CHAPTER XIII.
HOW A YOUNG AND LOVELY NATURE TAKES A SHOCK MOST CRUELLY ADMINISTERED. AND HOW A DOWAGER TAKES A NEW NAME AS A DIRECT INSULT. AND HOW TITA DECLINES TO PROMISE ANYTHING.
He stands at the open window looking in. All at once Tita knows and feels that Margaret sent him to rescue her from captivity.
"Lady Rylton," calls he, "won't you come out? The evening is a perfect dream—a boon and a blessing to men, like those pens, you know."
The elder Lady Rylton answers him. She leans forward, a charming smile on her wonderfully youthful features.
"No. No, thanks." She shakes her pretty, fair head at Gower in a delightfully coquettish fashion. Dear boy! How sweet is it of him to come and fetch her for a little stroll among the hollyhocks. "I can't go out now. Not to-night, Randal!"
"Oh! er—so sorry! But——" He looks at Tita. It is impossible not to understand that the Lady Rylton he had intended to take for a little stroll in the calm, delightful evening, had been the younger Lady Rylton. "Well, if your—er—mother—won't come, won't you?" asks he, now addressing Tita distinctly.
"I am not going out either," says she, smiling gently at him. To go now will be to betray fear, and she—no, she will not give in, any way, she will never show the white feather. She will finish this hour with Lady Rylton, whatever it may cost her.
"Really?" asks Gower. He looks as if he would have persuaded her to come with him, but something in her manner convinces him of the folly of persistence.
"Yes, really," returns she, after which he goes down the steps again. They can hear him going, slowly this time, as if reluctantly, and step by step. There doesn't seem to be a run left in him.
"How absurd it is, this confusion of titles!" says Lady Rylton, as the last unsatisfactory step is lost to them in the distance. "Lady Rylton here and Lady Rylton there. Absurd, I call it." She makes a pretence at laughter, but it is a sorry one—her laugh is only angry.
"I suppose it can't be helped," says Tita indifferently. Her eyes are still downcast, her young mouth a little scornful.
"But if you are to be Lady Rylton as well as I, how are we to distinguish? What am I to be?"
"The dowager, I suppose," says Tita, with a little flash of malice. She has been rubbed the wrong way a trifle too much for one afternoon.
"The dowager!" Lady Rylton springs to her feet. "I—do you think that I shall follow you out of a room?"
"Follow me! I'd hate you to follow me anywhere!" says Tita, who does not certainly follow her as to her meaning.
"That is meant to be a smart speech, I presume," says Lady Rylton, sinking back into her seat once more. "But do not for a moment imagine that I dread you. You know very little of Society if you think you will be tolerated there."
"I know nothing of Society," returns Tita, now very pale, "and perhaps you will understand me when I say that I never want to know anything. If Society means people who tell hateful, unkind stories of a husband to his wife, I think I am very well out of it."
"That is a little censure upon poor me, I suppose," says Lady Rylton with a difficult smile. She looks at Tita. Evidently she expects Tita to sink into the ground beneath that austere regard, but Tita comes up smiling.
"Well, yes. After all, I suppose so," says she slowly, thoughtfully. "You shouldn't have told me that story about Maurice and——" She stops.
"I shall not permit you to dictate to me what I should or should not do," interrupts Lady Rylton coldly. "You forget yourself! You forget what is due to the head of the house."
"I do not, indeed; Maurice will tell you so!"
"Maurice! What has he to do with it?"
"Why, he is the head," slowly.
"True, you are right so far," says Lady Rylton bitterly. "But I was not alluding to the actual head; I was alluding to the—the mistress of this house." She pauses, and looks with open hatred at the little girl before her. Tita could have answered her, have told her that her authority was at an end for ever, but by a violent effort she restrains herself. Tita's naturally warm temper is now at boiling-point. Still, she puts a restraint upon herself.
"You will understand for the future, I hope," says Lady Rylton, who has lost all control over her temper; "you will, for the future, at all events, I trust, bear yourself with respect towards the mistress of this house."
Her manner is so insolent, so unbearable, that Tita's short-lived calm gives way.
"Maurice says I am the mistress here," says she distinctly, clearly.
"You! you——" Lady Rylton advances towards her with a movement that is almost threatening.
"Don't be uneasy about it," says Tita, with a scornful little laugh, and a gesture that destroys the meaning of Lady Rylton's. "I don't want to be the mistress here. I dislike the place. I shall be delighted if you will live here—instead of me."
"You are too good!" says Lady Rylton, in a choking tone. She looks as if she could kill this girl, whom she has driven to so fierce an anger.
"I think it dismal," goes on Tita. "I like light and gay places." There is a little clutch at her heart, though why, she hardly knows. What she does know is that she hates this pretty, fair, patrician woman before her—this woman with a well-bred face, and the vulgarest of all vulgar natures. This woman who has betrayed her son's secret. Even to so young a girl, and one who is not in love with her husband, the idea of the husband being in love with somebody else is distinctly distasteful.
"Besides, remember," says Tita, "Mrs. Bethune lives here. After all you have told me of her, and—Maurice—you," breaking into a gay little laugh, "could hardly expect me to make this place my home."
"You certainly seem to take it very lightly," says Lady Rylton. "Maurice must be congratulated on having secured so compliant a wife."
"Why should I care?" asks Tita, turning a bright face to her. "We made a bargain before our marriage—Maurice and I. He was to do as he liked."
"And you?"
"I was to follow suit."
"Outrageous!" says Lady Rylton. "I shall speak to Maurice about it. I shall warn you. I shall tell him how I disapprove of you, and he——"
"He will do nothing," interrupts Tita. She stands up, and looks at the older woman as if defying her. Her small face is all alight, her eyes are burning.
"I dare say not, after all," says Lady Rylton, with a cruel smile. "He knew what he was about when he made that arrangement. It leaves him delightfully free to renew his love-affair with Marian Bethune."
"If he desires such freedom it is his." Tita gathers up her fan, and the long suède gloves lying on the chair near her, and walks towards the door.
"Stay, Tita!" cries Lady Rylton hurriedly. "You will say nothing of this to Maurice. It was in strict confidence I spoke, and for your good and his. You will say nothing to him?"
"I! what should I say?" She looks back at Lady Rylton, superb disdain in her glance.
