Lady May laughed affably, and said— “Won’t you and your daughter go in and take some tea? Mr. (she was going to call on Longcluse, but he had glided away) — Oh, Mr. Darnley!”
And the introduction was made, and Vivian Darnley, with Mrs. Frumply on his arm, attended by her daughter Arabella, did as he was commanded and got tea for that simpering lady, and fruit and Naples biscuits, and plumcake, and was rewarded with the original joke about the clerk of the weather.
Mr. Longcluse, in the meantime, had passed the door indicated by Lady May, and stood upon the short terrace that overlooked the pretty flower-garden cut out in grotesque patterns, so that looking down upon its masses of crimson, blue, and yellow, as he leaned on the balustrade, it showed beneath his eye like a wide deep-piled carpet, on the green ground of which were walking groups of people, the brilliant hues of the ladies’ dresses rivalling the splendour of the verbenas, and making altogether a very gay picture.
The usual paucity of male attendance made Mr. Longcluse’s task of observation easy. He was looking for Richard Arden’s well-known figure among the groups, thinking that probably Alice was not far off. But he was not there, nor was Alice; and Walter Longcluse, gloomy and lonely in this gay crowd, descended the steps at the end of this terrace, and sauntered round again to the front of the house, now and then passing some one he knew, with an exchange of a smile or a bow, and then lost again in the Vanity Fair of strange faces and voices.
Now he is at the hall door — he mounts the steps. Suddenly, as he stands upon the level platform at top, he finds himself within four feet of Richard Arden. He looks on him as he might on the carved pilaster, at the side of the hall door; no one could have guessed, by his inflexible but unaffected glance, that he and Mr. Arden had ever been acquainted. The younger man showed something in his countenance, a sudden hauteur, a little elevation of the chin, a certain sternness, more melodramatic, though less effective, than the simple blank of Mr. Longcluse’s glance.
That gentleman looked about coolly. He was in search of Miss Arden, but he did not see her. He entered the hall again, and Richard Arden a little awkwardly resumed his conversation, which had suddenly subsided into silence on Longcluse’s appearance.
By this time Lady May was more at ease, having received all her company that were reasonably punctual, and in the hall Longcluse now encountered her.
“Have you seen Mr. Arden?” she inquired of him.
“Yes, he’s at the door, at the steps.”
“Would you mind telling him kindly that I want to say a word to him?”
“Certainly, most happy,” said Longcluse, without any distinct plan as to how he was to execute her awkward commission.
“Thank you very much. But, oh! dear, here is Lady Hummington, and she wishes so much to know you; I’ll send some one else. I must introduce you, come with me — Lady Hummington, I want to introduce my friend, Mr. Longcluse.” So Mr. Longcluse was presented to Lady Hummington, who was very lean, and a “blue,” and most fatiguingly well up in archæology, and all new books on dry and difficult subjects. So that Mr. Longcluse felt that he was, in Joe Willett’s phrase, “tackled” by a giant, and was driven to hideous exertions of attention and memory to hold his own. When Lady Hummington, to whom it was plain kind Lady May, with an unconscious cruelty, had been describing Mr. Longcluse’s accomplishments and acquirements, had taken some tea and other refection, and when Mr. Longcluse’s kindness “had her wants supplied,” and she, like Scott’s “old man” in the “Lay of the Last Minstrel,” “was gratified,” she proposed visiting the music-room, where she had heard a clever organist play, on a harmonium, three distinct tunes at the same time, which being composed on certain principles, that she explained with much animation and precision, harmonised very prettily.
So this clever woman directed, and Mr. Longcluse led, the way to the music-room.
CHAPTER XXX.
HE SEES HER.
Mr. Longcluse’s attention was beginning to wander a little, and his eyes were now busy in search of some one whom he had not found; and knowing that the duration of people’s stay at a garden-party is always uncertain, and that some of those gaily-plumed birds who make the flutter, and chirping, and brilliancy of the scene, hardly alight before they take wing again, he began to fear that Alice Arden had gone.
