IT WAS with no very real expectation of meeting Sophy that Lord Charlbury had a horse saddled next morning and betook himself to Hyde Park, for it seemed to him that a young lady who had danced the night through would not be very, likely to be found riding in the Park by ten o’clock next day. But he had not cantered once round the Row when he saw a magnificent black horse coming toward him and recognized Sophy on its back. He reined in and pulled off his hat, exclaiming, “I made sure you would still be abed and fast asleep! Are you made of iron, Miss Stanton-Lacy?”
She pulled Salamanca up, sidling and prancing. “Pooh!” she said laughing at him. “Did you think me such a poor creature as to be prostrated by one ball, sir?”
He turned his horse and fell in beside her. John Potton followed at a discreet distance. Lord Charlbury complimented Sophy on Salamanca, but was cut short.
“Very true, he is a superb horse, but we have not met to talk of horses. Such a kickup as there has been in Berkeley Square! Charles, of course — all Charles! The most diverting thing of all — do be diverted! Indeed, there is no need for that grave face! Is that Augustus Fawnhope was quite as much taken aback as you or Charles!”
“Are you telling me that he does not wish to marry Cecilia?” demanded Charlbury.
“Oh! In some misty future! Certainly not immediately! I expect, you know, being a poet, he would much prefer to be the victim of a hopeless passion!” said Sophy merrily.
“Coxcomb!”
“If you like. I danced one waltz with him last night, when you had left us, and I do think I was very helpful, for I suggested to him a number of genteel occupations of a gainful nature, and promised to look about me for some great man in need of a secretary.”
“I hope he was grateful to you,” said Charlbury heavily.
“Not in the least! Augustus does not want to be any man’s secretary, for he has a soul quite above such mundane matters as acquiring a respectable competence. I showed him what his future would be, in the prettiest way imaginable! Love in a cottage, you know, and a dozen hopeful children prattling at his knee.”
“You are a most unaccountable girl!” he exclaimed, looking at her in a good deal of amusement. “Did this picture appall him?”
“Of course it did, but he is very chivalrous and has now made up his mind to an early marriage. For anything I know he may be planning a flight to the border.”
“What?” ejaculated his lordship.
“Oh, have no fear! Cecilia is by far too well brought up to consent to such a scandalous thing! Let us have just one gallop! I know it is wrong, but there seem to be only nursemaids in the Park this morning. Good God, I am quite at fault! There is Lord Bromford, on that fat cob of his! I must tell you that he left the ball at midnight, because late hours are injurious to his health. Now we must gallop, or he will join us and tell us about Jamaica!”
They flew down the track, Salamanca always just ahead of Charlbury’s rat-tailed gray, and so rousing Lord Charlbury to enthusiasm. “By God, that’s a capital horse!” he said. “I do not know how you contrive to hold him, ma’am! Surely he is too strong for you?”
“I daresay, but he has charming manners, you see. Now we will proceed more soberly! Should you object very much to telling me whether you still desire to marry my cousin? You may snub me, if you choose!”
He replied rather ruefully: “Will you think me contemptible if I tell you, yes?”
“Not at all. You would be foolish to refine too much upon what happened last night. Only consider! Instead of first fixing your interest with Cecilia, you applied to my uncle for leave to address her — ”
“It is usual to do so!” he pointed out.
“It may be punctilious, but it is the greatest folly imaginable, particularly if you mean to contract mumps before you have even had time to offer for her!”
“It would, I collect, be useless to assure you that I did not mean to contract mumps! I had reason to believe that my suit would not be distasteful to her.”
“I expect she was very well disposed toward you,” agreed Sophy cordially. “But she had not then seen Augustus Fawnhope. At least, she had, but it seems that he was covered in spots at that time, so no one could expect her to fall in love with him.”
“I don’t find the reflection precisely comforting, Miss Stanton-Lacy.”
“Call me Sophy! Everyone does, and we are going to become excessively friendly.”
“Are — are we?” he said. “I mean, I am delighted to hear you say so, of course!”
