Part 46 (1/2)
”Have I stumbled anywhere?” Lady Gosstre leaned to Mr. Powys.
He replied with a satiric sententiousness that told Lady Gosstre what she wanted to know.
”This is the isolated case where a little knowledge is truly dangerous,”
said Lady Gosstre. ”I prohibit girls from any allusion to the cla.s.sics until they have taken their degree and are warranted not to open the wrong doors. On the whole, don't you think, Merthyr, it's better for women to avoid that pool?”
”And accept what the n.o.ble creature chooses to bring to us in buckets,”
added Lady Charlotte. ”What is your opinion, Georgey? I forget: Merthyr has thought you worthy of instruction.”
”Merthyr taught me in camp,” said Georgians, looking at her brother--her face showing peace and that confirmed calm delight habitual to it. ”We found that there are times in war when you can do nothing, and you are feverish to be employed. Then, if you can bring your mind to study, you are sure to learn quickly. I liked nothing better than Latin Grammar.”
”Studying Latin Grammar to the tune of great guns must be a new sensation,” Freshfield Sumner observed.
”The pleasure is in getting rid of all sensation,” said she. ”I mean you command it without at all crus.h.i.+ng your excitement. You cannot feel a fuller happiness than when you look back on those hours: at least, I speak for myself.”
”So,” said Lady Gosstre, ”Georgey did not waste her time after all, Charlotte.”
What the latter thought was: ”She could not handle a sword or fire a pistol. Would I have consented to be mere camp-baggage?” Yet no woman admired Georgiana Ford so much. Disappointment vitiated many of Lady Charlotte's first impulses; and not until strong antagonism had thrown her upon her generosity could she do justice to the finer natures about her. There was full life in her veins; and she was hearing the thirty fatal bells that should be music to a woman, if melancholy music; and she had not lived. Time, that sounded in her ears, as it kindled no past, spoke of no future. She was in unceasing rivalry with all of her s.e.x who had a pa.s.sion, or a fixed affection, or even an employment. A sense that she was wronged by her fate haunted this lady. Rivalry on behalf of a man she would have held mean--she would have plucked it from her bosom at once. She was simply envious of those who in the face of death could say, ”I have lived.” Pride, and the absence of any power of self-inspection, kept her blind to her disease. No recollection gave her boy save of the hours in the hunting-field. There she led gallantly; but it was not because of leading that she exulted. There the quick blood struck on her brain like wine, and she seemed for a time to have some one among the crowns of life. An object--who cared how small?--was ahead: a poor old fox trying to save his brush; and Charlotte would have it if the master of cunning did not beat her. ”It's my natural thirst for blood,” she said. She did not laugh as she thought now and then that the old red brush dragging over grey dews toward a yellow yolk in the curdled winter-morning sky, was the single thing that could make her heart throb.
Brookfield was supported in its trial by the discomfiture of the Tinleys. These girls, with their brother, had evidently plotted to 'draw out' Mrs. Chump. They had asked concerning her, severally; and hearing that she had not returned from town, had each shown a blank face, or had been doubtful of the next syllable. Of Wilfrid, Emilia, and Mr. Pole, question and answer were interchanged. ”Wilfrid will come in a few minutes. Miss Belloni, you know, is preparing for Italy. Papa? Papa, I really do fear will not be able to join us.” Such was Brookfield's concerted form of reply. The use of it, together with the gaiety of dancing blood, gave Adela (who believed that she ought to be weeping, and could have wept easily) strange twitches of what I would ask permission to call the juvenile 'shrug-philosophy.' As thus: 'What creatures we are, but life is so!' And again, 'Is not merriment dreadful when a duty!' She was as miserable as she could be but not knowing that youth furnished a plea available, the girl was ashamed of being cheerful at all. Edward Burley's sketch of Mr. Pericles scattering his band, sent her into m.u.f.fled screams of laughter; for which she did internal penance so bitter that, for her to be able to go on at all, the shrug-philosophy was positively necessary; Mr. Pericles himself saw the sketch, and remarked critically, ”It is zat I have more hair:” following which, he tapped the signal for an overture to commence, and at the first stroke took a run, with his elbows clapping exactly as the shrewd hand of Edward had drawn him.
”See him--zat fellow,” Mr. Pericles said to Laura Tinley, pointing to the leader. ”See him pose a maestro! zat leads zis tintamarre. He is a hum-a-bug!”
Laura did the vocal caricaturing, when she had gathered plenty of matter of this kind. Altogether, as host, Mr. Pericles accomplished his duty in furnis.h.i.+ng amus.e.m.e.nt.
Late in the afternoon, Sir Twickenham Pryme and Wilfrid arrived in company. The baronet went straight to Cornelia. Wilfrid beckoned to Adela, from whom he heard of his father's illness at the hotel in town, and the conditions imposed on them. He nodded, said lightly, ”Where's Emilia?” and nodded again to the answer, ”With papa,” and then stopped as he was walking off to one of the groups. ”After all, it won't do for us to listen to the whims of an invalid. I'm going back. You needn't say you've seen me.”
”We have the doctor's most imperative injunction, dearest,” pleaded Adela, deceived for a moment. ”Papa's illness is mental chiefly. He is able to rise and will be here very soon, if he is not in any way crossed. For heaven's sake, command yourself as we have done--painfully indeed! Besides, you have been seen.”
”Has she--?” Wilfrid began; and toned an additional carelessness. ”She writes, of course?”
”No, not once; and we are angry with her. It looks like ingrat.i.tude, or stupidity. She can write.”
”People might say that we are not behaving well,” returned Wilfrid, repeating that he must go to town. But now Edward Burley camp running with a message from the aristocratic heights, and thither Wilfrid walked captive--saying in Adela's ear, ”Don't be angry with her.”
Adela thought, very justly, ”I shall, if you've been making a fool of her, naughty boy!”
Wilfrid saluted the ladies, and made his bow of introduction to Georgiana Ford, at whom he looked twice, to confirm an impression that she was the perfect contrast to Emilia; and for this reason he chose not to look at her again. Lady Charlotte dropped him a quick recognition.
If Brookfield could have thrown the burden from its mind, the day was one to feel a pride in. Three Circles were present, and Brookfield denominated two that it had pa.s.sed through, and patronized all--from Lady Gosstre (aristocracy) to the Tinley set (lucre), and from these to the representative Sumner girls (cultivated poverty). There were also intellectual, scientific, and Art circles to deal with; music, pleasant to hear, albeit condemned by Mr. Pericles; agreeable chatter, courtly flirtation and homage, and no dread of the defection of the letter H from their family.
”I feel more and more convinced,” said Adela, meeting Arabella, ”that we can have really no cause for alarm; otherwise papa would not have been cruel to his children.” Arabella kindly reserved her opinion. ”So let us try and be happy,” continued Adela, determining to be encouraged by silence. With that she went on tiptoe gracefully and blew a kiss to her sister's lips. Running to Captain Gambier, she said, ”Do you really enjoy this?”
”Charming,” replied the ever-affable gentleman. ”If I might only venture to say what makes it so infinitely!”
Much to her immediate chagrin at missing a direct compliment, which would have had to be parried, and might have led to 'vistas,' the too sprightly young lady found herself running on: ”It's as nice as sin, without the knowledge that you are sinning.”
”Oh! do you think that part of it disagreeable?” said the captain.
”I think the heat terrific:” she retrieved her ground.
”Coquet et coquette,” muttered Lady Charlotte, observing them from a distance; and wondered whether her s.e.x might be strongly represented in this encounter.