The Love Child, page 4
“Does he? How very kind in him.”
“He is only sixteen,” Lady Stanton hastened to add.
“His first infatuation, then,” the countess suggested.
“I believe it is.”
“You would be amazed to know how very many young men do honour me with their first tendres. Not that I pride myself upon it; not at all. To be quite candid, I think it has as much to do with the exotic qualities of an Italian name as with my own attractions.”
“You are too modest.”
“No, indeed. Young men at their first encounter with romance are extremely impressionable: a name will win them as easily as a face. I have known boys to fall in love with women they have never seen, merely on the strength of an appealing appellation. Besides, they enjoy my being a widow—it saves them the potential trouble of duelling; and the fact of my being twice as old as they seems to comfort their more fanciful anxieties.”
“I understand you lived long in Italy,” Lady Stanton remarked, not caring especially to enter into a discussion of adolescent fancies, and reverting therefore to what seemed the safer topic.
“Very long; longer than anyone need live there,” she agreed.
“You found it tiresome?”
“Anyone who stopped there as long as I did would find it tiresome,” said the contessa. “Even the natives. Have you been there yourself?”
Lady Stanton paused a moment before she replied. “Many years ago,” she said finally. “I hardly recollect it.”
“Would I could say the same,” the countess remarked, rather obscurely. “I beg your pardon—did you say you were at Florence?”
“I did not say,” the other replied, with a curious stiffness.
“Isn’t that odd? The name Florence just popped into my head,” the countess told her. For a minute she said nothing. Then, “Were you at Florence?” she inquired.
But her interlocutor had grown suddenly restless. She had been gathering her skirts during the contessa’s long hesitation, and now sprang up from the settee with unwonted abruptness. “I beg your pardon, Lady Tremini; I think my daughter looks for me. I’m dreadfully sorry…” So saying she rushed away, leaving the countess by far more pensive than she was customarily. It may be noted here that if Miss Amabel Stanton was looking for her mother, she must have had eyes in a most singular location.
Lady Stanton returned to the fawn settee some while later, with the intention of explaining her erratic conduct to the contessa. By this time the gentlemen had regained the drawing-room; small parties were being assembled for whist and billiards, and a cluster of men (gallant, but mostly of middle age) had gathered about the Countess Tremini. Her popularity was such that Lady Stanton could not gain her side; in consequence, she delayed her explanation (which would have been rather vague in any case) and gravitated toward a less dense grouping of guests which had for its center Miss Jessica Cawley. This group was more obliging: the gentlemen, visibly flushed with wine, lost no time in establishing her in a comfortable chair and providing her with tea. She had then the benefit of their conversation which, though she herself said little, was as animated and bright as any discourse might be that had the Cawleys for participants.
Miss Jessica Cawley, a dark-eyed, lively woman of some nine-and-twenty years, was an authoress—one of those scribblers upon whose lace-capped and banded heads so much disdain has been so liberally bestowed. She had always been possessed of a preposterous imagination, and when her first few seasons had come and gone without bringing her a suitor intriguing enough to justify even half her fantastic whims, she turned to writing and created her own. In story and setting she favoured the Gothic (it was why she had agreed to pass the entire winter at Grasmere—the castle had utterly won her over), but her style had none of the fatuous romanticism one might have expected. On the contrary, it was diligently satirical, and she did not hesitate to parody, in her novels, quite recognizable eccentricities of the people near her. In fact, Mr. Algernon Longstreth, who at the moment we meet Miss Cawley was offering her a biscuit, had figured very plainly as the villain’s foppish, sentimental brother in her most recent effort, which had been published in a small edition and thoroughly read by the ton. It was not a flattering portrait—they never were—and Mr. Longstreth, as he drew the plate away, might have been observed to have been staring at Miss Cawley and thinking very hard. Miss Cawley caught the look, but it did not disconcert her. Though pretty, she was not vain, so his stare did not make her conscious; though the author of a clever, accurate insult, she was all boldness—so his stare did not make her afraid. Besides, she had known such a quantity of young men already, with such a variety of emotions in their breasts! She had kept her singlehood through choice, as all the world knew—she was not a beauty, but her irresistible manner and perfectly charming smile had brought her plenty of offers. Even now her friends pressed her to marry; she begged them to desist, but they pressed her. There was only one man in the world who did not disappoint her (probably because she had so few expectations of him), and this young man was her brother.