She laughed. “Oh, pray don’t be alarmed! If you still wish to marry Cecilia — and I must tell you that although I thought otherwise before I had met you, I have now made up my mind to it that you would suit capitally — I will say you just how you must go on.”
He could not help smiling. “I am much obliged to you! But if she loves young Fawnhope — ”
“You must, if you please, consider for a moment!” Sophy earnestly. “Only think how it was! No sooner had declared yourself to my uncle than you contracted a ridiculous complaint. She was informed that she was to become your wife — quite gothic, and most ill judged — and along came Augustus Fawnhope, looking, you will own, like a prince of a fairy tale, and what must he do but turn his back on the poor females who were setting their caps at him and fall in love with Cecilia’s beauty! My dear sir, he writes poems in her praise! He calls her a nymph, and says her eyes put stars to shame, and such stuff as that!”
“Good God!” said his lordship.
“Exactly so! You cannot wonder that she was swept off her feet. I daresay you had never so much as thought of calling her a nymph!”
“Miss Stanton — Sophy! Even to win Cecilia, I cannot write poetry, and if I could I’ll be dashed if I would write such — Well, in any event I have no turn in that direction!”
“Oh, no, you must not attempt to outshine Augustus in that line!” said Sophy. “Your strength lies in being precisely the kind of man who can procure one a chair when it has come on to rain.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Can you not?” she asked, turning her head to look at him with raised brows.
“I expect I could, but — ”
“Believe me, it is by far more important than being able to turn a verse!” she told him. “Augustus is quite unable to do so. I know, because he failed miserably at the Chelsea Gardens. I thought he would, which is why I made him escort Cecilia and me there on a day when you could see it would come on to pour. Our muslins were soaked, and I daresay we should have died of an inflammation of the lung had not one of my old friends procured a hackney to convey us home. Poor Cecy! She became almost cross with Augustus!”
He burst out laughing. “Major Quinton spoke nothing but the truth about you!” he declared. “I am already terrified of you!”
She smiled, but said, “Well, you need not be, for I mean to help you.”
“That is what terrifies me.”
“Nonsense! You are trying to quiz me. We have established that you can procure chairs in a rainstorm; I am also I the opinion that when you invite a party to supper at the Piazza the waiters do not fob you off with a table in a draught.”
“No,” he agreed, regarding her with a fascinated eye.
“Augustus, of course, is not in a position to invite us to upper at the Piazza, because my aunt would certainly not permit us to accept, but he did once entertain us to tea here, in the Park, and I could not but see that he is just the kind of man whom the waiters serve last. I feel sure I can rely upon you to see to it that everything goes without the least hitch when you invite us to the theater, and to supper afterward. You will be obliged, of course, to invite my aunt as well, but — ”
“For heaven’s sake!” he interrupted. “You cannot suppose that in the situation in which we now stand Cecilia would consent to make one of a party of my making!”
“Certainly I do,” she replied coolly. “What is more, you will invite Augustus.”
“No, that I will not!” he declared.
“Then you will be a great gaby. You must understand that Cecilia has been driven into announcing that she means to marry Augustus! You were not there to engage her affections; Augustus was sighing verses to her left eyebrow; and to clinch the matter my cousin Charles behaved in the most tyrannical fashion, forbidding her to think of Augustus, and fairly ordering her to marry you! I assure you, it would have been wonderful indeed if she had not made up her mind to do no such thing!”
He rode in silence beside her for some moments, frowning between his horse’s ears. “I see,” he said at last. “At least — Well, at all events, you don’t advise me to despair!”
“I don’t suppose,” said Sophy honestly, “that I should ever advise anyone to despair, for I can’t bear such poor-spirited conduct!”
“What do you advise me to do?” he asked. “I seem to be wholly in your hands!”
“Withdraw your suit!” said Sophy.
He looked sharply at her. “No I, I mean to make a push — ”
“You will call in Berkeley Square this afternoon,” said; Sophy, with the utmost patience, “and you will request the favor of a few minutes alone with Cecilia. When you see her — ”
“I shall not see her. She will deny herself!” he said bitterly.