"You might mention, for example, that it was I who told you."
"Well, why shouldn't I?" asked Tita. "Are you ashamed of what you have said?"
"I have always told you that I spoke only through a sense of duty, to protect you and him in your married life. You will give me your word that you will not betray me."
"I shall give you my word about nothing," coldly. "I shall tell
Maurice, or I shall not tell him, just as it suits me."
CHAPTER XIV.
HOW TITA COMES TO OAKDEAN, AND IS GLAD. AND HOW MAURICE CALLS TO HER, AND SHE PERFORMS AN ACROBATIC FEAT. AND HOW A DISCUSSION ARISES.
What a day it is! Golden light everywhere; and the sounds of singing birds, and the perfume of the late mignonette and stocks. Who shall say summer is gone? Tita, flitting gaily through the gardens and pleasure-grounds of her old dear home, her beloved Oakdean, tells herself that it is summer _here _at all events, whatever it may be in other stupid homes.
Oakdean to-day is at its best, and that is saying a great deal. The grand old lawn, studded here and there with giant beeches, seems sleeping solemnly in the warm light, and to their left the lake lies, sleeping too, rocking upon its breast the lily leaves, whose flowers are now all gone. Over there the hills are purple with flowering heather, and beyond them, yet not so far away but that the soft murmuring of it can be heard, dwells the sea, spreading itself out, grand, immense, until it seems to touch the pale blue heavens.
Tita, stopping with her hands full of lowers, stands upright, and as a little breeze comes to her, draws in a long breath, as if catching the salt from the great ocean that it brings her. Oh, what a day—what a day!
Her lovely old home! Here she is in it once more—parted for ever from the detested uncle, mistress of this one place that holds for her the only happy memories of her youth. Here she and her father had lived—she a young, _young _child, and he an old one—a most happy couple; and here, too, she had grown to girlhood. And now here she is again, free to roam, to order, to direct, with no single hitch anywhere to mar her happiness.
The lovely new horse that Maurice has got for her leaves nothing to be desired; she has had a gallop on him this morning. And all her dear dogs have been sent to Oakdean, so that her hands are full of favourites. As for Maurice himself, he is delightful. He doesn't even know how to scold. And it will always to be like this—always. As for that story of Lady Rylton's about Marian Bethune—why, Marian is quite an old thing! And besides—well, besides, it doesn't matter. Maurice is here now, and he can't see her, and even if he did—well, even if he did, what harm? Neither she nor Maurice even _pretends _to be in love with the other, and if he should be in love—as the idiots call it—with Mrs. Bethune, why, he can be! She won't prevent it, only she hopes poor Maurice won't make himself unhappy over that dreadful red-headed creature. But there is certainly one thing; he might have told her.
But what does anything matter? Here she is in her old home, with all her dear delights around her! She glances backwards and forwards, a happy smile upon her lips. From one of the Scotch firs over there, the graceful blossoms of the hop-plant droop prettily. And beyond them on the hillside, far, far away, she can see mushrooms gleaming in the fields, for all the world like little sheep dotted here and there. She laughs to herself as she notes the resemblance. And all is hers—all. And she is in her own home, and happy.
What a blessing she hadn't said "No" when Maurice asked her. If she had, she would have been living at Rickfort now with Uncle George.
"Tita!" cries Maurice.
He has thrown up the window of his smoking-room, and is calling to her.
"Yes?"
She turns to him, her arms full of flowers, her vivacious little face, just like another sort of flower, peeping over them.
"Can you come in for a moment?"
"Why can't you come out? Do, it is lovely here!"
"I can if you like, but it will mean hauling out pencils and paper, and——"
"Oh well, I'll come."
She runs to him across the green, sweet grass, and, standing beneath the window, holds out her hands to him.
"You can't come in this way," says he.
"Can't I? I wish I had a penny for every time I did get in this way," says she. "Here, give me your hands."
He stoops to her, and catches her small brown hands in a close grip. The new Lady Rylton plants a very shapely little foot against an excrescence in the wall, and in a second has her knee on the window-sill.
"After all, my mother was right," says Rylton, laughing. "You are a hoyden."
He takes the slight girlish figure in his arms, and swings her into the room. She stands for a second looking at him with a rather thoughtful air. Then—
"You mother may call me names if she likes," says she. "But you mustn't!"
"No?" laughing again. She amuses him with her little air of authority. "Very good. I shan't! I suppose I may call you wife, any way."
"Oh, that!" She stops. "Did you bring me in to ask me that question?"
At this they laugh together.
"No. I confess so much."
"What, then?"
"Well, we ought to decide at once who we are going to ask for the rest of the shooting. The preserves are splendid, and it seems quite a sin to let them go to waste. Of course I know a lot of men I could ask, but there should be a few women, too, for you."
"Why for me? I like men a great deal better," says Tita audaciously.
"Well, you shouldn't! And, besides, you have some friends of your won to be asked."
"Your friends will do very well."
"Nonsense!" with a touch of impatience. "It is you and your friends who are first to be considered; afterwards we can think of mine."
"I have no friends," says Tita carelessly.
"You have your uncle, at all events; he might like——"
"Oh, don't be an ass," says Lady Rylton.
She delivers this excellent advice with a promptitude and vigour that does her honour. Rylton stares at her for a moment, and then gives way to amusement.
"I shan't be if I can help it," says he; "but there are often so many difficulties in the way." He hesitates as if uncertain, and then goes on. "By the way, Tita, you shouldn't give yourself the habit of saying things like that."
"Like what?"
"Well, telling a fellow not to be an ass, you know. It doesn't matter to me, of course, but I heard you say something like that to old Lady Warbeck yesterday, and she seemed quite startled."
"Did she? Do her good!" says Tita, making a charming little face at him. "Nothing like electricity nowadays. It'll quite set her up again. Add years to her life."
"Still, she wouldn't like it, perhaps."
"Having years added to her life?"
"No; your slang."
"She likes me, any way," says Tita nonchalantly, "so it doesn't matter about the slang. The last word she mumbled at me through her old false teeth was that she hoped I'd come over and see her every Tuesday that I had at my command (I'm not going to have many), because I reminded her of some granddaughter who was now in heaven, or at the Antipodes—it's all the same."
