‘Readily! Also, that, Grandmama having failed to come to the scratch, my arrival on the scene was providential!’
‘Yes, that’s the truth,’ she said frankly. ‘I don’t mean that I would have accepted any offer. But although I was so little acquainted with you I liked you very well, and I knew, from what Lady Denville told me, that you were kind, and good-natured, and –’
‘Stop!’ he interrupted. ‘My poor girl, how could you allow yourself to be so taken-in? If you mean to accept me at my mother’s valuation a shocking disappointment awaits you! She is the most dotingly fond parent imaginable, and can detect no fault in either of her sons.’
She laughed. ‘Oh, I know that! But you are dotingly fond of her, and so charmingly attentive to her that I don’t know how she should detect your faults. I liked that in you too. And although I shouldn’t have thought of marriage if Grandmama had invited me to live with her I knew that it wouldn’t be easy to do that, because I had discovered by then that when one has held the reins for four years, as I did here, and at Stavely, it is the most difficult thing in the world to become a mere young lady, obedient to the decrees of her elders. You see, I never was that! So when you offered for me, Denville, it did seem to me that I should be a ninnyhammer to refuse you, only because I was not in love with you, or you with me. You were not disagreeable to me: I dearly love your mama; and you offered me not only your hand but the – the position to which I am accustomed.’ She paused, and after thinking for a moment, said: ‘And to be honest with you, having endured several taunts on my age, and being at my last prayers, I was strongly attracted by the notion of catching one of the biggest prizes on the Marriage Mart!’
He shook his head. ‘Very ignoble!’
‘Yes, wasn’t it?’ she agreed, answering the laughter in his eyes with one of her merriest twinkles. ‘But understandable – don’t you think?’
‘Well, never having regarded myself in that flattering light –’
‘Oh, what flummery!’ she interjected. ‘You must be well aware of it! But it’s all nonsense, of course: when you had left me that day, and I had leisure to reflect, I knew it.’ She scanned his face, her brow puckered. ‘I don’t know how it is, but when you came here last night I – I had almost decided to tell you it would not do. Thinking about it, not seeing you again after that interrupted talk – which was attended by a good deal of awkwardness, was it not? – and having had leisure to reflect more calmly – I had misgivings – began to think that we should not suit – that I had accepted your offer in a distempered freak! Then, last night, I met you again, and –’ She stopped, her frown deepening. He waited, speechless, and she said, with one of her open looks: ‘I liked you much better than ever before!’
He still said nothing, for there was nothing he could think of to say. Various thoughts chased one another through his head: that Evelyn was more fortunate than he knew; that the part he himself was playing was even more odious than he had foreseen; that he must remove himself from her vicinity immediately; that when she saw Evelyn again she must surely be conscious of his superior qualities.
‘And now I don’t know!’ she confessed. ‘I was never in such a – such a bumble-broth in my life, and how I come to be so stupid as not to know my own mind I can’t imagine! Such a thing has never happened to me before, for, in general, I should warn you, I do know it!’
‘I can believe that,’ he said. ‘You have a great look of decision! I conjecture that once your mind is made up there can be no turning you from it!’
‘Yes, I fear that’s true,’ she replied seriously. ‘I hope I may not be arrogant: one of those overmighty women, who grow to be like poor Grandmama!’
‘I don’t think there can be any fear of that!’ he said, amused.
‘I trust you may be right! I have certainly given you no cause to think me anything but a woolly-crown! But I must hold you accountable for that,’ she said, in a rallying tone. ‘I fancy you must have odd humours, perhaps! You make me feel one day that I have a pretty just notion of your character, and the next that I know nothing about you, which is very disconcerting, let me tell you!’
‘I beg your pardon! And so?’
‘And so I feel that Grandmama is right, when she says I ought to know you better before I make up this skimble-skamble mind of mine.’ Her eyes were hidden from him; she was engaged in the occupation of twisting a ring round and round upon her finger; but she raised them suddenly, squarely meeting his. ‘Will you grant me a little more time for consideration? To become better acquainted – each of us with the other? I daresay you mean to go to Brighton now that London is getting to be so thin of company: that’s your custom, isn’t it?’
