When Mrs. Fox-Darriel descended to the drawing-room a quarter of an hour
later, she found Lady Paton and Mary alone with Mrs. Jedsley, who as yet
showed no intention of departing. Mrs. Jedsley was very stout, but of a
vigorous bearing. Her firm, wide face was dashed with rather choleric
notes of red on cheeks, chin, and eyebrows. Her eyes were witty and
humorous. Mrs. Fox-Darriel, very indifferently, felt these quickly
travelling eyes taking in every gleam and glitter of her tea-gown. Mrs.
Fox-Darriel always jingled a little as she walked; she was one of those
women who dangle lorgnettes at the ends of swaying neck-chains, and
circle their wrists with a multitude of bangles, and now, as she sank
into a chair beside Lady Paton, and smiled a languid acceptance of tea,
the infinity of pendent jewels and the linked gold that draped her
person, chimed out quite a harmonious clatter. Mrs. Fox-Darriel always
gave Lady Paton a fluttered look, the look of a child shrinking from a
too persistently obtrusive rattle, and she handed her the tea and bread
and butter with gently scared glances.
"What delicious tea," said Mrs. Fox-Darriel affably, "and the pouring of
tea is an art in its decadence. Really, dear Lady Paton, you have
spoiled me for all cups poured by other hands. Your aunt's hands add a
distinct charm, do they not?" she added, looking at Mary,--"and her
cap." Indeed Lady Paton's caps and hands resembled one another in
blanched delicacy.
"Oh yes," Mary replied hastily; she was not accustomed to this suave
mode of address from Mrs. Fox-Darriel.
"I saw you walking in the garden just now," pursued that glittering
personage; "you made quite a picture in your pretty dress, I assure
you."
"Oh! do you like it?" Mary's face was transfused by a blush of surprised
pleasure.
"It is really charming," said Mrs. Fox-Darriel unblinkingly, while Mrs.
Jedsley's eyes travelled up and down poor Mary's ungainliness.
"Against the deeper shades of green, you know, and with your golden
hair, you looked quite--quite like an Albert Moore. Has your friend, Mr.
Perior, gone? I saw him with you." There was a subtly delightful
intimation in this question that filled Mary with a half painful, half
delicious embarrassment.
"Mr. Perior is with Camelia," she said, the crude fact hardly jarring on
the dulcet echo of Mrs. Fox-Darriel's question. He was her friend, Mary
knew, felt it with a wave of gratitude that quieted many aches, but was
it then so evident--so noticeable?
"Ah yes! Camelia is rather fond of teasing him, I am afraid," said Mrs.
Fox-Darriel, observing Mary's flush, and noting as an unkindness of
nature that her hair, the only grace she possessed, should grow so
thickly at the back and with such unbecoming scantiness around the high
brow. Mary's whole being had been quivering with the pain of her
dispossession, but a grateful warmth now stole through the chill of
bereavement.
Her flush had not died when Camelia came in, Perior following her.
Camelia's face was imperturbably gay, but from a certain severity and
tension in Perior's expression, Mrs. Fox-Darriel surmised that the
pastoral promenade had not been altogether peaceful.
It was hardly possible, of course, that the indifference of this stiff
provincial should pique Camelia into an attitude that might compromise
real interests; no, hardly possible; yet Mrs. Fox-Darriel, with some
acuteness, determined that all her efforts should tend to make such an
absurdity impossible indeed.
Ugly Mary was evidently in love with the unattractive Diogenes; but
Camelia need not know that. Mrs. Fox-Darriel almost laughed at herself
while she meditated; Camelia could hardly intend more than the
purposeless capturing of Diogenes; Camelia's head was perfectly sound
when it came to decisive extremes. Only--well--women, all women, were
such _fools_ sometimes. That bounding, pursuing step across the lawn had
given Mrs. Fox-Darriel a new impression of Camelia.
"Look, Mamma, is not this beautiful? Look, Frances." Camelia held out a
branch of white roses, buds and leaves climbing on lovely curves to a
heavy, swaying flower;--"it is such a perfect spray that I am going to
attempt a Japanese arrangement with this bit of pine. Mary, will you
fetch me that bronze vase out of the morning room--with its little
stand, you know--and have it filled with water; and, Mary,--" Mary was
departing obediently, "a pair of scissors--don't forget. If there is
anything I dislike," Camelia went on, hers was always a temperate manner
of speech, "it is a heavy mass of flowers bunched together with all the
individuality, all the form and vitality, of line quite lost."
