Volume I Part 7 (1/2)
”But now you are of age, and can't grow any more. What are you going to be, Rorie? What are you going to do with your liberty? Are you going into Parliament?”
Mr. Vawdrey indulged in a suppressed yawn.
”My mother would like it,” he said, ”but upon my word I don't care about it. I don't take enough interest in my fellow-creatures.”
”If they were foxes, you'd be anxious to legislate for them,” suggested Vixen.
”I would certainly try to protect them from indiscriminate slaughter.
And in fact, when one considers the looseness of existing game-laws, I think every country gentleman ought to be in Parliament.”
”And there is the Forest for you to take care of.”
”Yes, forestry is a subject on which I should like to have my say. I suppose I shall be obliged to turn senator. But I mean to take life easily--you may be sure of that, Vixen; and I intend to have the best stud of hunters in Hamps.h.i.+re. And now I think I must be off.”
”No, you mustn't,” cried Violet. ”The dinner is not till eight. If you leave here at six you will have no end of time for getting home to dress. How did you come?”
”On these two legs.”
”You shall have four to take you to Briarwood. West shall drive you home in papa's dog-cart, with the new mare. You don't know her, do you?
Papa only bought her last spring. She is such a beauty, and goes--goes--oh, like a skyrocket. She bolts occasionally; but you don't mind that, do you?”
”Not in the least. It would be rather romantic to be smashed on one's twenty-first birthday. Will you tell them to order West to get ready at once.”
”Oh, but you are to stop to tea with Miss McCroke and me--that's part of our bargain. No kettledrum, no Starlight Bess! And you'd scarcely care about walking to Briarwood under such rain as that!”
”So be it, then; kettledrum and Starlight Bess, at any hazard of maternal wrath. But really now I'm doing a most ungentlemanly thing, Vixen, to oblige you!”
”Always be ungentlemanly then for my sake--if it's ungentlemanly to come and see me,” said Vixen coaxingly.
They were standing side by side in the big window looking out at the straight thin rain. The two pairs of lips were not very far away from each other, and Rorie might have been tempted to commit a third offence against the proprieties, if Miss McCroke had not fortunately entered at this very moment. She was wonderfully surprised at seeing Mr. Vawdrey, congratulated him ceremoniously upon his majority, and infused an element of stiffness into the small a.s.sembly.
”Rorie is going to stay to tea,” said Vixen. ”We'll have it here by the fire, please, Crokey dear. One can't have too much of a good fire this weather. Or shall we go to my den? Which would you like best, Rorie?”
”I think we had better have tea here, Violet,” interjected Miss McCroke, ringing the bell.
Her pupil's _sanctum sanctorum_--that pretty up-stairs room, half schoolroom, half boudoir, and wholly untidy--was not, in Miss McCroke's opinion, an apartment to be violated by the presence of a young man.
”And as Rory hasn't had any luncheon, and has come ever so far out of his way to see me, please order something substantial for him,” said Vixen.
Her governess obeyed. The gipsy table was wheeled up to the broad hearth, and presently the old silver tea-pot and kettle, and the yellow cups and saucers, were s.h.i.+ning in the cheery firelight. The old butler put a sirloin and a game-pie on the sideboard, and then left the little party to s.h.i.+ft for themselves, in pleasant picnic fas.h.i.+on.
Vixen sat down before the hissing tea-kettle with a pretty important air, like a child making tea out of toy tea-things. Rorie brought a low square stool to a corner close to her, and seated himself with his chin a little above the tea-table.
”You can't eat roast beef in that position,” said Vixen.
”Oh yes I can--I can do anything that's mad or merry this evening. But I'm not at all sure that I want beef, though it is nearly three months since I've seen an honest bit of ox beef. I think thin bread and b.u.t.ter--or roses and dew even--quite substantial enough for me this evening.”
”You're afraid of spoiling your appet.i.te for the grand dinner,” said Vixen.