"Were you not together?" said Mrs. Carleton. - "Where were you, Guy?"
"Following the sport another way, Ma"am; I had very good success, too."
"What"s the total?" said Mr. Evelyn. "How much game did you bag?"
"Really, Sir, I didn"t count. I can only answer for a bagful."
"Ladies and gentlemen!" cried Rossitur, bursting forth, ?
"What will you say when I tell you that Mr. Carleton deserted me and the sport in a most unceremonious manner, and that he, ? the cynical philosopher, the reserved English gentleman, the gay man of the world, ? you are all of "em by turns, aren"t you, Carleton? ? _he!_ ? has gone and made a very cavaliero servente of himself to a piece of rusticity, and spent all to- day in helping a little girl pick up chestnuts."
"Mr. Carleton would be a better man if he were to spend a good many more days in the same manner," said that gentleman, drily enough. But the entrance of dinner put a stop to both laughter and questioning for a time, all of the party being well disposed to their meat.
When the pickerel from the lakes, and the poultry and half- kept joints had had their share of attention, and a pair of fine wild ducks were set on the table, the tongues of the party found something to do besides eating.
"We have had a very satisfactory day among the Shakers, Guy,"
said Mrs. Carleton; "and we have arranged to drive to Kenton to-morrow ? I suppose you will go with us?"
"With pleasure, mother, but that I am engaged to dinner about five or six miles in the opposite direction."
"Engaged to dinner! ? what with this old gentleman where you went last night? And you too, Mr. Rossitur?"
"I have made no promise, Ma"am; but I take it I must go."
"Vexatious! Is the little girl going with us, Guy?"
"I don"t know yet ? I half apprehend, yes; there seems to be a doubt in her grandfather"s mind, not whether he can let her go, but whether he can keep her, and that looks like it."
"Is it your little cousin who proved the successful rival of the woodc.o.c.k to-day, Charlton?" said Mrs. Evelyn. "What is she?"
"I don"t know, Ma"am, upon my word. I presume Carleton will tell you she is something uncommon and quite remarkable."
"Is she, Mr. Carleton?"
"What, Ma"am?"
"Uncommon?"
"Very."
"Come? That _is_ something, from _you_," said Rossitur"s brother officer, Lieut. Thorn.
"What"s the uncommonness?" said Mrs. Thorn, addressing herself rather to Mr. Rossitur as she saw Mr. Carleton"s averted eye; ? "Is she handsome, Mr. Rossitur?"
"I can"t tell you, I am sure, Ma"am. I saw nothing but a nice child enough, in a calico frock, just such as one would see in any farm-house. She rushed into the room when she was first called to see us, from somewhere in distant regions, with an immense iron ladle a foot and a half long in her hand, with which she had been performing unknown feats of housewifery; and they had left her head still encircled with a halo of kitchen smoke. If, as they say, "coming events cast their shadows before," she was the shadow of supper."
"O, Charlton, Charlton!" said Mrs. Evelyn, but in a tone of very gentle and laughing reproof, ? "for shame! What a picture! and of your cousin!"
"Is she a pretty child, Guy?" said Mrs. Carleton, who did not relish her son"s grave face.
"No, Ma"am ?something more than that."
"How old?"
"About ten or eleven."
"That"s an ugly age."
"She will never be at an ugly age."
"What style of beauty?"
"The highest ? that degree of mould and finish which belongs only to the finest material."
"That is hardly the kind of beauty one would expect to see in such a place," said Mrs. Carleton. "From one side of her family, to be sure, she has a right to it."
"I have seen very few examples of it anywhere," said her son.
"Who were her parents?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"Her mother was Mrs. Rossitur"s sister ? her father" ?
"Amy Charlton!" exclaimed Mrs. Evelyn, ? "Oh, I knew her! Was Amy Charlton her mother? O, I didn"t know whom you were talking of. She was one of my dearest friends. Her daughter may well be handsome ? she was one of the most lovely persons I ever knew; in body and mind both. O, I loved Amy Charlton very much. I must see this child."
"I don"t know who her father was," Mrs. Carleton went on.
"Oh, her father was Major Ringgan," said Mrs. Evelyn. "I never saw him, but I have heard him spoken of in very high terms. I always heard that Amy married very well."
"Major Ringgan!" said Mrs. Thorn; "his name is very well known; he was very distinguished."
"He was a self-made man, entirely," said Mrs. Evelyn, in a tone that conveyed a good deal more than the simple fact.
"Yes, he was a self-made man," said Mrs. Thorn, "but I should never think of that where a man distinguishes himself so much; he was very distinguished."
"Yes, and for more than officer-like qualities," said Mrs.
Evelyn. "I have heard his personal accomplishments as a gentleman highly praised."
"So that little Miss Ringgan"s right to be a beauty may be considered clearly made out," said Mr. Thorn.
"It is one of those singular cases," said Mr. Carleton, "where purity of blood proves itself, and one has no need to go back to past generations to make any inquiry concerning it."
"Hear him!" cried Rossitur; "and for the life of me I could see nothing of all this wonder. Her face is not at all striking."
"The wonder is not so much in what it is, as in what it indicates," said Mr. Carleton.
"What does it indicate?" said his mother.
"Suppose you were to ask me to count the shades of colour in a rainbow," answered he.
"Hear him!" cried Thorn, again.