She pauses to catch a fly—dexterously, and with amazing swiftness, in the palm of her hand—that has been buzzing aimlessly against the window-pane. Having looked at it between her fingers, she flings it into the warm air outside.
"So you see," continues she triumphantly, "it's a good thing to startle people. They fall in love with you at once."
Here, as if some gay little thought has occurred to her, she lowers her head and looks at her dainty finger-nails, then up at Rylton from under half-closed lids.
"What a good thing I didn't try to startle you!" says she. "You might have fallen in love with me, too."
She waits for a second as it were, just time enough to let her see the nervous movement of his brows, and then—she laughs.
"I've escaped that bore," says she, nodding her head. She throws herself into a big chair. "And now, as the parsons say, 'to continue'; you were advising me to ask——"
"Your uncle."
All the brightness has died out of Rylton's voice; he looks dull, uninterested. That small remark of hers—what memories it has awakened! And yet—would he go back?
"Chut! What a suggestion!" says Tita, shrugging her shoulders.
"Don't you know that my one thought is to enjoy myself?"
"A great one," says he, smiling strangely.
She cares for nothing, he tells himself: nothing! He has married a mere butterfly; yet how pretty the butterfly is, lying back there in that huge armchair, her picturesque little figure flung carelessly into artistic curves, her soft, velvety head rubbing itself restlessly amongst the amber cushions. The cushions had been in one of the drawing-rooms, but she had declared he was frightfully uncomfortable in his horrid old den, and has insisted on making him a handsome present of them. She seems to him the very incarnation of exquisite idleness, the idleness that knows no thought.
"Very good," says he at last. "If you refuse to make up a list of your friends, help me to make up a list of mine. You know you said you would like to fill the house."
"Ye—es," says she, as if meditating.
"Of course, if you don't want any people here——"
"But I do. I do really. I hate being alone!" cries she, springing into sudden life and leaning forward with her hands clasped on her knees.
"How few rings you have!" says he suddenly.
CHAPTER XV.
HOW TITA TELLS OF TWO STRANGE DREAMS, AND OF HOW THEY MOVED HER. AND HOW MAURICE SETS HIS SOUL ON ASKING A GUEST TO OAKDEAN; AND HOW HE GAINS HIS DESIRE.
"Not one, except this," touching her engagement ring. "That you have given me."
"You don't care for them, then?"
"Yes I do. I love them, but there was nobody to give them to me.
I was very young, you see, when poor daddy died."
She stops; her mouth takes a mournful curve; the large gray eyes look with a sort of intensity through the windows to something—something beyond—but something that Rylton cannot see. After all, is she so trivial? She cares, at all events, for the memory of that dead father. Rylton regards her with interest.
"He would have given me rings," she says.
It is so childish, so absurd, that Rylton wonders why he doesn't want to laugh. But the little sad face, with the gray eyes filled with tears, checks any mirth he might have felt. A sudden longing to give her another ring, when next he goes to town, fills his heart.
"Well! what about our guests?"
Her tone startles him. He looks up. All the tears, the grief are gone; she is the gay, laughing Tita that he thinks he knows.
"Well, what?" His tone is a little cold. She is superficial, certainly. "If you decline to ask your friends——"
"I don't decline. It is only that I have no friends," declares she.
There is something too deliberate in her manner to be quite natural, and Rylton looks at her. She returns his glance with something of mockery in hers.
"It isn't nice to be married to a mere nobody, is it?" says she, showing her pretty teeth in a rather malicious little laugh.
"I suppose not," says Rylton steadily. "I haven't tried it."
A gleam—a tiny gleam of pleasure comes into her eyes, bus she wilfully repulses it.
"Oh, you—if anybody. However, you knew before you married me, that is one comfort."
"Why do you speak to me like that, Tita?" A frown has settled on Rylton's forehead. It is all such abominably bad form. "You know how—how——"
"Ill-bred it is," supplies she quietly, gaily.
"It is intolerable," vehemently, turning away and walking towards the door.
"Ah, come back! Don't go—don't go!" cries she eagerly. She jumps out of her big chair and runs after him. She slips her hand through his arm, and swinging her little svelte body round, smiles up into his face mischievously. "What's the matter with you?" asks she.
"It is in such bad taste," says Rylton, mollified, however, in a measure in spite of himself. "You should consider how it hurts me. You should remember you are my wife."
"I do. That is why I think I can say to you what I can't say to anybody else," says Tita quietly. "However, never mind; sit down again and let us settle the question about our guests. Here's a sheet of paper," pushing it into his hands. "And here's a pencil—an awfully bad one, any way, but if you keep sticking it into your mouth it'll write. _I'm _tired of licking that pencil."
She is evidently hopeless! Rylton, after that first crushing thought, gives way, and, leaning back in his chair, roars with laughter.
"And am I to lick it now!" asks he.
"No, certainly not,". She is now evidently in high dudgeon. She puts the pencil back in her pocket, and stands staring at him with her angry little head somewhat lowered. "After all, you are right; I'm horrid!" says she.
"I'm right! By what authority do you say that! Come now, Tita!"
"By my own."
"The very worst in the world, then. Give me back that pencil."
"Not likely," says Tita, tilting her chin. "Here's one belonging to yourself," taking one off the writing-table near. "This can't offend you, I hope. After all, I'm a poor sort," says Tita, with a disconsolate sigh that is struggling hard with a smile to gain the mastery. "It's awfully hard to offend me. I've no dignity—that's what your mother says. And after all, too," brightening up, and smiling now with delightful gaiety, "I don't want to have any. One hates to be hated!"
"What an involved speech! Well, if you won't give me your pencil, let us get on with this. Now, to begin, surely you have someone you would like to ask here, in spite of all you have said."
"Well—perhaps." She pauses. "I want to see Margaret," says she, hurriedly, tremulously, as if tears might be in her eyes.
He cannot be sure of that, however, as her lids are lowered. But her tone—is there a note of unhappiness in it? The very thought gives him a shock; and of late has she not been a little uncertain in her moods?
"I was going to name her," says Rylton.
"Then you see we have one thought in common," says Tita.
She has knelt down beside him to look at his list, and suddenly he lays his palm under her chin, and so lifts her face that he can see it.
"What is it, Tita?" says he. "Is anything troubling you? Last night you were so silent; to-day you talk. It is bad to be unequal."
