Two or three days after the storming of Threlfall Tower, Lady Tatham came in from a mountain ramble at tea-time, expecting her son, who had been away on a short visit. She entered the drawing-room by a garden door, laden with branches of hawthorn and wild cherry. In her linen dress and shady hat she still looked youthful, and there were many who could not be got to admit that she was any less beautiful than she had ever been.
These flatterers of course belonged to her own generation; young eyes were not so kind.
Tea had been brought in, and she was busy with the arrangement of a branch of wild cherry in a corner of the room where its pearl and silver blossoms shone out against a background of dull purple, when the door was hastily opened, and a curly-haired youth stood on the threshold who smiled at sight of her.
"You are here, mother! That"s jolly! I thought I might find you gone."
"I put off London till next week. Mind my hat, you wretch."
For the young fellow had put his arms round her, kissing her heartily.
She disengaged herself and her hat, affecting to scold; but her eyes betrayed her. She put up her hand and smoothed back the thick and tumbling hair from his forehead.
"What a ruffian you look! Where have you been all this time?"
"I stopped in Keswick to do various things--and then--I say, shan"t we have some tea? I"ve got lots to tell you. Well, in the first place, mother, I"d better warn you, you may have some visitors directly!"
Lady Tatham opened her eyes, struck by the elation of the tone.
"Strangers?"
"Well, nearly--but I think you"ve seen them. You know that lady and her daughters who came to White Cottage about two years ago?"
"A Mrs. Penfold?"
"Just so. I told you I met them--in April, when you were abroad--at the Hunt Ball. But--well, really, I"ve met them several times since. The Deacons know them." The slight consciousness in the voice did not escape his mother. "You know you"ve never called on them. Mother, you are disgraceful about calling! Well, I met them again this afternoon, just the other side of Whitebeck. They were in a pony-carriage, and I was in the motor. It"s a jolly afternoon, and they didn"t seem to have anything particular to do, so I just asked them to come on here, and have tea, and we"d show them the place."
"All right, dear. I"ll bear up. Do you think they"ll come?"
"Well, I don"t know," said her son dubiously. "You see--I think Miss Penfold thought you ought to have called on them before they came here!
But Mrs. Penfold"s a nice old thing--she _said_ they"d come."
"Well, there"s plenty of tea, and I"ll go and call if you want me to."
"How many years?" laughed Tatham. "I remember somebody you took eight years to call on, and when you got there you"d forgotten their names."
"Pure invention. Never mind, sit down and have your tea. How many daughters?"
"How many Miss Penfolds? Well, there are two, and I danced with them both. But"--the young man shook his head slowly--"I haven"t got any use for the elder one."
"Plain?"
"Not at all--rather pretty. But she talks philosophy and stuff. Not my sort."
"And the younger one doesn"t talk philosophy?"
"Not she. She"s a deal too clever. But she paints--like a bird. I"ve seen some of her things."
"Oh!--so _you_"ve been to call?"
Lady Tatham lifted her beautiful eyes upon her son. Harry Tatham fidgeted with his cup and spoon.
"No. I was shy, because you hadn"t been. But--"
"Harry," interrupted his mother, her look all vivacity, "did she paint those two water-colours in your sitting-room?"
The boyish, bluntly cut face beside her broke into a charming laugh.
"I bought "em out of the Edinburgh exhibition. Wasn"t it "cute of me? She told me she had sent them there. So I just wrote to the secretary and bought them."
There was silence a moment. Lady Tatham continued to look at her son. The eyebrows on her brow, as they slowly arched themselves, expressed the half-amused, half-startled inquiry she did not put into words. He flushed scarlet, still smiling, and suddenly he laid his hand on hers.
"I say, mummie, don"t tease me, and don"t talk to me about it. There may be nothing in it--nothing at all."
His mother"s face deepened into gravity.
"You take my breath away. Remember--there"s only me, Harry, to look after you."
"I know. But you"re not like other mothers," said the youth impatiently.
"You want me to be happy and please myself. At least if you"d wanted the usual thing, you should have brought me up differently!" He smiled upon her again, patting her hand.
"What do you mean by the "usual thing"?"
"Well, family and money, I suppose. As if we hadn"t got enough for ten!"
Lady Tatham hesitated.
"One talks in the air," she said, frowning a little. "I can"t promise you, Harry, exactly how I should behave, if--"
"If what?"
"If you put me to the _test_."
"Oh, yes, you can," he said, affectionately. Then he got up restlessly from the table. "But don"t let"s talk about it. Somehow I can"t stand it--yet. I just wanted you to know that I liked them--and I"d be glad if you"d be civil to them--that"s all. Hullo--here they are!" For as he moved across the room he caught sight, through a side window commanding the park, of a pony-carriage just driving into the wide gravel s.p.a.ce before the house.
"Already? Their pony must have seven-leagued boots, to have caught you up in this time."
"Oh! I was overtaken by Undershaw, and he kept me talking. He told me the most extraordinary thing! You"ve no idea what"s been happening at the Tower. That old brute Melrose! But I say--!" He made a dash across the room.
"What"s the matter?"
"I must go and put those pictures away, in case--"
A far door opened and shut noisily behind him. He was gone.
"In case he asks her to go and see his sitting-room? This is all very surprising."
Lady Tatham sat on at the tea-table, her chin in her hands. It was quite true that she had brought up her son with unconventional ideas; that she had unconventional ideas herself on family and marriage. All the same, her mind at this moment was in a most conventional state of shock. She knew it, perceiving quite clearly the irony of the situation. Who were the Penfolds? A little artist girl?--earning her living--with humble, perhaps hardly presentable relations--to mate with her glorious, golden Harry?--Harry whom half the ambitious mothers of England courted and flattered?
The thought of defeating the mothers of England was however so pleasant to her sense of humour that she hurriedly abandoned this line of reflection. What had she been about? to be so blind to Harry"s proceedings? She had been lately absorbed, with that intensity she could still, at fifty, throw into the most diverse things, in a piece of new embroidery, reproducing a gorgeous Italian design; and in a religious novel of Fogazzaro"s. Also she had been watching birds, for hours, with a spy-gla.s.s in the park. She said to herself that she had better have been watching her son.