“She will see you, because I shall tell her she owes it to you to do so. I wish you will not keep on interrupting me!” He begged pardon meekly, and she continued, “When you see her, you will assure her that you have no desire to distress her, that you will never mention the matter again to her. You will be excessively noble, and she will feel that you sympathize with her, and if you can convey to her also the sense of your heart being broken, however well you contrive to conceal it, so much the better!”
“I am strongly of the opinion that Major Quinton grossly understated the case!” said his lordship, with feeling.
“Very likely. Gentlemen can never see when a little duplicity is needed. You, I have no doubt, if I left you to your own devices, would storm and rant at Cecilia, so that all would end in a quarrel, and you would find it quite impossible to visit the house, even! But if she knows that you will not enact her any tragedies she will be perfectly pleased to see you as often as you care to come to Berkeley Square.”
“How can I visit in Berkeley Square when she is betrothed to another man? If you imagine that I’ll play the lovelorn suitor in the hope of arousing pity in Cecilia’s breast you were never more at fault! As well be a lap dog!”
“Much better,” said Sophy. “You will visit in Berkeley Square to see me. You cannot too suddenly seem to transfer your interest in my direction, of course, but it would be an excellent start if you were to find an opportunity of telling Cecilia today how droll and entertaining you think me.”
“Do you know,” he said seriously, “you are the most startling female it has ever been my fortune to meet? You will observe that I do not say good or ill fortune, for I haven’t the smallest notion which it will prove to be!”
She laughed. “But will you do what I tell you?”
“Yes,” he replied. “To the best of my poor ability. But I wish I knew the extent of the dark scheme you are revolving in your head.”
She turned her head to look at him, her expressive eyes questioning, and at the same time acknowledging a hit. “But I have told you!”
“I have a notion there is more to it than what you have told me.”
She looked mischievous, but would only shake her head.
They had reached the Stanhope Gate again, and she reined in, holding out her hand. “I must go now. Pray don’t be afraid of me! I never do people any harm — indeed I don’t! Good-by! At about four o’clock, mind.”
She reached Berkeley Square again to find the house in a state of considerable uneasiness, Lord Ombersley, informed by his wife of Cecilia’s overnight announcement, having flown into a passion of exasperation at the folly, ingratitude, and selfishness of daughters; and Hubert and Theodore between them having chosen this singularly inappropriate moment to allow Jacko to escape from the schoolroom.
Sophy was met on her arrival by various distracted persons, who lost no time in pouring their woes or grievances into her ears. Cecilia, shaken by the interview with her father, wanted to carry her off instantly to the seclusion of her bedchamber; Miss Adderbury wished to explain that she had repeatedly warned Mr. Hubert not to excite the monkey; Theodore desired to impress upon everyone that it had all been Hubert’s fault; Hubert demanded that she should help him to recover the monkey before its escape came to Charles’s ears; Dassett, having observed with disfavor the enthusiasm with which both footmen entered into the chase, delivered himself of an icily civil monologue, the gist of which seemed to be that wild animals roaming at large in a nobleman’s residence were not what he had been accustomed to or what he could bring himself to tolerate.
As this speech contained a dark threat to inform His Lordship instantly, it appeared to Sophy that her most pressing duty was to soothe Dassett’s feelings, half a dozen persons having informed her that Lord Ombersley was in a dreadful temper. So she told Cecilia that she could come to her room presently, and considerably mollified the butler by rejecting the services of the footmen. Cecilia, who besides her interview with Lord Ombersley, had endured a few moments with her elder brother, and half an hour with Lady Ombersley, was in no mood for monkeys, and said, rather hysterically, that she supposed she might have expected that Jacko would be thought of more importance than herself. Selina, who was thoroughly enjoying the atmosphere of drama and impending doom that hung over the house, hissed, “H’sh! Charles is in the library!” Cecilia retorted that she did not care where he was and rushed upstairs to her bedroom.
“What a commotion!” exclaimed Sophy, amused.