His tone is grave.
"The night before last I had a bad dream," says Tita solemnly, turning her head a little to one side, and giving him a slight glance that lasts for the tiniest fraction of a second.
It occurs to Rylton that there is a little touch of wickedness in it. At all events, he grows interested.
"A bad dream?"
"Yes, the worst!" She nods her small head reproachfully at him. "I dreamt you were married to a princess!"
"Well, so I am," says Rylton, smiling.
His smile is a failure, however; something in her air has disconcerted him.
"Oh no! No, she was not like me; she was a tall princess, and she was beautiful, and her hair was like a glory round her head. She was a very dream in herself; whereas I—— Naturally , that puts me out of sorts!" She shrugs her shoulders pathetically. "But last night"—she stops, clasps her hands, and sits back on her heels. "Oh no! I shan't tell you what I dreamt last night," says she. She shakes her head at him. "No, no! indeed, not if you asked me for ever!"
"Oh, but you must!" says he, laughing.
He catches her hands and draws her up gently into a kneeling position once more—a position that brings her slender body resting against his knees.
"Must I?" She pauses as if in amused thought, and then, leaning confidentially across his knees, says, "Well, then, I dreamt that you were madly in love with me! And, oh, the joy of it!"
She breaks off, and gives way to irrepressible laughter. Covering her face with her hands, she peeps at him through her fingers as a child might who is bent on mischief.
"Is all that true?" asks Maurice, colouring.
"What, the first dream or the second?"
"I presume one is as true as the other," somewhat stiffly.
"You are a prophet," says Tita, with a little grimace. "Well now, go on, do. We have arranged for Margaret." She pauses, and then says very softly, "Darling Margaret! Do you know, I believe she is the only friend I have in the world?"
Her words cut him to the heart.
"And I, Tita, do I not count?" asks he.
"You! No!" She gives him a little shake, taking his arms, as she kneels beside him. "You represent Society, don't you? And Society forbids all that. No man's wife is his friend nowadays."
"True," says Rylton bitterly. "Most men's wives are their enemies nowadays."
"Oh, I shan't be yours!" says Tita. "And you mustn't be mine either, remember! Well, go on—we have put down Margaret," peeping at the paper in his hand, "and no one else. Now, someone to meet her. Colonel Neilson?"
"Yes, of course; and Captain Marryatt?"
"And Mrs. Chichester to meet him!"
"My dear Tita, Mrs. Chichester has a husband somewhere!"
"So she told me," says Tita. "But, then, he is so very far off, and in your Society distance counts."
Rylton regards her with some surprise. Is she satirical?—this silly child!
"You will have to correct your ideas about Society," says he coldly. "By all means ask Mrs. Chichester here, too; I, for one, prefer not to believe in scandals."
"One must believe in something," says Tita. "I suppose," pencil poised in hand, "you would like to ask Mr. Gower?"
"Certainly."
"And his aunt?"
"Certainly not."
"Oh, but I should," says Tita; "she amuses me. Do let us ask old
Miss Gower!"
"I begin to think you are a wicked child," says Rylton, laughing, whereon Miss Gower's name is scrawled down on the list. "There are the men from the barracks in Merriton; they can always be asked over," goes on Maurice. "And now, who else?"
"The Marchmonts!"
"Of course." He pauses. "And then—there is Mrs. Bethune!"
"Your cousin! Yes!"
"Shall we ask her?"
"Why should we not ask her?" She lifts one small, delicate, brown hand, and, laying it on his cheek, turns his face to hers. "Don't look out of the window; look at me. Why should we not ask her?"
"My dear girl, there is no answer to such a question as that."
"No!" She scribbles Mrs. Bethune's name on her list, and then, "You particularly wish her to be asked?"
"Not particularly. Certainly not at all if you object to it."
"Object! Why should I object? She is amusing—she will keep us all alive; she will help you to entertain your people."
"I should hope you, Tita, would help me to do that."
"Oh, I have not the air—the manner! I shall feel like a guest myself," says Tita. She has sprung to her feet, and is now blowing a little feather she had found upon her frock up into the air. It eludes her, however; she follows it round the small table, but all in vain—it sinks to the ground. "What a beast of a feather!" says she.
"I don't like you to say that," says Rylton. "A _guest _in your own house!"
"You don't like me to say anything," says Tita petulantly. "I told you I was horrid. Well, I'll be mistress in my own house, if that will please you. But," prophetically, "it won't. Do you know, Maurice," looking straight at him with a defiant little mien, "I'm more glad that I can tell you that I don't care a ha'penny about you, because if I did you would break my heart."
"You have a high opinion of me!" says Maurice. "That I acknowledge. But, regarding me as you do, I wonder you ever had the courage to marry me!"
"Well, even you are better than Uncle George," says she. "Now, go on; is there anyone else? The Heriots! Who are they? I heard you speak of them."
"Ordinary people; but he shoots. He is a first-class shot."
"Heriot! It reminds me——" Tita grows silent a moment, and now a little flood of colour warms her face. "I have someone I want to ask, after all," cries she. "A cousin—Tom Hescott."
"A cousin?"
"Yes. And he has a sister—Minnie Hescott. I should like to ask them both." She looks at him. "They are quite presentable," says she whimsically.
"Your cousins should be, naturally," says he.
Yet his heart sinks. What sort of people are these Hescotts?
"I have not seen them for years," says Tita—"never since I lived with my father. Tom used to be with us always then, but he went abroad."
"To Australia?"
"Oh no—to Rome! To Rome first, at all events; he was going to India after that."
"For——"
"Nothing—nothing at all. Just to see the world!"
"He must have had a good deal of money!"
"More than was good for him, I often heard. But I did like Tom; and I heard he was in town last week, and Minnie with him, and I should like very much indeed to ask them here."
"Well, scribble down their names."
"I dare say they won't come," says Tita, writing.
"Why?"
"Oh, because they know such lots of people. However, I'll try them, any way." She flings down her pencil. "There, that's done; and now I shall go and have a ride before luncheon."
"You have been riding all the morning!"
"Yes."
"Do you never get tired?"
"Never! Come and see if I do."
"Well, I'll come," says Rylton.
"Really!" cries Tita; her eyes grow very bright. "You mean it?"
"Certainly I do. It is my place, you know, to see that you don't overdo it."
