Part 32 (1/2)
THE NEW LIFE
”You haven't mentioned it to the young man himself?” asked Lady Evenswood.
”Certainly not. I've only seen him once, and then he didn't talk of his own affairs. He takes the thing very well. He's lost his position and he's the hero of the newspapers, and he bears both afflictions quite coolly. A lad of good balance, I think.”
”Is he agreeable?”
”Hum, I'm not sure of that. No excess of modesty, I fancy.”
”I suppose you mean he's not shy? All young men are conceited. I think I should like you to bring him to see me.”
For forty years such an intimation from Lady Evenswood had enjoyed the rank of a command; Lord Southend received it with proper obedience.
”The solution I spoke of has occurred to some of us,” he went on. ”He's poor now, but with that he could make a marriage. The case is very exceptional----”
”So is what you propose, George.”
”Oh, there are precedents. It was done in the Bearsdale case.”
”There was a doubt there.” Lady Evenswood knew all about the Bearsdale case; though it was ancient history to Southend, she had danced with both the parties to it.
”The House was against the marriage unanimously.” But he did not deny the doubt.
”Well, what are you going to do?” she asked.
”It would be necessary to approach Disney.” Southend spoke with some appearance of timidity. Mr Disney was Prime Minister. ”And the truth is, none of us seemed to like the job. So John Fullcombe suggested you.”
”What brave men you are!” Her face wrinkled humorously.
”Well, he might bite us, and he couldn't bite you--not so hard anyhow.”
”And you want me to ask for a higher rank! That wasn't done in the Bearsdale case, nor in any other that I ever heard of.”
”We shouldn't press that. A barony would do. But if Disney thought that under the very exceptional circ.u.mstances a viscounty----”
”I don't see why you want it,” she persisted. The slight embarra.s.sment in Southend's manner stirred the old lady's curiosity. ”It's rather odd to reward a man for his mother's----. There, I don't say a word about Addie. I took her to her first ball, poor girl.”
”Disney used to know her as a girl.”
”If you're relying on Robert Disney's romantic memories----” But she stopped, adding after a pause, ”Well, one never knows. But again, why a viscounty?”
Driven into a corner, but evidently rather ashamed of himself, Southend explained.
”The viscounty would be more convenient if a match came about between him and the girl.”
”What, the new Lady Tristram? Well, George, romance has taken possession of you to-day!”
”Not at all,” he protested indignantly. ”It's the obviously sensible way out.”
”Then they can do it without a viscounty.”