"No, no, no!" cries the little figure, "you couldn"t beat me. I bet you anything you like you couldn"t. You may play me again if you will, and then," smiling and shaking her head at him, "we shall see!"
The windows are open and every word can be heard.
"Your future daughter-in-law," says Mrs. Bethune, in a low voice, nodding her beautiful head at Lady Rylton.
"Oh, it is detestable! A hoyden--a mere _hoyden_," says Lady Rylton pettishly. "Look at her hair!"
And, indeed, it must be confessed that the hoyden"s hair is not all it ought to be. It is in effect "all over the place"--it is straight here, and wandering there; but perhaps its wildness helps to make more charming the naughty childish little face that peeps out of it.
"She has no manners--_none!"_ says Lady Rylton. "She----"
"Ah, is that you, Lady Rylton?" cries the small creature on the terrace, having caught a glimpse of her hostess through the window.
"Yes, come in--come in!" cries Lady Rylton, changing her tone at once, and smiling and beckoning to the girl with long fingers. "I hope you have not been fatiguing yourself on the tennis-courts, you dearest child!"
Her tones are cooing.
"I have won, at all events!" says t.i.ta, jumping in over the window-sill. "Though Mr. Gower," glancing back at her companion, "won"t acknowledge it."
"Why should I acknowledge it?" says the stout young man. "It"s folly to acknowledge anything."
"But the truth is the truth!" says the girl, facing him.
"Oh, no; on the contrary, it"s generally a lie," says he.
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself," says Miss Bolton, turning her back on him, which proceeding seems to fill the stout young man"s soul with delight.
"Do come and sit down, dear child; you look exhausted," says Lady Rylton, still cooing.
"I"m not," says t.i.ta, shaking her head. "Tennis is not so very exhausting--is it, Mrs. Bethune?"
"I don"t know, I"m sure. It seems to have exhausted your hair, at all events," says Mrs. Bethune, with her quick smile. "I think you had better go upstairs and settle it; it is very untidy."
"Is it? Is it?" says t.i.ta.
She runs her little fingers through her pretty short locks, and gazes round. Her eyes meet Margaret"s.
"No, no," says the latter, laughing. "It looks like the hair of a little girl. You," smiling, _"are_ a little girl. Go away and finish your fight with Mr. Gower."
"Yes. Come! Miss Knollys is on my side. She knows I shall win," says the stout young man; and, whilst disputing with him at every step, t.i.ta disappears.
"What a girl! No style, no manners," says Lady Rylton; "and yet I must receive her as a daughter. Fancy living with that girl! A silly child, with her hair always untidy, and a laugh that one can hear a mile off. Yet it must be done."
"After all, it is Maurice who will have to live with her," says Mrs.
Bethune.
"Oh, I hope not," says Margaret quickly.
"Why?" asks Lady Rylton, turning to her with sharp inquiry.
"It would never do," says Margaret with decision. "They are not suited to each other. Maurice! and that _baby!_ It is absurd! I should certainly not counsel Maurice to take such a step as that!"
"Why not? Good heavens, Margaret, I hope you are not in love with him, too!" says Lady Rylton.
"Too?"
Margaret looks blank.
"She means me," says Mrs. Bethune, with a slight, insolent smile.
"You know, don"t you, how desperately in love with Maurice I am?"
"I know nothing," says Miss Knollys, a little curtly.
"Ah, you will!" says Mrs. Bethune, with her queer smile.
"The fact is, Margaret," says Lady Rylton, with some agitation, "that if Maurice doesn"t marry this girl, there--there will be an end of us all. He _must_ marry her."
"But he doesn"t love--he barely knows her--and a marriage without love----"
"Is the safest thing known."
"Under given circ.u.mstances! I grant you that if two people well on in life, old enough to know their own minds, and what they are doing, were to marry, it might be different. They might risk a few years of mere friendship together, and be glad of the venture later on. But for two _young_ people to set out on life"s journey with nothing to steer by--that would be madness!"
"Ah! yes. Margaret speaks like a book," says Mrs. Bethune, with an amused air; "Maurice, you see, is _so_ young, _so_ inexperienced----"
"At all events, t.i.ta is only a child."
"t.i.ta! Is that her name?"
"A pet name, I fancy. Short for t.i.tania; she is such a little thing."
"t.i.tania--Queen of the Fairies; I wonder if the original t.i.tania"s father dealt in b.u.t.tons! Is it b.u.t.tons, or soap, or tar? You didn"t say," says Mrs. Bethune, turning to Lady Rylton.
"I really don"t know--and as it _has_ to be trade, I can"t see that it matters," says Lady Rylton, frowning.
"Nothing matters, if you come to think of it," says Mrs. Bethune.
"Go on, Margaret--you were in the middle of a sermon; I dare say we shall endure to the end."
"I was saying that Miss Bolton is only a child."
"She is seventeen. She told us about it last night at dinner. Gave us month and day. It was very clever of her. We _ought_ to give her birthday-gifts, don"t you think? And yet you call her a child!"
"At seventeen, what else?"
"Don"t be ridiculous, Margaret," says Lady Rylton pettishly; "and, above all things, don"t be old-fashioned. There is no such product nowadays as a child of seventeen. There isn"t _time_ for it. It has gone out! The idea is entirely exploded. Perhaps there were children aged seventeen long ago--one reads of them, I admit, but it is too long ago for one to remember. Why, I was only eighteen when I married your uncle."
"Pour uncle!" says Mrs. Bethune; her tone is full of feeling.
Lady Rylton accepts the feeling as grief for the uncle"s death; but Margaret, casting a swift glance at Mrs. Bethune, wonders if it was meant for grief for the uncle"s life--_with_ Lady Rylton.