Part 6 (2/2)

He was forced, unwillingly, to decline, but doubtless remarked the colour fade in her cheek while he did so, expressing at the same time a hope of meeting next day. Uncle Joseph, who had quite abandoned the control of his own household, expressed entire satisfaction with everybody's arrangements, and Miss Ross whispered in his ear, ”it was very dear of him to be so good-natured!”

Goldthred, too, having lost nine pairs of gloves, six and a half, three b.u.t.tons, to Mrs. Lascelles, was in the seventh heaven. Altogether, not many race-goers left the Course better pleased with themselves that day.

And Mr. Picard, looking down at Helen as he pa.s.sed her carriage driving home, said to the loudish lady by his side--

”_That's_ the handsomest girl I've seen the whole season! I wonder who she is?”

To which the loudish lady replied with acrimony--

”_Do_ you think so? Well, perhaps she is fresh looking, in a bread-and-b.u.t.ter, missy-ish sort of style. Can't you go a little faster?

One gets choked with this horrid dust!”

CHAPTER VII.

FRANK.

The barrack-room of a subaltern in the Household Cavalry has been lately described by a gifted auth.o.r.ess as resembling ”the boudoir of a young d.u.c.h.ess.” My experience of the latter, I honestly confess, is exceedingly limited, but I think I know enough of the former tenement to submit that our talented romancer has overstated her case. She would have been nearer the mark, I imagine, had she compared the lair of the formidable warrior to a servants' hall, a laundry, a condemned cell, or some such abode of vacuity and desolation, modified princ.i.p.ally by whitewash. Gaudy pictures on the walls, gaudy flowers in the window-sill, do indeed serve to brighten the neutral tints prevailing in an officer's quarters, as provided by his grateful country, and a barrack-room chair is an exceedingly comfortable resting-place in which to smoke the pipe of peace in the stronghold of war. For ease, merriment, and good-fellows.h.i.+p, give me the habitation of the dragoon; but when you talk of pomp, luxury, taste, and refinement, I am prepared to back the d.u.c.h.ess, ay, even though she be a dowager d.u.c.h.ess, against all the cavalry regiments in the Army List, and give you the Horse Artillery in!

Let us take, for example, the room in which Frank Vanguard lies fast asleep, at ten in the morning, though a summer sun, streaming through the open window, bathes him, like a male Danae, in floods of gold. He possesses horses, carriages, costly jewellery, clothes in abundance, boots innumerable, yet his furniture consists of the following items:--

One iron bedstead, without curtains; one wooden tub; one enormous sponge, one medium-sized ditto; a chest of drawers, constructed to travel by baggage-waggon; a huge box, meant to hold saddlery; a stick and whip stand; twelve pairs of spurs; a set of boxing-gloves; four steeple-chase prints; and a meerschaum pipe he never smokes. These, with a chair or two, and a few toilet necessaries, comprise the whole furniture of his apartment; and he is happier here than in luxurious London lodgings, lordly castle, or stately country house.

The song of birds, the flutter of the summer morning, snort, stamp, and stable-call, ring of bridle, and clink of steel, all fail to wake him.

He is not for duty to-day, and never went to bed till five in the morning.

To say nothing of the mess-man and his satellites, it is a heavy week, that of Ascot Races, for field-officers, captains, subalterns, and all concerned in the dispensation of unbounded hospitality at Windsor during the meeting. They entertain countless guests, they convey them to and from the Course, they provide board and lodging for the gentlemen, amus.e.m.e.nt and adoration for the ladies, they are afoot day and night; yet seem always fresh, lively, good-humoured, and on the alert. But even cavalry officers are mortal, and though they never confess it, they _must_ be very tired, and a little thankful when the whole function is over.

No wonder Frank sleeps so sound--dreaming doubtless of--what? His dark-brown charger, his chestnut mare, the stag he shot last year in Scotland, the team he drove yesterday to Ascot? Of Miss Hallaton, perhaps, and the deep l.u.s.trous eyes that haunted him so while he flung himself on his bed and went off into the very slumber from which he is roused, even now, by unceremonious knuckles tapping at the door.

A sleepy man says ”come in” without waking, and enter a soldier-servant nearly seven feet high, who proceeds to fill the tub, and further dressing arrangements generally, with a clatter, that he has found from experience of many masters is the surest way to get a sluggard out of bed. This stalwart personage considers himself responsible (and it is no light burthen) that his officer should always be in time. With a Cornet his prevision is touching, and almost maternal in its care. Having thoroughly roused the sleeper, his servant plants himself at the bedside, drawn up to an exceeding alt.i.tude, in the position drill-sergeants call ”attention.”

”What is it?” says Frank yawning.

”Gentleman come to breakfast, sir. Waiting in the little mess-room.”

”Order it at once, Blake, and say I'll be down in twenty minutes.”

Exit Blake, facing to the right, solemnly but far less noisily than he came in; while Frank with one bound is on the floor, and with another in his tub, not feeling his eyes quite open till he has splashed the bracing cold water into them more than once.

While he shaves and dresses, getting through each process with surprising celerity, I may state that the gentleman waiting breakfast for him below is none other than Mr. Picard, the driver of the blue coach with red wheels, the quick-stepping browns, and the loudish lady of the day before.

A timely pull in Frank's favour, when the latter was in difficulties with his team at an awkward corner on the Heath,--a little judicious flattery extolling the capabilities of that team, and the mode in which it was handled,--a draught of champagne-cup offered,--a cigar exchanged,--and Vanguard was so pleased with his new friend, that he pressed the invitation which now brought him to breakfast in the officers' mess-room, accompanied by an appet.i.te that never failed, and a determination to make the most of this, as of all other advantages in the game of life.

A couple of Cornets are already hard at work, with the voracity of youth just done growing in length but not breadth. Their jaws cease simultaneously at the entrance of a stranger, and, boys as they are, the instinct of each warns him against this plausible personage whom, as a guest, they welcome nevertheless with hospitality and perfect good breeding. It speaks well for Picard's _savoir faire_, that long ere his entertainer comes down, he has made a favourable impression on these late Etonians, so that, emerging to smoke outside in couples as usual, says one inseparable to the other--

”Pleasant company that hairy chap, and tongue enough for a street-preacher! Who the devil is he, Jack, and where did Frank pick him up?”

To which Jack, whose real name is Frederic, replies with deliberation:

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