And he had told his father that he intended to ask Mabel Grex to be his wife. He had so committed himself that the offer must now be made. He did not specially regret that, though he wished that he had been more reticent. ‘What a fool a man is to blurt out everything!’ he said to himself. A wife would be a good thing for him; and where could he possibly find a better wife than Mabel Grex? In beauty she was no doubt inferior to Miss Boncassen. There was something about Miss Boncassen which made it impossible to forget her. But Miss Boncassen was an American, and on many accounts out of the question. It did not occur to him that he would fall in love with Miss Boncassen; but still it seemed hard to him that this intention of marriage should stand in his way of having a good time with Miss Boncassen for a few weeks. No doubt there were objections to marriage. It clipped a fellow's wings. But then, if he were married, he might be sure that Tifto would be laid aside. It was such a great thing to have got his father's assured consent to a marriage. It meant complete independence in money matters.
Then his mind ran away to a review of his father's affairs. It was a genuine trouble to him that his father should be so unhappy. Of all the griefs which weighed upon the Duke's mind, that in reference to his sister was the heaviest. The money which Gerald owed at Cambridge would be nothing if that other sorrow could be conquered. Nor had Tifto and his own extravagance caused the Duke any incurable wounds. If Tregear could be got out of the way his father, he thought, might be reconciled to other things. He felt very tender-hearted about his father; but he had no remorse in regard to his sister as he made up his mind that he would speak very seriously to Tregear.
He had wandered into St James's Park, and had lighted by this time half-a-dozen cigarettes one after another, as he sat on one of the benches. He was a handsome youth, all but six feet high, with light hair, with round blue eyes, and with all that aristocratic look, which had belonged so peculiarly to the late Duke but which was less conspicuous in the present head of the family. He was a young man whom you would hardly pass in a crowd without observing, – but of whom you would say, after due observation, that he had not as yet put off all his childish ways. He now sat with his legs stretched out, with his cane in his hands, looking down upon the water. He was trying to think. He worked hard at thinking. But the bench was hard and, upon the whole, he was not satisfied with his position. He had just made up his mind that he would look up Tregear, when Tregear himself appeared on the path before him.
‘Tregear!’ exclaimed Silverbridge.
‘Silverbridge!’ exclaimed Tregear.
‘What on earth makes you walk about here on a Sunday morning?’
‘What on earth makes you sit there? That I should walk here, which I often do, does not seem to me odd. But that I should find you is marvellous. Do you often come?’
‘Never was here in my life before. I strolled in because I had things to think of.’
‘Questions to be asked in Parliament? Notices of motions, Amendments in Committee, and that kind of thing?’
‘Go on, old fellow.’
‘Or perhaps Major Tifto has made important revelations.’
‘D—— Major Tifto.’
‘With all my heart,’ said Tregear.
‘Sit down here,’ said Silverbridge. ‘As it happened, at the moment when you came up I was thinking of you.’
‘That was kind.’
‘And I was determined to go to you. All this about my sister must be given up.’
‘Must be given up!’
‘It can never lead to any good. I mean that there never can be a marriage.’ Then he paused, but Tregear was determined to hear him out. ‘It is making my father so miserable that you would pity him if you could see him.’
‘I dare say I should. When I see people unhappy I always pity them. What I would ask you to think of is this. If I were to commission you to tell your sister that everything between us should be given up, would not she be so unhappy that you would have to pity her?’
‘She would get over it.’
‘And so will your father.’
‘He has a right to have his own opinion on such a matter.’
‘And so have I. And so has she. His rights in this matter are very clear and very potential.1 I am quite ready to admit that we cannot marry for many years to come, unless he will provide the money. You are quite at liberty to tell him that I say so. I have no right to ask your father for a penny, and I will never do so. The power is all in his hands. As far as I know my own purposes, I shall not make any immediate attempt even to see her. We did meet, as you saw, the other day, by the merest chance. After that, do you think that your sister wishes me to give her up?’
