Margaret took Harriet"s arm, and returned to the house. At the portico, they met Everard Gage, who had just succeeded in finding a shawl.
Harriet rallied him upon the haste he had made, attempted to push him out of her path with the points of her slender fingers, and led Margaret up the great staircase.
She helped to undress her with great care and quickness, brought her some coffee, saw her drink it, and then desired her to go to sleep.
Strange to say, she had not long been out of the room, before Margaret obeyed her directions, and fell into a profound slumber.
Yielding to the advice of Mrs. Fitzpatrick, it was late in the morning before she went down stairs.
As the day was very hot, the ladies had all agreed not to go out. The evening was the gay time at Wardenscourt; and it was good policy not to look f.a.gged, when there were so many people always to dinner.
Margaret found the ladies a.s.sembled, all at their worsted work, except Harriet, who was playing with Lady James Deacon"s little boy, and enticing him to do all sorts of mischief to the ladies" work-baskets.
Lady James had no objection that her darling should be amused at the expense of worsteds and floss silks, so long as he kept his hands out of her particular basket; and Harriet raced him round the room like a kitten, trailing after him half a dozen brilliant-coloured b.a.l.l.s.
Miss Campbell, who was pretty, in spite of her red hair, and possessed all the mysterious powers of attracting the other s.e.x, common to ladies of that hue, became an object of serious interest to Margaret.
She remembered Mr. Haveloc"s smile, when he thought he was speaking to Miss Campbell; she recollected that he had not positively declined the part of Alphonse, and Miss Campbell seemed only to be uncertain about accepting Camille, until she knew definitely, who was to enact the lover.
As she reclined in a low arm-chair, displaying the most slender ancle conceivable, and a thin foot incomparably shod, with her delicate blue muslin dress, her exquisite collar, and piquante cap of blue gauze artfully commingled with lace, Margaret thought that no one could deny her the meed of remarkable elegance. True, that extreme slenderness of form was adverse to an evening toilet, the neck and arms gained considerably by being left to the imagination; but she was exceedingly clever--talked good nonsense, laughed prettily, and sang with great archness and point. She was certain of a crowd of gentlemen round the piano, whenever she went to it: and Margaret who had scarcely ever seen Mr. Haveloc in society, did not know at all the style of person he generally admired. Harriet called her a knitting pin, a javelin-woman, and every other term she could coin expressive of her distaste for that style of beauty; but Harriet was no guide in the present instance; no test of what Mr. Haveloc might like. And feeling sure that she was, by her own act, for ever divided from Mr. Haveloc, she was conscious of a feverish desire to know on whom his choice would fall.
The ladies dispersed to dress rather earlier than usual, there were three or four officers coming, and women seem aware that fine clothes are never wasted upon men in that profession.
Margaret whose dress was always simple, came down soon into the deserted drawing-room, and finding Mrs. Fitzpatrick reading at a table, she joined her, and read over her shoulder. It was the "Records of Woman."
They looked as if grouped for a picture, and Harriet who was coming in at the doorway with Mr. Haveloc, who had just arrived, stopped him and bade him admire the att.i.tude.
Margaret"s face was turned from them, but her extended arm, as white and rounded as that of a statue, was pa.s.sed over Mrs. Fitzpatrick"s shoulder, tracing the lines with her finger. Mr. Haveloc stayed a moment, in obedience to Mrs. Gage, then came abruptly up to Mrs.
Fitzpatrick.
"My dear Mrs. Fitzpatrick!"
"Mr. Haveloc--this is a pleasure!"
Margaret withdrew her hand softly, and pa.s.sing behind them, went to one of the sofas and sat down beside Harriet. Mrs. Fitzpatrick and Mr.
Haveloc continued in earnest conversation. Directly after he had spoken to her, he looked round as if to address Margaret, but finding her gone, and people scattered between them, for the room was now filling, he turned back again.
Margaret tried to keep up a conversation with Harriet; she took up her fan, and asked Mrs. Gage to show her some of the Spanish movements with it. Harriet, full of fun, complied. She showed her how to say, "How are you--come, and see me," and other little sentences of the kind; but she warned her that this accomplishment did not depend solely on the dexterous handling of the fan, but required to be seconded by the expression of the lady"s eye.
Lord James Deacon wished to share the lesson; but at the first trial, he endangered the ivory sticks, and Harriet took the fan from his hand.
Lucy declined a trial, and Everard got to the farthest end of the room, behind the piano, because Harriet had already called to him for a footstool. Lord Raymond said gravely that he did not think the Spanish women could be much better than they should be; and that he thought these tricks with fans were as bad as sending about tulips, and cinders, and rubbish, as the women did in Turkey.
Lady Raymond laughed at him, and so did all the others. Miss Campbell was wild to learn, and Margaret surrendered her place to her; but dinner was announced before the lesson could proceed. Margaret, as usual, was a.s.signed to Everard Gage, and as usual they went on very peaceably.
Mr. Haveloc was between Miss Campbell, and Mrs. Fitzpatrick, but he appeared to devote all his attention to the latter lady. Lord James Deacon treated Margaret with his usual insolent neglect; staring hard at her when it suited him, and at other times neither addressing a word to her, nor helping her to what she wanted at table.
In the evening, Lady Raymond came up to Mr. Haveloc who was standing by Mrs. Fitzpatrick, and renewed her entreaties that he would take the part of Alphonse.
He declined, laughing--she pressed the point; she bought Lord Raymond to press the point--still he laughed it off.
Nothing he should like better than to play, if he could; but it was a weakness of his, that he could not overcome. He was too diffident to succeed on the boards.
Harriet accused him of being a Saint.
He bowed to the compliment, and said he saw neither reason nor precedent for saints to put on the buskin when they had no turn for wearing it.
Lady James Deacon who had secretly destined him for her friend Miss Campbell, now called on that young lady to persuade him.
Miss Campbell was sitting on a sofa making pencil alterations in a song.
She looked up with her quaint expression.
"Oh, don"t teaze him!" she said, "I would not. Put his name down, and send him a part-book, if you cannot get a _better_ Alphonse."
She gave her speeches all the point in tone and manner of a good actress. Mr. Haveloc took a seat by her side.
"Is that your advice, Miss Campbell?" he said, "they should make you stage-manager."
"Lord James is stage-manager," she replied, without raising her eyes from the sheet of music she was marking.
"Are you going to sing, Miss Campbell?" he asked.
"Oh! if I"m properly begged and prayed;" she returned, still making dots on the paper on her knee.
"How much begging and praying do you require?"
"_Try_," she said, suddenly raising her quaint eyes.
Every body laughed, Mr. Haveloc as much as the rest.
"Everard!" cried Harriet, making way for him, "see if _you_ possess sufficient oratory to persuade Miss Campbell."
"_Do_," said he, putting on his softest look. They all laughed again.
Miss Campbell rose, and walked idly to the piano.
"No eloquence like the laconic," said Mr. Haveloc to Mrs. Fitzpatrick.
"So I perceive," she said smiling, "it was equal to the Spartan--_If_."
But Miss Campbell having tried over the embellishments with her right hand, rose from the instrument.
The officers surrounded her with various exclamations, she paid no sort of attention to them, and resumed her seat beside Mr. Haveloc.
"What have we all done," said he, "that you disappoint us in this manner."
"Nothing at all," said she, putting the music in his hand, "but Schubert has done something, he has written this accompaniment in so many flats, that it is beyond me to read, and sing at once."
"Then let some one accompany you."
"La chose est faisible," said she, "go and canva.s.s for me."
"What do you want," asked Lady Raymond.