Part 7 (1/2)
When you do, you will enjoy yourself all the more, and be respected none the less. You will be equally efficient as a chaperon, though the trident be not always pointed on the defensive; and the lion may be an excellent watch-dog, without being trained to growl at every fellow-creature who does not happen to keep a carriage. His lords.h.i.+p's business, however, lies chiefly with those, so to speak, below the salt. Voters are they, or, more important still, voters' wives and daughters, and, as such, must be propitiated; for Mount Helicon, we need scarcely inform our readers, is not an English peerage, and my lord may probably require to sit again for the same incorruptible borough.
So he bows to _this_ lady, and flirts with _that_, and submits to be patted on the shoulder and twaddled to by a fat little man, primed with port, but who, when not thus bemused, is an influential member of his committee, and a staunch supporter on the hustings. Nay more, with an effort that he deserves infinite credit for concealing with such good grace, he offers his arm to the red-haired daughter of his literally _warm_ supporter, and leads the well-pleased damsel, blus.h.i.+ng much, and mindful ”to keep her head up,” right away to the county families' quadrille at the top of the room, where she dances _vis-a-vis_--actually _vis-a-vis_--to Miss Kettering and Captain Lacquers.
That gentleman is considerably brightened up by his dinner and his potations. He has besides got his favourite boots on, and feels equal to almost any social emergency, so he is making the agreeable to the heiress with that degree of originality so peculiarly his own, and getting on, as he thinks, ”like a house on fire.”
”Very _wawm_, Miss Kettering,” observes the dandy, holding steadily by his starboard moustache. ”Guyville people always make it so hot.
Charming _bouquet_!”
”Your _vis-a-vis_ is dancing alone,” says Blanche, cutting short her partner's interesting remarks, and sending him sprawling and swaggering across the room, only to hasten back again and proceed with his conversation.
”You know the man opposite--man with red whiskers? That's Mount Helicon. Good fellow--aw--if he could but dye his whiskers. Asked to be introduced to _you_ to-day on the course. Told him--aw--I couldn't take such a liberty.” Lacquers wishes to say he would like to keep her society all to himself, but, as usual, he cannot express clearly what he means, so he twirls his moustaches instead, and is presently lost in the intricacies of ”La Poule.” We need hardly observe that manuvring is not our friend's forte. Blanche's eyes meanwhile are turned steadily towards the lower end of the room, and her partner's following their direction, he discovers, as he thinks, a fresh topic of conversation. ”Ah! there's Hardingstone just come in--aw. Why don't he bring his wife with him, I wonder!”
”His wife!” repeated Blanche, with a start that sent the blood from her heart; ”why, he's not married, is he?” she added, with more animation than she had hitherto exhibited.
”Don't know, I'm sure,” replied the dandy, glancing down at his own faultless _chaussure_; ”thought he was--aw--looks like a married man--aw.”
”Why should you think so?” inquired Blanche, half amused in spite of herself.
”Why--aw,” replied the observant reasoner, ”got the married _look_, you know. Wears wide family boots--aw. Do to ride the children on, you know.”
Blanche could not repress a laugh; and the quadrille being concluded, off she went with Cousin Charlie, to stagger through a breathless polka, just at the moment the ”family boots” bore their owner to the upper end of the room in search of her.
Frank was out of his element, and thoroughly uncomfortable. Generally speaking, he could adapt himself to any society into which he happened to be thrown, but to-night he was restless and out of spirits; dissatisfied with Blanche, with himself for being so, and with the world in general. ”What a parcel of fools these people are,” thought he, as with folded arms he leant against the wall and gazed vacantly on the s.h.i.+fting throng; ”jigging away to bad music in a hot room, and calling it pleasure. What a waste of time, and energy, and everything.
Now, there's little Blanche Kettering. I _did_ think that girl was superior to the common run of women. I fancied she had a heart, and a mind, and 'brains,' and was above all the petty vanities of flirting, and fiddling, and dressing, which a posse of idiots dignify with the name of society. But no; they are all alike, giddy, vain, and frivolous. There she is, dancing away with as light a heart as if 'Cousin Charlie' were not under orders for the Cape, and to start to-morrow morning. She don't care--not she! I wonder if she _will_ marry him, should he ever come back. I have never liked to ask him, but everybody seems to say it's a settled thing. How changed she must be since we used to go out in the boat at St. Swithin's; and yet how little altered she is in features from the child I was so fond of.
It's disappointing!” And Frank ground his teeth with subdued ferocity.
”It's disgusting! She's not half good enough for Charlie. I'll never believe in one of them again!”
