying to you when I came up?--for I remember he
stopped short, and you both looked so guilty.”
“Guilty! did I?--Did he?--Dearest Mrs. Beaumont, don’t look at me so
with your piercing eyes!--Oh! I vow and protest I can’t tell you; I
won’t tell you.”
The young lady tittered, and twisted herself into various affected
attitudes; then kissing Mrs. Beaumont, and then turning her back with
childish playfulness, she cried, “No, I won’t tell you; never, never,
never!”
“Come, come, my dear, don’t trifle; I have really business to do, and am
in a hurry.”
“Well, don’t look at me--never look at me again--promise me that, and
I’ll tell you. Poor Lightbody--Oh, you’re looking at me!--Poor Lightbody
was talking to me of _somebody_, and he laid me a wager--but I can’t
tell you that--Ah, don’t be angry with me, and I will tell, if you’ll
turn your head quite away!--that I should be married to _somebody_
before the end of this year. Oh, now, don’t look at me, dearest, dearest
Mrs. Beaumont.”
“You dear little simpleton, and was that all?” said Mrs. Beaumont, vexed
to have wasted her time upon such folly: “come, be serious now, my dear;
if you knew the anxiety I am in at this moment--” But wisely judging
that it would be in vain to hope for any portion of the love-sick
damsel’s attention, until she had confirmed her hopes of being married
to _somebody_ before the end of the year, Mrs. Beaumont scrupled not to
throw out assurances, in which she had herself no further faith.
After what she had heard from her son this morning, she must have been
convinced that there was no chance of marrying him to Miss Hunter; she
knew indeed positively, that he would soon declare his real attachment,
but she could, she thought, during the interval retain her power over
Miss Hunter, and secure her services, by concealing the truth.
“Before I say one word more of my own affairs, let me, my dearest
child, assure you, that in the midst of all these disappointments and
mortifications about Amelia, I am supported by the hope--by something
more than the hope--that I shall see the daughter of my heart happily
settled soon: Lightbody does not want penetration, I see. But I am
not at liberty to say more. So now, my dear, help me with all your
cleverness to consider what I shall do in the difficulties I am in at
this moment. Your brother has a letter of mine, approving, and so forth,
his addresses to my daughter; now, if he, in the first rashness of his
anger, should produce this to Palmer, I’m undone--or to my son, worse
and worse! there would be a duel between them infallibly, for Beaumont
is so warm on any point of honour--Oh, I dread to think of it, my dear!”
“So do I, I’m sure; but, Lord, I’m the worst person to think in a
hurry--But can’t you write a letter? for you always know what to say so
well--And after all, do you know, I don’t think he’ll be half so angry
or _so disappointed_ as you fancy, for I never thought he was so much in
love with Amelia.”
“Indeed!”
“I know, if it was not a secret, I could tell you--”
“What? No secrets between us, my darling child.”
“Then I can tell you, that just before he proposed for Amelia, he was
consulting with me about proposing for Mrs. Dutton.”
“Mrs. Dutton, the widow! Mrs. Dutton! How you astonish me!” said Mrs.
Beaumont (though she knew this before). “Why she is older than I am.”
“Older! yes, a great deal; but then you know my brother is no chicken
himself.”
“To be sure, compared with you, my dear, he is not young. There’s a
prodigious difference between you.”
“Above twenty years; _for,_ you know, he’s by another marriage.”
“True; but I can’t believe he proposed for Mrs. Dutton.”
“Not actually proposed, because I would not let him; for I should
have hated to have had such an unfashionable-looking woman for my
sister-in-law. I never could have borne to go into public with her, you
know: so I plagued my brother out of it; and luckily he found out that
her jointure is not half so great as it was said to be.”
“I could have told him that. Mrs. Dutton’s jointure is nothing nearly
so large as mine was, even before the addition to it which my son so
handsomely, and indeed unexpectedly, made to it this morning. And did I
tell you, my dear? Mr. Palmer, this day, has been so kind as to leave me
all his immense fortune for my own life. But don’t mention it, lest it
should get round, and make ill-will: the Walsinghams know nothing of it.
But to return to your poor brother--if I could any way serve him with
Mrs. Dutton?”
“La! he’d never think of her more--and I’m sure I would not have him.”
“You dear little saucy creature! indeed I cannot wonder that you don’t
like the thoughts of Mrs. Dutton for a _chaperon_ in town.”
“Oh, horrid! horrid!”
“And yet, would you condemn your poor brother to be an old bachelor,
after this disappointment with Amelia?”
“La, ma’am, can’t he marry any body but Mrs. Dutton?”
“I wish I could think of any person would suit him. Can you?’
“Oh, I know very well who I think would suit him, and one I like to go
into public with of all things.”
“Who?”
“And one who has promised to present me at court next winter.”
“My dearest child! is it possible that you mean me?”
“I do;--and why not?”
“Why not! My sweet love, do you consider my age?”
“But you look so young.”
“To be sure Mrs. Dutton looks older, and is older; but I could not bring
myself, especially after being a widow so long, to think of marrying a
young man--to be sure, your brother is not what one should call a very
young man.”
“Dear, no; you don’t look above three, or four, or five years older than
he does; and in public, and with dress, and rouge, and fashion, and all
that, I think it would do vastly well, and nobody would think it odd at
all. There’s Lady ----, is not she ten years older than Lord ----? and
every body says that’s nothing, and that she gives the most delightful
parties. Oh, I declare, dearest Mrs. Beaumont, you must and shall marry
my brother, and that’s the only way to make him amends, and prevent
mischief between the gentlemen; the only way to settle every thing
charmingly--and I shall so like it--and I’m so proud of its being my
plan! I vow, I’ll go and write to my brother this minute, and--”
“Stay, you dear mad creature; only consider what you are about.”
