Volume I Part 26 (2/2)
”How do you do?” said Roderick, with a gush of originality. ”Your mamma is here, I suppose.”
”Haven't you seen her?”
”No; we've only just come.”
”We,” no doubt, meant the Dovedale party, of which Mr. Vawdrey was henceforth a part.
”I did not know you were to be here,” said Vixen, ”or then that you were in England.”
”We only came home yesterday, or I should have called at the Abbey House. We have been coming home, or talking about it, for the last three weeks. A few days ago the d.u.c.h.ess took it into her head that she ought to be at Lady Almira's wedding--there's some kind of relations.h.i.+p, you know, between the Ashbournes and the Southminsters--so we put on a spurt, and here we are.”
”I am very glad,” said Vixen, not knowing very well what to say; and then seeing Captain Winstanley standing stiffly at her side, with an aggrieved expression of countenance, she faltered: ”I beg your pardon; I don't think you have ever met Mr. Vawdrey. Captain Winstanley--Mr.
Vawdrey.”
Both gentlemen acknowledged the introduction with the stiffest and chilliest of bows; and then the Captain offered Violet his arm, and she, having no excuse for refusing it, submitted quietly to be taken away from her old friend. Roderick made no attempt to detain her.
The change in him could hardly have been more marked, Vixen thought.
Yes, the old Rorie--playfellow, scapegoat, friend of the dear old childish days--was verily dead and gone.
”Shall we go and look at the presents?” asked Captain Winstanley.
”What presents?”
”Lady Almira's wedding presents. They are all laid out in the library.
I hear they are very splendid. Everybody is crowding to see them.”
”I daresay mamma would like to go, and Mrs. Scobel,” suggested Vixen.
”Then we will all go together.”
They found the two matrons side by side on a settee, under a lovely girlish head by Greuze. They were both delighted at the idea of seeing the presents. It was something to do. Mrs. Tempest had made up her mind to abjure even square dances this evening. There was something incongruous in widowhood and the Lancers; especially in one's own neighbourhood.
CHAPTER XVI.
Rorie asks a Question.
The library was one of the finest rooms at Southminster. It was not like the library at Althorpe--a collection for a nation to be proud of.
There was no priceless Decameron, no Caxton Bible, no inestimable ”Book of Hours,” or early Venetian Virgil; but as a library of reference, a library for all purposes of culture or enjoyment, it left nothing to be desired. It was a s.p.a.cious and lofty room, lined from floor to ceiling with exquisitely bound books; for, if not a collector of rare editions, Lord Southminster was at least a connoisseur of bindings. Creamy vellum, flowered with gold, antique brown calf, and russia in every shade of crimson and brown, gave brightness to the shelves, while the sombre darkness of carved oak made a background for this variety of colour.
Not a mortal in the crowded library this evening thought of looking at the books. The room had been transformed into a bazaar. Two long tables were loaded with the wedding gifts which rejoicing friends and aspiring acquaintances had lavished upon Lady Almira. Each gift was labelled with the name of the giver; the exhibition was full of an intensely personal interest. Everybody wanted to see what everybody had given.
Most of the people looking at the show had made their offerings, and were anxious to see if their own particular contribution appeared to advantage.
Here Mrs. Scobel was in her element. She explained everything, expatiated upon the beauty and usefulness of everything. If she had a.s.sisted at the purchase of all these gifts, or had actually chosen them, she could not have been more familiar with their uses and merits.
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