"Oh, how delightful!" says she, clasping her hands. "I hate riding alone. We'll go right over the downs, and back of Scart Hill, and so home. Come on—come on," running out of the room; "don't be a minute dressing."
CHAPTER XVI.
HOW A DULL MORNING GIVES BIRTH TO A STRANGE AFTERNOON. AND HOW RYLTON'S EYES ARE WIDENED BY A FRIEND.
"Good old day!" says Mrs. Chichester disgustedly. She is sitting near the window in the small drawing-room at Oakdean, watching the raindrops race each other down the panes.
"What's the matter with it?" asks Mr. Gower, who is standing beside her, much to the annoyance of Captain Marryatt, who is anxious to engage her for some waltzes at the dance old Lady Warbeck is giving in the near future.
"What isn't the matter with it?" asks Mrs. Chichester, turning her thin shoulders, that always have some queer sort of fascination in them, on Gower. She gives him a glance out of her blue-green eyes. She is enjoying herself immensely, in spite of the day, being quite alive to the fact that Captain Marryatt is growing desperate, and that old Miss Gower, whom Tita has insisted on asking to her house party, is thinking dark things of her from the ottoman over there.
"What's it good for, any way?"
"For the ducks," says Mr. Gower, who is always there. An answer to any question under the sun comes as naturally to him as sighing to the sad.
"Oh, well, I'm not a duck," says she prettily; whereupon Mr. Gower whispers something to her that makes her laugh, and drives Captain Marryatt to frenzy.
He comes forward.
"Lady Rylton is talking of getting up something to pass the time;" says he, regarding Mrs. Chichester with a frowning brow—a contortion that fills that frivolous young woman's breast with pure joy.
"May the heavens be her bed!" says Mr. Gower, who has spent some years in Ireland, and has succeeded in studying the lower orders with immense advantage to himself, but not very much to others. He has, at all events, carried off from them a good deal of the pleasant small-talk, whereas they had only carried off from him a wild wonder as to what he was and where born, and whether he ought or ought not to be inside a lunatic asylum. They had carried off also, I am bound to add, a considerable amount of shillings. "Lady Rylton!" to Tita, who has just come up, "is this a reality or a mere snare? Did you say you thought you could put us successfully through this afternoon without reducing us to the necessity of coming to bloodshed?" Here he looks, first at Captain Marryatt, who providentially does not see the glance, and then at Mrs. Chichester, who laughs.
"I'm not sure. I haven't quite thought it out," says Tita. "What would you suggest, Margaret?" to Miss Knollys. "Or you, Tom?" to a tall young man who has followed in her quick little progress across the room.
He is her cousin, Tom Hescott. He is so very much taller than she is, that she has to look up at him—the top of her head coming barely to a level with his shoulder. She smiles as she asks her question, and the cousin smiles back at her. It suddenly occurs to Sir Maurice, who has strolled into the room (and in answer to a glance from Mrs. Bethune is going to where she stands), that Tom Hescott is extraordinarily handsome.
And not handsome in any common way, either. If his father had been a duke, he could not have shown more breeding in look and gesture and voice. The fact that "Uncle Joe," the sugar merchant, was his actual father, does not do away with his charm; and his sister, Minnie Hescott, is almost as handsome as he is! All at once Rylton seems to remember what his wife had said to him a few weeks ago, when they were discussing the question of their guests. She had told him he need not be afraid of her relations; they were presentable enough, or something like that. Looking at Tom Hescott at this moment, Sir Maurice tells himself, with a grim smile, that he is, perhaps, a little too presentable—a sort of man that women always smile upon. His grim smile fades into a distinct frown as he watches Tita smiling now on the too presentable cousin.
"What is it?" asks Mrs. Bethune, making room for him in the recess of the window that is so cosily cushioned. "The cousin?"
"What cousin?" demands Sir Maurice, making a bad fight, however; his glance is still concentrated on the upper part of the room.
"Why, her cousin," says Mrs. Bethune, laughing. She is looking
younger than ever and radiant. She is looking, indeed, beautiful.
There is not a woman in the room to compare with her; and few in all
England outside it.
The past week has opened out to her a little path that she feels she may tread with light feet. The cousin, the handsome, the admirable cousin! What a chance he affords for—vengeance! vengeance on that little fool over there, who has dared to step in and rob her—Marian Bethune—of her prey!
"Haven't you noticed?" says she, laughing lightly, and bending so close to Rylton as almost to touch his ear with her lips. "No? Oh, silly boy!"
"What do you mean?" asks Rylton a little warmly.
"And after so many days! Why, we all have guessed it long ago."
"I'm not good at conundrums," coldly.
"But this is such an easy one. Why, the handsome cousin is in love with the charming little wife, that is all."
"You say everyone has been talking about it," says Rylton. His manner is so strange, so unpleasant, that Marian takes warning.
"Ah! That was an exaggeration. One does talk much folly, you know. No—no! It was I only who said it—at least"—hesitating—"I think so." She pauses to let her hesitation sink in, and to be as fatal as it can be. "But you know I have always your interests at heart, and so I see things that, perhaps, others do not see."
"One may see more than——"
"True—true; and of course I am wrong. No doubt I imagined it all. But, even if it should be so," laughing and patting his arm softly, "who need wonder? Your wife is so pretty—those little things often are pretty—and he is her cousin—they grew up together, in a sense."
"No, I think not."
"At all events, they were much together when she was growing from child to girl. And old associations—they——" She stops as if some dart has struck her. Rylton looks at her.
"Are you ill?" says he sharply. "You look pale."
"Nothing, nothing." She recovers herself and smiles at him, but her face is still white. "A thought, a mere thought—it cannot be only Tita and her cousin who have old associations, who have—memories."
Her eyes are full of tears. She leans toward him. This time her lips do touch him—softly her lips touch his cheek. The curtains hide them.
"Have you no memories?" says she.
"Marian! This is madness," says Rylton, turning suddenly to her. In a sense, though without a gesture, he repulses her. She looks back at him; rage is in her heart at first, but, seeing him as he is, rage gives place to triumph. He is actually livid. She has moved him, then. She still has power over him. Oh for time, time only! And he will be hers again, soul and body, and that small supplanter shall be lowered to the very dust!