Her voice, penetrating the shut library door, reached the sharp ears of Tina, who, during her absence from the house, had attached herself to Mr. Rivenhall. She at once demanded to be allowed to rejoin her mistress, and her insistence brought Mr. Rivenhall upon the scene, for he was obliged to open the door for her. Perceiving that a large part of his family appeared to be assembled in the hall, he somewhat coldly inquired the reason. Before anyone could answer him, Amabel, in the basement, gave a warning shriek, Jacko suddenly erupted into the hall from the nether regions, gibbered at the sight of Tina, and swarmed up the window curtains to a place of safety well out of anyone’s reach. Amabel then came storming up the basement stairs, closely followed by the housekeeper, who at once lodged an impassioned protest with Mr. Rivenhall. The dratted monkey, she said, had wantonly destroyed two of the best dish cloths and had scattered a bowl of raisins all over the kitchen floor.
“If that damned monkey cannot be controlled,” said Mr. Rivenhall, making no apology for the violence of his language, “it must be got rid of!”
Theodore, Gertrude, and Amabel at once burst into a spirited accusation against Hubert, who, they averred, had wantonly teased Jacko. Hubert, conscious of a rent coat pocket, retired into the background, and Mr. Rivenhall, eyeing his juniors with revulsion, walked forward to the window, and held up his hand, saying calmly, “Come along!”
Jacko’s reply to this, though voluble, was incomprehensible. His general attitude, however, was contumacious, so that everyone was surprised when, upon Mr. Rivenhall’s repeating his command, he began to descend the curtain. Tina, in wholehearted agreement with Dassett and the housekeeper on the undesirability of monkeys in noblemen’s residences, caused a slight setback by barking, but Sophy snatched her up and muffled her before Jacko had had time to retreat again to the top of the window. Mr. Rivenhall, acidly requesting his audience to refrain from making any noise or sudden movement, again commanded Jacko to come down. Jacko satisfied that Tina was under strong guard, reluctantly descended, allowed himself to be seized, and clasped both skinny arms round Mr. Rivenhall’s neck. Unimpressed by this mark of affection, Mr. Rivenhall detached him, handed him over to Gertrude, and warned her not to permit him to escape again. The schoolroom party then withdrew circumspectly, scarcely able to believe that their pet was not to be wrested from them; and Sophy, smiling warmly upon Mr. Rivenhall, said, “Thank you. There is some magic in you which makes all animals trust you, I think. When I am most vexed with you I cannot but remember it!”
“The only magic, Cousin, lay in not alarming an already frightened animal,” he replied dampingly, and went back into the library and shut the door.
“Phew!” uttered Hubert, emerging from the embrasure at the head of the basement stairs. “Sophy, only look what that dashed brute has done to my new coat!”
“Give it to me! I’ll mend it for you — and for heaven’s sake, you wretched creature, don’t kick up any more larks today!” said Sophy.
He grinned at her, stripped off the coat, and handed it to her. “What did happen last night?” he asked. “Don’t know when I’ve seen my father in such a taking! Is Cecilia going to marry Fawnhope?”
“Ask her!” Sophy advised him. “I will have your coat ready for you in twenty minutes. Come to my room then, and you shall have it!”
She ran up the stairs and without waiting to change her riding habit, sat down by the window to repair the rent caused by Jacko’s fury. She was a deft needlewoman and had mended half the tear with her tiny stitches when Cecilia came to her room. Cecilia was strongly of the opinion that Hubert might have found someone else to do his mending and begged her to put it aside. This, however, Sophy refused to do, merely saying, “I can listen to you while I work, you know. What a goose you were last night, Cecy!”
This brought Cecilia’s chin up. She enunciated with great clarity, “I am betrothed to Augustus, and if I may not marry him I will marry no one!”
“I daresay, but to make such an announcement in the middle of a ball!”
“Sophy, I thought you would feel for me!”
It occurred to Sophy suddenly that the fewer people to sympathize with Cecilia the better it would be, so she kept her head bent over her work, and said lightly, “Well, and so I do, but I still think it was a ridiculous moment to choose for making such an announcement!”
