THE BEGINNING OF TROUBLES.
It was in the afternoon that Lucilla again expected her guests, on the
day of the ball given at Adelonga in honour of the coming of age of her
absent stepson; and the hospitable arrangements characteristic of bush
households on such occasions, were made for their reception on the usual
Adelonga scale. All the visitors were to be "put up" of course; and from
the exhaustless piles of material stowed away in the ample store-rooms,
bed-rooms were improvised in every hole and corner, and beds made up
wherever beds could decently go--in the store-rooms themselves, in the
school-room, in the laundry, in the gardener's cottage, as well as in
the numerous guest-chambers with which this, in common with other
Australian "country seats," was regularly supplied.
Bright log fires burned on every hearth; bright spring flowers adorned
all the ladies' dressing-tables; stupendous viands piled the pantry
shelves and filled the spacious kitchens with delectable odours.
Servants bustled about with a festive air.
Mr. Thornley, in shirt sleeves, brought forth treasures from the remote
recesses of his cellar that no one but he was competent to meddle with.
Mrs. Thornley moved complacently about her extensive domain, regulating
all these exceptional arrangements with that housewifely good sense and
judgment which distinguished all Mrs. Hardy's daughters.
Rachel found her sphere of action in the ball-room, where with Miss
O'Hara and the children, a young gardener to supply material, the
station carpenter to do the rough work, and Mr. Kingston to look on and
criticise from an arm-chair by the fire, she worked all day at the
decorations, which had been designed in committee and partly prepared
the day before. The great Japanese screens had been carried away (to be
made very useful in the construction of bed and bath-rooms) and the
carpets taken up; and now she feathered the great empty room all about
with fern-tree fronds--hanging them from extemporised chandeliers, and
from wire netting stretched over the ceiling, and from doorless
doorways, rooted in masses of shrubs and blossoms that made a bower of
the whole place. It was just such a task as she delighted in, and she
was considered to have completed it successfully at four o'clock, when
she put her finishing touches to a trophy over the chimney-piece, which,
though rather complicated as to symbolism, being arranged on a
foundation of breech-loaders and riding-whips, had a bold and pleasing
effect.
At four o'clock the guests began to arrive. She was directing her
attendants to sweep up the last of her litters from the newly-polished
floor, when the Digbys' waggonette drove in at the wide-standing garden
gates, and rattled up to the house.
After them came other buggies in quick succession. Grooms and house
servants poured out to receive them; doors banged; confused voices and
laughter rose and fell in waves of pleasant sound through the maze of
passages intersecting the rabbit-warren of a house.
Rachel ran to a window and looked out in time to see Lucifer led off to
the stables blowing and panting, and jangling his bridle, but stepping
out still with unconquered spirit, as became a brave old horse of noble
lineage, whom such a master owned.
Mr. Kingston, the only other person just then in the room, came behind
her and laid his hands with the air of a proprietor on her shoulders.
"Whose hack is that?" he inquired, with languid curiosity. "Looks a good
sort of breed, something like your mare in colour, only much bigger."
"Mr. Dalrymple's," murmured Rachel.
"Dalrymple?--that brother of Mrs. Digby's you spoke of? I've heard of
that fellow. I was curious to know who he was, and I made inquiries at
the club. He is a rather considerable scamp, if all tales are true."
"All tales are not true," replied the girl, with majestic calmness.
"And pray how do _you_ know?" he retorted quickly, a little amused and
a great deal irritated by her highly indiscreet behaviour. "I don't
suppose that you have heard all that I have--at any rate, I _hope_ not."
"I know enough," she stammered hurriedly; "I know the worst anyone can
say against him."
"I hope not," repeated Mr. Kingston, with ominous gravity.
"And I know he has done wrong--done very wrong, indeed; but he has had
such terrible provocations--he has been, oh, so dreadfully unfortunate!"
she went on, wishing heartily that she had not undertaken her new
friend's defence, yet finding it easier to go through with it now than
to turn back and desert him. "And, whatever he may have been once, he
is doing nothing to harm anybody now; and it is cruel of people to be
always raking up the past, when it is done with and repented of, and
throwing it in his teeth. Any of us would think it hard and unfair--you
would yourself."
"Never mind me, my dear; my past is not being called in question that I
am aware of."
Mr. Kingston's not very placid temper was rising.
"He is doing nothing wrong now," she repeated, frightened but reckless;
"if he were, Mr. Thornley would not invite him here--he said so himself.
And Lucilla, though she does not like him--nobody likes him,
indeed--says he would never do a mean action, and that he has perfect
manners, and that he is a thorough gentleman every way. I think they
all agree about _that_."
