THE CONSPIRATORS TRIUMPH.
The dressing-bell was pealing as the gay party returned in high spirits
from their walk. It had been a very successful excursion, and the
newcomer, Miss Sylla, was unanimously voted an acquisition.
"Laura tells me," said Miss Bloxam, "that her cousin sings charmingly,
and is simply immense at charades, private theatricals, and all that
sort of thing."
"Ah, we might do something in that way one evening next week," said her
brother, as they passed through the hall. "Mr. Beauchamp here, James?"
"Yes, sir; came about a quarter of an hour ago; he has just gone up to
dress."
Blanche was sitting in front of her dressing-table, with her maid
putting the finishing-touches to her toilette, when a slight tap at the
door was followed by the entrance of her mother.
"That will do, Gimp," said Lady Mary. "I will arrange those flowers in
Miss Blanche's hair myself;" and, obedient to the intimation, the
lady's-maid left the room. "I have just looked in to speak to you,
Blanche, about this ball. If the subject is revived at dinner this
evening, you won't want to go to it: you understand?"
"Of course, mamma, I will say so if you wish it; but I should like to
go, all the same."
"Oh, nonsense! An Easter ball at Commonstone would be a shocking,
vulgar, not to say rowdy, affair. Besides, surely you have had plenty
of dancing in London, to say nothing of heaps more in perspective."
"Dancing!" replied the girl, with a shrug of her shoulders. "I don't
call a London ball dancing. One jigs round and round in a place about
ten feet square, but one never gets a really good spin. We have been
at Commonstone balls before. What makes you think this one would be
more uproarious than usual?"
"We have never been to an Easter ball, my dear," replied Lady Mary,
adjusting a piece of fern in her daughter's tresses. "We came down
here for quiet, and if you don't require a rest, I do. You must think
of your poor chaperon a little, Blanche."
"Don't say another word, mamma. You are a dear amiable chaperon, and
have been awfully good about staying a little late at times. I don't
want to drag you over to Commonstone, when your wish is to be left
peacefully at home. We won't do the Easter ball, though it is sad to
think what a capital room they have for it. But come along, there goes
the bell, and I am sure now I look most bewitching."
It was not Lady's Mary's custom to take her daughters into her
confidence, in the first instance, with regard to the matrimonial
designs she had formed for their benefit. All the preliminary
manoeuvres she conducted herself. The idea of young people gravitating
together naturally was a theory she would have received with profound
derision. She looked upon it that all what she would have termed
successful marriages were as much owing to the clever diplomacy of
mothers or chaperons as the victory of a horse in a big race is due to
the skilful handling of his jockey. During the afternoon she had been
meditating over the plan of her Easter campaign, and resolved to adhere
to her original determination. Most decidedly she would have nothing
to do with Commonstone and its gaieties, nor would she afford greater
favour to any revelries at the Rockcliffe camp; and most devoutly did
she wish that it was in her power to keep the rector's daughters
altogether at arm's length, now that she had seen this new cousinly
importation. At arm's length as much as possible the Misses Chipchase
should be held, she determined.
"That Miss Sylla," she muttered, "is just the sort of girl men always
lose their heads about; clever, too, if I mistake not. Well, I don't
mean to see more of her at the Grange than I am positively obliged to;
but keep her out altogether I can't. The Chipchase girls have grown up
with my own, and been always accustomed to come and go pretty much as
they liked. However," thought her ladyship, "the first thing to settle
undoubtedly is this ball;" and, as she and her daughter descended to
dinner, Lady Mary did fancy that, at all events, she had settled that.
"Ah, here you are at last," said the Squire, as they entered the
drawing-room; "dinner is already announced, my lady. Come along, Mrs.
Evesham, it's no use letting the soup get cold."
"How do you do, Mr. Beauchamp?" said Lady Mary, as a dark, good-looking
young fellow came forward to shake hands with her. "It seems I am
dreadfully late, and have only time now to say I am delighted that you
have found your way to Todborough. Perhaps you will take care of
Blanche." And then the hostess turned away to pair off her other
guests.
