"Oh, _I_ don't know. The list is there at your elbow. You are dull
to-day, Gerald."
"I know I am. I think I'm in for an attack of flue, or something; feel
shivery and all-overish. And I think you might be able to understand my
hating to have your daughter make such a horrible _mésalliance_, Tony."
She was touched with the pathetic facility for being touched common to
fading beauties. Rising, she laid her pretty hand on his shoulder.
"Poor darling, I am sorry I was cross. It is dear of you to mind. I
hated it, too, at first, for poor old Ponty is a gentleman, and he is
awfully cut up. But after all, it may not be a bad thing. She's a very
queer girl, Gerald, not at all easy to live with, and this boy Joyselle
is really nice. Besides, he has plenty of money----"
"By the way," interrupted Carron, tossing the kitten to a soft chair,
"where did he get the money? The fiddling chap can't have much. They say
he's a great spendthrift----"
"No, it isn't that. I mean Isabel Clough-Hardy left it to him. You
remember the moley one who died in Egypt?"
"Did she? He must have been a mere child when she died. You mean Hugh
Hislip's daughter?"
"Yes. Oh, yes, it was years ago. They say she was in love with Victor
Joyselle before she married."
"By Jove! Why didn't he marry her?"
"Because in this unenlightened land no man is allowed to have more than
one wife at a time--Oh, Tommy, what have you been doing?"
Kingsmead, who had come in without knocking, sat down and stretched his
thin legs over the arm of the chair. "Ratting."
"Oh, you nasty child! What a beastly thing!"
"Ratting, my dear mother, is a fine, manly, old-time sport. Most fellows
of my age and appearance would be making love to their mothers' friends,
but I bar women. Sport," he added solemnly, "for Thomas Edward, Earl of
Kingsmead."
Carron, who had always disliked the boy, looked at him. "So you bar
women? Many other 'men of your appearance' have said the same."
It was a nasty thrust, but Tommy, though he felt it, grinned cheerfully.
"_Stung!_" he cried, laying his hand on his heart in an absurd
theatrical gesture. "Your bolt has gone home, my dear fellow. But
experience may take the place of beauty at fifty."
Carron started. He loathed being fifty, he loathed Tommy, he loathed
everything.
Tommy turned to the kitten and talked artless nonsense to it to fill up
the pause that followed, and Lady Kingsmead powdered her nose with a bit
of chamois skin that lived in a silver box full of Fuller's earth under
the _chaise-longue_ pillows.
"Glad Brigit's coming?" asked Tommy, turning with appalling suddenness
to Carron, whose hatred for him increased tenfold as he tried to answer
carelessly.
As he replied, Brigit came in, without a hat, but covered from head to
foot with a rough tweed coat. Her wavy hair was very wet, and her
gloves, as she pulled them off, dripped on the floor. In her pearly pale
cheeks was a lovely pink tinge.
"What a day!" she cried. "I can't kiss you, mother--how d'ye do, Gerald?
Tommy, you angel, come and be drowned in sister's fond embrace!"
They all stared at her. "It's such a jolly rain. I drove myself in the
cart that had gone for Mr. Green. Green came in the brougham, poor dear!
Well--what are you all staring at, souls?"
"You look so--so young, Bicky," answered Tommy, with an effort. "What a
good time you must have had!"
Having taken off her coat and thrown her ruined gloves into the fire,
she sat down by her brother and put her arm round him.
"Dear little boy! I _am_ young, Thomas, and I did have a good time. He
is going to play for you, dear--all you want him to. He is a--a--what
shall I say?" Her eyes crinkled with amusement as she sought for a word.
"He really is a--ripper, Tommy. And he has a human dog named
Papillon--But-ter-fly," she added, still smiling and obviously quoting,
"also a parrot."
"And a wife," put in Carron sharply.
She looked at him, her face stiffening into its old expression of surly
hauteur.
"You have seen her?"
"No. But a friend of mine has. Charley Masterson, Tony. He says she
looks like a clean old peasant."
"That is exactly what she is--bravo, Charley Masterson! A clean old
peasant. Joyselle, too, is a peasant. They come from near Falaise, and
as a girl Madame Joyselle wore a cap. Is there no tea going?"
Lady Kingsmead, who hated rows unless she was one of the principals,
rang the bell.
"How was Pam?" she asked hastily.
"As nice as ever. They both sent you their love, by the way. I had a
heavenly week there, and they liked Théo so much. He came down for the
week-end. Oh, mother," she went on as the man who had answered the bell
closed the door, "please ask them down soon, will you? The clean old
peasant won't come; she never leaves home, and _he_ is--perfectly
presentable."
Lady Kingsmead watched her daughter in amazement. Tommy, as usual, was
right; Brigit looked, and seemed, years younger than she had done a
fortnight ago.
"Yes, my dear, I'll write to-night," she said with the graciousness she
used at will, and that was so charming. Then she added, "I might ask him
when the Duchess comes. He is sure to love duchesses; _those_ kind of
people always do."
"Yes, and as to duchesses, _those_ kind of people frequently like good
music for nothing."
But there was no bitterness in her tone, and mother and daughter smiled
at each other.