"Prithee, say thou--the damsel hath a dowry?"
"Nay, truly, not so. No diamonds hath she but those of her eyes, no
pearls but those in her mouth, no gold but that hidden among her
hair."
_Old Play_.
The morning succeeding the day on which Captain Chancellor had seen Roma
off for Brighton, found her comfortably seated at breakfast with her
sister-in-law in the lodgings which Mrs Eyrecourt had engaged for the
month of sea air, generally by a happy coincidence, found necessary in
late autumn for "the children." Their visit to Brighton was later than
usual this year, having been delayed by home engagements; most of Mrs
Eyrecourt's friends had left, and she was beginning to feel anxious to
follow their example.
"I am so glad to have you back again, Roma," she said, as she watched
her sister-in-law pouring out the coffee. "It has been dreadfully dull
the last week or two, and so cold. I shall be glad to be at home again.
How did you manage to keep yourself alive in Cumberland?"
"Lady Dervock keeps her house very warm," replied Roma. "The coldness
isn't the worst part of it--it is so dreadfully dull and out-of-the way.
She was very kind, as I told you, and did her best to entertain me.
She invited all the neighbours she has, to come to dinner in turn, but
there are not many, and they are mostly old and stupid. Still, it was
gratifying in one sense. I have no objection to be considered the woman
my dear godmamma delighteth to honour. It looks promising. But I
couldn't live there. Ah, no," with a little shudder. "I shall
certainly let Deepthorne if ever it belongs to me."
Mrs Eyrecourt looked up quickly. "Lady Dervock may put a clause in her
will obliging you to do so," she said. "I have heard of such things.
But, seriously, Roma, I do hope you are not allowing yourself to count
upon anything of that kind? It would be very foolish."
"Count upon it!" repeated Roma, with an air of the utmost superiority to
any such folly. "Certainly not, my dear Gertrude. I never count upon
anything. I amuse myself by a little harmless speculation upon
possibilities; that's all, I assure you."
"And about Wareborough? How did you get on there? Mary Dalrymple was
very kind, of course, and made a great deal of you and all that, I have
no doubt. But oh, Roma, how unlucky it was about Beauchamp's turning up
there. I cannot tell you how provoked I was."
A look of annoyance came over her face as she spoke, heightening for the
time the slight resemblance she bore to her brother. It was not a
striking resemblance. She was a small, fair woman, considerably less
good-looking than one would have expected to find Beauchamp Chancellor's
sister. Her figure, of its kind, was good, and shown to advantage by
her dress, which was always unexceptionable in make and material,
delicately but not obtrusively suggestive of her early widowhood. She
hardly looked her age, which was thirty-one, for her skin was of the
fine smooth kind which is slow to wrinkle deeply; her eyes of the
"innocent-blue" shade, her hair soft and abundant.
Roma did not at once reply; but looking up suddenly, Mrs Eyrecourt saw
that her sister-in-law was smiling.
"What are you laughing at, Roma?" she asked, with some asperity. "It's
very strange that you should begin to laugh when I am speaking
seriously."
"I beg your pardon, Gertrude--I do, really," said Roma, apologetically.
"I didn't mean to smile. I was only thinking how curiously like each
other you and Beauchamp are when you are not pleased. Oh, he was _so_
cross to me the other night at the Dalrymples'! Only to poor me! He
was more charming than ever to every one else. And it was all through
trying to please you, Gertrude. I wouldn't dance with him on account of
your letter, and whether you believe it of me or not, I do hate making
myself disagreeable--even to Beauchamp." There was a curious undertone
of real feeling in her last words. Gertrude felt sorry for her, and
showed it in her manner.
"I don't want you to make yourself disagreeable, Roma. I only want to
save real disagreeables in the future. It is both of you I think of.