"And yet don't like him. That is rather inconsistent. And what about
yourself, Rachel? If it is not a rude question--are you an exception in
this respect, or not?"
He had taken his hands from her shoulders, and was standing sideways in
the embrasure of the window, so that he could see her face; and he was
smiling in a most unpleasant manner.
Rachel had never seen him like this before, and the first seed of active
dislike was sown where as yet there had been nothing worse than
indifference. The familiar colour rose and flooded her white brow and
her whiter throat. She clenched her hands to still the flutter of her
heart. She shut her teeth and struggled in silence against an
ignominious impulse to cry.
But Mr. Kingston continued to watch her with that sardonic curiosity;
and presently, like the traditional worm, she turned on him.
"Yes," she said, "I am an exception. I like Mr. Dalrymple very
much--what little I know of him. I have seen no reason to do otherwise.
I do not pay any attention to vulgar gossip."
A timid woman, trying to be defiant, generally fails by overdoing it;
and so did she, poor child. Mr. Kingston heard the emphasis of strong
emotion, that she would have given worlds to keep back, vibrating
through her tremulous accents, and it drove him beyond those
considerations of policy and politeness which he made a boast of as his
rule of life and action--especially in his dealings with women. Rachel,
however, in the category of women, was exceptionally placed with respect
to him; and I suppose one must do him the justice to concede that this
was an exceptional emergency.
"I'll tell you what," he said, smiling no longer, and speaking with a
rough edge to his voice that betokened the original rude nature, usually
so carefully clothed, and that she instinctively resented as an
indignity, "Thornley can do as he likes about the people he brings here
to associate with his wife, but I won't have you making acquaintance
with a vagabond like that."
"I have already made his acquaintance," she said quietly.
"Then I beg you will break it off."
"How can I break it off while he is in the same house with me?"
She was surprised to find how strong she was to withstand this incipient
tyranny; and yet her heart contracted with a pain very like despair.
"There will be so many people that one--and he a man--may be easily
avoided, if you wish to avoid. And you _will_ wish to do what would
please me, wouldn't you, dear?" he demanded, perceiving that he was
bullying her, and trying to correct himself.
"Yes," she replied; "certainly. But I hope you will not ask me to be
rude to one of my cousin's guests. I don't mind what else I do to please
you. And when I am married, I will of course know nobody but the people
you like."
"You are as good as married to me already," he said, putting his arm
round her shoulder as she stood before him, with all sorts of changes
and revolutions going on within her. "And of course I don't want you to
be rude--I don't want you to be anything. Simply don't take any notice
of Dalrymple--he will quite understand it; don't dance with him, or have
anything to do with him."
"Not dance with him!" she broke out sharply.
Her evident dismay and disappointment, together with her unconscious
efforts to evade his embrace, exasperated his already ruffled temper
afresh.
"Certainly not," he said, with angry vehemence. "I shall be exceedingly
annoyed and vexed if I see you dancing with that man."
Rachel did not know until now how much she had secretly set her heart
upon doing this forbidden thing; as her exigent lover did not know until
now that he had it in him to be so horribly jealous.
"He will be sure to come and ask me," she said, with a despairing sigh.
"Very well. If he does, I beg you will refuse him."
"Then I must refuse everybody."
"Not at all. He will quite understand that there are reasons why he
should be exceptionally treated."
"And do you think I will make him understand _that_?" she burst out,
with pathetic indignation that filled her soft eyes with tears. "Do you
think I would be so--so infamously rude and cruel? Oh, Mr.
Kingston"--she never called him "Graham" except in her letters, though
he tried his best to make her--"you don't want to spoil all my pleasure
to-night, which was going to be such a happy night?"
"Your pleasure doesn't depend on dancing with Mr. Dalrymple, I _hope_."
"No--no; but may I not treat him like all the rest, for Lucilla's
sake--for common politeness' sake?"
"No, Rachel. I don't want to be unkind, my dear, but you must remember
your position, and that now you belong to me. A lady who understands
these matters can quite easily manage to get off dancing with a man if
she wishes, without being rude. You must learn those little social
accomplishments, and this is a very good time to begin. Now let us
change the subject. Kiss me, and don't look so miserable, or I shall
begin to think--but that it would be insulting you too much--that you
have fallen in love with this disreputable ruffian."
Mr. Kingston tried to assume a light and airy manner, but his badinage
had a menacing tone that was very chilling.
Rachel, strange to say, did not blush at all; she quietly excused
herself on the plea that she must go and arrange her dishevelled
costume, and (having no private bedroom to-night) went a long way down
the garden to a retired harbour for half an hour's meditation.