Part 13 (1/2)
”We'll talk about it later. Of course there are lots of points,” Nick pursued. ”At present let's be purely convivial. Somehow Harsh is such a false note here. _Nous causerons de ca_.”
”My dear fellow, you've caught exactly the tone of Mr. Gabriel Nash,”
Peter Sherringham declared on this.
”Who's Mr. Gabriel Nash?” Mrs. Dallow asked.
”Nick, is he a gentleman? Biddy says so,” Grace Dormer interposed before this inquiry was answered.
”It's to be supposed that any one Nick brings to lunch with us--!” Lady Agnes rather coldly sighed.
”Ah Grace, with your tremendous standard!” her son said; while Peter Sherringham explained to his sister that Mr. Nash was Nick's new Mentor or oracle--whom, moreover, she should see if she would come and have tea with him.
”I haven't the least desire to see him,” Julia made answer, ”any more than I have to talk about Harsh and bore poor Peter.”
”Oh certainly, dear, you'd bore me,” her brother rang out.
”One thing at a time then. Let us by all means be convivial. Only you must show me how,” Mrs. Dallow went on to Nick. ”What does he mean, Cousin Agnes? Does he want us to drain the wine-cup, to flash with repartee?”
”You'll do very well,” said Nick. ”You're thoroughly charming to-night.”
”Do go to Peter's, Julia, if you want something exciting. You'll see a wonderful girl,” Biddy broke in with her smile on Peter.
”Wonderful for what?”
”For thinking she can act when she can't,” said the roguish Biddy.
”Dear me, what people you all know! I hate Peter's theatrical people.”
”And aren't you going home, Julia?” Lady Agnes inquired.
”Home to the hotel?”
”Dear, no, to Harsh--to see about everything.”
”I'm in the midst of telegrams. I don't know yet.”
”I suppose there's no doubt they'll have him,” Lady Agnes decided to pursue.
”Who'll have whom?”
”Why, the local people and the party managers. I'm speaking of the question of my son's standing.”
”They'll have the person I want them to have, I daresay. There are so many people in it, in one way or another--it's dreadful. I like the way you sit there,” Julia went on to Nick.
”So do I,” he smiled back at her; and he thought she _was_ charming now, because she was gay and easy and willing really, though she might plead incompetence, to understand how jocose a dinner in a pothouse in a foreign town might be. She was in good humour or was going to be, and not grand nor stiff nor indifferent nor haughty nor any of the things people who disliked her usually found her and sometimes even a little made him believe her. The spirit of mirth in some cold natures manifests itself not altogether happily, their effort of recreation resembles too much the bath of the hippopotamus; but when Mrs. Dallow put her elbows on the table one felt she could be trusted to get them safely off again.
For a family in mourning the dinner was lively; the more so that before it was half over Julia had arranged that her brother, eschewing the inferior spectacle, should take the girls to the Theatre Francais. It was her idea, and Nick had a chance to observe how an idea was apt to be not successfully controverted when it was Julia's. Even the programme appeared to have been prearranged to suit it, just the thing for the cheek of the young person--_Il ne Faut Jurer de Rien_ and _Mademoiselle de la Seigliere_. Peter was all willingness, but it was Julia who settled it, even to sending for the newspaper--he was by a rare accident unconscious of the evening's bill--and to rea.s.suring Biddy, who was happy but anxious, on the article of their being too late for good places. Peter could always get good places: a word from him and the best box was at his disposal. She made him write the word on a card and saw a messenger despatched with it to the Rue de Richelieu; and all this without loudness or insistence, parenthetically and authoritatively. The box was bespoken and the carriage, as soon as they had had their coffee, found to be in attendance. Peter drove off in it with the girls, understanding that he was to send it back, and Nick waited for it over the finished repast with the two ladies. After this his mother was escorted to it and conveyed to her apartments, and all the while it had been Julia who governed the succession of events. ”Do be nice to her,”
Lady Agnes breathed to him as he placed her in the vehicle at the door of the cafe; and he guessed it gave her a comfort to have left him sitting there with Mrs. Dallow.