Certainly this infatuation of Beauchamp's _is_ most unlucky; and though
you say you are so sure of yourself, still, you know, dear, he _is_ very
attractive, and--"
"Of course he is," interrupted Roma--"very attractive, and splendidly
handsome, and everything that is likely to make any girl fall in love
with him. But I am not any girl, Gertrude, and I never _could_ fall in
love with him. Oh, I do wish you would get that well into your little
head! What a great deal of worry it would save you and me! I have a
real liking and affection for Beauchamp--how could I not have it, when
you remember how we have been thrown together?--but I know his faults
and weaknesses as well as his good qualities. Oh, no! If ever I
imagine myself falling in love with any one, it is with a very different
sort of person. Not that I ever intend to do anything so silly; but
that is beside the point. Now, Gertrude, are you convinced?
By-the-bye, you should apologise for speaking of poor Beauchamp's
amiable feelings as an `infatuation,' shouldn't you?"
"I didn't mean it in that sense," replied Mrs Eyrecourt, meekly. "I
only meant--"
"Yes, I know what you meant," interrupted Roma again. "You meant that,
as we are both penniless, or very nearly so, and, what is worse, both of
us blessed with most luxurious tastes and a supreme contempt for
economy, we couldn't do worse than set out on our travels through life
together. Of course I quite agree with you. Even if I cared for
Beauchamp--which I don't--I know we should be wretched. _I_ couldn't
stand it, and I am quite sure he couldn't. The age for that sort of
thing is past long ago. Every sensible person must see that, though now
and then, in weak moments, one has a sort of hazy regret for it, just as
one regrets one's childish belief in fairy tales." She sat silent for a
minute or two, looking down absently, idly turning the spoon round and
round in her empty cup. Then suddenly she spoke again. "It is very
puzzling to know what is best to do," she said, looking up. "Do you
know, Gertrude, notwithstanding your repeated injunctions to me to try
to snub Beauchamp without letting it come to a regular formal proposal,
and all that, I really believe I should, on my own responsibility (it
couldn't cause more uncomfortable feeling than the present state of
things), have let it come to a crisis and be done with, but for another,
a purely unselfish, reason."
"What do you mean?" asked Mrs Eyrecourt, looking alarmed.
"Just this: I think it possible that his fancy--after all, I am not sure
that it is anything but fancy, or whatever you call it--for me, may keep
him from something still sillier."
"What do you mean?" repeated Gertrude again. "You can't mean that
Beauchamp would think of marrying any one still--"
She hesitated.
"Still less desirable than I?" said Roma, coolly. "Yes--that is exactly
what I do mean."
"He would never be so foolish!" exclaimed her sister-in-law. "He is too
alive to his own interests--too much a man of the world. And think what
numberless flirtations he has had! Oh, no, Roma! he would never do
anything foolish of that kind, I feel sure."
"_I_ don't," said the younger lady. "He is a man of the world, he is
alive to his own interests; but still, Gertrude, remember what we know
as a fact--that at this moment, though it should ruin all his prospects
for life, he is ready--more than ready, absurdly eager to marry me. So
we mustn't count too much on his worldly wisdom, cool-headed and
experienced in such matters as he seems. Certainly, contradiction may
have had a good deal to do with the growth and continuance of his
feelings for me. There is that to be considered; and knowing that, I
was idiotic enough to try to warn him."
"To warn him! Oh, Roma; do you mean that there is some one already that
he would ever really think of seriously?" asked Mrs Eyrecourt, with
great anxiety.
"Not exactly that--at least, not as yet," replied Roma. "What I mean
is, that if I succeeded, as I could easily, if it came to the point, in
quite convincing him he must altogether give up thoughts of me, he would
be very likely to do worse--or more foolishly, at least. I have no
doubt the girl is as good as she is pretty--I was taken by her myself--
but utterly, completely unsuited to him in every single respect. And
for this reason, Gertrude, I was very civil to Beauchamp at the end: I
let him come to the station to see me off--we parted most
affectionately. I wanted to do away with the bad effects of my warning,
which I feared had offended him deeply the night before. But after all,
perhaps, the warning was rather encouraging to his vain hopes than
otherwise. I do believe he thought I was jealous."
