Volume I Part 29 (1/2)
”Such a delightful set!” she exclaimed gaspingly.
”I'm afraid your dress has suffered,” said her partner.
”Not in the least.” protested Mrs. Scobel, with the fort.i.tude of that ladylike martyr to a clumsy carver, celebrated by Sydney Smith, who, splashed from head to foot, and with rills of brown gravy trickling down her countenance, vowed that not a drop had reached her.
”This,” says the reverend wit, ”I esteem the highest triumph of civilisation.”
”Your carriage will be the third,” the captain told Mrs. Tempest, while Roderick was putting Violet's cloak round her in the vestibule; ”there are a good many people leaving already.”
Roderick went with them to the carriage door, and stayed in the porch till they were gone. The last object Vixen saw under the Southminster lamps was the pale grave face of her old playfellow.
He went straight from the porch to the supper-room, not to find himself a place at one of the snug little tables, but to go to the buffet and pour out a gla.s.s of brandy, which he drank at a draught. Yet, in a general way, there was no man more abstemious than Roderick Vawdrey.
A quarter of an hour afterwards he was waltzing with Lady Mabel--positively the last dance before their departure.
”Roderick,” she said in an awe-stricken undertone, ”I am going to say something very dreadful. Please forgive me in advance.”
”Certainly,” he said, with a somewhat apprehensive look.
”Just now, when you were talking to me, I fancied you had been drinking brandy.”
”I had.”
”Absolute undiluted brandy!”
”Neat brandy, sometimes denominated 'short.'”
”Good heavens! were you ill?”
”I had had what people call 'a turn.'”
CHAPTER XVII.
Where the Red King was slain.
May had come. The red glow of the beech-branches had changed to a tender green; the oaks were amber; the winding forest-paths, the deep inaccessible glades where the cattle led such a happy life, were blue with dog-violets and golden with primroses. Whitsuntide was close at hand, and good Mr. Scobel had given up his mind to church decoration, and the entertainment of his school-children with tea and buns in that delightful valley, where an iron monument, a little less artistic than a pillar post-office marks the spot where the Red King fell.
Vixen, though not particularly fond of school-feasts, had promised to a.s.sist at this one. It was not to be a stiff or ceremonious affair.
There was to be no bevy of young ladies, oppressively attentive to their small charges, causing the children to drink scalding tea in a paroxysm of shyness. The whole thing was to be done in an easy and friendly manner; with no aid but that of the school-mistress and master. The magnates of the land were to have no part in the festival.
”The children enjoy themselves so much more when there are no finely-dressed people making believe to wait upon them,” said Mrs.
Scobel; ”but I know they'll be delighted to have you, Violet. They positively adore you!”
”I'm sure I can't imagine why they should,” answered Violet truthfully.
”Oh, but they do. They like to look at you. When you come into the school-room they're all in a flutter; and they point at you awfully, don't they, Miss Pierson?” said Mrs. Scobel, appealing to the school-mistress.
”Yes, ma'am. I can't cure them of pointing, do what I will.”
”Oh, they are dear little children,” exclaimed Violet, ”and I don't care how much they point at me if they really like me. They make me such nice little bob-curtsies when I meet them in the Forest, and they all seem fond of Argus. I'm sure you have made them extremely polite, Miss Pierson. I shall be very pleased to come to your school-feast, Mrs. Scobel; and I'll tell our good old Trimmer to make no end of cakes.”