“Consider! I have considered, and I must and will have my own way,” said
the dear mad creature, struggling with Mrs. Beaumont, who detained her
with an earnest hand. “My love,” said she, “I positively cannot let you
use my name in such a strange way. If your brother or the world should
think I had any share in the transaction, it would be so indelicate.”
“Indelicate! Dear me, ma’am, but when nobody will know it, how can it
be indelicate? and I will not mention your name, and nobody will ever
imagine that you knew any thing of my writing; and I shall manage it
all my own way; and the plan is all my own: so let me go and write this
minute.”
“Mercy upon me! what shall I do with this dear headstrong creature!”
said Mrs. Beaumont, letting Miss Hunter go, as if exhausted by the
struggle she had made to detain her impetuous young friend. Away ran
Miss Hunter, sometimes looking back in defiance and laughing, whilst
Mrs. Beaumont shook her head at her whenever she looked back, but found
it impossible to overtake her, and vain to make further opposition. As
Mrs. Beaumont walked slowly homewards, she meditated her own epistle to
Sir John Hunter, and arranged her future plan of operations.
If, thought she, Miss Hunter’s letter should not succeed, it is only a
suggestion of hers, of which I am not supposed to know any thing, and
I am only just where I was before. If it does succeed, and if Sir
John transfers his addresses to me, I avoid all danger of his anger on
account of his disappointment with Amelia; for it must then be his play,
to convince me that he is not at all disappointed, and then I shall
have leisure to consider whether I shall marry Sir John or not. At all
events, I can draw on his courtship as long as I please, till I have by
degrees brought Mr. Palmer round to approve of the match.
With these views Mrs. Beaumont wrote an incomparable letter to Sir John
Hunter, in which she enveloped her meaning in so many words, and so
much sentiment, that it was scarcely possible to comprehend any thing,
except, “that she should be glad to see Sir John Hunter the next day,
to explain to him a circumstance that had given her, on his account,
heartfelt uneasiness.” Miss Hunter’s letter was carefully revised by
Mrs. Beaumont, though she was to know nothing of it; and such was the
art with which it was retouched, that, after all proper corrections,
nothing appeared but the most childish and imprudent simplicity.
After having despatched these letters, Mrs. Beaumont felt much anxiety
about the effect which they might produce; but she was doomed by her own
habits of insincerity to have perpetually the irksome task of assuming
an appearance contrary to her real feelings. Amelia was better, and
Mr. Palmer’s determination to stay in England had spread a degree of
cheerfulness over the whole family, which had not been felt for some
time at Beaumont Park. In this general delight Mrs. Beaumont was
compelled seemingly to sympathize: she performed her part so well, that
even Dr. Wheeler and Captain Lightbody, who had been behind the scenes,
began to believe that the actress was in earnest. Amelia, alas! knew
her mother too well to be the dupe even of her most consummate powers
of acting. All that Mrs. Beaumont said about her joy, and her hopes
that Captain Walsingham would soon appear and confirm her happy
_pre-sentiments_, Amelia heard without daring to believe. She had such
an opinion of her mother’s address, such a sublime superstitious dread
that her mother would, by some inscrutable means, work out her own
purposes, that she felt as if she could not escape from these secret
machinations. Amelia still apprehended that Sir John Hunter would not be
irrevocably dismissed, and that by some turn of artifice she should find
herself bound to him. The next morning Sir John Hunter, however, finally
relieved her from these apprehensions. After having been closeted for
upwards of two hours with Mrs. Beaumont, he begged to speak to Miss
Beaumont; and he resigned all pretensions to the honour which he had
so long and so ardently aspired to. It was his pride to show that his
spirits were not affected by this disappointment: he scarcely indeed
exhibited that decent appearance of mortification which is usually
expected on such an occasion; but with provoking haughtiness professed
himself sincerely obliged to Miss Beaumont for having, _however late
in the business_, prevented him, by her candour, from the danger of
crossing her inclinations. For this he could scarcely be sufficiently
thankful, when he considered how every day showed the consequences of
marrying young ladies whose affections were previously engaged. He had
only to add, that he hoped the world would see _the thing_ in the same
light in which he took it, and that Miss Beaumont might not find herself
blamed for breaking off _the matter_, after it had been so publicly
reported: that, for his part, he assured her, he would, as far as he was
concerned, do his utmost to silence unpleasant observations; and that,
as the most effectual means to do this, he conceived, would be to show
that he continued on an amicable footing with the family, he should
do himself the honour to avail himself of the permission--invitation,
indeed--he had just received from Mrs. Beaumont, to continue his visits
as usual at Beaumont Park.
To this Amelia could make no objection after the express declaration
which he had just made, that he renounced all pretensions to her favour.
However keenly she felt the implied reproach of having encouraged Sir
John as her admirer, while her affections were previously engaged, and
of having shown candour _late_ in this affair, she could not vindicate
herself without accusing her mother; therefore she attempted neither
excuse nor apology, submitted to let the unfeeling baronet enjoy her
confusion, whilst she said, in general terms, she felt obliged by his
assurance that she should not be the cause of any quarrel between two
families who had hitherto lived in friendship.