* * * * *
"Oh, how delightful! The very thing," says Mrs. Chichester, clapping her hands.
The conversation at the other end of the room is growing merrier; Tita, in the midst of a small group, has evidently been suggesting something in a most animated fashion.
"We should have to put all the things back," says Minnie Hescott, glancing round her at the small chairs and tables that abound.
"Not at all—not at all," says Tita gaily; "we could go into the smaller dancing-room and have it there."
"Oh, of course! Splendid idea!" says Minnie.
She is a tall, handsome young creature, standing fully five feet five in her dainty little black silk stockings. Her eyes are dark and almond-shaped like her brother's, and there is a little droop at the far corners of the lids that adds singularly to their beauty; it gives them softness. Perhaps this softness had not been altogether meant, for Mother Nature had certainly not added gentleness to the many gifts she had given Miss Hescott at her birth. Not that the girl is of a nature to be detested; it is only that she is strong, intolerant, and self-satisfied. She grates a little. Her yea is always yea, and her nay, nay. She would always prefer the oppressed to the oppressor, unless, perhaps, the oppressor might chance to be useful to herself. She likes useful people. Yet, with all this, she is of a merry nature, and very popular with most of her acquaintances. Friends, in the strictest sense, she has none. She doesn't permit herself such luxuries.
She had been at once attracted by Tita. Naturally Tita would be useful to her, so she has adopted her on the spot. Baronets' wives are few and far between upon her visiting list, and to have an actual cousin for one of them sounds promising. Tita will probably be the means of getting her into the Society for which she longs; therefore Tita is to be cultivated. She had told Tom that he must be very specially delightful to Tita; Tom, so far, has seemed to find no difficulty in obeying her. To him, indeed, Tita is once more the little merry, tiny girl whom he had taught to ride and drive in those old, good, past, sweet days, when he used to spend all his vacations with his uncle.
"Will you come and help us?" says Tita, turning to Gower.
That young man spreads his arms abroad as if in protestation.
"What a question from you to me!" says he reproachfully.
"'Call, and I follow; I follow, though I die!'"
"You're too silly for anything," returns she most ungratefully, turning her back upon him.
"'Twas ever thus,'" says Mr. Gower, who seems to be in a poetical mood. "Yet what have I done?"
"Oh, nothing—nothing!" cries Tita petulantly. "It is only the day!
Surely it would depress anyone!"
Her eyes wandered down the room, and are now fixed upon the curtains that hide the window where Mrs. Bethune and her husband are conversing.
"Anyone but me!" says Mr. Gower, with an exalted air. "I was up early this morning to——"
"Up early! I like that! When were you up?" asks Mrs. Chichester, between whom and Randal there is always a living feud. "Why, you can't get up even on Sundays, I hear, to be in time for service!"
"What it is to be clever!" says Mr. Gower, looking at her with enthusiastic admiration. "One hears so much"—pause—"that isn't true!"
"That's a mere put off," says she. "When were you up this morning?
Come now—honour bright!"
"At shriek of day," says Gower with dignity. "Were you ever up at that time?"
"Never!" says Mrs. Chichester, laughing.
She has evidently that best of all things—a sense of humour; she gives in.
"Well, I was. I wish I hadn't been," says Mr. Gower. "When I opened my window the rain beat upon me so hard that I felt it was a sort of second edition kind of thing when I took my bath later on."
"I'm so sorry the weather is turning out so horrid," says Tita.
"I don't see why you should ever be sorry about anything," says Tom
Hescott, in his slow, musical voice.
"Don't you?" She turns to him in a little quick way—a way that brings her back to that hateful window down below there. "You are right," she laughs gaily. It seems as if she had really cast that window and its occupants behind her for ever. "Well, I won't be. By-the-by, I told you all that we are to go to a dance at Lady Warbeck's on Thursday week? Thursday!—yes. Thursday week."
"I remember! How delightful!" cries Mrs. Chichester.
"Lady Warbeck! I know her," says Gower; "she has a son!"
"Yes—a son."
"Oh, do go on! Lady Rylton, do tell us about him," says Mrs.
Chichester, who is ever in search of fresh fields and pastures new.
CHAPTER XVII.
HOW TITA SUGGESTS A GAME OF BLIND MAN'S BUFF, AND WHAT COMES OF IT.
"Well, I hardly can," says Tita, struggling with her memory. "He seems a big man, with—airs, you know, and—and——"
"Trousers!" puts in Mr. Gower. "I assure you," looking confidently around him, "the checks on his trousers are so loud, that one can hear him rattle as he walks."
"Oh! is that the Mr. Warbeck?" says Minnie. "I know; I met him in town last July."
"You met a hero of romance, then," says Gower. "That is, a thing out of the common."
"I know him too," says Mrs. Chichester, who has been thinking. "A big man, a sort of giant?"
"A horrid man!" says Tita.
Mrs. Chichester looks at her as if amused.
"Why horrid?" asks she.
"Oh, I don't know," says Tita, shrugging her shoulders. "I didn't like him, anyway."
"I'm sure I'm not surprised," says Tom Hescott.
He takes a step closer to Tita, as if to protect her. It seems hideous to him that she should have to discuss—that she should even have known him.
"Well, neither am I," says Mrs. Chichester. "He _is _horrid, and as ugly as the——" She had the grace to stop here, and change her sentence. "As ugly can be."
It is a lame conclusion, but she is consoled for it by the fact that some of her audience understand what the natural end of that sentence would have been.
"And what manners!" says she. "After all," with a pretty little shake of her head, "what can you expect of a man with hair as red as a carrot?"
"Decency, at all events," says Tom Hescott coldly.
"Oh! That—last of all," says Mrs. Chichester.
"Lady Warbeck is a very charming old lady," says Margaret Knollys, breaking into the conversation with a view to changing it.
"Yes," says Mrs. Chichester. She laughs mischievously. "And such a delightful contrast to her son! She is so good."
"She's funny, isn't she?" says Tita, throwing back her lovely little head, and laughing as if at some late remembrance.
"No; good—good!" insists Mrs. Chichester. "Captain Marryatt, were you with me when she called that day in town? No? Oh! well," with a little glance meant for him alone—a glance that restores him at once to good humour, and his position as her slave once more—"you ought to have been."
"What did she say, then?" asks Minnie Hescott.