‘Why, yes! I have been very much in the habit of escorting my mother there! This year, I find myself obliged to go to Ravenhurst – I don’t know for how long, or whether Mama means to accompany me,’ he replied.
‘Oh! Well, Ravenhurst is not so far from Worthing, is it? The thing is, Denville, that I am going to Worthing with Grandmama next week, to spend the summer there, and I thought that perhaps you would drive over to visit us now and then.’
‘So that we may learn to know one another? You may be sure I shall do so. I must hope that you will find it such a dead bore at Worthing, amongst all the dowagers, that it will weigh the scales down in my favour.’
‘It might well do so,’ she acknowledged, with a grimace. ‘But I must warn you that I am inured to that particular boredom: I go there every year!’
‘I can safely promise that if you marry me you will never set foot in the place again!’ he said, laughter springing to his eyes as he tried to picture his twin in that respectable resort.
Six
Mr Fancot arrived on his own doorstep just as his mother’s youthful adorer was being ushered out of the house by Brigg. Mr Horning, who was dressed with a studied negligence which included a handkerchief carelessly knotted round his neck, and unstarched shirt-points, checked, and uttered dramatically: ‘My lord!’
‘How do you do?’ said Kit politely. His appreciative gaze took in every detail of the poet’s attire. He saw too, with unholy amusement, that Mr Horning was looking slightly belligerent, and concluded that Evelyn had not encouraged the dazzled youth’s infatuation. So he said, with immense affability: ‘Did you come to visit me? Do tell me how I may serve you!’
Somewhat taken-aback, Mr Horning said, with a challenging look: ‘I have been visiting Lady Denville, my lord!’
‘No, have you?’ said Kit. ‘But how kind of you!’
‘Kind?’ repeated Mr Horning blankly.
‘As long as she didn’t find your visit rather too much for her. At her age, you know, and troubled as she is with the gout –’
‘I collect, my lord, that you have some objection to my visits!’ interrupted Mr Horning, glaring at him.
‘Not the least in the world!’ said Kit cordially. ‘You have been reading to her, I daresay, and keeping her quietly entertained, which is an excellent thing! It is a hard matter to induce her to rest, but at her age, you know –’
‘Lord Denville, I regard her ladyship as an angel!’ said Mr Horning reverently.
‘Oh, no, no, you take too melancholy a view of her case!’ Kit assured him. ‘We trust she may – with care – enjoy several more years of life, and tolerably good health!’
With these optimistic words he smiled sweetly at the stunned poet, and passed into the house.
Bent on regaling his mama with this passage, he looked into the drawing-room on his way upstairs, and was gratified to find her there, charmingly attired in a half dress of fawn figured silk, a treble pleating of lace falling off round the neck, and a cap of French lace, adorned with a cluster of flowers, set on her shining gold hair. She looked elegant, graceful, and absurdly youthful: circumstances which made Kit chuckle, as he said: ‘I’ve just encountered y
our mooncalf, Mama! Next time he comes to visit you he won’t bring a poem, but a gum-plaster!’
‘Bring me a gum-plaster?’ she said, astonished.
‘Yes, love: for your gout!’ he said mischievously. ‘I told him that we hoped you would survive for a few years yet, however. That was when he called you an angel – and a more inappropriate description I never heard!’
She burst out laughing. ‘Oh, what an abominable creature you are! But come in, Evelyn! Bonamy and I were this instant talking about you!’
Having advanced a step into the room, and closed the door behind him, he had already seen that his mama was not alone: the enormous bulk of Sir Bonamy Ripple occupied almost the whole of a sofa placed opposite her chair. Kit shot a startled, questioning look at his mother, for although he did not rate Sir Bonamy’s intelligence high, he could hardly believe that one who had known him and Evelyn from their cradles would detect no difference between them. But Lady Denville appeared to feel no misgiving. She smiled seraphically at Kit. ‘Dearest, Bonamy tells me that proposed connexion with Cressida Stavely is one of the on-dits of London!’
‘What, are the quizzes busy already?’ Kit said, shaking hands with the visitor.