"I congratulate you, Lady Mary, on so favourable an augury," said
Pansey Cottrell, as he leisurely consumed his fish.
"Favourable augury! What can you mean?"
"Do you not see," returned Cottrell, in mock-tragical tones, "that we
are thirteen to dinner? Do you not know that Lionel Beauchamp is the
thirteenth? and do you not know what Fate has invariably in store for
the thirteenth at a dinner party?"
"Good gracious!" exclaimed Lady Mary; "why, they say it's hanging, do
they not?"
"Well, of late years they have rather qualified the sentence. Popular
opinion, I think, now inclines to the belief that the thirteenth, when
a man, will be either hung--or married."
"I suppose we are advancing in the science of augury as in all other
sciences," replied her ladyship, laughing, "and find that the omens,
like the readings of the barometer, are capable of two interpretations."
"You must not speak lightly of the science of augury, Lady Mary. Allow
me to give you the complete interpretation of the omen. The Fates have
not only decreed that Lionel Beauchamp shall either be hung or married
within the twelvemonth, but reserved the latter lot for him; and they
indicate further who his future wife shall be. When there is no lady
next him, it's a hanging matter, saith the oracle; where there is, that
lady will be his wife before the year is out. Now, it can hardly point
to Mrs. Evesham, who is on the right, and therefore I conclude it must
indicate Miss Blanche, who is on his left."
"Very ingenious, indeed, Mr. Cottrell; but, dear me! they have begun to
talk about that horrid ball again at the bottom of the table, have they
not?"
"I say, mother," exclaimed Jim Bloxam, "of course we are all going to
this Commonstone ball on Monday?"
"Nonsense! I am surprised at your thinking of such a thing. The idea
of our going to a Commonstone ball on Easter Monday! Just fancy, my
dear Jim, what it would be,--townspeople and excursionists from round
about. No; I don't go in for being exclusive, goodness knows; but the
Commonstone Easter ball is a rather more boisterous business than I can
stand."
"What nonsense!" rejoined the dragoon, a little staggered, all the
same, by his mother's argument. "It will be great fun, and I don't
suppose a bit worse than any other of the Commonstone balls; and we
have always gone to them, you know."
"Yes, but that's a very different thing from an Easter Monday ball. Of
course you and any of the gentlemen of the party can go. You will have
great fun, no doubt."
"But," urged Jim, "we are a large party, and can keep to ourselves, you
know. It is a good room; and here is Blanche, I know, dying for a
galop. Are you not, my sister?"
"No, indeed," said Blanche, responding bravely to her before-dinner
tutoring; "I assure you I don't care about it in the least. I have no
doubt mamma is right, and that the ball will be crowded with all sorts
of disagreeable people."
"You little traitress," said Jim, with a comical grin upon his
countenance, "I did think I could count upon you; but you are as
perfidious as a county elector in these days of the ballot-box."
Poor Blanche coloured and bit her lip. She was conscious of gross
tergiversation, of having ratted shamefully; for that merry party in
the afternoon, as they stood in the camp of Rockcliffe overlooking
Commonstone, had, one and all, vowed to foot it merrily in the
town-hall on Easter Monday, and agreed that for real lovers of dancing
a country ball beat a London one all to pieces.
"Well, mother," rejoined Jim, with one of his queer smiles, "on your
head be it if any harm comes to us; if you will allow your young braves
to go out on the war-path without their natural protectors, you must
not be surprised if some of them lose their scalps. Beauchamp, you are
a devotee of the goddess, I know. You will of course form one of 'the
lost children' who brave all the horde of excursionists for the honour
of Todborough."
"Thanks, no," replied Lionel. "I don't think I care about facing the
barbarians at play."
He was a good deal smitten with Blanche, and knew better than to run
counter to his enslaver's pronounced opinion.
"Then," exclaimed Jim, "like Curtius, I must leap into the gulf
single-handed. Stop! hang it, I will exercise my military prerogative;
yes, Braybrooke, I shall order you to accompany me, if it is only to
witness the sacrifice."