She smiled at Mrs. Jedsley as she spoke, skimming caressing finger-tips
over her rose branch, and adding, "You may see me at your place
to-morrow, Mrs. Jedsley. Mr. Perior has been giving me a dreadful
scolding on my neighborly deficiencies. To-morrow I make a conscientious
round of calls--and pour balm into all the wounded bosoms." Mrs.
Fox-Darriel glanced quickly at Perior to see how he relished this
offensive obedience; Perior, as he stood before the fireplace, was
looking at his boots. Mrs. Jedsley's eyebrows grew very red.
"I won't be at home to-morrow," she said decidedly, "and if I were
conscious of wounds I'd keep at a good distance from you, Camelia." Lady
Paton looked from her daughter to Perior, an alarmed appeal, but he did
not raise his eyes nor seem to notice Camelia's graceful promises.
"Mrs. Jedsley, _why_ are you always so unkind to me?" Camelia asked,
laughing. "I assure you that you may trust my balms. Mrs. Jedsley, I
will wager you--do you ever bet?--that by to-morrow night the whole
county-side will be singing my praises. I like people to sing my
praises--I like to feel affection and sympathy about me; now Mr. Perior
has been telling me that there is a distinct absence of these elements
in my atmosphere. I begin to feel the vacuum myself. Won't you help me
to fill it--help my regeneration?--No, Mary, that is the wrong vase--how
could I arrange flowers in that? On the stand, was it? The house-maid's
stupidity, then; and I bought together the stand and the proper vase to
go with it. No; don't take the _stand_ back with you, you goosie! put it
here. Now, Mrs. Jedsley," she added, when Mary had once more departed,
Perior having relieved her of the stand and carried it, not at all
graciously, to Camelia, "tell me how I can best please every one most?
You know them all so well--their pet pursuits, their pet hobbies. Mrs.
Harley has orchids, of course; I shall immediately ask her to take me to
the conservatory. And Mrs. Grier--that pensive little woman with the
long, long nose--has she not a son at Oxford, a boy she dotes on? Isn't
she very fond of music?"
Mrs. Jedsley was stirring her third cup of tea with an entirely
recovered composure. "Yes, Mrs. Grier plays the violin, and has a son
she dotes on; if you flatter her nicely enough, she will certainly join
in the 'Hallelujah.'"
"Well, that is nice to know." Mary had now brought the correct Japanese
vase, and Camelia neatly trimmed from her branch while she spoke a few
superfluous leaves and twigs.
"Is not Mrs. Grier a dear friend of Lady Henge's?" Mrs. Fox-Darriel
asked in an aside to Lady Paton--to the latter a very welcome aside, as
in murmured acquiescence she found a momentary refuge from the
bewildered sensations her daughter's projects gave her.
Yes, Lady Henge and Mrs. Grier were great friends, both musical, both
deeply interested in charitable work. Mrs. Grier, a sweet woman,--"and
you know," said Lady Paton, bending gently towards her guest, "her nose
is not so long. That is only Camelia's droll way of putting things, you
know."
"Oh, yes,"--Mrs. Fox-Darriel's smile was very reassuring--"you and I
understand Camelia, Lady Paton. It doesn't do to take her _au grand
sérieux_." Indeed, Mrs. Fox-Darriel smiled inwardly, feeling that all
disquiet on Camelia's account was very unnecessary, and convinced that
she knew her very thoroughly.
"You won't be at home to-morrow, then?" asked Camelia, looking around
from her vase as Mrs. Jedsley rose to go.
"No, my dear; and I'm afraid you won't find me of use at any time. I
haven't any particular foibles. You won't discover a handle about me by
which to wind me up to the required musical pitch."
"You traduce yourself, Mrs. Jedsley; with your charitable heart, do you
mean to tell me that, were I to wrap Clievesbury in red flannel, fill it
with buns and broth, you wouldn't think me charming, and make sweet
music in my ears?"
"I never denied that you were charming, balefully charming, you naughty
girl," said Mrs. Jedsley with a good humor that implied no submission.
"Here is a rose for you. May it give you kind thoughts of me." Camelia
fastened one of the rejected buds in the lady's portly bosom, and when
she was gone, Lady Paton, leaving the room with her, she added, "Mary,
is the piano tuned?"
Mary went to the Steinway. "Lady Henge is a composer, as you know." She
turned a face sparkling with mischief to Perior, who maintained his
silence beside the mantelpiece.
"You have heard her? Yes? Well, you shall hear her again. That's enough,
Mary," she added, lightly; "we hear that the piano needs tuning."
Now Mary had a certain little pride in the neat execution of Beethoven's
Sonatas, that many hours of faithful practice had seemed to justify, and
while Camelia stood back to admire her flower arrangement, both Perior
and Mrs. Fox-Darriel noticed the flush that swept over Mary's face.