She smiled at the recollection. "The worst of it is," she went on, "if
he thinks so, it will probably lead to his flirting all the more
desperately, in hopes of my hearing of it. And then if it comes to my
being driven into formally refusing him, what shall I do when he comes
to us in February? He told me he is to have six weeks then. And he
will go back to Wareborough again after that. Oh dear, oh dear, it is
all dreadfully plain to my prophetic vision."
"Roma, do be serious. You don't mean to say--you can't mean, that this
girl, whoever she is, is a _Wareborough_ girl. Wareborough!" with
supreme contempt, "Why, we all thought your cousin, Mary Pevensey,
throwing herself away when she married Henry Dalrymple, though he didn't
exactly belong to Wareborough, and was so rich. By-the-bye, this girl
may be rich; not that that would reconcile me to it," with a sigh.
"But it might somewhat modify the vehemence of your opposition," said
Roma, in her usual lazy, half-bantering tone, from which her unwonted
earnestness had hitherto roused her. "No, Gertrude; you must not even
apply that unction to your damask cheek--what am I saying? I never can
remember those horrid little quotations we had to hunt up at school, and
I am so sleepy with travelling all yesterday--lay that flattering
unction to your soul, I mean. Beauchamp would say I was trying to make
a female Dundreary of myself--a good thing he's not here. No, she is
not rich. I told you she was utterly unsuited to him in _every_ way. I
found out she wasn't rich before Beauchamp ever saw her; something
interested me in her, I don't know what exactly, and I asked Mary about
her."
"Not rich, and Wareborough! Oh, no, Roma; I am quite satisfied. There
is no fear in that quarter. It is only one of his incessant
flirtations, I am sure."
"If so, it will be all on his side. She isn't the sort of girl to
flirt. It would be all or nothing with her, I expect," said Roma,
oracularly.
"I can't understand what makes you think so much of it," said Mrs
Eyrecourt, fretfully. "How often did you see them together?"
"Only once--that last evening at the Dalrymples! There was a carpet
dance. Don't you remember I wrote and told you they _would_ ask
Beauchamp, when they heard he was coming?" said Roma.
"Only once. You only saw them together once, and that at a dance, where
Beauchamp was _sure_ to flirt--especially as you snubbed him! Really,
Roma, you are absurdly fanciful," exclaimed Mrs Eyrecourt.
Roma took the remark in good part.
"Perhaps I am," she replied; "but it isn't generally a weakness of mine
to be so. For all I know, the girl is engaged to someone else, or she
and Beauchamp may never see each other again. I don't say I have any
grounds for what I fear. One gets impressions sometimes that one can't
account for."
"Ah, yes, and I really think, dear, you are a little morbid on the
subject. You have had so much worry about Beauchamp," said Gertrude,
consolingly. "But as you've told me so much, tell me a little more. Is
she such a very pretty girl? There must be something out of the common
about her to have attracted you. Who is she?"
"She is a--" began Miss Eyrecourt, but a noise at the door interrupted
her. There was a bang, then a succession of tiny raps, then a fumbling
at the handle.
"That tiresome child!" exclaimed Mrs Eyrecourt. "Floss," in a higher
key, "be quiet, do. Run up stairs--never mind her, Roma; go on with
what you were saying." But the fumbling continued. Roma's nerves,
perhaps, were not quite in train this morning; however that may have
been, the noise was very irritating. She got up at last and opened the
door.
"Come in, Floss," she said, good-humouredly, but her invitation was not
accepted.
"I won't come into rooms when people call me a tiresome child at the
door and I haven't been naughty," said the new-comer, with much dignity
and scanty punctuation.
She was a very small person indeed. Of years she numbered five, in
height and appearance she might easily have passed for three. She was
hardly a pretty child, for her features, though small and delicate, were
wanting in the rosebud freshness so charming in early childhood; her
eyes, when one succeeded in penetrating to them through the tangle of
wavy light hair that no combing and brushing could keep in its place,
were peculiar in colour and expression. There was a queer greenish
light in them as she looked up into Roma's face with a half-resentful,
half-questioning gaze, standing there on the door-mat, her legs very
wide apart, under one arm a very small kitten, under the other a very
big doll--fond objects of her otherwise somewhat unappreciated devotion.
