Fully absorbed as she was in showing attentions to her more favoured guests, Mrs. Tudor did not perceive the cold, uncomfortable, unsocial feeling that had crept over the rest of her company.
Tea was at last announced. I felt relieved at this, and so, I perceived, did most of those around me. At the tea-table I expected to find Mrs. Tudor more general in her attentions. But no. These favoured ones were served first, and "Mrs.--, will you have this?"
and "Mrs.--, will you have that?" were almost exclusively confined to three persons at the table. Mr. Tudor, I remarked, noticed this, for he exerted himself in order to make all the rest feel at ease, which he succeeded in doing to some extent.
Waiting upon the table was a female domestic, a young girl of good manners and appearance. To her Mrs. Tudor uniformly spoke in a way that must have been felt as peculiarly disagreeable. The blandest smile; and the most winning expression of voice, would instantly change, when Lucy was addressed, to a cold, supercilious look, and an undertone of command. Several times I saw the blood mount to the girl"s forehead, as a word or tone more marked and offensive than usual would be given so loudly as to be perceived by all. Once or twice, at such times, I could not resist a glance at Mrs.
Sunderland, which was generally met with a slight, rebuking contraction of her brow.
Through the efforts of Mr. Tudor, who certainly did his part well, the tea-table party was a good deal more social than had been the individuals composing it while in the parlour. The favoured guests, notwithstanding the incense offered them by our hostess, appeared in no way to esteem themselves as better than the rest, and, as soon as opportunity was afforded them, tried to be at home with every one.
Once more in the parlours, and arranged there by a kind of social crystallization, I perceived that Mrs. Tudor was sitting between two of the ladies who were considered by her worthy of the most marked attention. There she sat during nearly the whole of the evening, except when refreshments were introduced, when she accompanied Lucy round the room, occasionally speaking to her in a tone of offensive command or cutting rebuke.
For one, I was glad when the time came to go home, and I rather think that all present were as much relieved, in getting away, as I was.
"What is your opinion now?" said I, triumphantly, to Mrs.
Sunderland, the moment we were in the street.
"My opinion," she replied, a little sharply, "is, that you did not act, in several instances, this evening, like a gentleman!"
"I did not!" I spoke with affected surprise only; for I thought I knew what it was she meant.
"No, I am sorry to say that you did not. Nothing could have been more improper than the notice you took of what was pa.s.sing. A true gentlemanly spirit would have led you to look away from, rather than at the weakness of our hostess."
"Look away from it, Mrs. Sunderland! How could I do that, pray? It was before my eyes all the time."
"You ought to have shut your eyes, then."
"Nonsense."
"Very far from it, Mr. Sunderland! You are ready enough to see the faults of other people!"--(in this, I must confess, my wife did not err very much)--"but quite willing to shut your eyes to your own.
Now, I think you acted just as bad as Mrs. Tudor; and, in fact, worse."
"Worse! You are complimentary, Mrs. Sunderland."
"I can"t help it if I am. Mrs. Tudor was led by her weakness to conduct herself in an unlady-like manner; but you, with her example before your eyes, and in a mood to reflect, permitted yourself to remark upon her conduct in a way calculated to give pain."
"In the name of wonder, what are you driving at, Mrs. Sunderland? No one but you heard any remark I made."
"I wish I could think so."
"Who, besides yourself, heard what I said?"
"Mr. Tudor."
"Impossible!"
"He was sitting very near us when you so far forgot yourself as to notice, verbally, what was pa.s.sing, and I am well satisfied, either heard distinctly what was said, or enough to enable him to understand the nature of all you said."
"You are surely mistaken," said I, feeling a good deal mortified, and perceiving much more clearly than I did before the nature of my offence against good manners and propriety of conduct.
"I wish I were. But I fear I am not. I know that Mr. Tudor looked around toward you suddenly, and I noticed that he was much more particular afterward in his attentions to the rest of the company.
At table, you may have yourself remarked this."
"Yes, I noticed it."
"And yet, even at the table, when he was doing his best, you again hurt his feelings."
"Me!"
"Yes, you. When Mrs. Tudor spoke harshly to Lucy, or did something or other that you thought out of the way, you must look your sarcasm at me, notwithstanding the eyes of her husband were upon you."
"But he didn"t see me, then."
"Yes, but he did. I saw him looking directly at you."
"Oh, no! it cannot be." I was unwilling to believe this.
"I wish it were not so for my husband"s sake," returned Mrs.
Sunderland. "But the evidence of my senses I generally find it necessary to credit."
I must own that I felt considerably cut up, or cut down, whichever is the most mortifying state to be in. To look and whisper my censure in company, I had thought no great harm; but now that I had found I had been discovered in the act, I had a mortifying sense of its impropriety.
"Well, anyhow," said I, rallying myself, and speaking with some lightness of tone, "it is clear that Mrs. Tudor is no lady, for all you thought her such a pattern-card of gentility."
"And I have not the least doubt," retorted my wife, "that it is equally clear to Mr. Tudor that you are no gentleman. So, on that score, the account stands fairly balanced between the two families."
This was a pretty hard hit; and I felt a little "riled up," as the Yankees say, but I concluded that the uttering of a few sharp sayings to my wife, under the circ.u.mstances, would not prove my claim to being a gentleman, especially against the facts of the case; so I cooled down, and walked home rather silently, and in not the best humour with myself.
On the next morning, I took up a little book from my wife"s bureau, and sat down to look over it while waiting for the breakfast bell.
It was a book of aphorisms, and I opened at once to a page where a leaf was turned down. A slight dot with a pencil directed my eyes to a particular line, which read--
"_He who lives in a gla.s.s house shouldn"t throw stones_."
I am not sure that Mrs. Sunderland turned down that leaf in the book, and marked the sentiment for my especial benefit; though I strongly suspected her. At any rate, I deemed it best not to ask the question.
GOING INTO MOURNING.
THE weeping mother bent over the beautiful form of innocent childhood--beautiful still, though its animating spirit had fled--and kissed the pale cheek of her dear departed one. When she lifted her head, a tear glistened on the cold brow of the babe. Then the father looked his last look, and, with an effort, controlled the emotion that wellnigh mastered him. The sisters came next, with audible sobs, and cheeks suffused with tears. A moment or two they gazed upon the expressionless face of their dear little playfellow, and then the coffin lid was shut down, while each one present experienced a momentary feeling of suffocation.
As the funeral procession came out of the door, and the family pa.s.sed slowly across the pavement to the carriages, a few gossiping neighbours--such as, with no particular acquaintance with the princ.i.p.al members of a household, know all about the internal management of every dwelling in the square--a.s.sembled close by, and thus discoursed of the events connected with the burying.
"Poor Mrs. Condy," said one, "how can she bear the loss of that sweet little fellow!"
"Other people have lost children as well as she," remarked a sour-looking dame. "Rich people, thank heaven! have to feel as well as we poor folks."
No one seemed disposed to reply to this; and there was a momentary silence.