Well, if not ”half good enough for Charlie,” we mistake much whether, even at the very moment of condemnation, our philosopher did not consider her quite ”good enough for Frank”; and could he but have known the young girl's thoughts while he judged her so harshly, he would have been much more in charity with the world in general, and looked upon the rational amus.e.m.e.nt of dancing in a light more becoming a sensible man--which, to do him justice, he generally was.
Blanche, even as she wound and threaded through the mazes of a crowded polka, skilfully steered by Cousin Charlie, who was a beautiful dancer, and one of whose little feet would scarcely have served to ”ride a fairy,” was wondering in her own mind why Mr. Hardingstone had not asked her to dance, and why he had been so distant at the steeple-chase, and speculating whether it was possible he could be married. How she hoped Mrs. Hardingstone, if there should be one, was _a nice person_, and how fond she would be of her, and yet few people were worthy of _him_. How n.o.ble and manly he looked to-night amongst all the dandies. She would rather see Mr. Hardingstone frown than any one else smile--there was n.o.body like him, except, perhaps, Major D'Orville; he had the same quiet voice, the same self-reliant manner; but then the Major was much older. Oh no--there was nothing equal to Frank--and how she _liked_ him, he was _such_ a friend of Charlie; and just as Blanche arrived at this conclusion, the skirt of her dress got entangled in Cornet Capon's spur, and Charlie laughed so (the provoking boy!) that he could not set her free, and the Cornet's apologies were so absurd, and everybody stared so, it was quite disagreeable! But a tall, manly figure interposed between her and the crowd, and Major D'Orville released her in an instant; and that deep, winning voice engaged her for the next dance, and she could not but comply, though she had rather it had been some one else. Frank saw it all, still with his arms folded, and misjudged her again, as men do those of whom they are fondest. ”How well she does it, the little coquette,” he thought; ”it's a good piece of acting all through--now she'll flirt with D'Orville because he happens to be a great man here, and then she'll throw him over for some one else; and so they 'keep the game alive.'” Frank! Frank! you ought to be ashamed of yourself!
In the meantime, Lord Mount Helicon must not neglect a very important part of the business which has brought him to Guyville. In the pocket of his lords.h.i.+p's morning coat is a letter which Straps, who has taken that garment down to brush, in the natural course of things, is even now perusing. As its contents may somewhat enlighten us as well as the valet, we will take the liberty of peeping over that trusty domestic's shoulder, and joining him in his pursuit of knowledge, premising that the epistle is dated Brook Street, and is a fair specimen of maternal advice to a son. After the usual gossip regarding Mrs. Bolter's elopement, and Lady Susan Stiffneck's marriage, with the indispensable conjectures about ”ministers,” a body in whose precarious position ladies of a certain age take an unaccountable interest, the letter goes on to demonstrate that
”it is needless to point out, my dear Mount, the advantages you would obtain under your peculiar circ.u.mstances by settling early in life. When I was at Bubbleton last autumn (and Globus says I have never been so well since he attended me when you were born--in fact, the spasms left me altogether), I made the acquaintance of a General Bounce, an odious, vulgar man, who had been all his life somewhere in India, but who had a niece, a quiet, amiable girl, by name Kettering, with whom I was much pleased. They have a nice place, though damp, somewhere in the neighbourhood of your borough, and I dined there once or twice before I left Bubbleton. Everything looked like _maison montee_; and from information I can rely on, I understand the girl is a great heiress. Between ourselves, Lady Champfront told me she would have from three to four hundred thousand pounds. Now, although I should be the last person to hint at your selling yourself for money, particularly with your talents and your position, yet if you should happen to see this young lady, and take a fancy to her, it would be a very nice thing, and would make you quite independent. She is prettyish in the 'Jeannette and Jeannot' style, and although her manner is not the least formed, she has no _p.r.o.nonce_ vulgarity, and would soon acquire our 'ways' when she came to live amongst us. Of course we should drop the General immediately; and, my dear boy, I trust you would give up that horrid racing--young Cubbington, who has hardly left school, is already nearly ruined by it, and Lady Looby is in despair--such a mother too as she has been to him! By the by, there is a cousin in our way, but he is young enough to be in love only with himself, and appeared to me to be rather making up to the governess!
Think of this, my dear Mount, and believe me,
”Your most affectionate mother,
”M. MT. HELICON.
”P.S.--Your book is much admired. Trifles _raves_ about it, and your old friend Mrs. Blacklamb a.s.sures me that _it made her quite ill_.”
