The d.u.c.h.ess pouted.
"Oh!" she said. "Then there is something in fingers!"
Lord Lackington"s face suddenly relaxed. He broke into a shout of laughter, _bon enfant_ that he was; and the d.u.c.h.ess laughed, too; but under cover of their merriment she, mindful of quite other things, drew him a little farther away from Julie.
"I thought you had asked her to Nonpareil for Easter?" she said, in his ear, with a motion of her pretty head towards Julie in the distance.
"Yes, but, my dear lady, Blanche won"t come home! She and Aileen put it off, and put it off. Now she says they mean to spend May in Switzerland--may perhaps be away the whole summer! I had counted on them for Easter. I am dependent on Blanche for hostess. It is really too bad of her. Everything has broken down, and William and I (he named his youngest son) are going to the Uredales" for a fortnight."
Lord Uredale, his eldest son, a sportsman and farmer, troubled by none of his father"s originalities, reigned over the second family "place,"
in Herefordshire, beside the Wye.
"Has Aileen any love affairs yet?" said the d.u.c.h.ess, abruptly, raising her face to his.
Lord Lackington looked surprised.
"Not that I know of. However, I dare say they wouldn"t tell me. I"m a sieve, I know. Have you heard of any? Tell me." He stooped to her with roguish eagerness. "I like to steal a march on Blanche."
So he knew nothing--while half their world was talking! It was very characteristic, however. Except for his own hobbies, artistic, medical, or military, Lord Lackington had walked through life as a Johnny Head-in-Air, from his youth till now. His children had not trusted him with their secrets, and he had never discovered them for himself.
"Is there any likeness between Julie and Aileen?" whispered the d.u.c.h.ess.
Lord Lackington started. Both turned their eyes towards Julie, as she stood some ten yards away from them, in front of a refined and mysterious profile of the cinque-cento--some lady, perhaps, of the d"Este or Sforza families, attributed to Ambrogio da Predis. In her soft, black dress, delicately folded and draped to hide her excessive thinness, her small toque fitting closely over her wealth of hair, her only ornaments a long and slender chain set with uncut jewels which Lord Lackington had brought her the day before, and a bunch of violets which the d.u.c.h.ess had just slipped into her belt, she was as rare and delicate as the picture. But she turned her face towards them, and Lord Lackington made a sudden exclamation.
"No! Good Heavens, no! Aileen was a dancing-sprite when I saw her last, and this poor girl!--d.u.c.h.ess, why does she look like that? So sad, so bloodless!"
He turned upon her impetuously, his face frowning and disturbed.
The d.u.c.h.ess sighed.
"You and I have just got to do all we can for her," she said, relieved to see that Julie had wandered farther away, as though it pleased her to be left to herself.
"But I would do anything--everything!" cried Lord Lackington. "Of course, none of us can undo the past. But I offered yesterday to make full provision for her. She has refused. She has the most Quixotic notions, poor child!"
"No, let her earn her own living yet awhile. It will do her good.
But--shall I tell you secrets?" The d.u.c.h.ess looked at him, knitting her small brows.
"Tell me what I ought to know--no more," he said, gravely, with a dignity contrasting oddly with his school-boy curiosity in the matter of little Aileen"s lover.
The d.u.c.h.ess hesitated. Just in front of her was a picture of the Venetian school representing St. George, Princess Saba, and the dragon.
The princess, a long and slender victim, with bowed head and fettered hands, reminded her of Julie. The dragon--perfidious, encroaching wretch!--he was easy enough of interpretation. But from the blue distance, thank Heaven! spurs the champion. Oh, ye heavenly powers, give him wings and strength! "St. George--St. George to the rescue!"
"Well," she said, slowly, "I can tell you of some one who is very devoted to Julie--some one worthy of her. Come with me."
And she took him away into the next room, still talking in his ear.
When they returned, Lord Lackington was radiant. With a new eagerness he looked for Julie"s distant figure amid the groups scattered about the central room. The d.u.c.h.ess had sworn him to secrecy, indeed; and he meant to be discretion itself. But--Jacob Delafield! Yes, that, indeed, would be a solution. His pride was acutely pleased; his affection--of which he already began to feel no small store for this charming woman of his own blood, this poor granddaughter _de la main gauche_--was strengthened and stimulated. She was sad now and out of spirits, poor thing, because, no doubt, of this horrid business with Lady Henry, to whom, by-the-way, he had written his mind. But time would see to that--time--gently and discreetly a.s.sisted by himself and the d.u.c.h.ess. It was impossible that she should finally hold out against such a good fellow--impossible, and most unreasonable. No. Rose"s daughter would be brought back safely to her mother"s world and cla.s.s, and poor Rose"s tragedy would at last work itself out for good. How strange, romantic, and providential!
In such a mood did he now devote himself to Julie. He chattered about the pictures; he gossiped about their owners; he excused himself for the absence of "that gad-about Blanche"; he made her promise him a Whitsuntide visit instead, and whispered in her ear, "You shall have _her_ room"; he paid her the most handsome and gallant attentions, natural to the man of fashion _par excellence_, mingled with something intimate, brusque, capricious, which marked her his own, and of the family. Seventy-five!--with that step, that carriage of the shoulders, that vivacity! Ridiculous!
And Julie could not but respond.