Cecilia began to tell her again what provocation had been supplied by Charles; she agreed, but absently, and appeared to be more exercised with the set of Hubert’s coat than with Cecilia’s wrongs. She shook it out, smoothed the darn she had made, and, when Hubert came knocking at the door, cut Cecilia short to jump up and restore the garment to him. The end of all this was that when, at four o’clock, Lord Charlbury sent up his card, with a request to see Miss Rivenhall, Cecilia, almost forced to accede to his wishes, found in him her only sympathizer. One glance at her pale face and tragic mien banished from his mind all notion of duplicity. He stepped quickly forward, took the hand so shrinkingly held out to I and said in a deeply concerned voice. “Do not look so happy! Indeed, I have not come to distress you!”
Her eyes filled with tears; her hand slightly returned the pressure of his before it was withdrawn; and she managed to say something, in a suffocated voice, about his kindness,’ and her own regret. He obliged her to be seated, himself took a chair near to hers, and said, “My sentiments have undergone no change; indeed, I believe it to be impossible that they should! But I have been told — I have understood — that yours were never engaged. Believe me, if you cannot return my regard, I honor you for having the courage to say so. That; you should be constrained to accept my suit, when your heart is given to another, is a thought wholly repugnant to me! Forgive me! I think you have had to bear a great deal on this head which I never intended, or indeed, dreamed — But I have said enough! Only let me assure you that I will do all that lies in my power to put an end to such intolerable promptings!”
“You are all consideration — all goodness!” Cecilia uttered. “I am so sorry that — that expectations which it is not in my power to fulfill should have been raised! If my gratitude for a sensibility which permits you to feel for me in my present predicament, for a chivalry which — ” Her voice became wholly suspended by tears; she could only turn away her face and make a gesture imploring his understanding.
He took her hand and kissed it. “Say no more! I always thought the prize beyond my reach. Though you deny me that nearer relationship which I so ardently desire, we may continue friends? If there is any way in which I can serve you, will you tell me of it? That would be a happiness indeed!”
“Oh, do not say so! You are too good!”
The door opened; Mr. Rivenhall came into the room, checked an instant on the threshold, when he saw Charlbury, and looked as though he would have retired again. Charlbury rose, however, and said, “I am glad you are at home, Charles, for I believe I can settle this business better with you than with anyone. You sister and I have agreed that we shall not suit.”
“I see,” said Mr. Rivenhall dryly. “There seems to be .nothing I can profitably say, except that I am sorry. I conclude you wish me to inform my father that there is to be no engagement?”
“Lord Charlbury has been everything that is most kind — most magnanimous!” whispered Cecilia.
“That I can believe,” responded Mr. Rivenhall.
“Nonsense!” Charlbury said, taking her hand. “I shall leave you now, but I hope I may still visit this house, on terms of friendship. You friendship I must always value, you know. Perhaps I may not dance at your wedding, but I shall wish you very happy, upon my honor!”
He pressed her hand, released it, and went out of the room, followed by Mr. Rivenhall, who escorted him downstairs to the hall, saying, “This is a damnable business, Everard. She is out of her senses! But as for marrying that ippy — no, by God!”
“Your cousin tells me it is all my fault for having willfully contracted mumps!” Charlbury said ruefully.
“Sophy!” Mr. Rivenhall ejaculated in anything but loving accents. “I do not think we have had a day’s peace since that girl entered the house!”
“I shouldn’t think you would,” said his lordship reflectively. “She is the oddest female I ever met, but I own I like her. Do you not?”
“No, I do not!” said Mr. Rivenhall.
He saw Charlbury off the premises and turned back into the house just as Hubert came down the stairs, in long bounds. “Hallo, where are you off to in such haste?” he inquired.
“Oh, nowhere!” Hubert answered. “Just out!”
“When do you go up to Oxford again?”
“Next week. Why?”
“Do you care to go with me to Thorpe Grange tomorrow? I must go down and shall stay a night, I daresay.”
Hubert shook his head. “No, I can’t. I’m off to stay with Harpenden for a couple of nights, you know.”
“I didn’t. Newmarket?”