‘As for supposing that girls are to have what they wish, that is nonsense.’
‘For young men I suppose equally so. Life ought to be a life of self-denial, no doubt. Perhaps it might be my duty to retire from this affair, if by doing so I should sacrifice only myself. The one person of whom I am bound to think in this matter is the girl I love.’
‘That is just what she would say about you.’
‘I hope so.’
‘In that way you support each other. If it were any other man circumstanced just like you are, and any other girl placed like Mary, you would be the first to say that the man was behaving badly. I don't like to use hard language to you, but in such a case you would be the first to say of another man – that he was looking after the girl's money.’
Silverbridge as he said this looked forward steadfastly on to the water, regretting much that cause for quarrel should have arisen, but thinking that Tregear would find himself obliged to quarrel. But Tregear, after a few moments' silence, having thought it out, determined that he would not quarrel. ‘I think I probably might,’ he said laying his hand on Silverbridge's arm. ‘I think I perhaps might express such an opinion.’
‘Well then!’
‘I have to examine myself, and find out whether I am guilty of the meanness which I might perhaps be too ready to impute to another. I have done so, and I am quite sure that I am not drawn to your sister by any desire for her money. I did not seek her because she was a rich man's daughter, nor, – because she is a rich man's daughter will I give her up. She shall be mistress of the occasion. Nothing but a word from her shall induce me to leave her; – but a word from her, if it comes from her own lips, – shall do so.’ Then he took his friend's hand in his, and, having grasped it, walked away without saying another word.
CHAPTER 31
Miss Boncassen s River-Party No. 1
Thrice within the next three weeks did Lord Silverbridge go forth to ask Mabel to be his wife, but thrice in vain. On one occasion she would talk on other things. On the second Miss Cassewary would not leave her. On the third the conversation turned in a very disagreeable way on Miss Boncassen, as to whom Lord Silverbridge could not but think that Lady Mabel said some very ill-natured things. It was no doubt true that he, during the last three weeks, had often been in Miss Boncassen's company, that he had danced with her, ridden with her, taken her to the House of Lords and to the House of Commons, and was now engaged to attend upon her at a river-party up above Maidenhead. But Mabel had certainly no right to complain. Had he not thrice during the same period come there to lay his coronet at her feet; – and now, at this very moment, was it not her fault that he was not going through the ceremony?
‘I suppose,’ she said, laughing, ‘that it is all settled.’
‘What is all settled?’
‘About you and the American beauty.’
‘I am not aware that anything particular has been settled.’
‘Then it ought to be, – oughtn't it? For her sake, I mean.’
‘That is so like an English woman,’ said Lord Silverbridge. ‘Because you cannot understand a manner of life a little different from your own you will impute evil.’
‘I have imputed no evil, Lord Silverbridge, and you have no right to say so.’
‘If you mean to assert,’ said Miss Cass, ‘that
the manners of American young ladies are freer than those of English young ladies, it is you that are taking away their characters.’
‘I don't say it would be at all bad,’ continued Lady Mabel. ‘She is a beautiful girl, and very clever, and would make a charming Duchess. And then it would be such a delicious change to have an American Duchess.’
‘She wouldn't be a Duchess.’
‘Well, Countess, with Duchessship before her in the remote future. Wouldn't it be a change, Miss Cass?’
‘Oh decidedly!’ said Miss Cass.
‘And very much for the better. Quite a case of new blood, you know. Pray don't suppose that I mean to object. Everybody who talks about it approves. I haven't heard a dissentient voice. Only as it has gone so far, and as English people are too stupid you know to understand all these new ways, – don't you think perhaps –?’
‘No, I don't think. I don't think anything except that you are very ill-natured.’ Then he got up and, after making formal adieux to both the ladies, left the house.