Lord Roger Cawley was, as I have noted, among the young people Lady Stanton now joined. He sat at some little distance from his sister, quieter, more pensive, even graver than she, yet by any standard a most amiable and pleasant man. He was his sister’s senior by some years, and had long been her guardian, both their parents having died in a coaching accident when Jessica was sixteen. Like Jessica, Roger was dark and of no great height; unlike her, he was actively interested in innovative agriculture, the quality and administration of justice in rural districts, and the impact of the French Wars on the English economy. He was so good, however, as generally to spare his sister the necessity of discussing these topics with him; in fact, he rather admired her less serious turn of mind, and wished, though without rancour, he could be as diverting in society as she was. He quite encouraged her unconventionality, and was not among those who thought she ought to marry. He, of course, must take a bride sometime or other—there had to be an heir to his father’s title; but if Jessica was as happy now as he believed her to be, he had no quarrel with her chosen way of life.
“Do you mean it is as close as Nottingham, and yet no provision has been made for us to visit it?” Miss Cawley was demanding as Lady Stanton sat down. “What a dreadful oversight!”
“I am sure Their Graces had no idea of your being so interested,” a young gentleman, Mr. Cosmo Remington by name, answered. He kept a house near Nottingham himself, and so was in a position to respond to her. “Goose-Fair is a great occasion to the peasantry, but it is not, in general, much frequented by the ton.”
“What do you call it?” cried Jessica, with an incredulous smile. “Goose-Fair! Oh, now I am certain we must go there.”
“Pr-properly, it is called the great October Fair of Nottingham,” Mr. Remington informed her. “Goose-Fair is but a local name.”
“It is by far more attractive than the other,” said Jessica. “I, for one, shall adopt it immediately, and use it exclusively. Why shouldn’t we go? Roger, will you take me?” she added in the same breath.
Her brother nodded his assent.
“Karr can tell you all about it, no doubt,” Mr. Remington continued. “Really, it is only a country fair like any other.”
“Somebody fetch him,” Miss Cawley directed, fairly bristling with enthusiasm. Mr. Longstreth departed upon this errand, found the duke in conversation with his mother at the other end of the drawing-room, and returned with him presently. “My dear sir,” Jessica addressed him reproachfully, “I understand you have been keeping a secret from us—but we have found you out. Whatever, if you please, is Goose-Fair?”
The duke, striking an easy pose, smiled affably at his accusing guest. “Dear ma’am, I assure you I had no intention of creating mysteries. Goose-Fair is simply a yearly market at Nottingham, attended chiefly by farmers and merchants, and having mostly to do with the trading of cheese and horse-flesh. Do you long to go to it?”
“He makes it sound so tedious!” she complained, appealing to Cosmo Remington. “Make him talk about the jugglers and the beasts. There are jugglers and beasts,” she told the duke, with more than a hint of impudence.
“I confess it, there are,” Karr replied, with an expressive lift of a single dark eyebrow. “Wombwell’s Menagerie visits it every year; companies of comedians, discordant bands of musicians, and hawkers of every sort of cheap ware abound there. If you are seriously interested in going, I do believe some of the gentry drive there for the gig-fair—”
“The gig-fair?”
“The later portions of it, when the trading is over,” he explained. “If you like I will engage to find a window for you in town, whence you may observe it.”
“I do not wish to be a spectator!” she exclaimed, much dismayed.
“Perhaps you wished to sell some cheese, then?” he inquired.
“Roger, challenge that man to a duel,” she said, with mock pride. “He insults my dignity.”
“My profoundest apologies, madam,” said Karr, bowing.
“Your apologies are accepted, sir. But in the future, kindly remember that I do not deal in cheese. I peddle books, as you ought to know.” This speech was delivered in such a tone of rigid solemnity that it caused all its audience to laugh.
“You ought really to consider, Miss Cawley,” the duke took up again in more genuine accents, “how little you would like being jostled among that mob. With your gown and your manner, beggars would cling to you all the day through; the gipsies might even try to run off with you.”