Hubert flushed. “Dash it, why shouldn’t I go to Newmarket, if I choose?”
“There is no reason why you should not, but I could wish that you would choose your company more wisely. Are you set on it? We could ride over from Thorpe, if you liked.”
“Very good of you, Charles, but I’m promised to Harpenden and can’t fail now!” Hubert said gruffly. “Very well. Don’t draw the bustle too much!” Hubert hunched his shoulder. “I knew you would say that!”
“I’ll say something else, and you may believe it! I can’t and I won’t be saddled with your racing bets, so don’t bet beyond your means!”
He waited for no answer, but went upstairs again to the drawing room, where he found his sister still seated where he had left her, weeping softly into a shred of a handkerchief. He tossed his own into her lap. “If you must be a watering pot, take mine!” he recommended. “Are satisfied? You should be! It is not every girl who can boa of having rejected a man like Charlbury!”
“I do not boast of it!” she retorted, firing up. “But I nothing for wealth and position! Where my affections not engaged — ”
“You might care for worth of character, however! You , could search England without finding a better fellow, Cecilia., Don’t flatter yourself you have found one in your poet! I wish you may not live to regret this day’s work.”
“I am aware that Lord Charlbury has every amiable quality,” she said, in, a subdued voice, and mopping her wet cheeks with his handkerchief. “Indeed, I believe him to be the finest gentleman of my acquaintance, and if I am crying it is from sorrow at having been obliged to wound him!”
He walked over to the window and stood looking out into the square. “It is useless now to remonstrate with you. After your announcement last night it is not very likely that Charlbury would desire to marry you. What do you mean to do? I may tell you now that my father will not consent to your marriage with Fawnhope.”
“Because you will not let him consent! Can you not be content, Charles, with making a marriage of convenience yourself, without wishing me to do the same?” she cried hotly.
He stiffened. “It is not difficult to perceive my cousin’s influence at work!” he said. “Before her arrival in London, you would not have spoken so to me! My regard for Eugenia — ”
“If you loved, Charles, you would not talk of your regard for Eugenia!”
It was at this inappropriate moment that Dassett ushered Miss Wraxton into the room. Cecilia whisked her brother’s handkerchief out of sight, a tide of crimson flooding her cheeks; Mr. Rivenhall turned away from the window, and said with a palpable effort, “Eugenia! We did not expect this pleasure! How do you do?”
She gave him her hand, but turned her gaze upon Cecilia, saying, “Tell me it is not so! I was never more shocked in my life than when Alfred told me what had occurred last night!”
Almost insensibly the brother and sister drew closer together. “Alfred?” repeated Mr. Rivenhall.
“He told me, when we drove home after the ball, that he could not choose but overhear what Cecilia had said to you, Charles. And Lord Charlbury! I could not believe it to have been possible!”
Loyalty, as much as the ties of affection, kept Mr. Rivenhall ranged on the side of his sister, but he looked to be very much annoyed, which indeed he was, for he thought it inexcusable of Cecilia to have placed him in such a situation. He said repressively, “If you mean that Cecilia and Lord Charlbury ; have made up their minds to it they would not suit, you are I quite correct. I do not know what business it is of Alfred’s, or why he must run to you with what he overhears!”
“My dear Charles, he knows that what concerns your family must be also my concern!”
“I am much obliged to you, but I have no wish to discuss the matter.”
“Excuse me! I must go to my mother!” Cecilia said. She escaped from the room; Miss Wraxton looked significantly at Mr. Rivenhall, and said, “I do not wonder you are vexed. It has been a sadly mismanaged business, and I fancy we have not far to seek for the influence that prompted dear Cecilia to behave in a way so unlike herself!”
“I have not the smallest conjecture as to your meaning.”
His tone, which was forbidding, warned her that she would be wise to turn the subject, but her dislike of Sophy had become such an obsession with her that she was impelled to continue.
“You must have noticed, dear Charles, that our sweet sister has fallen quite under the sway of her cousin. I cannot think it will lead to anything but disaster. Miss Stanton-Lacy doubtless has many excellent qualities, but I have always thought that you were right in saying she had too little delicacy of mind.”