‘Bound to be,’ said Sir Bonamy, in a rich voice that accorded well with his massive person. ‘How-de-do? Been out of town, I hear. Didn’t see you at Ascot Races.’ He scanned Kit’s face, and added: ‘You’re looking better than when I saw you last. Told you it was time you went on a repairing lease. And now you’re in a way to become riveted, are you? I wish you happy, my boy.’
‘Thank you, sir, but you are a trifle previous! The matter is not yet decided, you know. Who set the rumour afoot, I wonder?’
‘Lady Stavely, of course!’ said his mother. ‘Trying to force you both into it, meddlesome ninnyhammer that she is!’
Owing to the height and rigidity of his collar-points, and the depth of his Oriental Tie, Sir Bonamy could neither shake his head, nor nod it. When he wished to signify assent he was obliged to incline the upper part of his body in a stately manner which frequently exercised an unnerving effect upon strangers already awed by his size and magnificence. He did so now, but as the Fancots were well accustomed to his ways neither Kit nor his mama was dismayed. Lady Denville, indeed, stared very hard at him, and exclaimed: ‘Bonamy! It’s you who are making that creaking noise! Exactly like the Regent!’
He looked so crestfallen that Kit interposed to ask him how he had fared at Ascot. But although he was chagrined he was not in the least embarrassed by his hostess’s forthright words. He said: ‘Oh, tol-lol!’ in answer to Kit, but told Lady Denville that in point of fact his new corset was a replica of the one worn by the Regent, only rather larger. ‘For the truth is, Amabel, that I am growing to be a little too stout,’ he confided earnestly.
Her eyes danced. ‘How can you say so? I’ll tell you what you must do: you must subsist wholly on biscuits and soda-water, as they say Lord Byron was used to do!’
He blenched perceptibly, but responded with great gallantry: ‘Ah, my pretty, if I could hope to win you at last I would even do that!’
‘If this is a proposal of marriage, I think I ought to go away,’ said Kit.
‘She won’t have me,’ said Sir Bonamy mournfully. He shifted his position ponderously, so that he could look at Kit, who had sat down out of the direct line of his vision. ‘But I’ll tell you this, Evelyn! you’ll be a lucky fellow if you get yourself leg-shackled to Stavely’s girl! They tell me she’s a very amiable, pretty young woman. She can’t hold a candle to your mother, of course, but I never saw the woman that could, which is why I’ve stayed a bachelor all my life. I could never fancy any other female. Never shall! That’s why you see me now, a lonely man, with no one to care for, and no one to care a straw for me!’
As he presented the appearance of a comfortable hedonist, Kit was bereft of words. Lady Denville, however, was not so tongue-tied. With what her undutiful son subsequently informed her was an entire absence of propriety, she exclaimed: ‘Well, of all the plumpers – ! As though I didn’t know about the – the birds of Paradise you’ve taken under your protection any time these five-and-twenty years! And several of them, as I recall, were dashers of the first water – far more beautiful than I ever was!’
‘No one was ever more beautiful than you, my lovely,’ said Sir Bonamy simply. He heaved a deep sigh, which made the Cumberland corset creak alarmingly; but almost immediately grew more cheerful, as he disclosed to Kit that his object in coming to Hill Street was to beg him to bring his mama to a little dinner-party which he was planning to hold at the Clarendon Hotel, before he retired to Brighton for the summer months. ‘They have a way of cooking semelles of carp which is better than anything my Alphonse can do,’ he said impressively. ‘You cut your carp into large collops, you know, and in a stew-pan you put butter, chopped shallots, thyme, parsley, mushrooms, and pepper and salt, of course – anyone knows that! But at the Clarendon something else is added, and devilish good it is, though I haven’t yet discovered what it may be. It is not sorrel, for I desired Alphonse to try that, and it was not the same thing at all. I wonder if it might be just a touch of chervil, and perhaps one or two tarragon-leaves?’ He slewed round to smile fondly upon Lady Denville. ‘You will know, I daresay, my pretty! I thought I would have it removed with a fillet of veal. We must have quails: that goes without saying – and ducklings; and nothing beside except a few larded sweetbreads, and a raised pie. And for the second course just a green goose, with cauliflowers and French beans and peas, for I know you don’t care for large dinners. So I shall add only a dressed lobster, and some asparagus, and a few jellies and creams, and a basket of pastries for you to nibble at. That,’ he said, beaming upon his prospective guests, ‘is my notion of a neat little dinner.’