Something stole into her heart that had never yet lodged there. She must love the old man--she did. When he left her for the d.u.c.h.ess her eyes followed him--her dark-rimmed, wistful eyes.
"I must be off," said Lord Lackington, presently, b.u.t.toning up his coat.
"This, ladies, has been dalliance. I now go to my duties. Read me in the _Times_ to-morrow. I shall make a rattling speech. You see, I shall rub it in."
"Montresor?" said the d.u.c.h.ess.
Lord Lackington nodded. That afternoon he proposed to strew the floor of the House of Lords with the _debris_ of Montresor"s farcical reforms.
Suddenly he pulled himself up.
"d.u.c.h.ess, look round you, at those two in the doorway. Isn"t it--by George, it is!--Chudleigh and his boy!"
"Yes--yes, it is," said the d.u.c.h.ess, in some excitement. "Don"t recognize them. Don"t speak to him. Jacob implored me not."
And she hurried her companions along till they were well out of the track of the new-comers; then on the threshold of another room she paused, and, touching Julie on the arm, said, in a whisper:
"Now look back. That"s Jacob"s Duke, and his poor, poor boy!"
Julie threw a hurried glance towards the two figures; but that glance impressed forever upon her memory a most tragic sight.
A man of middle height, sallow, and careworn, with jet-black hair and beard, supported a sickly lad, apparently about seventeen, who clung to his arm and coughed at intervals. The father moved as though in a dream.
He looked at the pictures with unseeing, l.u.s.treless eyes, except when the boy asked him a question. Then he would smile, stoop his head and answer, only to resume again immediately his melancholy pa.s.sivity. The boy, meanwhile, his lips gently parted over his white teeth, his blue eyes wide open and intent upon the pictures, his emaciated cheeks deeply flushed, wore an aspect of patient suffering, of docile dependence, peculiarly touching.
It was evident the father and son thought of none but each other. From time to time the man would make the boy rest on one of the seats in the middle of the room, and the boy would look up and chatter to his companion standing before him. Then again they would resume their walk, the boy leaning on his father. Clearly the poor lad was marked for death; clearly, also, he was the desire of his father"s heart.
"The possessor, and the heir, of perhaps the finest houses and the most magnificent estates in England," said Lord Lackington, with a shrug of pity. "And Chudleigh would gladly give them all to keep that boy alive."
Julie turned away. Strange thoughts had been pa.s.sing and repa.s.sing through her brain.
Then, with angry loathing, she flung her thoughts from her. What did the Chudleigh inheritance matter to her? That night she said good-bye to the man she loved. These three miserable, burning weeks were done. Her heart, her life, would go with Warkworth to Africa and the desert. If at the beginning of this period of pa.s.sion--so short in prospect, and, to look back upon, an eternity--she had ever supposed that power or wealth could make her amends for the loss of her lover, she was in no mood to calculate such compensations to-day. Parting was too near, the anguish in her veins too sharp.
"Jacob takes them to Paris to-morrow," said the d.u.c.h.ess to Lord Lackington. "The Duke has heard of some new doctor."
An hour or two later, Sir Wilfrid Bury, in the smoking-room of his club, took out a letter which he had that morning received from Lady Henry Delafield and gave it a second reading.
"So I hear that mademoiselle"s social prospects are not, after all, so triumphant as both she and I imagined. I gave the world credit for more fools than it seems actually to possess; and she--well, I own I am a little puzzled. Has she taken leave of her senses? I am told that she is constantly seen with this man; that in spite of all denials there can be no doubt of his engagement to the Moffatt girl; and that _en somme_ she has done herself no good by the whole affair. But, after all, poor soul, she is disinterested. She stands to gain nothing, as I understand; and she risks a good deal.
From this comfortable distance, I really find something touching in her behavior.
"She gives her first "Wednesday," I understand, to-morrow.
"Mademoiselle Le Breton at home!" I confess I am curious. By all means go, and send me a full report. Mr. Montresor and his wife will certainly be there. He and I have been corresponding, of course. He wishes to persuade me that he feels himself in some way responsible for mademoiselle"s position, and for my dismissal of her; that I ought to allow him in consequence full freedom of action. I cannot see matters in the same light. But, as I tell him, the change will be all to his advantage. He exchanges a fractious old woman, always ready to tell him unpleasant truths, for one who has made flattery her _metier_. If he wants quant.i.ty she will give it him. Quality he can dispense with--as I have seen for some time past.
"Lord Lackington has written me an impertinent letter. It seems she has revealed herself, and _il s"en prend a moi_, because I kept the secret from him, and because I have now dared to dismiss his granddaughter. I am in the midst of a reply which amuses me. He is to cast off his belongings as he pleases; but when a lady of the Chantrey blood--no matter how she came by it--condescends to enter a paid employment, legitimate or illegitimate, she must be treated _en reine_, or Lord L. will know the reason why. "Here is one hundred pounds a year, and let me hear no more of you," he says to her at sixteen. Thirteen years later I take her in, respect his wishes, and keep the secret. She misbehaves herself, and I dismiss her. Where is the grievance? He himself made her a _lectrice_, and now complains that she is expected to do her duty in that line of life. He himself banished her from the family, and now grumbles that I did not at once foist her upon him. He would like to escape the odium of his former action by blaming me; but I am not meek, and I shall make him regret his letter.