"I would in a minute, if I had a figure like hers," laughed Mrs. Reade.
"Mamma, we must get her a good habit to set off that figure. I"ll come round in the morning, and go with you to have her measured. Are you going, Mr. Kingston, without a cup of hot coffee? Good-night, then; mind you send your horse."
The servant shut the door behind him; and he went out into the solemnity of the autumn night. The wind was rustling and whispering through the shrubberies round the house; it had the scent in it of untimely violets, mingled with a faint fragrance of the distant sea.
Above, the stars were shining brilliantly; below, the teeming city lay silent in the lap of darkness, with a thousand lamplights sprinkled over it. In the foreground he could dimly see the lines of gravelled paths and gra.s.sy terraces, and the gleam of great bunches of pale chrysanthemums swaying to and fro in the cool air.
"It is a splendid site," he said to himself; "but I think, if anything, mine is better."
He stood for some time, looking away over the illuminated valley to the milky streak on the horizon where in three or four hours the waters of Port Philip Bay would shine; and then he sauntered down to the lodge, and found his hansom waiting for him.
"Go up to my land there, will you?" said he, pointing his thumb over his shoulder as he got in. "I"m going to set the men on soon, and I want to have a look at it."
The driver, wondering whether he had had more champagne than usual, said, "All right, Sir," and drove him the few dozen yards that intervened between Mr. Hardy"s gates and the place where his own were designed to be.
In the darkness he clambered over the fence, made his way to the highest ground in the enclosure, and stood once more to look at the lamp-spangled city and the dim and distant bay.
"Yes," he said, "I am higher here. I shall get a better view." And he began to build his house in fancy--to see it towering over all his neighbours", with great white walls and colonnades, and myriad windows full of lights, and lovely gardens full of flowers and fountains. "I must begin at once," he said. "I must see the contractors to-morrow. I must not put it off any longer, or I shall be an old man before I can begin to enjoy it."
And after long musing over the details of his project, he stumbled back, through saplings, and tussocks, and broken bottles, to the fence; tore his dress-coat on a nail getting over it; and subsiding into his cab, lit a cheroot, and stared intently into vacancy all the way to his club.
When he reached this bachelor"s home he did not know what to do with himself. He thought he would write to a celebrated firm of contractors to make an appointment for the morning; but it was past twelve o"clock, and the letters had been collected.
Some men called him to come and play loo, but he was not in the mood for cards. He tried billiards, and found his hand unsteady; he went into the smoking-room, but it was hot and noisy. He had always liked his club, and maintained against all comers that it was a glorious inst.i.tution; but now he began to see that after all a middle-aged gentleman of ample fortune might find himself pleasanter lodgings. He went out of doors, where the air was so sweet and cool, rustling up and down an ivied wall, and over a strip of lawn that lay deep in shadow below it; and looking at the clear dark sky and the clear pale stars, he put to himself a momentous question, for which he had a half-shaped answer ready:
"Who shall I ask to be the mistress of my house?"
CHAPTER IV.
THE ANSWER.
A girl of eighteen is popularly supposed to be grown up--to have all wisdom and knowledge necessary for her guidance and protection through the supreme difficulties of a woman"s lot. When one gets ten years older, one is apt to think that this is a mistake. Life is not so easy to learn. The treasures of love, like visions of the Holy Grail, are not revealed to those who have known none of the waiting, and yearning, and suffering, and sacrifice that teach their divine nature and their immeasurable worth.
And to all the vast meanings and solemn mysteries that surround the great question of right and wrong--the great question of human life--the spiritual eyesight is blind, or worse than blind, until the experience of years of mistakes and disillusions brings, little by little, dim apprehensions of light and truth.
Rachel Fetherstonhaugh, with the snare of her beauty and her sensuous love of luxurious surroundings newly laid about her feet, entered upon her kingdom more than ordinarily unprepared.
Poor little, helpless, foolish child! How was she to know that marriage meant something better than a richly-appointed house and a kind protector? How could she be held accountable for the commission, or contemplation, of a crime against her youth and womanhood of whose nature and consequences she was absolutely ignorant?
She was flitting in and out through the French windows of the drawing-room one fine morning, with a basket of flowers on her arm, busily engaged in rearranging the numerous little bouquets that she made it her business to keep in perennial freshness all about the house, when Mr. Kingston was announced.
She had seen him several times since the night of the opera; he had left his card twice when she had been away from home; and Mrs. Hardy had had polite messages respecting the horse, which had been duly sent for her approval. He came in now, with his light and jaunty step, bowing low, and smiling so that his white teeth shone under his Napoleonic moustache, carrying a large roll of paper in his hand.
