"My poor child! I am afraid it will. I can tell some friends of mine to call on you; but I don"t know whether they will be admitted."
"Where is--the house?" Lesley asked. She did not like to say "my father"s house."
"In Upper Woburn Place, Bloomsbury. I believe it is near Euston Square, or some such neighborhood."
"Then it is not where _you_ lived, mamma?"
"No, dear. We lived further West, in a street near Portman Square. I believe that Mr. Brooke finds Bloomsbury a convenient district for the kind of work that he has to do."
She spoke very formally of her husband; but Lesley began to notice an under-current of resentment, of something like contempt, in her voice when she spoke of him. Lady Alice tried in vain to simulate an indifference which she did not feel, and the very effort roughened her voice and sharpened her accent in a way of which she was unconscious.
The effect on a young girl, who had not seen much of human emotion, was to induce a pa.s.sing doubt of her mother"s judgment, and a transient wonder as to whether her father had always been so much in the wrong.
The sensation was but momentary, for Lesley was devotedly attached to her mother, and could not believe her to be mistaken. And, while she was repenting of her hasty injustice, the carriage stopped between the white globes of electric light that fronted a great hotel, and Lesley was obliged to give her attention to the things around her rather than to her own thoughts and feelings.
A waiter conducted the mother and daughter up one flight of stairs and consigned them to the care of a chambermaid. The chambermaid led them to the door of a suite of rooms, where they were met by Dayman, Lady Alice"s own woman, whose stolid face relaxed into a smile of pleasure at the sight of Lesley.
"Take Miss Brooke to her own room and see that she is made nice for dinner," said her mistress. "His Lordship has ordered dinner in our own rooms, I suppose?"
"Yes, my lady. Covers for four--Captain d.u.c.h.esne is here."
"Oh," said Lady Alice, with an accent of faint surprise, "oh--well--Lesley, dear, we must not be late."
To Lesley it seemed hardly worth while to unpack her boxes and dress herself for that one evening in the soft embroidered white muslin which had hitherto served for her best Sunday frock. But Mrs. Dayman insisted on a careful toilette, and was well satisfied with the result.
"There, Miss Lesley," she said, "you have just your mamma"s look--a sort of finished look, as if you were perfect outside and in!"
Lesley laughed. "That compliment might be taken in two ways, Dayman,"
she said, as she turned to meet her mother at the door. And in a few minutes she was standing in the gay little French _salon_, where the earl was conversing with a much younger man in a glare of waxlights.
Lord Courtleroy was a stately-looking man, with perfectly snow-white hair and beard, an upright carriage, and bright, piercing, blue eyes. A striking man in appearance, and of exceedingly well-marked characteristics. The family pride for which he had long been noted seemed to show itself in his bearing and in every feature as he greeted his granddaughter, and yet it was softened by a touch of personal affection with which family pride had nothing whatever to do. For Lord Courtleroy"s feelings towards Lesley were mixed. He saw in her the child of a man whose very name he detested, who stood as a type to him of all that was hateful in the bourgeois cla.s.s. But he also saw in her his own granddaughter, "poor Alice"s girl," whom fate had used so unkindly in giving her Caspar Brooke for a father. The earl had next to no personal knowledge of Caspar Brooke. They had not met since the one sad and stormy interview which they had held together when Lady Alice had left her husband"s house. And Lord Courtleroy was wont to declare that he did not wish to know anything more of Mr. Brooke. That he was a Radical journalist, and that he had treated a daughter of the Courtleroys with shameful unkindness and neglect, was quite enough for the earl. And his manner to Lesley varied a little according as his sense of her affinity with his own family or his remembrance of her kinship with Mr. Brooke was uppermost.
Lesley was too simply filial in disposition to resent or even to remark on his changes of mood. She admired her grandfather immensely, and was pleased to hear him comment on her growth and development since she saw him last. And then the visitor was introduced to her; and to Lesley"s interest and surprise she saw that he was young.
Young men were an unknown quant.i.ty to Lesley. She could not remember that she had ever spoken to a man so young and so good-looking before!
Captain Henry d.u.c.h.esne was tall, well-made, well-dressed: he was very dark in complexion, and had a rather heavy jaw; but his dark eyes were pleasant and honest, and he had a very attractive smile. The length of his moustache was almost the first thing that struck Lesley: it seemed to her so abnormally lengthy, with such very stiffly waxed ends, that she could scarcely avert her eyes from them. She was not able to tell, save from instinct, whether a man were well or ill-dressed, but she felt sure that Captain d.u.c.h.esne"s air of smartness was due to the perfection of every detail of his attire. She liked his manner: it was easy, well-bred, and una.s.suming; and she felt glad that he was present. For after the communication made to her by her mother, the evening might have proved an occasion of embarra.s.sment. It was a relief to talk to some one for a little while who did not know her present circ.u.mstances and position.
Lady Alice watched the two young people with a little dawning trouble in her sad eyes. She had known and liked Harry d.u.c.h.esne since his childhood, and she had not been free from certain hopes and visions of his future, which affected Lesley also, but she thought that her father"s invitation had been premature. Especially when she heard Captain d.u.c.h.esne say to the girl in the course of the evening--
"Are you going to London to-morrow?"
"Yes, I believe so," said Lesley, looking down.