“Just like my luck!” he thought bitterly; “and if she is gone, when shall I have an opportunity of seeing her again?”
Lady Hummington’s well-informed conversation had been, unheeded, accompanying the ruminations and distractions of this “passionate pilgrim;” and as they approached the door of the music-room, the little crush there brought the learned lady’s lips so near to his ear, that with a little start he heard the words— “All strictly arithmetical, you know, and adjusted by the relative frequency of vibrations. That theory, I am sure, you approve, Mr. Longcluse.”
To which the distracted lover made answer, “I quite agree with you, Lady Hummington.”
The music-room at Raleigh Court is an apartment of no great size, and therefore when, with Lady Hummington on his arm, he entered, it was at no great distance that he saw Miss Arden standing near the window, and talking with an elderly gentleman, whose appearance he did not know, but who seemed to be extremely interested in her conversation. She saw him, he had not a doubt, for she turned a little quickly, and looked ever so little more directly out at the window, and a very slight tinge flushed her cheek. It was quite plain, he thought, and a dreadful pang stole through his breast, that she did not choose to see him — quite plain that she did see him — and he thought, from a subtle scrutiny of her beautiful features, quite plain also that it gave her pain to meet without acknowledging him.
Lady Hummington was conversing with volubility; but the air felt icy, and there was a strange trembling at his heart, and this, in many respects, hard man of the world, felt that the tears were on the point of welling from his eyes. The struggle was but for a few moments, and he seemed quite himself again. Lady Hummington wished to go to the end of the room where the piano was, and the harmonium on which the organist had performed his feat of the three tunes. That artist was taking his departure, having a musical assignation of some kind to keep. But to oblige Lady Hummington, who had heard of Thalberg’s doing something of the kind, he sat down and played an elaborate piece of music on the piano with his thumbs only. This charming effort over, and applauded, the performer took his departure. And Lady Hummington said —
“I am told, Mr. Longcluse, that you are a very good musician.”
“A very indifferent performer, Lady Hummington.”
“Lady May Penrose tells a very different tale.”
“Lady May Penrose is too kind to be critical,” said Longcluse; and as he maintained this dialogue, his eye was observing every movement of Alice Arden. She seemed, however, to have quite made up her mind to stand her ground. There was a strange interest, to him, even in being in the same room with her. Perhaps Miss Arden saw that Mr. Longcluse’s movements were dependent upon those of the lady whom he accompanied, and might have thought that, the musician having departed, their stay in that room would not be very long.
“I should be so glad to hear you sing, Mr. Longcluse,” pursued Lady Hummington. “You have been in the East, I think; have you any of the Hindostanee songs? There are some, I have read, that embody the theories of the Brahmin philosophy.”
“Long-winded songs, I fancy,” said Mr. Longcluse, laughing; “it is a very voluminous philosophy, but the truth is, I’ve got a little cold, and I should not like to make a bad impression so early.”
“But surely there are some simple little things, without very much compass, that would not distress you. How pretty those old English songs are that they are collecting and publishing now! I mean songs of Shakespeare’s time — Ben Jonson’s, Beaumont and Fletcher’s, and Massinger’s, you know. Some of them are so extremely pretty!”
“Oh! yes, I’ll sing you one of those with pleasure,” said he with
a strange alacrity, quite forgetting his cold, sitting down at the instrument, and striking two or three fierce chords.
I am sure that most of my readers are acquainted with that pretty old English song, of the time of James the First, entitled, “Once I Loved a Maiden Fair.” That was the song he chose.
Never, perhaps, did he sing so well before, with a fluctuation of pathos and scorn, tenderness and hatred, expressed with real dramatic fire, and with more power of voice than at moments of less excitement he possessed. He sang it with real passion, and produced, exactly where he wished, a strange but unavowed sensation. He omitted one verse, and the song as he delivered it was thus: —
“Once I loved a maiden fair, But she did deceive me: She with Venus could compare, In my mind, believe me. She was young, and among All our maids the sweetest: Now I say, Ah, well-a-day! Brightest hopes are fleetest.