She was a curious child, full of "touchy tempers and contrary ways,"
not easily cowed, rebellious and argumentative, and no one had as yet
taken the trouble to understand her--to draw out the fund of
unappropriated affection in her baby heart.
Roma got tired of holding the door open. "Come, Floss," she said,
impatiently, "come in quickly."
Floss stared at her for another minute without speaking. Then, "No,"
she said deliberately. "I won't come in nor neither go out;" and as
Roma turned away with a little laugh and a careless, "then stay where
you are, Floss," the child shook with indignation and impotent
resentment.
"She is really dreadful, Roma," said Mrs Eyrecourt, plaintively. "For
some time past nurse tells me it is the same thing every day--out of one
temper into another, from morning to night."
"She must take after her uncle," said Roma; "it is all contradiction.
Don't bother yourself about her, Gertrude. I'll ring for nurse."
And the matter ended in the poor little culprit being carried off to the
nursery in a whirlwind of misery and passion, reiterating as she went
that mamma and aunt _made_ her naughty when she had "comed down good."
"What has become of Quintin?" asked Roma, when they were again left in
peace. "I haven't seen him this morning."
"He is spending the day with the Montmorris boys. He set off quite
early, immediately after his breakfast, in great spirits, dear fellow,"
replied his mother. "How different he is from Floss, Roma!"
"Yes," answered Roma, "he is a nice boy. But it comes easily to people
like Quintin to be good, Gertrude. He has everything in his favour--
perfect health, a naturally easy temper, good looks, and every one
inclined to think the best of him. Whereas poor little Flossy seems to
have been always at war with the world. She is so delicate too. My
conscience pricks me sometimes a little about that child."
"I don't see that there is anything more to be done for her. I trust to
her growing out of these tempers in time," said Mrs Eyrecourt,
philosophically--she was always philosophical about Floss when not in
her immediate presence. "Speaking of the Montmorris boys, Roma, reminds
me we are dining there to-day. That is to say--I accepted for myself
certainly, and for you conditionally, the day before yesterday. You are
not too tired to go?"
"Oh, no. I daresay I shall feel brisker by the evening," replied Roma.
"I suppose it isn't anything very overwhelming, is it? for my wardrobe
is getting rather dilapidated--I didn't think I should have been so long
without going home, you know. By-the-bye, Gertrude, are you not in
deeper mourning than when I went away?"
"Yes, I forgot to tell you. Indeed, I hardly thought you would care to
hear--the poor old man had been virtually dead for so long. It is for
our old uncle--Beauchamp's and my uncle I mean--Mr Chancellor of
Halswood. He died a fortnight ago. It was hardly necessary to go into
mourning; he was only my father's uncle. But still he was the head of
the family, and I thought it better."
"Who succeeds him?" asked Roma. "Halswood is a nice place, isn't it?"
"Very; but they have never kept it up properly," said Mrs Eyrecourt.
"At least, not for many years past. Old Uncle Chancellor has been half
in his dotage for ever so long, but still he had sense enough to be
jealous of his grandsons. There are two of them; the elder of course
succeeds. He has sons; he has been married some years. We know very
little of them now. My great uncle was angry with my father for selling
Winsedge to your people, Roma; for though it was not entailed, and had
come into the hands of a younger son, it had been a long, long time in
the family. And that made a coolness they never got over."
"Why did your father sell it?" inquired Roma. "It would have been very
nice for you now if it had belonged to Beauchamp. Much nicer than for
it to be Quin's, who has got plenty already."
"Yes," replied Gertrude, slowly; "it would have been very nice, but it
could not have been. My father was dreadfully in debt, and even selling
Winsedge didn't clear him. When he died it was all my poor mother could
do to start Beauchamp in the army. Poor Beauchamp! it has been very
hard upon him to be so restricted, with his tastes, and his looks, and
his feelings altogether. He has never been extravagant, as young men
go, but he hates poverty." Roma laughed. "I don't think he knows much
about it, so far," she said. "Wait till he is married with very little
more than he has now--two or three hundred a year and his pay. It
wouldn't be long before love came flying out of _his_ window. But, dear
me," starting up as a timepiece struck the hour, "how late it is! I
must write to tell Mary Dalrymple of my safe arrival. What time is the
Montmorris's dinner hour? Seven; oh, I am glad of that; we shall get
home early."