As soon as he was gone Lady Mabel began to laugh, but the least apprehensive1 ears would have perceived that the laughter was affected. Miss Cassewary did not laugh at all, but sat bolt upright and looked very serious. ‘Upon my honour,’ said the younger lady, ‘he is the most beautifully simple-minded human being I ever knew in my life.’
‘Then I wouldn't laugh at him.’
‘How can one help it? But of course I do it with a purpose.’
‘What purpose?’
‘I think he is making a fool of himself. If somebody does not interfere he will go so far that he will not be able to draw back without misbehaving.’
‘I thought,’ said Miss Cassewary, in a very low voice, almost whispering, ‘I thought that he was looking for a wife elsewhere.’
‘You need not think of that again,’ said Lady Mab, jumping up from her seat. ‘I had thought of it too. But as I told you before, I spared him. He did not really mean it with me; – nor does he mean it with this American girl. Such young men seldom mean. They drift into matrimony. But she will not spare him. It would be a national triumph. All the States would sing a paean of glory. Fancy a New York belle having compassed a Duke!’
‘I don't think it possible. It would be too horrid.’
‘I think it quite possible. As for me, I could teach myself to think it best as it is, were I not so sure that I should be better for him than so many others. But I shouldn't love him.’
‘Why not love him?’
‘He is such a boy. I should always treat him like a boy, – spoiling him and petting him, but never respecting him. Don't run away with any idea that I should refuse him from conscientious motives, if he were really to ask me. I too should like to be a Duchess. I should like to bring all this misery at home to an end.’
‘But you did refuse him.’
‘Not exactly; – because he never asked me. For the moment I was weak, and so I let him have another chance. I shall not have been a good friend to him if it ends in his marrying this Yankee.’
Lord Silverbridge went out of the house in a very ill humour, – which however left him when in the course of the afternoon he found himself up at Maidenhead with Miss Boncassen. Miss Boncassen at any rate did not laugh at him. And then she was so pleasant, so full of common sense, and so completely intelligent! ‘I like you,’ she had said, ‘because I feel that you will not think that you ought to make love to me. There is nothing I hate so much as the idea that a young man and a young woman can't be acquainted with each other without some such tomfoolery as that.’ This had exactly expressed his own feeling. Nothing could be so pleasant as his intimacy with Isabel Boncassen.
Mrs Boncassen seemed to be a homely person, with no desire either to speak, or to be spoken to. She went out but seldom, and on those rare occasions did not in any way interfere with her daughter. Mr Boncassen filled a prouder situation. Everybody knew that Miss Boncassen was in England, because it suited Mr Boncassen to spend many hours in the British Museum. But still the daughter hardly seemed to be under control from the father. She went alone where she liked; talked to those she liked; and did what she liked. Some of the young ladies of the day thought that there was a good deal to be said in favour of the freedom which she enjoyed.
There is however a good deal to be said against it. All young ladies cannot be Miss Boncassens, with such an assurance of admirers as to be free from all fear of loneliness. There is a comfort for a young lady in having a pied-à-terre to which she may retreat in case of need. In American circles, where girls congregate without their mothers, there is a danger felt by young men that if a lady be once taken in hand, there will be no possibility of getting rid of her, – no mamma to whom she may be taken and under whose wings she may be dropped. ‘My dear,’ said an old gentleman the other day walking through an American ballroom, and addressing himself to a girl whom he knew well, – ‘My dear ——’ But the girl bowed and passed on, still clinging to the arm of the young man who accompanied her. But the old gentleman was cruel, and possessed of a determined purpose. ‘My dear,’ said he again, catching the young man tight by the collar and holding him fast. ‘Don't be afraid; I've got him; he shan't desert you; I'll hold him here till you have told me how your father does.’ The young lady looked as if she didn't like it, and the sight of her misery gave rise to a feeling that, after all, mammas perhaps may be a comfort.