“I will go in disguise,” she answered.
“You will like it none the more,” he warned. “It is the rudest of entertainments.”
“We will all go,” she announced, as if she had not heard him. “It will be a most memorable excursion. When do you say it takes place?”
“Four days from now,” Mr. Remington told her. “The caravans have already begun to arrive, no doubt, and the horse-fair begins tomorrow.”
“And it lasts how long?”
“Two days,” she was told.
“Very well; we go on the second. My friends, prepare your costumes. Anyone who does not look thoroughly rustic will be excluded from the party.”
“Miss Cawley,” the duke enjoined her gently, “I really think this is most ill-advised. The dangers attaching to such a project are too serious; I should not like you to expose yourself to them on a mere whim.”
“Your Grace, you are a perfect host, and you have done your duty very nicely. I am cautioned; we are all cautioned. But as for abandoning the scheme—never!”
“Miss Cawley, truly—”
“If it frightens you, you need not come,” said Jessica, who was by far too addicted to her independence to retreat before a mild advisement.
“It is not, of course, a question of that. I will come if for no other purpose than to protect you.”
“In that office, or in any other, you are most welcome,” said she. “But you must be more careful in your disguise than any of us: the people may recognize you by your face.”
Lord Cawley, who had said nothing hitherto, now thought it might be wise to interrupt his sister. “Jessie, really, if His Grace feels you will not be safe…It is too much to insist upon imperilling yourself while you accept his hospitality.”
Jessica considered this for a moment; she held her brother in very high esteem. She ended, however, by rising, going to the duke, and taking his hands in her own. “My very good sir,” she murmured to him, with a melting look which could not fail to be persuasive, “I regret extremely if I cause you anxiety. It is my last intention. And yet this fair must be so very delightful—and I cannot bear to observe where I might participate. Please, is there no means by which your most admirable desire to protect me may be reconciled to my wish of entertainment?”
The duke foresaw disaster; but the more immediate sight of this agreeable young woman, her heart set on having her own way with the earnestness of a child, presented a nearer and more affecting vision. “Madam,” he said, “it is beyond me to resist such entreaty. We will bring with us some of the footmen—and if the ladies will promise to stay always near the gentlemen…I truly cannot resist,” he broke off with a laugh, kissing her hands before he let them drop. “She looks as if she would cry, were I to say no,” he remarked, feeling somewhat silly at having been moved by a pleading glance before so large a company.
Miss Cawley set up a shout of joy which attracted the attention of the other guests; in no time the excursion had been explained to all the company, and places within the party offered to everyone. To those who had not been present at the inception of the scheme, and who had not witnessed the obtaining of Karr’s consent to it, it seemed but a feeble attraction; even Lady Stanton, who had herself seen everything, felt the excursion more suitable to younger spirits than her own. In the end, the group which chose to go was comprised almost entirely of those people who had been gathered round Miss Cawley in the first place: her brother, Mr. Remington and Mr. Longstreth, Karr, and Lady Henrietta Helms. Lady Henrietta was, as the reader will recall, the woman whom the dowager duchess hoped to see replace her as mistress of Grasmere. She had chanced to be sitting beside Lord Cawley when the scene sketched above took place, and though she said nothing, was listening carefully. The duke’s rôle was of particular interest to her; being of sober judgment, she was somewhat surprised—even shocked—that Miss Cawley should persist in a plan so obviously discomforting to their courteous host. Nonetheless, she wished to go if anybody did; she would take counsel with her parents before committing herself, but only their permission, and not their encouragement, would be necessary to her.
The sole exception to the rule I have observed—that only those originally near Miss Cawley chose to accompany her to Goose-Fair—was Miss Lotta Chilton. She, neither too elevated in rank to be unfamiliar with country fairs, nor too elevated in years to be unattracted by them, most heartily wished to be one of the projected party; unhappily for her, her status among the company at Grasmere was so hazy as to prevent her putting herself forward for the purpose. The duchess, who was near her when they heard of it, caught the gleam of longing in her young companion’s beautiful eyes, but she declined to encourage it. Lotta felt, quite properly, that the general invitation did not include her; she must wait for a special one, and she soon perceived that the duchess did not mean to extend it. Within minutes, therefore, she resigned herself to stopping at the castle, even rebuking herself inwardly for regretting the necessity. The dowager had been excessively liberal with her already; she must guard against becoming presumptuous.