"And you will be in town during the winter, I hope?"
Lady Alice thought it well to interpose.
"My daughter will not be staying with me. She goes to a relation"s house for a few months, and will lead a very quiet life indeed. When she comes back to Courtleroy it will be time enough for her to commence a round of gaieties." This with a smile; but, as Henry d.u.c.h.esne knew well enough, with Lady Alice a smile sometimes covered a very serious purpose. His quick perceptions showed him that he was not wanted to call on Miss Brooke during her stay in London, and he adroitly changed the subject.
"Unfashionable relations, I suppose," he said to himself, reflecting on the matter at a later hour of the evening. "Upon my word I shouldn"t have thought that Lady Alice was so worldly-minded! She certainly didn"t want me to know where Miss Brooke was going. To some relation of that disreputable father of hers, I should fancy. Poor girt!"
For, like many other persons in London society, Captain d.u.c.h.esne knew only the name and nothing of the character of the man whom Lady Alice had married and left. It was vaguely supposed that he was not a very respectable character, and that no woman of spirit would have submitted to live with him any longer. Lady Alice"s reputation stood so high that it could not be supposed that any one except her husband was in fault.
Brooke is not an uncommon name. In certain circles the name of Caspar Brooke was known well enough; but was not often identified with the man who had run away with an earl"s daughter. He had other claims to repute, but in a world to which Lady Alice had not the right of entry.
When Harry d.u.c.h.esne had departed Lady Alice went with Lesley to her bedroom. Mother and daughter sat down together, clasping each other"s hands, and looking wistfully from time to time into each other"s faces, but saying very little. The wish to ask questions faded out of Lesley"s mind. She could not ask more than her mother chose to tell her.
But Lady Alice thought that she had already said too much, and she restrained her tongue. It was after a long and pregnant silence that she murmured--
"Lesley, my child, I want you to promise me something."
"Oh, yes, mamma!"
"I feel like one who is sending a lamb forth into the midst of wolves.
Not that Mr. Brooke is a wolf--exactly," said Lady Alice, with a forced laugh, "but I mean that you are young and--and--unsophisticated, and that there may be a mixture of people at his house."
Lesley was silent; she did not quite know what "a mixture of people"
would be like.
"I am so afraid for you, darling," said her mother, pleadingly. "Afraid lest you should be drawn into relationships and connections that you might afterwards regret: Do you understand me? Will you promise me to make no vows of any sort while you are away from me? Only for one year, my child--promise me for the year."
"I don"t think I quite understand you, mamma."
"Must I put it so plainly? I mean this, Lesley. Don"t engage yourself to be married while you are in your father"s house."
"Oh, that is easily promised!" said Lesley, with a smile of frank amus.e.m.e.nt and relief.
"It may not be so easy to carry out as you think. Give me your word, darling. You promise not to form any engagement of marriage for a year?
You promise me that?"
"Oh, yes, mamma, I promise," said the girl, so lightly that Lady Alice almost felt that she had done an unwarrantable thing in exacting a promise only half understood. But she swallowed her rising qualms, and went oh, as if exculpating herself--
"It is a safeguard. I do not ask you to marry only a man that I approve--I simply ask you to wait until I can help you with my advice.
It will be no loss to you in any way. You are too young to think of these things yet; but it is on the young that unscrupulous persons love to prey--and therefore I give you a warning."
"I am quite sure that I shall not need it," said Lesley, confidently; "and if I did, I could write and ask your advice----"
"No, no! Oh, how could I forget to tell you? You are not to write to me while you are in your father"s house."
"Oh, mamma, that is cruel."
"It is _his_ doing, not mine. Intercede with _him_, if you like. That was one of the conditions--that for this one year you should have no intercourse with me. And for the next year you will have no intercourse with him. And after that, you may choose for yourself."
But this deprivation of correspondence affected Lesley more powerfully than even the prospect of separation--to which she was used already. She threw herself into her mother"s arms and wept bitterly for a few moments. Then it occurred to her that she was acting neither thoughtfully nor courageously, and that her grief would only grieve her mother, and could remedy nothing. So she sat up and dried her eyes, and tried to respond cheerfully when Lady Alice spoke a few soothing words.
But in the whole course of her short life poor Lesley had never been so miserable as she was that night.
The bustle of preparation which had to be gone through next day prevented her, however, from thinking too much about her troubles. She and Lady Alice, with the faithful Dayman, were to leave Paris late in the afternoon; and the morning was spent in hurried excursions to shops, interviews with milliners and dressmakers, eager discussions on color, shape, and fitness. Lesley was glad to see that she was not to be sent to London with anything over-fine in the way of clothes. The gowns chosen were extremely simple, but in good taste; and the _modiste_ promised that they should be sent after the young lady in the course of a very few days. There was some argument as to whether Lesley would require a ball dress, or dinner dresses. Lady Alice thought not. But, although nothing that could actually be called a ball-dress was ordered, there were one or two frocks of lovely shimmering hue and delightfully soft texture which would serve for any such festivity.
"Though in _my_ day," said Lady Alice, smiling, "we did not go to b.a.l.l.s in Bloomsbury. But, of course, I don"t know what society Mr. Brooke sees now."
Lesley was conscious of the sarcasm.