‘It sounds delightful, sir,’ agreed Kit. ‘The only thing is –’
‘Yes, yes, I know what you’re going to say, my boy!’ Sir Bonamy interrupted. ‘It wouldn’t do for a large party! But I mean only to invite three other persons, so that we shall sit down no more than six to table. And there will be side-dishes: a haunch of venison, and a braised ham, possibly. Or a dish of lamb cutlets: I must consider what would be most suitable.’ A note of discontent entered his voice. ‘I do not consider this the season for dinners of real excellence,’ he said gravely. ‘To be sure, few things are so good as freshly cut asparagus, to say nothing of a basket of strawberries, which I promise you, my pretty, you shall have! But only think how superior it would be if we could have some plump partridges, and a couple of braised pheasants!’
‘Yes, indeed, but that wasn’t what I was about to say, sir! Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to escort Mama to your party, but it so chances that I am obliged to return to Ravenhurst almost immediately.’
‘Why, whatever will you find to do there?’ asked Sir Bonamy, opening his small round eyes to their widest extent.
‘A great deal, I promise you,’ responded Kit easily. ‘If Miss Stavely does me the honour to marry me, my uncle, as I daresay Mama has told you, means to wind up the Trust. There are arrangements to be made – a quantity of things to be done before I could venture to bring my bride to Ravenhurst!’
‘But don’t you mean to be in Brighton this summer?’ demanded Sir Bonamy, greatly astonished. ‘I thought you had acquired the same house on the Steyne which you rented last year!’
‘Yes, so I have – and it is naturally at my mother’s disposal. I expect I shall be joining her there presently. I don’t know what her plans may be, but I can’t think that she needs my escort to your party, sir! Her poet will be delighted to take my place!’
‘If you mean that silly young chough I sent to the right-about not ten minutes before you came in, Evelyn, I won’t have him at my party!’ said Sir Bonamy, roused to unwonted violence. ‘A fellow that knows no better than to come to visit a lady, dressed all by gue
ss, and with a handkerchief knotted round his throat –�! Ay, and what do you think he was doing when I walked in? Reading poetry to her! What a booberkin! I can tell you this, my boy: in my day we’d more rumgumption than to bore a pretty woman into a lethargy!’
‘I was not in a lethargy!’ stated her ladyship. ‘No female of my age could be bored by poems written in her honour! Particularly when the poet has been so obliging as to liken her to a daffodil!’ She observed, with sparkling delight, the revulsion in both gentlemen’s faces, and added soulfully: ‘Tossed like a nymph in the breeze!’ She went into one of her trills of laughter, as the gentlemen exchanged speaking glances. ‘Confess, Bonamy! you never said such a pretty thing to me!’
‘Puppy!’ said Sir Bonamy, his eyes kindling. ‘A daffodil! Good God! Well, I’ve never written a line of poetry in my life: it is not my way! But if I did write about you I shouldn’t call you a paltry daffodil! I should liken you to a rose – one of those yellow ones, with a deep golden heart, and a sweet scent!’ said Sir Bonamy, warming to the theme.
‘Nonsense!’ she said briskly. ‘You would be very much more likely to call me a plump partridge, or a Spanish fritter! As for your party, I should like it of all things, and it is most vexatious of Evelyn to go into the country again, for naturally I must accompany him. It is so dreary at Ravenhurst, if one is quite alone: not that I ever have been there alone, but I have often thought how melancholy it would be if I were obliged to stay there by myself. So you will drive over from Brighton to dine with us, if you please! I expect we shall be able to set ducklings before you, though not, I fancy, quails. But certainly lobsters and asparagus!’
This ready acquiescence in his resolve to seek refuge at Ravenhurst surprised Kit. It was not until Sir Bonamy had departed that he learned the reason for it. ‘Dearest, did you know, then?’ demanded his mother, when he returned from helping to hoist her admirer into his carriage.