Lady Alice, who glowered sternly on him during this speech, nodded abruptly with an inarticulate sound, and then looked to his left, at a distant picture.
"I trust I see you a great deal better, Lady Alice. I have the pleasure, I believe, to address Lady Alice Redcliffe--aw, haw, h"m," and the attorney executed his best bow, a ceremony rather of agility than grace.
"I had the honour of seeing you, Lady Alice Redcliffe, at a shower-flow--flower-show, I mean--in the year--let me see--egad, ma"am, twelve--no--no--_thirteen_ years ago. How time does fly! Of course all them years--_thirteen_, egad!--has not gone for nothing. I dare say you don"t perceive the alterations in yourself--no one does--I wish no one else did--that was always my wish to Mrs. P. of a morning--_my_ good lady, Mrs. Pelter--ha, ha, ha! Man can"t tether time or tide, as the Psalm says, and every year scribbles a wrinkle or two. You were suffering, I heard then, ma"am, chronic cough, ma"am--and all that. I hope it"s abated--I know it will, ma"am--my poor lady is a martyr to it--troublesome thing--very--awful troublesome! Lady Alice."
There was no reply, Lady Alice was still looking sternly at the picture.
"I remember so well, ma"am, you were walking a little lame then, linked with Lord Lumdlebury--(we have had the honour to do business occasionally for his lordship)--and I was informed by a party with me that you had been with Pincendorf. I don"t think much of them jockeys, ma"am, for my part; but if it was anything of a callosity--"
Without waiting for any more, Lady Alice Redcliffe rose in solemn silence to her full height, beckoned to Beatrix, and said grimly--
"I"ll change my seat, dear, to the sofa--will you help me with these things?"
Lady Alice glided awfully to the sofa, and the gallant Mr. Pelter inst.i.tuted a playful struggle with Beatrix for possession of the shawls.
"I remember the time, miss, I would not have let you carry your share; but, as I was saying to Lady Alice Redcliffe--"
He was by this time tucking a shawl about her knees, which, so soon as she perceived, she gasped to Beatrix--
"Where"s Jekyl?--I can"t have _this_ any longer--call him here."
"As I was saying to you, Lady Alice, ma"am, our joints grow a bit rusty after sixty; and talking of feet, I pa.s.sed the Smather and Slam Junction, ma"am, only two hours after the collision; and, egad! there were three feet all in a row cut off by the instep, quite smooth, ma"am, lying in the blood there, a pool as long as the pa.s.sage up-stairs--awful sight!"
Lady Alice rose up again, with her eyes very wide, and her mouth very close, apparently engaged in mental prayer, and her face angry and pink, and she beckoned with tremulous fingers to Sir Jekyl, who was approaching with one of his provoking smiles.
"I say, Mr. Pelter, my friend Doocey wants you over there; they"re at logger-heads about a law point, and I can"t help them."
"Hey! if it"s _practice_ I can give them a wrinkle maybe;" and away stumped the attorney, his fists in his pockets, smirking, to the group indicated by his host.
"Hope I haven"t interrupted a conversation? What can I do for you?" said Sir Jekyl, gaily.
"What do you _mean_, Jekyl Marlowe--what _can_ you mean by bringing such persons here? What pleasure can you _possibly_ find in low and _dreadful_ society?--none of your family liked it. Where did you find that man? How on earth did you procure such a person? If I _could_--if I had been well enough, I"d have rung the bell and ordered your servant to remove him. I"d have gone to my bed-room, sir, only that even there I could not have felt safe from his intrusions. It"s utterly intolerable and preposterous!"
"I had no idea my venerable friend, Pelter, could have pursued a lady so cruelly; but rely upon me, I"ll protect you."
"I think you had better cleanse your house of such persons; at all events, I insist they shan"t be allowed to make their horrible sport of me!" said Lady Alice, darting a fiery glance after the agreeable attorney.
CHAPTER XVII.
Old Donnie and Lady Jane.