Mr. Rivenhall, who had decided that Sophy was to blame for his sister’s conduct, said without an instant’s hesitation, “You are mistaken. I never made any such remark!”
“Did you not? Something of that nature I think you once said to me, but it hardly signifies! It is a thousand pities that dear Lady Ombersley was forced to receive her as a guest at this precise time. Every time I enter the house I am conscious of a change in it! Even the children — ”
“It is certainly by far more lively,” he interrupted.
She gave vent to rather an artificial laugh. “It is certainly less peaceful!” She began to smooth the wrinkles from her gloves. “Do you know, Charles, I have always so much admired the tone of this house? Your doing, I know well! I cannot but feel a little melancholy when I see that ordered calm — a certain dignity, I should say — shattered by wild spirits. Poor little Amabel, I thought the other day, is growing quite out of hand. Of course, Miss Stanton-Lacy encourages her unthinkingly. One must remember that she herself has had a strangely irregular upbringing!”
“My cousin,” said Mr. Rivenhall, with finality, “has been extremely kind to the children, and is a great favorite with my mother. I must add that it is a pleasure to me to see my mother’s spirits so much improved by Sophy’s presence. Have you any errands in this part of town? May I escort you? I must be in Bond Street in twenty minutes’ time.”
In face of so comprehensive a snub as this it was impossible for Miss Wraxton to say more. Her color rose, and her lips tightened, but she managed to suppress an acid retort, and to say with the appearance at least of complaisance, “Thank you, I have to call at the library for Mama. I came in the barouche and shall be glad to take you up as far as to your destination.”
Since this was Jackson’s Boxing Saloon, she could hardly have been expected to have been pleased, for she did not care for sport of any kind and considered boxing a peculiarly low form of it. But apart from quizzing Mr. Rivenhall archly on his obvious preference for a horrid prizefighter’s society rather than for her own, she made no comment.
Cecilia, meanwhile, had fled, not to Lady Ombersley but to her cousin, whom she discovered seated before her dressing table, scanning a slip of paper. Jane Storridge was putting away her habit, but when Cecilia came into the room she seemed to feel that she was not wanted, for she gave an audible sniff, picked up Sophy’s riding boots, and went away with them under her arm.
“What do you suppose this can be, Cecy?” asked Sophy, still studying with knit brows the paper in her hand. “Jane says she found it by the window and thought it must be mine. What a funny name! Goldhanger, Bear Alley, Fleet Lane. I do not know the writing, and cannot conceive how — Oh, how stupid! it must have fallen out of the pocket of Hubert’s coat!”
“Sophy!” said Cecilia, “I have had the most dreadful interview with Charlbury!”
Sophy laid the paper down. “Good gracious, how is this?”
“I find my spirits utterly overborne!” declared Cecilia, sinking into a chair. “No one — no one! — could have behaved with more exquisite sensibility! I wish you had not persuaded me to see him! Nothing could have been more painful!”
“Oh, do not give him a thought!” said Sophy bracingly. “Let us rather think what is to be done about fixing Augustus in some genteel occupation!”
“How can you be so heartless?” demanded Cecilia. “When he was so kind, and I could not but see how much I had grieved him!”
“I daresay he will recover speedily enough,” Sophy replied, in a careless way. “Ten to one he will fall in love with another female before the month is out!”
Cecilia did not look as though she found this prophecy consoling, but after a moment she said, “I am sure I wish he may, for to be ruining a man’s life is no very pleasant thing, I can tell you!”
“Do you think it will rain? Dare I wear my new straw hat? I have a mind to flirt with Charlbury myself. I liked him.”
“I wish you may succeed,” said Cecilia, a trifle stiffly. “I do not think him a man at all given to flirting, however. The tone of his mind is too nice for such a pastime as that!”
Sophy laughed. “We’ll see! Do tell me which hat I should wear! The straw is so ravishing, but if it were to come on to mizzle — ”
“I don’t care which hat you wear!” snapped Cecilia.