Part 25 (2/2)

Everybody laughed and said it was the best joke of the season.”

Lord Upperton saw a troubled look upon Miss Newville's face, as if she had heard quite enough about masquerades.

”The recreations of court life, I would not have you think, Miss Newville, are masquerades and b.a.l.l.s, and nothing else. We have suppers which are quite different affairs, where we do not try to be what we are not. After the theatres are out we go to the banquet halls, where wine and wit flow together. We gossip, sing songs, and flirt with the Macaroni ladies. The opera girls sing to us if they are not too tipsy, and we have gay larks till the wagons begin to rumble around Covent Garden Market, and the greengrocers are displaying their onions and cabbages for the early morning sale.”

”Who are the Macaroni ladies?” Miss Newville asked.

Lord Upperton laughed.

”I don't wonder that you inquire. We call them Macaronies, ladies and gentlemen alike, who have traveled on the Continent, flirted at Versailles, in Paris, or in the Palace Barberini in Rome; who have eaten macaroni in Naples, and who have come home with all the follies, to say nothing of some of the vices of the n.o.bility of other countries, in addition to what they had before they started on their travels. The gentlemen wear their hair in long curls; the ladies patch and paint their faces. If they haven't a pimple or a wart they make one. They wear gorgeous dresses. The gentlemen twiddle canes ornamented with dogs' heads or eagles' beaks, with gold ta.s.sels; carry attar of rose bottles in their gloved hands, and squirt rosewater on their handkerchiefs. They ogle the ladies through their quizzing gla.s.ses, wear high-heeled slippers, and diddle along on their toes like a French dancing-master teaching his pupils the minuet. The ladies simper and giggle and wink at the gentlemen from behind their fans, and leave you to imagine something they don't say.”

Again Lord Upperton saw a troubled look upon Miss Newville's face.

”We have convivial parties,” he continued. ”If you like cards, you can try your hand at winning or losing. We play for fifty-pound rouleaux.

There is always a great crowd, and not infrequently you may see ten thousand pounds on the table. Some play small; others plunge in regardless of consequences. My young friend, Lord Stravendale, before he was of age, one night lost eleven thousand pounds, but nothing daunted he played again, and as luck would have it got it all back at one hazard. He lamented he had not made the stakes larger, and said if he had been playing deep he might have made a million. It was really very clever in Stravendale.”

Again his lords.h.i.+p laughed, but Miss Newville could not see anything in the narrative to cause her to smile.

”There is Charley Fox,” Lord Upperton continued, ”who goes in rather strong. He makes grand speeches in the Commons; but almost always gets fleeced at Almack's. The Jews, who are usually on hand in one of the outside rooms with their shekels, waiting to lend money, charge exorbitant interest. Charley calls it the Jerusalem Chamber. Sometimes he gets completely cleaned out, and has to borrow a guinea to pay the waiter who brings him his brandy. One night at the beginning he won eight thousand pounds, but before morning lost the last sixpence.”

”Do ladies play?” Miss Newville asked.

”Certainly; they love gaming as well as the men. Her royal highness the d.u.c.h.ess of c.u.mberland not long ago set up card playing and gaming in her drawing-rooms. Her sister, Lady Elizabeth Lutterell, is one of the best gamesters in London. It is whispered, though, that she cheats on the sly. Lady Ess.e.x gives grand card parties, where there is high gaming. One lady, whom I know, lost three thousand guineas at loo. It is whispered that two ladies, not long since, had high words at one of Lady Ess.e.x's parties; that they rode out to St. Pancras and fought a duel with pistols, and that one was wounded; which shows that our n.o.ble women have real grit.”

”Is what you are saying a fair picture of life among the n.o.bility?”

Ruth asked.

”I would not have you think, Miss Newville, that everybody of n.o.ble birth or high position is a gambler, but every one who plays, of course, wants a stake of some kind.”

”Pardon me, my lord, but I do not see any fun in losing money in the way you speak of.”

”Well, perhaps there isn't any fun in losing, but it is real jolly when you win. It is like drinking wine; it warms you up.”

”Do you have any other recreations equally attractive and delightful?”

Miss Newville inquired.

”We have gay times at the Derby during the races. Of course you have felt the excitement of a horse-race, Miss Newville?”

”No, for we do not have horse-racing here; but I believe they do in Virginia.”

”No racing! I am astonished. Are not your people rather slow?”

”We have few diversions, my lord; we do not win money by racing.”

”You can have no conception of what a grand sight it is. Everybody goes to the Derby--dukes, lords, bishops, rectors, ladies, and gentlemen. Before the race begins, we have our lunch parties. All are eating, talking, laughing, or laying bets. The horses come out from their stalls with the jockey boys in red, green, blue, and yellow, in their saddles. They draw lots to see which shall have the inside, then go down the track a little distance. The horses understand what they are to do just as well as we who stake our money. They sniff the air, step lightly, then break into a run, and everybody is on tiptoe. In a moment they are down to the first turn, and come in full view. There are four, perhaps, neck and neck. You have staked, say, on yellow. He loses half a length, and your heart goes down: but he gains a little, is up even once more--half a length ahead, and you yell and double your stakes. They are round the second turn, going like a whirlwind; yellow and blue are ahead of the others, neck and neck.

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