"Nothing to signify, really. But as a contrast to her son, she is perhaps, as Lady Rylton has just said, 'funny.' It was about a book—a book we are all reading nowadays; and she said she couldn't recommend it to me, as it bordered on impropriety! I was so enchanted."
"I know the book you mean," says Mrs. Bethune, who has just sauntered up to them in her slow, graceful fashion.
"Well, of course," says Mrs. Chichester. "Such nonsense condemning it! As if anybody worried about impropriety nowadays. Why, it has gone out of fashion. It is an exploded essence. Nobody gives it a thought."
"That is fatally true," says old Miss Gower in a sepulchral tone. She has been sitting in a corner near them, knitting sedulously until now. But now she uplifts her voice. She uplifts her eyes, too, and fixes them on Mrs. Chichester the frivolous. "Do your own words never make you shiver?" asks she austerely.
"Never," gaily; "I often wish they would in warm weather."
Miss Gower uprears herself.
"Be careful, woman! be careful!" says she gloomily. "There is a warmer climate in store for some of us than has been ever known on earth!"
She turns aside abruptly, and strides from the room.
Randal Gower gives way to mirth, and so do most of the others. Mrs. Chichester, it is true, laughs a little, but Tita can see that the laughter is somewhat forced.
She goes quickly up to her and slips her hand into hers.
"Don't mind her," says she. "As if a little word here and there would count, when one has a good heart, and I know you have one. We shall all go to heaven, I think, don't you? Don't mind what she hinted about—about that other place, you know."
"Eh?" says Mrs. Chichester, staring at her as if astonished.
"I saw you didn't like it," says Tita.
"Well, I didn't," says Mrs. Chichester, pouting.
"No, of course, one wouldn't."
"One wouldn't what?"
"Like to be told that one would have to go to—you know."
"Oh, I see," says Mrs. Chichester, with some disgust. "Is that what you mean? Oh, I shouldn't care a fig about that!"
"About what, then?" asks Tita anxiously.
"Well, I didn't like to be called a woman!" says Mrs. Chichester, frowning.
"Oh!" says Tita.
"Lady Rylton, where are you? You said you were going to get up blind man's buff," cries someone at this moment.
"Yes, yes, indeed. Maurice, will you come and help us?" says Tita, seeing her husband, and going to him gladly, as a means of getting out of her ridiculous interview with Mrs. Chichester, which has begun to border on burlesque.
"Certainly," says Sir Maurice; he speaks rapidly, eagerly, as if desirous of showing himself devoted to any project of hers.
"Well, then, come on—come on," cries she, gaily beckoning to her guests right and left, and carrying them off, a merry train, to the ball-room.
"Now, who'll be blinded first?" asks Mr. Gower, who has evidently constituted himself Master of the Ceremonies.
"You!" cries Miss Hescott.
"Not at all. There is only one fair way of arranging that," says Tita. "I'll show you. Now," turning to her husband, "make them all catch hands, Maurice—all in a ring, don't you know—and I'll show you."
They all catch hands; there is a slight tussle between Captain Marryatt and Mr. Gower (who is nothing if not a born nuisance wherever he goes), as to which of them is to take Mrs. Chichester's right hand. This, providentially, is arranged by Mr. Gower's giving in, and consenting on a grimace from her to take her left hand. Not that he wants it. Tom Hescott has shown himself desirous of taking Tita's small fingers into his possession for the time being, at all events—a fact pointed out to Rylton by Mrs. Bethune with a low, amused little laugh; but Tita had told him to go away, as she couldn't give her hand to anybody for a moment, as she was going to have the conduct of the affair.
"Now, are you all ready?" asks she, and seeing them standing in a circle, hands entwined, she runs suddenly to Maurice, disengages his hand from Mrs. Bethune's with a little airy grace, gives her right hand to the latter, and the left to Maurice, and, having so joined the broken ring again, leans forward.
"Now," cries she gaily, her lovely little face lit up with excitement, "who ever the last word comes to, he or she will have to hunt us! See?"
She takes her right hand from Mrs. Bethune's, that she may point her little forefinger at each one in succession, and begins her incantation with Mr. Gower, who is directly opposite to her, nodding her head at each mystic word; and, indeed, so far as the beginning of it goes, this strange chant of hers mystifies everybody—everybody except Tom Hescott, who has played this game with her before, in the not so very distant past—Tom Hescott, who is now gazing at her with a most profound regard, all his soul in his eyes, oblivious of the fact that two pairs of eyes, at all events, are regarding _him _very curiously.
"Hena, Dena, Dina, Dus."
"Good heavens!" interrupts Mr. Gower, with extravagant admiration. "What command of language! I"—to miss Hescott—"didn't know she was a linguist, did you?"
"Calto, Wheela, Kila, Kus."
"Oh, I say!" murmurs Mr. Gower faintly. "It can't be right, can it, to say 'cuss words' at us like that? Oh, really, Rylton, _would _you mind if I retired?"
"Hot pan, Mustard, Jan,
Tiddledum, taddledum, twenty-one,
You raise up the latch, and walk straight out."
The last word falls on Tom Hescott. "Out" comes to him.
"There, Tom! You must be blindfolded," says Tita delightfully.
"Who's got a big handkerchief?"
"I wouldn't stand that, Hescott, if I were you," says Colonel
Neilson, laughing.
"What is it?" asks Tom, who is a little abstracted.
"Nothing much," says Mrs. Chichester mischievously. "Except that Lady Rylton says your head is so big that she has sent to the housekeeper for a young sheet to tie it up in."
Hescott smiles. He can well afford his smile, his head being wonderfully handsome, not too small, but slender and beautifully formed.
"Give me yours," says Tita, thrusting her hand into her husband's pocket and pulling out his handkerchief.
The little familiar action sends a sharp pang through Mrs. Bethune's heart.
"Now, Tom, come and be decorated," cries Tita. Hescott advances to her, and stops as if waiting. "Ah!" cries she, "do you imagine I could ever get up there!"
She raises both her arms to their fullest height, which hardly brings her pretty hands even to a level with his forehead. She stands so for a moment, laughing at him through the gracefully uplifted arms. It is a coquettish gesture, though certainly innocent, and nobody, perhaps, would have thought anything of it but for the quick, bright light that springs into Hescott's eyes. So she might stand if she were about to fling her arms around his neck.
