Part 19 (1/2)
CHAPTER XIX
”My dear,” said Lady Garnett, accepting a cup of tea from the hands of her niece, and regarding her at the same time, from her low cus.h.i.+oned chair, with a certain drollery, ”do you know that it is exactly one week since Mr. Sylvester called?”
Mary Masters' head was bent a little over her long _Suede_ gloves--they had just returned from their afternoon drive in the Park--and she paused to remove her hat and veil before she replied.
”And it is at least three weeks since Mr. Rainham was here.”
”Ah, poor Philip!” remarked the old lady, ”he is always irregular; he may come, or he may not. I must ask him to dinner, by the way, soon. But I was talking of Mr. Sylvester, who is a model of punctuality. (Give me a piece of _baba_ for Mefistofele, please!) Mr.
Sylvester was here last Sat.u.r.day, and the Sat.u.r.day before that. I think it is highly probable, Mary, that we shall be honoured with a visit from Mr. Sylvester to-day.”
”I hope not!” said the girl with some energy. ”I have a couple of songs that I must positively try over before to-night. Surely, it is a little late too, even for Mr. Sylvester.”
”It is barely half-past five,” said Lady Garnett, lazily feeding her pug, ”and he knows that we do not dine till eight. Resign yourself, _cherie_; he will certainly come.”
She glanced across at the young girl, pointing, with her keen gaze, words which seemed trivial enough. And Mary, her calm forehead puckered with a certain vague annoyance which she disdained to a.n.a.lyse, understood perfectly all that the elder lady was too discreet to say. She sat for a little while, her hands resting idly in her lap, or smoothing the creases out of her long, soft gloves.
Then she rose and moved quickly across to Lady Garnett's side, knelt suddenly down by her chair.
”Ah, my aunt!” she cried impulsively, ”tell me what is to be done?”
Lady Garnett glanced up from the novel into which she had subsided; she laid it on the little tea-table with a sigh of relief at this sudden mood of confidence, coming a little strangely amidst the young girl's habitual reticence.
”We will talk, my dear,” she said, ”now you are practical. I suppose, by the way, he has not proposed?”
Mary shook her head.
”That is it, Aunt Marcelle! That is exactly what I want to prevent.
Is--is he going to?”
Lady Garnett smiled, and her smile had a very definite quality indeed.
”I would not cherish any false hopes, my dear. Charles Sylvester is a young man--not so very young though, by the way--whose conclusions are very slow, but when they arrive, _mon Dieu_! they are durable. I am sure he is terribly tenacious. It took him a long time to conclude that he was in love with you; at first, you know, he was a little troubled about your fortune, but at last he came to that conclusion--at Lucerne.”
”Oh, at Lucerne!” protested the young girl with a nervous laugh.
”Surely not there!”
”It was precisely at Lucerne,” continued Lady Garnett, ”that he decided you would make him an adorable wife, and, in effect, it was a considerable piece of wisdom. And since then his conclusions have been more rapid. The last has been that he will certainly marry you--with or without a _dot_--before the elections. You are serious, you know, my dear, though not so serious as he believes; you are a girl of intelligence, and he is going to stand for some place or other, and candidates with clever wives often obtain a majority over candidates who are clever but have no wives. Yes, my dear, he is certainly going to propose. You may postpone it by the use of great tact for a month or so; you will hardly do so for longer.”
”I don't want to postpone it,” said Mary ruefully; ”if it be inevitable, I would sooner have it over.”
”It will never be over,” remarked Lady Garnett decisively. ”Did I not say that he was tenacious--_comme on ne l'est plus_? You may refuse him once--twice; it will all be to go over again and again, until you end by accepting him.”
”Oh, Aunt Marcelle!” protested the young girl, with little flush of righteous wrath.
”After all,” continued the elder lady, ignoring her interruption, ”are you so very sure that--that it would not do? There are many worse men in the world than Sylvester. Both _my_ husbands were profligates, in addition to being fools. At any rate, this dear Charles is very correct. And remember, the poor man is really in love with you.”
”I know,” said Mary plaintively; ”that is why I am so sorry. He is a good man, a conscientious man, and a gentleman; and really, sometimes lately, he has been quite simple and nice. Only----”
Lady Garnett completed the sentence for her with an impartial shrug.