"Stay, Captain Bloxam," said Mrs. Sartoris, laughing. "Such devoted
gallantry deserves encouragement; I won't see you fall into the hands
of the Philistines without an effort at your preservation. You'll go,
Tom, won't you?" she continued, appealing to her husband, "if Lady Mary
can only find us transport."
"Yes, I am good to go, if you wish it," replied Sartoris.
"How I should like to shake the life out of that woman!" thought Lady
Mary, as she smilingly murmured that "if Mrs. Sartoris had the courage
to face the horrors of an Easter ball, there was, of course, the
carriage at her disposal."
"Bravo, Mrs. Sartoris!" cried Jim; "and now that you have given them a
lead, I have no doubt I shall pick up some more recruits, at all
events, young ladies," he continued, appealing to the Misses Evesham,
"it's a consolation to think that we have secured a chaperon, even if
our mothers remain obdurate on the point."
But Lady Mary was not going to suffer any further discussion concerning
the Commonstone ball, if she could possibly prevent it. What she
mentally termed the pig-headedness of her son already threatened to
upset the seclusion that she had marked out as most conducive to Lionel
Beauchamp's subjection. Taking advantage of the decanters having made
their appearance on the table, she bent her head to Mrs. Evesham, and
the rising of the ladies put an end to the subject, at all events for
the present. "If," thought Lady Mary, as she followed her guests to
the drawing-room, "I can only stop their talking any more about this
wretched ball, there will be no harm done. Jim, Captain Braybrooke,
and the Sartorises are welcome to go, so long as the rest stay at home."
Though silent, Pansey Cottrell had been an amused auditor of the
previous conversation. Living, as he habitually had done from his
boyhood, always in society, he derived no little amusement from
watching the foibles and manoeuvres of those around him, and
occasionally indulged himself by gently pulling the strings for his own
diversion. It was a secret that had been penetrated by only a few of
his intimates, but there was lurking in Pansey Cottrell a spirit of
mischief that sometimes urged him to contravene the schemes of his
associates. It was never from any feeling of malice, but from a sheer
sense of fun. The present state of affairs, for instance, tickled him
immensely. He knew that poor Lady Mary had resolutely made up her mind
that the Grange party should have none of this ball, and equally did he
foresee that there was every probability of both herself and all her
guests being present at it. Secondly, she had brought Lionel Beauchamp
down here, far away from rival beauties, so that Miss Blanche might
capture him at her leisure; and such was Lady Mary's malignant star,
that an exceedingly pretty and fascinating stranger immediately
appeared upon the scene. Now this was just one of the little dramas
that it so amused Pansey Cottrell occasionally to exercise his
influence in. I do not mean to say that he would interfere to such an
extent as to either make or mar the wedding; but to take part with the
conspirators and coerce Lady Mary into going to this Commonstone ball
was a bit of mischief quite in his way. He could not resist the
temptation of teasing his fellow-creatures, and what gave such
particular zest to such tormenting was that his victims were always
perfectly unconscious that he was at the bottom of their annoyance.
In the drawing-room Lady Mary expressed her disapproval of the ball so
strongly that Mrs. Sartoris felt quite guilty, and rather repented her
of having volunteered to join Captain Bloxam's party; but when the
gentlemen made their appearance, Lady Mary was doomed to be made once
more uncomfortable by the proceedings of her first-born.
She listened in somewhat _distrait_ fashion to a flood of anecdote and
small-talk that Mr. Cottrell was pouring into her ears; for she felt
intuitively that Jim was canvassing the whole party on the subject of
this abominable ball with an ardour worthy of a better cause. She had
seen him talking and laughing with Mrs. Sartoris, and knew that he had
confirmed that lady in her iniquity. Now he was talking with the
Misses Evesham, and she felt convinced that those flabby-minded damsels
had admitted that they should like to be present, although not half an
hour ago they had assured her that they detested all such "omnium
gatherums." If she could but have got hold of Jim and told him that
there were particular reasons why the Grange party should not attend
upon this occasion! but no, Pansey Cottrell was entertaining her with a
scandalous and apparently interminable narrative of the doings of one
of her friends, and she felt she had been as effectually buttonholed as
if she were the victim of the Ancient Mariner.
