Part 5 (1/2)
Mrs. Lascelles sat at the open window, not quite in the room, not quite on the balcony. Jin, with considerable forethought, had entrenched herself in a corner near the pianoforte, free from draughts. The soft mellow lamp-light threw a very becoming l.u.s.tre on these bewitching individuals. Each knew she was looking well, and it made her look better still. After a bottle of sound claret, it was not to be expected that a man should enact ”his grandsire cut in alabaster” in such company.
Goldthred, armed with a flat hat and a coffee-cup, advanced in tolerably good order to the attack.
It was a fine night even in London. The moon sailed broad and bright in a clear, fathomless sky. The very gas-lamps, studding street and square, through the flickering leaves of spring flashed out a diabolical enchantment of their own, half revelry, half romance. The scent of geraniums and mignionette stole with a soft, intoxicating fragrance on the rebellious senses; and a German band, round the corner, was playing a seductive measure of love and languor and lawlessness from the last new opera. Mrs. Lascelles, moving out on the balcony, drank in the soft night-air with a deep-drawn breath that was almost a sigh. Young Goldthred followed as the medium follows the mesmerist, the bird the rattlesnake. His heart beat fast, and the coffee-cup clattered in his hand. Time and scene were adapted, no doubt, for sentiment, especially out of doors.
It is done every day, and all day long. Also, perhaps, more effectually still on nights like these. Pull a man's purse, madam, from his waistcoat-pocket, and although you have Iago's authority for considering it ”trash,” you may find yourself picking oak.u.m as a first consequence, and may finish, in due course, at the penitentiary; but dive those pretty fingers a thought deeper, take his heart scientifically out of his pericardium, or wherever he keeps it, squeeze it, drain it, rinse it quite dry, return him the shrivelled fragments, with a curtsy, and a ”thank you kindly, sir,” you will receive applause from the bystanders, and hearty approbation from the world in general for your skill.
So Mrs. Lascelles, stifling all compunction, played out the pretty game.
They leaned over the balcony, side by side; they smelt the mignionette, with their heads very close together; they looked at the moon, and into each other's eyes, and down on the street, where a faded figure, in torn shawl and tawdry bonnet, flitted past, to be lost in the shadow of darkness farther on; sighing, smiling, whispering, till the boy's blood surged madly to his brain; and the woman, despite of craft, science, and experience, felt that she must practise all her self-command not to be softer and kinder, if only for a moment, than she desired.
Her white, cool hand lay on the edge of the mignionette box. He covered it with his own. In another moment he would have seized and pressed it, hungrily, rapturously, to his lips. She rose just in time, and came full into the lamp-light from within.
”What nonsense we have been talking!” she exclaimed, with a laugh; ”and what a deal of sentiment! It is nice to talk nonsense sometimes, and sentiment too, but a little goes a long way.”
He was hurt, and, not being a woman, showed it.
”I am sorry,” said he, gloomily; ”I thought you liked it.”
She did not want to snub him too much.
”So I do,” she answered, stepping back into the drawing-room, ”when it's the real thing, sweet and strong, little and good. Come and listen to Jin's song; it's better for you than flirting in the dark on the balcony.”
Though mocking and mischievous, there was yet something kind and playful in her tone; he felt quite happy again as he followed her in, meekly, like a lamb to the slaughter.
Miss Ross, although she had taken up a position more adapted to the comfort of an elderly and rheumatic admirer, did not suffer the s.h.i.+ning hour to pa.s.s away unimproved. She possessed a full, sweet voice, of rare compa.s.s, and was a thorough mistress of the musical art, accompanying her own or other people's songs with equal taste and skill. Uncle Joseph, in an arm-chair, with a hand on each knee, sat spell-bound by the Syren,--eyes, ears, and mouth wide open, under the influence of her strains.
It was but a simple ditty of which she gave him the benefit, yet neither nature nor art were spared to render it as destructive as she could. He had never heard it before; but, as he expressed entire approval of its rhythm, and asked for it again, I feel justified in giving it here. She called it--
”OVER THE WATER.”
I stand on the brink of the river, The river that runs to the sea; The fears of a maid I forgive her, And bid her come over to me.
She knows that her lover is waiting, She's longing his darling to be, And spring is the season of mating, But--she dares not come over to thee!
I have jewels and gold without measure, I have mountain and meadow and sea; I have store of possessions and treasure, All wasting and spoiling for thee.
Her heart is well worthy the winning, But Love is a gift of the free, And she vowed from the very beginning, She'd never come over to thee.
Then lonely I'll wed with my sorrow-- Dead branch on a desolate tree-- My night hath no hope of a morrow, Unless she come over to me.
Love takes no denial, and pity Is love in a second degree, So long ere I'd ended my ditty, The maiden came over to me!
The two guests left No. 40 together, and parted at the end of the street; the junior betaking himself to his cigar, the senior to his whist. Each carried away with him a vague idea that he had spent an evening in Paradise. Which of the two had been made the greater fool of, it is not my province to decide; but I have some recollection of an old couplet in the West of England to the following effect:
”Young man's love soon blazeth and is done, Old man's love burneth to the bone.”
CHAPTER VI.
”TERRARUM DOMINOS.”
”Near side, man! the near side! Take it up two holes--that'll do. Sit tight behind!”