But in her present phase of life Miss Boncassen suffered no misfortune of this kind. It had become a privilege to be allowed to attend upon Miss Boncassen, and the feeling of this privilege had been enhanced by the manner in which Lord Silverbridge had devoted himself to her. Fashion of course makes fashion. Had not Lord Silverbridge been so very much struck by the charm of the young lady, Lords Glasslough and Popplecourt would not perhaps have found it necessary to run after her. As it was, even that most unenergetic of young men, Dolly Longstaff, was moved to profound admiration.
On this occasion they were all up the river at Maidenhead. Mr Boncassen had looked about for some means of returning the civilities offered to him, and had been instigated by Mrs Montacute Jones to do it after this fashion. There was a magnificent banquet spread in a summer-house on the river bank. There were boats, and there was a band, and there was a sward for dancing. There was lawn-tennis, and fishing-rods, – which nobody used, – and better still, long shady secluded walks in which gentlemen might stroll, – and ladies too, if they were kind enough. The whole thing had been arranged by Mrs Montacute Jones. As the day was fine, as many of the old people had abstained from coming, as there were plenty of young men of the best sort, and as nothing had been spared in reference to external comforts, the party promised to be a success. Every most lovely girl in London of course was there, – except Lady Mabel Grex. Lady Mabel was in the habit of going everywhere, but on this occasion she had refused Mrs Boncassen's invitation. ‘I don't want to see her triumphs,’ she had said to Miss Cass.
Everybody went down by railway of course, and innumerable flies2 and carriages had been provided to take them to the scene of action. Some immediately got into boats and rowed themselves up from the bridge, – which, as the thermometer was standing at eighty in the shade, was an inconsiderate proceeding. ‘I don't think I am quite up to that,’ said Dolly Longstaff, when it was proposed to him to take an oar. ‘Miss Amazon will do it. She rows so well, and is so strong.’ Whereupon Miss Amazon, not at all abashed, did take the oar; and as Lord Silverbridge was on the seat behind her with the other oar she probably enjoyed her task.
‘What a very nice sort of person Lady Cantrip is.’ This was said to Silverbridge by that generally silent young nobleman Lord Popplecourt. The remark was the more singular because Lady Cantrip was not at the party, – and the more so again because, as Silverbridge thought, there could be but little in common between the Countess who had his sister in charge and the young lord beside him, who was not fast only because he did not like to risk his money.
‘Well, – yes; I dare
say she is.’
‘I thought so, peculiarly. I was at that place at Richmond yesterday.’
‘The devil you were! What were you doing at The Horns?’
‘Lady Cantrip's grandmother was, – I don't quite know what she was, but something to us. I know I've got a picture of her at Popplecourt. Lady Cantrip wanted to ask me something about it, and so I went down. I was so glad to make acquaintance with your sister.’
‘You saw Mary, did you?’
‘Oh yes; I lunched there. I'm to go down and meet the Duke some day.’
‘Meet the Duke!’
‘Why not?’
‘No reason on earth, – only I can't imagine the governor going to Richmond for his dinner. Well! I am very glad to hear it. I hope you'll get on well with him.’
‘I was so much struck with your sister.’
‘Yes; I dare say,’ said Silverbridge, turning away into the path where he saw Miss Boncassen standing with some other ladies. It certainly did not occur to him that Popplecourt was to be brought forward as a suitor for his sister's hand.
‘I believe this is the most lovely place in the world,’ Miss Boncassen said to him.
‘We are so much the more obliged to you for bringing us here.’
‘We don't bring you. You allow us to come with you and see all that is pretty and lovely.’
‘Is it not your party?’
‘Father will pay the bill, I suppose, – as far as that goes. And mother's name was put on the cards. But of course we know what that means. It is because you and a few others like you have been so kind to us, that we are able to be here at all.’
‘Everybody, I should think, must be kind to you.’
‘I do have a good time pretty much; but nowhere so good as here. I fear that when I get back I shall not like New York.’
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