Suddenly a "Confound it, Jim, do hold your tongue!" from the
whist-table caught her ear. "You deuced near made me revoke. What on
earth makes you so red hot about this ball?" And the Squire
mechanically looked round to his wife for telegraphic guidance as to
what line he was to take.
By a sudden shifting of Mr. Pansey Cottrell's chair that gentleman's
form intercepted the slight bending of the brows and shake of the head
that replied to her husband's look of inquiry.
"The proper thing to do, sir," resumed Jim; "residents in the vicinity
of Commonstone must support Commonstone festivities. The Todborough
contingent must show up on such an occasion, and the Todborough
contingent must show with its chief at its head. Who knows but you may
want to contest the county again some of these days? and if you don't,
why, perhaps I shall. I assure you I have a very pretty talent for
public speaking--at least, so our fellows all say. Isn't it so,
Braybrooke?"
"Oh, I don't quite know about that," was the reply. "We give you
credit for unlimited 'cheek' when on your legs after supper, and that's
about as far as we can give you a character."
"Well, I don't know; we always do go. I suppose we ought to go this
time; but there's no necessity for all this hurry. The ball is not
until the day after to-morrow." And the Squire again looked anxiously
round for instructions from his wife; but Pansey Cottrell was now
standing between Lady Mary and the card-table, and such inspiration as
might be derived from his back was sole response to the inquiry.
"Excuse me," said Jim, "we can't have people making up their mind about
ball-going on Sundays. Ball-dresses, however perfect, nearly always
want a little something doing to them at the last, don't they, Mrs.
Sartoris? Besides, vacillation spoils slumber. I am only anxious that
you shall lay your head tranquilly on your pillow, like myself, with
your mind made up to do a good and virtuous action."
"Come, I say," cried the Squire, chuckling, "that's rather tall talk,
you know. I never heard going to a ball called a 'good and virtuous
action' before."
"Well, perhaps not," replied Jim; "but it is, comparatively, you know,
when you think of the many worse things you might do;--Stay at home
here, for instance, trump your partner's thirteenth, revoke, lose your
money and your temper."
"You make out a good case, Jim," said the Squire, laughing. "I suppose
we must go, lest, as you say, worse should come to us."
As these two latter speeches reached her ears, Lady Mary felt that she
could have boxed those of her son with exceeding satisfaction, and so
wandered in her attention to Pansey Cottrell's narrative as to occasion
that gentleman, who was perfectly aware of the disturbing influence,
infinite amusement. As a _causeur_ of some repute in his own
estimation, he considered himself in duty bound to take vengeance for
such negligence, and spun out his story to its extreme attenuation
before suffering his hostess to escape. At length released, Lady Mary
crosses to the whist-table; but the conversation has dropped. Jim has
moved to another part of the room; and that the Todborough Grange party
shall go to the ball is an accepted fact. To revive the subject now
Lady Mary felt would be useless, but she made up her mind somewhat
spitefully that her lord should hear a little more about it before he
slept.
"Rather a sudden change in the wind," said Lionel Beauchamp, as he lit
Miss Bloxam's candle in the hall: "instead of being dead against, it
seems to be blowing quite a gale in the direction of the Commonstone
ball. I suppose you will go too, if the rest do?"
"Yes," she replied mendaciously. "I don't care in the least about it,
but suppose, like all minorities, I shall have to recant my opinion,
or, what is the same thing, do as the others do; and I shall expect you
to do the same, Mr. Beauchamp, and not, after the manner of some
shameless London men whom we have had here, plead a bad cold, and then
spend the evening tranquilly in the smoking-room, over much tobacco and
a French novel."