"Can you tell me, child, anything about that horrible fat old Frenchman, who has begun to speak English since his return?" asked Lady Jane Lennox of Beatrix, whom she stopped, just touching her arm with the tip of her finger, as she was pa.s.sing. Lady Jane was leaning back indolently, and watching the movements of M. Varbarriere with a disagreeable interest.
"That"s Monsieur Varbarriere," answered Beatrix.
"Yes, I know that; but who is he--what is he? I wish he were gone,"
replied she.
"I really know nothing of him," replied Beatrix, with a smile.
"Yes, you do know something about him: for instance, you know he"s the uncle of that handsome young man who accompanied him." This Lady Jane spoke with a point which caused on a sudden a beautiful scarlet to tinge the young girl"s cheeks.
Lady Jane looked at her, without a smile, without archness, with a lowering curiosity and something of pain, one might fancy, even of malignity.
Lady Jane hooked her finger in Beatrix"s bracelet, and lowering her eyes to the carpet, remained silent, it seemed to the girl undecided whether to speak or not on some doubtful subject. With a vague interest Beatrix watched her handsome but sombre countenance, till Lady Jane appearing to escape from her thoughts, with a little toss of her beautiful head and a frown, said, looking up--
"Beatrix, I have such frightful dreams sometimes. I am ill, I think; I am horribly nervous to-night."
"Would you like to go to your room? Maybe if you were to lie down, Lady Jane--"
"By-and-by, perhaps--yes." She was still stealthily watching Varbarriere.
"I"ll go with you--shall I?" said Beatrix.
"No, you shan"t," answered Lady Jane, rudely.
"And why, Lady Jane?" asked Beatrix, hurt and surprised.
"You shall never visit my room; you are a good little creature. I could have loved you, Beatrix, but now I can"t."
"Yet I like you, and you meet me so! why is this?" pleaded Beatrix.
"I can"t say, little fool; who ever knows why they like or dislike? I don"t. The fault, I suppose, is mine, not yours. I never said it was yours. If you were ever so little wicked," she added, with a strange little laugh, "perhaps I could; but it is not worth talking about," and with a sudden change from this sinister levity to a seriousness which oscillated strangely between cruelty and sadness, she said--
"Beatrix, you like that young man, Mr. Strangways?" Again poor Beatrix blushed, and was about to falter an exculpation and a protest; but Lady Jane silenced it with a grave and resolute "_Yes--you like him_;" and after a little pause, she added--"Well, if you don"t marry _him_, marry no one else;" and shortly after this, Lady Jane sighed heavily.
This speech of hers was delivered in a way that prevented evasion or girlish hypocrisy, and Beatrix had no answer but that blush which became her so; and dropping her eyes to the ground, she fell into a reverie, from which she was called up by Lady Jane, who said suddenly--
"What can that fat Monsieur Varbarriere be? He looks like Torquemada, the Inquisitor--mysterious, plausible, truculent--what do you think?
Don"t you fancy he could poison you in an ice or a cup of coffee; or put you into Cardinal Ballue"s cage, and smile on you once a year through the bars?"
Beatrix smiled, and looked on the unctuous old gentleman with an indulgent eye, comparatively.
"I can"t see him so melodramatically, Lady Jane," she laughed. "To me he seems a much more commonplace individual, a great deal less interesting and atrocious, and less like the abbot."
"What abbot?" said Lady Jane, sharply, "Now really that"s very odd."
"I meant," said Beatrix, laughing, "the Abbot of Quedlinberg, in Canning"s play, who is described, you know, as very corpulent and cruel."
"Oh, I forgot; I don"t think I ever read it; but it chimed in so oddly with my dreams."
"How, what do you mean?" cried Beatrix, amused.
"I dreamed some one knocked at night at my door, and when I said "come in," that Monsieur Varbarriere put in his great face, with a hood on like a friar"s, smiling like--like an a.s.sa.s.sin; and somehow I have felt a disgust of him ever since."