Then ensues a pause. Somehow every one has stopped talking, and Lady Chetwoode has set down the teapot and turned to Lilian with an air full of expectancy. They all feel that something yet remains to be said.
Possessed with this idea, and seeing Lilian"s hesitation, Lady Chetwoode says, in her gentlest tones:
"Well, dear?"
"He is unhappy," says Lilian, running one of her fingers up and down the table-cloth and growing more and more embarra.s.sed: "every year he used to come to the Park for his holidays, and now----"
"And now he cannot go to the Park: is that it?"
"Yes. A little while ago he joined his regiment, and now he has leave of absence, and he has nowhere to spend it except at Colonel Graham"s, who is his guardian and his uncle, and he _hates_ Colonel Graham," says Lilian, impressively, looking at Lady Chetwoode with appealing eyes.
"Poor boy," says that kindest of women, "I do not like to hear of his being unhappy. Perhaps, Lilian, you would wish----"
"I want you to ask him here," says Lilian, quickly and boldly, coloring furiously, and fixing her great honest eyes on Lady Chetwoode. "He said nothing about it, but I know he would like to be where I am."
"My dear, of course," says Lady Chetwoode, with most unusual briskness for her, "ask him instantly to come here as _soon_ as you like, to stay as _long_ as you like."
"Auntie Nannie," says Lilian, rising tumultuously from her chair, "you are the dearest, kindest, best of women!" She presses her lips gently, although rapturously, to her auntie"s cheek, after which she returns to her seat. "Now I am thoroughly content," she says naively: "I could not bear to picture Taffy wretched, and that old Colonel Graham is a downright Tartar!"
""Taffy"! what an extraordinary name!" says Florence. "Is it a fancy name?"
"No; it is, I am ashamed to say, a nickname. I believe he was christened James, but one day when we were both almost babies he stole from me my best doll and squeezed the eyes out of it to see what lay behind, and I was very angry, and said he was a regular "Taffy" to do such a thing.
You know the old rhyme?" turning to Lady Chetwoode with a blush and a light laugh:
"Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a thief, Taffy came to my house And stole a piece of beef.
There is a good deal more of it, quite as interesting, but of course you know it. Nurse laughed when I so christened him, and after that he was always called "Master Taffy" by the servants, and nothing else."
"How nicknames do cling to one!"
"I don"t believe I should know him by any other now. It suits him much better than his own, as he doesn"t look the least in the world like a James."
"How old is your cousin?" asks Florence, with an eye to business.
"A year older than I am."
"And that is----"
"Nineteen."
"Indeed! I should have thought you older than that."
"He is very like me, and he is a dragoon!" says Lilian, proudly. "But I have never seen him since he was gazetted."
"Then you have not seen him in his uniform?" says Guy.
"No. But he tells me," glancing at her letter, "he looks "uncommonly jolly" in it."
They all laugh. Even Florence condescends to be amused.
"When may we expect this hero?" asks Guy, kindly.
"His leave begins next week," answers Lilian, looking at Lady Chetwoode.
"If he might come then, it would be such a comfort to him."
"Of course he must come then," says Lady Chetwoode. "Do not let him lose a day of his precious leave. I remember when Guy was in the army how stingy they were about granting him a few days now and then."
"The Mater"s "few days" always meant eight months out of the twelve,"
says Cyril, laughing, "and anything like the abuse she used to shower upon the colonel because he didn"t see it in the light that she did, was never heard. It is unfit for publication."
"Archibald Chesney is coming here the twenty-ninth," says Guy. "So you will be able to make choice between your two cousins."
"Is Archibald coming?" surprised. "But my choice is already made. No one shall ever get inside Taffy in my affections."
"Thrice blessed Taffy," says Cyril. "See what it is to be a young and gallant plunger!"
"That wouldn"t weigh with me," says Lilian, indignantly.
"Would it not?" asks Guy. "I was hoping otherwise. I was a plunger once.
What is the renowned Taffy"s other name?"
"Musgrave," says Lilian.
"A very pretty name," remarks Miss Beauchamp, who has received an unexpected check by the morning"s post, and is consequently in high good humor.
"I think so too," returns Lilian.
"Five distinct blushes, and all about Taffy," says Cyril, meditatively.
"Happy Taffy! I have counted them religiously. Are you very much in love with him, Lilian?"
""In love"! nonsense!" laughing. "If you only saw Taffy! (But," with a glad smile, "you soon will.) He never remembers anything half an hour after he has said it, and besides," scornfully, "he is only a boy."
""Only a boy"! Was there ever such willful waste! Such reckless, extravagant, woful waste! To throw away five priceless, divine blushes upon "only a boy"! Oh, that I were a boy! Perhaps, Lilian, when you come to know me longer I shall be happy enough to have one whole blush all to myself."
"Be consoled," says Miss Chesney, saucily: "I feel a.s.sured the longer I know you, the more reason I shall have to blush for you!"
All through the day Miss Chesney"s joy makes itself felt. She is thoroughly happy, and takes very good care every one shall know it. She sings through the house, "up-stairs, down-stairs, and in my lady"s chamber," gay as any lark, and inundates her nurse with vain conjectures and interrogations; as for example, whether she thinks Taffy will be much changed,--and whether twelve months could possibly produce a respectable moustache,--and if she really believes the fact of his being a full-blown dragoon will have a demoralizing effect upon him.
"An" no doubt it will, ninny," says nurse, shaking her beribboned head very solemnly, "I have no opinion of those soldiering ways myself. I fear me he will be growing wilder an" wilder every day."
"Oh! if that"s all!" says Miss Lilian, with a relieved sigh. "I am only afraid he will be growing steadier and steadier; and Taffy would be ruined if he gave himself airs. I can"t endure dignified young men."
"I don"t think you need fret about that, my dear," says nurse, with conviction. "I never yet saw much signs of it about him."
Having used up all nurse"s powers of conversation, Lilian goes on to Lady Chetwoode"s boudoir, and finds out from her the room Taffy will be likely to occupy. Having inspected it, and brought up half the servants to change every article of furniture in the room into a different position, and given as much trouble as possible, and decided in her own mind the precise flowers she will place upon his dressing-table the morning of his arrival, she goes back to her auntie to tell her all she has done.