"Not I, Miss Bloxam," replied Lionel, laughing. "I can assure you I am
very fond of a country ball. My objection is to a country ball with
all the attraction left out."
"Thank you," said Blanche, making him a little mock curtsey, "that is a
very pretty speech to send me to sleep upon; and now good night. O
Jim, Jim!" she whispered, as she passed her brother, "how could you?
Had you been yet in your childhood, bread and water and dungeons dark
would be punishment quite inadequate to your offending."
"Why, good Heavens! what have I done?"
"Couldn't you see that mamma is dead against any of us going to this
ball, and have you not been canvassing us all as if you had been a
steward?"
"Go to bed, you arrant little humbug," replied Jim, with a perceptible
quiver of his right eye. "What the _madre's_ reasons may be for
setting her face against this bit of jollity I don't know; but you and
she needn't go, you know. Mrs. Sartoris has kindly undertaken the
charge of all us young people."
Blanche merely smiled, nodded, and then tripped up the staircase. I
think there was an unspoken understanding between these two on the
subject of the Commonstone ball. Jim Bloxam had before known his
sisters take part with the authorities against their private likings
and convictions.
Lady Mary, when she had gained the privacy of her own chamber, felt, to
speak figuratively, that the horses had got a little out of her hand;
that her party, or at all events the larger portion of them, would
attend this ball whether she liked it or not. Of course she herself
could stay at home and keep Blanche with her; but it would be a little
too marked to attempt to retain Mr. Beauchamp when all the rest of the
party were bound for Commonstone. She was far too skilful a manoeuvrer
to give lookers-on such transparent grounds for designating her a
match-making mother. But Lady Mary was a woman both clever and fertile
in resource, one who thoroughly understood the philosophy that, when
things are not going to your liking, there only remains to make the
best of things as they are. Her instinct warned her that it would have
been better for her designs if she could have carried out her original
programme, and contrived that the Grange party should keep to
themselves; but as things were it was obvious that Lionel Beauchamp
would go to the Commonstone ball, and under those circumstances she
promptly decided that it would be advisable for Blanche and herself to
go too. Her mind misgave her that Sylla Chipchase was a formidable
rival to Blanche in the matter of beauty and attraction; still, the
encountering of no opposition could but make Miss Sylla more
formidable. Just as she had resolved upon a change of front, the
Squire entered the room.
"My dear Cedric," she exclaimed, "how could you be so foolish? What
made you encourage all these people in the absurdity of wishing to
attend that Easter ball?--a mob of tag, rag, and bobtail, tradespeople
and people from Heaven knows where: very good fun, no doubt, for the
officers from Rockcliffe, Jim, or any other young men, but no place for
ladies and their daughters to go to."
"What nonsense, Mary! Why, you know we always did go to the
Commonstone balls; besides, Mrs. Sartoris expressed----"
"Don't talk to me about what Mrs. Sartoris expressed," interrupted Lady
Mary sharply; "that woman is evidently one of the fast school, and I am
very sorry for Blanche's sake that I asked her down here at all."
This was a most unjustified accusation against poor little Mrs.
Sartoris, who was simply a young married woman fond of dancing and
gaiety.
"Besides," she continued, "you might have remembered that I wanted
Blanche to have a quiet fortnight. Girls at her age are so easily
knocked up by the dissipations of London, and it is very desirable that
she should take the opportunity of a rest now she can get it."
"Pooh! that's all nonsense, Mary, and you know it. Blanche is as
strong as a horse, and no girl enjoys dancing more. Why, she has never
been sick nor sorry since she was a little thing! I'll go bail that
she's none the worse for her first season."
"Oh, very well; of course if you know better than I do, well and good.
A mother is usually supposed to be the best judge of such matters. If
she is regularly knocked up by July, don't forget I raised my voice
against the Commonstone ball."
"No, my dear," replied the Squire, as he composed himself for slumber;
"there is not the slightest probability of my forgetting it, insomuch
as, if such a misfortune should befall the girl, I feel confident that
fact would be pretty constantly recalled to my memory."