"Good morning, Miss Fetherstonhaugh," he exclaimed gaily. "I must apologise for this early call; but I can never find you at home after lunch these fine days."
Rachel, who had not seen his approach nor heard him enter the house, whose hall-door was standing open for her convenience, turned round with her hands full of flowers. In the sunshine of the morning she looked more fair and refined than he had ever seen her, he thought. The plainest little black gown showed her graceful shape to perfection; her complexion, always so delicate, was flushed and freshened with the wind and her embarra.s.sment.
As for her hair, half-covered with a shabby garden hat on the back of her head, it was the central patch of light and colour in the bright-hued room; he was sure he had never seen hair so silky in texture and so rich in tint.
His ideal woman, hitherto, had been highly polished and elaborately appointed; she had been a woman of rank and fashion, in Parisian clothes, a queen of society, always moving about in state, with her crown on. But now, in the autumn of his years, all his theories of life were being overturned by an ignorant little country girl, sprung from n.o.body knew where; and a coronet of diamonds would not have had the charm of that old straw hat, with a wisp of muslin round it, which framed the sweetest face he had ever seen or dreamed of.
"My aunt is in her room," she stammered hastily; "I will send to tell her you are here. She will be very glad to see you."
And she called back the servant who had admitted him, and sent a message upstairs.
Mrs. Hardy, however, did not hurry herself. She was a thrifty housekeeper still, as in her early days, and devoted her forenoons religiously to her domestic affairs. Just now she was sorting linen that had returned from the wash; and, hearing that her niece was in the drawing-room, she had no scruple about remaining to finish her task.
"Say I will be down directly," she said. And she did not go down for considerably more than half an hour.
In the meantime Rachel tumbled her flowers into the basket, took off her hat, and seated herself demurely in a green satin chair.
"It is a lovely morning," she remarked.
"Oh, a charming morning--perfectly charming! You ought to be having a ride, you know. Have you tried Black Agnes yet?"
"No, not yet. My habit has not come home. They promised to send it last night, but they did not. I am very anxious to try her. She is the prettiest creature I ever saw. I--I," beginning to blush violently, "have not half thanked you for your kindness, Mr. Kingston."
"Pray don"t mention it," he replied, waving his hand; "I shall be only too glad if I am able to give you a little pleasure."
"It is the _greatest_ pleasure," she said, smiling. "But she is so good--so much too good--I am half afraid to take her out, for fear anything should happen to her. Uncle Hardy says she is a much better horse than he wants for me."
"Your uncle had better mind his own business," said Mr. Kingston, with sudden irritation. "If you are to have a horse at all, you must have one that is fit to ride, of course."
"But I think it is his business," suggested Rachel, laughingly.
"No; just now it is mine. I mean," he added hastily, a little alarmed at the expression and colour of her face, "that Black Agnes is mine. And while I lend her to you she is yours. And I trust you will use her in every way as if she were actually yours."
"Thank you; you are very kind. I hope nothing _will_ happen to her. I shall take great care of her, of course. I will not jump fences or anything of that sort."
"Oh, pray do," urged Mr. Kingston. "She is trained to jump. She has carried a lady over fences scores of times." The fact was he had only bought her a few days before, and had selected her from a large and miscellaneous a.s.sortment on account of this special qualification. "I hope you will let me ride out with you, and show you my old cross-country hunting leaps. You will not mind jumping fences with her, if I am with you, and make you do it?"
"No," she said, "for I shall show you that it is not the fault of my riding if accidents happen."
"Exactly. I am sure it will not be your fault. But we will not have any accidents--I will take too good care of you. Can"t we go out this afternoon? Oh, I forgot that habit. I"ll call on your tailor, if you"ll allow me, and "exhort" him; shall I? I have done it before, on my own account, with the most satisfactory results."
"No, thank you," said Rachel, "I would not give you that trouble. He will send it home when it is ready, I suppose."
And she rose from her chair and began to move about the room, wondering whether her aunt was ever coming downstairs.
Mr. Kingston thought it would be expedient to change the conversation.
"I have brought you the plans of my house," he said, taking up his roll of papers, and beginning to spread great sheets on a table near him. "I meant to have asked your opinion before I began to build it, but--well, I took it for granted that you would like it as it was."
"Ah, yes," responded Rachel brightly, coming to his side. "Uncle Hardy said you had begun. And you know I can see all the men and carts from my window. Oh! oh!"
This enthusiastic exclamation greeted the unrolling of the "front elevation," which, in faint outlines, filled in with pale washes of grey and blue and pink, showed her the towers and colonnades of her ideal palace. When he heard it, Mr. Kingston"s heart swelled. He was more charmed with his pretty creature than ever.