Primed with such sage counsel, his lords.h.i.+p determined to lose no time in ”opening the trenches.” After enacting sundry duty-dances, by which he had gained at least one prospective ”plumper,” he accordingly ”completed the first parallel” by obtaining an introduction to General Bounce, which ceremony Captain Lacquers performed in his usual easy off-hand style--the introducer shouting into each man's ear his listener's _own_ name, and suppressing altogether that of his new acquaintance, an ingenious method of presenting people to each other without furthering their intimacy to any great extent. The General, however, and the member had known each other previously by sight as well as by name, the former having voted and spoken against the latter at the past election, with his peculiar abruptness and energy; but Mount Helicon was the last man in the world to owe an antagonist a grudge, and being keenly alive to the ridiculous, was prepared to be delighted with his political opponent, in whom he saw a fund of absurdity, out of which he promised himself much amus.e.m.e.nt.
”Glad to make your acquaintance, my Lud,” said the General, standing well behind his orders and decorations, which showed to great advantage on a coat tightly b.u.t.toned across his somewhat corpulent frame--”Don't like your politics--what? never did--progress and all that, sir, not worth a row of gingerbread--don't tell _me_--why, what did Lord Hindostan say to me at Government House, when they threatened to report me at home for exceeding my orders? 'Bounce,' says his Excellency--'Bounce, _I'll see you through it_'--what? _nothing like a big stick for a n.i.g.g.e.r_. _Stick!_ how d'ye mean?”--and the speaker, who was beginning to foam at the mouth, suddenly changed his tone to one of the sweetest politeness, as he introduced 'My niece, Miss Kettering; Lord Mount Helicon.' A second time was Frank Hardingstone forestalled; he had just made up his mind that he would dance with Blanche only _once_, sun himself yet _once_ again in her sweet smile, and then think of her no more--a sensible resolution, but not very easy to carry out. Of course he laid the blame on her. ”First she makes a fool of D'Orville,” thought he, ”a man old enough to be her father--and now she whisks away with this red-bearded radical--to make a fool of him too, unless she means to throw over Charlie; and who is the greatest fool of the three? Why, you, Frank Hardingstone, who ought to know better. I shall go home, smoke a cigar, and go to bed; the dream is over; I had no idea it would be so unpleasant to wake from it.” So Frank selected his hat, pulled out his cigar-case, and trudged off, by no means in a philosophical or even a charitable frame of mind.
There was a light twinkling in the window of his lodgings over the Saddlers, some three hours afterwards, when a carriage drove rapidly by, bearing a freight of pleasure-seekers home from the ball. Inside were the General and Blanche, the former fast asleep, wrapped in the dreamless slumbers which those enjoy who have reached that time of life when the soundness of the stomach is far more attended to than that of the heart--when sentiment is of small account, but digestion of paramount importance. Age, as it widens the circle of our affections, weakens their intensity, and although proverbially ”there is no fool like an old one,” we question if in the present day there are many Anacreons who--
”When they behold the festive train Of dancing youth, are young again;”
or who, however little they might object to celebrating her charms ”in the bowl,” would, for ”soft Bathylla's sake,” wreathe vine-leaves round their grizzled heads. No: Age is loth to make itself ridiculous in _that_ way; and the General snored and grunted, heartwhole and comfortable, by the side of his pretty niece. How pretty she looked--a little pale from over-excitement and fatigue, but her violet eyes all the deeper and darker from the contrast, whilst none but her maid would have thought the long golden brown hair spoiled by hanging down in those rich, uncurling cl.u.s.ters. She was like the pale blush rose in her bouquet--more winning as it droops in half-faded loveliness than when first it bloomed, bright and crisp, in its native conservatory.
The flower yields its fragrance all the sweeter from being shaken by the breeze. Who but a cousin or a brother would have gone on the box to smoke with such a girl as Blanche inside? Yet so it was. Master Charlie, who danced, as he did everything else, with his whole heart and soul, could not forego the luxury of a cigar in the cool night air, after the noise and heat and revelry of the ball. As he puffed volumes of smoke into the air, and watched the bright stars twinkling down through the clear, pure night, his thoughts wandered far--far into the future; and he, too, felt that the majesty of a sad, sweet face had impressed itself on his being--that she had been watching him to-day through his boyish exploits--and that her eye would kindle, her cheek would glow, when military honours and distinction were heaped upon him, as heaped he was resolved they should be, if ever an opportunity offered. To-morrow his career would begin! To-morrow, ay, even to-day (for it was already past midnight) he was to embark for the Cape; and scarce a thought of the bitterness of parting, perhaps for ever, shaded that bright, young imagination, as it sketched out for itself its impossible romance, worth all the material possibilities that have ever been accomplished. So Charlie smoked and pondered, and dreamed of beauty and valour. We do not think he was in very imminent danger of marrying his cousin.