"Down on your knees," cries Tita, giving herself the airs of a little queen.
Hescott drops silently on to them. He has never once removed his gaze from hers. Such a strange gaze! One or two of the men present grow amused, all the women interested. Margaret Knollys makes an involuntary step forward, and then checks herself.
"There!" says Tita, who has now bound the handkerchief over Hescott's eager eyes. "Now are you sure you can't see? Not a blink?" She turns up his chin, and examines him carefully. "I'm certain you can see out of this one," says she, and pulls the handkerchief a little farther over the offending eye. "Now, get up. 'How many horses in your father's stable?'"
This is an embarrassing question, or ought to be, as Mr. Hescott's father is dead; but he seems quite up to it. Indeed, it now occurs to Sir Maurice that this cannot be the first time he has played blind man's buff with his cousin.
"'Three white and three gray.'"
"An excellent stud!" says Mr. Gower.
But Tita is not thinking of frivolities. Like Elia's old lady, the "rigour of game" is all she cares for. She gives Tom Hescott one or two little turns.
"'Then turn about, and turn about,'" says she, suiting the action to the word, "'And you don't catch me till May-day.'"
With this, she gives him a delicate little shove, and, picking up the train of her gown, springs lightly backwards to the wall behind her.
And now the fun grows fast and furious. Hescott, who, I regret to say, must have disarranged that handkerchief once for all, is making great running with the lady guests. As Mr. Gower remarks, it is perfectly wonderful how well he and Marryatt and the other men can elude him. There is no difficulty at all about it! Whereas Mrs. Chichester is in danger of her life any moment, and Mrs. Bethune has had several narrow escapes. Tita, who is singularly nimble (fairies usually are), has been able to dart to and fro with comparative ease; but Margaret Knollys, who, to everybody's immense surprise, is enjoying herself down to the ground, was very nearly caught once.
"That was a near shave," says Colonel Neilson, who happens to be near her when she runs, flushed and laughing, to the doorway. And then—"How you are enjoying yourself!"
"Yes. Isn't it foolish of me," says she; but she laughs still.
"It is the essence of wisdom," says Neilson.
Here a little giggle from Mrs. Chichester tells of her having been nearly caught. And now, now there is a skirmish down there, and presently they can see Hescott drawing Tita reluctantly forward.
Tita is making frantic signs to Mr. Gower.
"It's not a fair capture unless you can guess the name of your captive," says Gower, in answer to that frantic if silent appeal.
Hescott raises his right hand, pretends to feel blindly in the air for a moment, then his hand falls on Tita's sunny little head. It wanders on her short curls—it is a very slow wandering.
Mrs. Bethune looks up at Rylton, who is standing beside her.
"Do you still doubt?" asks she, in a low whisper.
"Doubt! I am a past master at it," says he bitterly. "I should be! You taught me!"
"I! Oh, Maurice!"
"Yes—you! Yesterday, as it seems to me, I believed in everyone.
To-day I doubt every soul I meet."
At this point Hescott's "doubts," at all events, seem to be set at rest. His hand has ceased to wander over the pretty head, and in a low tone he says:
"Titania!"
This word is meant for Tita alone. A second later he calls aloud:
"Lady Rylton!"
But Maurice and Mrs. Bethune, who had been standing just behind him, had heard that whispered first word.
"Oh, you rare right," says Tita petulantly. "But you would never have known me but for my hair. And I hate being blindfolded, too. Maurice, will you take it for me?" holding out to him the handkerchief.
"No!" says Rylton quietly, but decisively—so decisively that Mrs.
Chichester suddenly hides her face behind her fan.
"What a No!" says she to Captain Marryatt. "Did you hear it? What's the matter with him?"
"He's jealous, perhaps," says Captain Marryatt.
Mrs. Chichester gives way to wild, if suppressed, mirth.
"Heavens! Fancy being jealous of one's own wife!" says she. "Now, if it had been anyone else's——"
"Yes, there would be reason in that!" says Captain Marryatt, so gloomily that her mirth breaks forth afresh.
He is always a joy to her, this absurd young man, who, in spite of barbs and shafts, follows at her chariot wheels with a determination worthy of a better cause.
Gower, who also had heard that quiet "No," had come instantly forward, and entreated Tita to blindfold him. And once more the fun is at its height. Hescott, as compared with Randal Gower, is not even in it in this game. The latter simulates the swallow, and even outdoes that wily bird in his swift dartings to and fro. Great is his surprise, and greater still his courage—this last is acknowledged by all—when, on a final swoop round the room with arms extended, he suddenly closes them round the bony form of Miss Gower, who had returned five minutes ago, and who, silent and solitary, is standing in a distant corner breathing anathemas upon the game.
Everyone stops dead short—everyone looks at the ceiling; surely it must fall! There had been a general, if unvoiced, opinion up to this that Mr. Gower could see; but now he is at once exonerated, and may leave the dock at any moment without a stain upon his character.
"Come away! come away!" whisper two or three behind his back.
Mrs. Chichester pulls frantically at his coat-tails; but Mr. Gower holds on. He passes his hand over Miss Gower's gray head.
"It is—it is—it must be!" cries he, in a positive tone.
"It"—here his hand flies swiftly down her warlike nose—"it is
Colonel Neilson!" declares he, with a shout of triumph.
"Unhand me, sir!" cries Miss Gower.
She had not spoken up to this—but to compare her to a man! She moves majestically forward. Gower unhands her, and, lifting one side of his would-be blind, regards her fixedly.
"It was the nose!" He looks round reproachfully at Neilson. "Just see what you've let me in for!" says he.
"Don't talk to me, sir!" cries his aunt indignantly. "Make no excuses—none need be made! When one plays demoralizing games in daylight, one should be prepared for anything;" and with this she once more leaves the room.
"Ah, we should have played demoralizing games at midnight," says Mr. Gower, who doesn't look half as much ashamed of himself as he ought, "then we should have been all right."
Here somebody who is standing at one of the windows says suddenly:
"It is clearing!"
"Is it?" cries Tita. "Then I suppose we ought to go out! But what a pity we couldn't have another game first!"
She looks very sorry.
"You certainly seemed to enjoy it," says Sir Maurice with a cold smile, as he passes her.