Her delighted surprise, consequently, may well be imagined when the duke himself arrived to rescue her from disappointment. He was feeling generous and benevolent, as one sometimes does after making a concession to another’s happiness, and had caught (not, perhaps, entirely by chance) the single interrogative glance she had cast toward his mother. He had also caught the dowager’s pointed lack of response, and the unequal interchange drew him toward them.
“Miss Chilton,” he began, his dark eyes arresting her bright ones, “I hope you will favour us with your attendance at Nottingham.”
She smiled, but tilted her glazed complexion away from the candlelight and replied, “I am afraid I must disappoint you, Your Grace.”
“You mean my mother disappoints you,” he corrected, continuing, “Madam, surely you can do without Miss Chilton’s services for a few hours. I admit her conversation to be charming, but I must also point out your own considerable resources in the matter of solitary amusement.”
“You press for a precedent which may be foolish,” the duchess said, looking straight at him and not in the least abashed at approaching the matter so publicly, and so bluntly.
“I do not mean to press at all,” he answered evenly.
“Miss Chilton is in my employ,” the duchess said significantly.
“I am sure no one doubts that.”
“On the contrary, they are all too conscious of it,” she returned, with a dry laugh and an ironical intonation. The outrage some of her guests experienced at having to dine with a hired companion had not escaped her notice, and she had been deeply, though silently, scornful of what she deemed their narrow-mindedness. This scorn, which she now remembered, influenced her suddenly. “She may go,” the dowager pronounced. “See she is well taken care of.”
“Ah, madam! You may be easy on that head.” The duke turned to Miss Chilton (who had endeavoured to be as invisible as possible during the preceding dispute) and smiled down upon her with an unexpected sensation of warmth. Miss Chilton—he noticed it as if for the first time—was really astonishingly lovely! It would be a pleasure to ensure her security, and he told her so.
“Your Grace is too good,” she murmured.
“The goodness is all on your side,” said he.
“Miss Chilton was right,” the duchess broke in sharply. “You are much too good, Karr; much too good. You will learn the error of it someday.”
“I will think of you when I do, madam,” he replied very simply. “Miss Chilton,” he bowed, and went off alone to see to the diversion of his guests.
These fortunate people, with all the facilities of a great house at their disposal, were—if at all uncertain what to do—bewildered rather by the abundance of possibilities than the lack of them. A party of gentlemen, led by the gallant Sir Isaac Bridwell, had already departed for the billiard-room. A few of the younger people were endeavouring to establish a table for Speculation, in which venture they sought the aid of Mr. Chauncey Stanton; he was loth, however, to quit the side of the Contessa di Tremini, who was in the act of persuading Sir Francis Olney to play at whist with her. The Duke of Karr entered into this scene, comprehended its visible and invisible aspects—the invisible ones being that Chauncey was infatuated with the countess; and that the countess entreated Sir Francis so specially because, and only because, his fortune was known to be such as could withstand deep play—and with swift and expert diplomacy arranged his guests in the most natural and suitable order. He introduced Lady Anne Stanton to the game of whist, trusting her to keep the stakes within reasonable bounds; encouraged the Speculation players to avail themselves of the vacant Rose Saloon (thus sparing Chauncey the necessity—and even the possibility—of gazing helplessly across the room at his heart’s desire, and in consequence freeing his mind for the enjoyment of the game); and went off himself to minister to the welfare of Lady Henrietta Helms, who sat alone in a corner of the drawing-room, leafing through a large album. He chose this last occupation for himself not so much to gratify his own desires as to pacify his mother the duchess, who had been glaring alternately at him and at Henrietta these past ten minutes. Karr knew the meaning of that glare, and feeling he had crossed her with regard to Miss Chilton, moved himself to oblige her in this matter. Lady Helms, not inquisitive as to what good fortune had sent him her way, welcomed him sedately—she did everything sedately—and proceeded to engage him in a discussion of Alexander Pope.