The Montmorrises were quiet, steady-going, rather old-fashioned people,
who lived in Brighton as evenly and monotonously as they would have
lived in a country village. They were not by any means in Mrs
Eyrecourt's "set," but they were very old friends of the Chancellor
family--old Mr Montmorris, indeed, had been their lawyer for
generations, and his firm, in which his eldest son now represented him,
still managed the Halswood affairs. Once upon a time there had been a
large family of young Montmorrises, but, after the manner of large
families, they were now scattered far and wide--"some were married, some
were dead," two maiden sisters only, no longer youthful, still
representing at home the boys and girls, the "children" of long ago.
But their brother--Mr Christian Montmorris, the hope of the family and
the head of the firm--had by this time a wife and large family of his
own, none of whom had any objection to spending a few weeks now and then
at "grandpapa's," on which occasions their father used to "run down"
from town as many times a week as he could spare the time, "running up
again" by the first train the next morning; for he was a shrewd, clever,
energetic man, with some fingers to spare for other pies besides those
it was his legitimate office to cook; with a clear head and a sharp eye
for a wary venture or a profitable investment. Among other by-concerns
of this kind, in which his name did not appear, he was interested in the
affairs of the great Wareborough engineering company, in whose employ
Gerald Thurston, the curate's elder brother, had spent the last three
years in India.
The sisters-in-law were received by their friends with open arms.
"So kind of you to come to us in this unceremonious way. So pleased to
see Miss Eyrecourt again. We quite feared Mrs Eyrecourt would have
left Brighton this year before you joined her," said Miss
Cecilia Montmorris. And then old Mrs Montmorris broke in with
self-congratulations that "Christy" had just arrived unexpectedly, and,
what was more, had brought a friend with him, a gentleman just arrived
from India. "We were quite pleased to see him, I assure you," she
continued, addressing Roma in particular, "for a new-comer always brings
a little variety; and now that my boys are all away from us we seem to
be falling out of fresh acquaintances sadly. Mr Montmorris and I are
getting too old for any sort of gaiety," she went on. "It is dull for
Cecilia and Bessie sometimes, but they are good girls, very, and they
know it won't be always that they will have their father and me to care
for. Besides, they have a little change now and then when Mrs
Christian takes one of them up to town for a week or two. Bessie is
going back with them next week. And you have been away up in the north,
I hear, my dear? How did you like that? I used to know Cumberland in
my young days."
So she chattered on with the not unpleasing garrulity of gentle, kindly
old age. She was a very sweet old lady, and Roma considered herself
much more fortunate than her sister-in-law, who had been seized upon by
Mrs Christian Montmorris to have poured into her sympathising ear an
account of how dreadfully ill her youngest but one had been the last two
days, cutting its eye-teeth. Gertrude smiled and said, "indeed," and
tried to look interested; but Roma laughed inwardly at her evident
eagerness to change the conversation. Mrs Eyrecourt was not a person
in whom the maternal instinct was in all directions fully developed: she
loved her handsome little son as much as she could love anything; she
honestly meant to do her best by Floss, but on certain points she was by
no means an authority. It is, indeed, a question if both Quintin and
Floss might not have passed through babyhood guiltless of cutting any
teeth at all without her awaking from her happy unconsciousness of their
failure in the performance of this important infantine obligation.
So poor Gertrude sat there, looking and feeling very much bored and
rather indignant with Roma for the mischievous glances of pity she now
and then bestowed upon her. At last, however, the door opened to admit
the two gentlemen, whose late arrival had prolonged "the stupid
quarter-of-an-hour," and with, a sensation of relief Mrs Eyrecourt
turned to reply to Mr Christian Montmorris's greeting, feeling that she
had had quite enough of his better-half for some time to come.