Maidens wavering and untrue Many a heart have broken; Sweetest lips the world e’er knew Falsest words have spoken. Fare thee well, faithless girl, I’ll not sorrow for thee: Once I held thee dear as pearl, Now I do abhor thee.”
When he had finished the song, he said coldly, but very distinctly, as he rose —
“I like that song, there is a melancholy psychology in it. It is a song worthy of Shakespeare himself.”
Lady Hummington urged him with an encore, but he was proof against her entreaties. And so, after a little, she took Mr. Longcluse’s arm; and Alice felt relieved when the room was rid of them.
CHAPTER XXXI.
ABOUT THE GROUNDS.
Lady Hummington, well pleased at having found in Mr. Longcluse what she termed a kindred mind, was warned by the hour that she must depart. She took her leave of Mr. Longcluse with regret, and made him promise to come to luncheon with her on the Thursday following. Mr. Longcluse called her carriage for her, and put in, besides herself, her maiden sister and two daughters, who all exhibited the family leanness, with noses more or less red and aquiline, and small black eyes, set rather close together.
As he ascended the steps he was accosted by a damsel in distress.
“Mr. Longcluse, I’m so glad to see you! You must do a very goodnatured thing,” said handsome Miss Maubray, smiling on him. “I came here with old Sir Arthur and Lady Tramway, and I’ve lost them; and I’ve been bored to death by a Mr. Bagshot, and I’ve sent him to look for my pockethandkerchief in the tea-room; and I want you, as you hope for mercy, to show it now, and rescue me from my troubles.”
“I’m too much honoured. I’m only too happy, Miss Maubray. I shall put Mr. Bagshot to death, if you wish it, and Sir Arthur and Lady Tramway shall appear the moment you command.”
Mr. Longcluse was talking his nonsense with the high spirits which sometimes attend a painful excitement.
“I told them I should get to that tree if I were lost in the crowd, and that they would be sure to find me under it after six o’clock. Do take me there; I am so afraid of Mr. Bagshot’s returning!”
So over the short grass that handsome girl walked, with Mr. Longcluse at her side.
“I’ll sit at this side, thank you; I don’t want to be seen by Mr. Bagshot.”
So she sat down, placing herself at the further side of the great trunk of the old chestnut-tree. Mr. Longcluse stood nearly opposite, but so placed as to command a view of the hall-door steps. He was still watching the groups that emerged, with as much interest as if his life depended on the order of their to-ing and fro-ing. But, in spite of this, very soon Miss Maubray’s talk began to interest him.
“Whom did Alice Arden come with?” asked Miss Maubray. “I should like to know; because, if I should lose my people, I must find some one to take me home.”
“With her brother, I fancy.”
“Oh! yes, to be sure — I saw him here. I forgot. But Alice is very independent, just now, of his protection,” and she laughed.
“How do you mean?”
“Oh! Lord Wynderbroke, of course, takes care of her while she’s here. I saw them walking about together, so happy! I suppose it is all settled.”
“About Lord Wynderbroke?” suggested Longcluse, with a gentle carelessness, as if he did not care a farthing — as if a dreadful pain had not at that moment pierced his heart.
“Yes, Lord Wynderbroke. Why, haven’t you heard of that?”
“Yes, I believe — I think so. I am sure I have heard something of it; but one hears so many things, one forgets, and I don’t know him. What kind of man is he?”
“He’s hard to describe; he’s not disagreeable, and he’s not dull; he has a great deal to say for himself about pictures, and the East, and the Crimea, and the opera, and all the people at all the courts in Europe, and he ought to be amusing; but I think he is the driest person I ever talked to. And he is really goodnatured; but I think him much more teasing than the most ill-natured man alive, he’s so insufferably punctual and precise.”
“You know him very well, then?” said Longcluse, with an effort to contribute his share to the talk.
“Pretty well,” said the young lady, with just a slight tinge flushing her haughty cheek. “But no one, who has been a week in the same house with him, could fail to see all that.”
Miss Maubray herself, I am told, had hopes of Lord Wynderbroke about a year before, and was not amiably disposed towards him now, and looked on the triumph of Alice a little sourly; although something like the beginning of a real love had since stolen into her heart — not, perhaps, destined to be much more happy.
“Lord Wynderbroke — I don’t know him. Is that gentleman he whom I saw talking to Miss Arden in the music-room, I wonder? He’s not actually thin, and he is not at all stout; he’s a little above the middle height, and he stoops just a little. He appears past fifty, and his hair looks like an oldfashioned brown wig, brushed up into a sort of cone over his forehead. He seems a little formal, and very polite and smiling, with a flower in his buttonhole; a blue coat; and he has a pair of those little gold Paris glasses, and was looking out through the window with them.”
“Had he a high nose?”
“Yes, rather a thin, high nose, and his face is very brown.”
“Well, if he was all that, and had a brown face and a high nose, and was pretty near fifty-three, and very near Alice Arden, he was positively Lord Wynderbroke.”
“And has this been going on for some time, or is it a sudden thing?”
“Both, I believe. It has been going on a long time, I believe, in old Sir Reginald’s head; but it has come about, after all, rather suddenly; and my guardian says — Mr. David Arden, you know — that he has written a proposal in a letter to Sir Reginald, and you see how happy the young lady looks. So I think we may assume that the course of true love, for once, runs smooth — don’t you?”
“And I suppose there is no objection anywhere?” said Longcluse, smiling. “It is a pity he is not a little younger, perhaps.”
“I don’t hear any complaints; let us rather rejoice he is not ten or twenty years older. I am sure it would not prevent his happiness, but it would heighten the ridicule. Are you one of Lady May Penrose’s party to the Derby tomorrow?” inquired the young lady.
“No; I haven’t been asked.”
“Lord Wynderbroke is going.”
“Oh! of course he is.”
“I don’t think Mr. David Arden likes it; but, of course, it is no business of his if other people are pleased. I wonder you did not hear all this from Richard Arden, you and he are so intimate.”
So said the young lady, looking very innocent. But I think she suspected more than she said.
“No, I did not hear it,” he said carelessly; “or, if I did, I forgot it. But do you blame the young lady?”
“Blame her! not at all. Besides, I am not so sure that she knows.”
“How can you think so?”
“Because I think she likes quite another person.”
“Really! And who is he?”
“Can’t you guess?”
“Upon my honour, I can
’t.”
There was something so earnest, and even vehement, in this sudden asseveration, that Miss Maubray looked for a moment in his face; and seeing her curious expression, he said more quietly, “I assure you I don’t think I ever heard; I’m rather curious to know.”
“I mean Mr. Vivian Darnley.”
“Oh! Well, I’ve suspected that a long time. I told Richard Arden, one day — I forget how it came about — but he said no.”
“Well, I say yes,” laughed the young lady, “and we shall see who’s right.”
“Oh! Recollect I’m only giving you his opinion. I rather lean to yours, but he said there was positively nothing in it, and that Mr. Darnley is too poor to marry.”
“If Alice Arden resembles me,” said the young lady, “she thinks there are just two things to marry for — either love or ambition.”
“You place love first, I’m glad to hear,” said Mr. Longcluse, with a smile.
“So I do, because it is most likely to prevail with a pig-headed girl; but what I mean is this: that social pre-eminence — I mean rank, and not trumpery rank; but such as, being accompanied with wealth and precedence, is also attended with power — is worth an immense sacrifice of all other objects; my reason tells me, worth the sacrifice of love. But that is a sacrifice which impatient, impetuous people can’t always so easily make — which I daresay I could not make if I were tried; but I don’t think I shall ever be fool enough to become so insane, for the state of a person in love is a state of simple idiotism. It is pitiable, I allow, but also contemptible; but, judging by what I see, it appears to me a more irresistible delusion than ambition. But I don’t understand Alice well. I think, if I knew a little more of her brother — certain qualities so run in families — I should be able to make a better guess. What do you think of him?”
“He’s very agreeable, isn’t he? and, for the rest, really, until men are tried as events only can try them, it is neither wise nor safe to pronounce.”
Delphi Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu Page 537