But the tone had grown suddenly dubious. Lady Tatham"s eyebrows rose slightly.
"Go to Threlfall, Harry?"
"Well, not to call on Melrose, mother! I should have to make sure he was out of the way. But I feel as if I ought to do something about Faversham.
The fact is he did me a great kindness my first term at Oxford--he got me into a little club I wanted to belong to."
"Oh, but _you_ could belong to any club you wished!" cried Mrs. Penfold.
Tatham laughed and coloured. Lady Tatham slipped the slightest look at Lydia.
"Not at all. Faversham was awfully useful. I must see what can be done.
He can"t stay on at that place."
"You never go to Threlfall?" Mrs. Penfold addressed her hostess.
"Never," said Lady Tatham quietly. "Mr. Melrose is impossible."
"I should jolly well think he is!" said Tatham; "the most grasping and tyrannical old villain! He"s got a business on now of the most abominable kind. I have been hearing the whole story this week. A man who dared to county court him for some perfectly just claim. And Melrose in revenge has simply ruined him. Then there"s a right of way dispute going on--scandalous!--nothing to do with me!--but I"m helping other people to fight him. And his _cottages_!--you never saw such pigsties!
He"s defied every sort of inspector. I believe everybody"s afraid of him.
And you can"t get a yard of land out of him for any public purpose whatever. Well, now that I"m on the County Council, I mean to _go for him!"_
The young man sprang up, apparently to fetch cigarettes, really that he might once more obtain a full view of Lydia, who had moved from the tea-table to a more distant seat.
Mrs. Penfold waved the silver box aside. "I never learnt"--she said, adding with soft, upturned eyes--confidingly--"sometimes I wish I did.
Oh, Lydia will!"
And Lydia, following Lady Tatham"s lead, quietly lit up. Tatham who cherished some rather strict and old-fashioned notions about women, very imperfectly revealed even to his mother, was momentarily displeased; then lost himself in the pleasure of watching a white hand and arm--for the day was hot and sleeves short--in new positions.
Lady Tatham looked round in answer to her son"s last words.
"I wish, Harry, you"d leave him alone."
"Who? Melrose? _Mother!_ Oh, I forgot--he"s a sort of cousin, isn"t he?"
"My second cousin."
"Worse luck! But that"s nothing, unless one chooses it shall be. I believe, mother, you know a heap of things about Melrose you"ve never told me!"
Lady Tatham smiled faintly, but did not reply. Whereat Mrs. Penfold whose curiosity was insatiable, within lady-like bounds, tried to ask questions of her hostess. A wife? Surely there had been a wife?
"Certainly--twenty years ago. I saw her." The answer came readily.
"She ran away?"
"Not in the usual sense. There was no one, I understand, to run with.
But she could not stand Threlfall--nor--I suppose--her husband. So one day--when he had gone to Italy, and she was left behind--she just--"
""Elopes--down a ladder of ropes"" laughed Tatham; "and took the child?"
"Yes--and a bronze, worth a thousand pounds."
"Sensible woman! And where are they now?"
Lady Tatham shrugged her shoulders.
"Oh, they can"t be alive, surely," said Lydia. "Mr. Melrose told Doctor Undershaw that he had no relations in the world, and didn"t wish to be troubled with any."
Contempt sat on Tatham"s ruddy countenance.
"Well, as far as we"re concerned, he may take it easy. His family affections don"t matter to anybody! But the way he behaves as a landowner does really matter to all of us. He brings disgrace on the whole show."
He rose, straightening his young shoulders as he spoke. Lydia noted the modest involuntary consciousness of power and responsibility which for a moment dignified the boyish countenance; and as her eyes met his Tatham was startled by the pa.s.sionate approval expressed in the girl"s look.
She asked if there was no agent on the Melrose estates to temper the tyrannies of their master.
Tatham came to her side--explaining--looking down upon her with an eagerness which had but a superficial connection with the thing said.
"You see no decent man would ever stay with him. He"d never do the things Melrose does. He"d cut his hand off first. And if he didn"t, the old villain would kick him out in no time. But that"s enough about him, isn"t it? I get him on the brain! Won"t you come and see the pictures?"
The quartet inspecting the house had pa.s.sed through the princ.i.p.al rooms, and had returned to the drawing-room. There Tatham said something to Lydia, and they moved away together. His mother looked after them. Tatham was leading the way toward the door in the farther wall which led to his own sitting-room. Their young faces were turned toward each other. The girl"s shyness seemed to have broken up. She was now talking fast, with smiles. Ah, no doubt they would have plenty to say to each other, as soon as they were together.
It was one of the bitter-sweet moments of life. Lady Tatham steadied herself.
"That is a sketch," she said mechanically, "by Burne-Jones, for one of the Pygmalion and Galatea series. We have one or two others on the same subject."
Mrs. Penfold clasped her small hands in rapture.
"Oh! but _how_ interesting! Do you know I was once Galatea? When I was a girl I used to act a great deal. Well, not act exactly--for I didn"t have to speak. I never could remember my lines. But I had two great parts.
There was Hermione, in "The Winter"s Tale"; and Galatea. I made hundreds of pounds for hospitals--hundreds. It"s not vain now, is it, to say one was pretty in one"s youth?"
"You like remembering it? Some people don"t."
"Ah, no, that"s wrong! I"d liked to have been beautiful once, if I"m old and ugly now," cried Mrs. Penfold with fervour. "Of course"--she looked shyly at the sketch--"I had beautiful draperies on. My Galatea was not like that."
"Draperies?" Lady Tatham laughed. "Pygmalion had only just made her--there had been no time to dress her."
"_We_ dressed her," said Mrs. Penfold decidedly, "from top to toe. Some day I must show you the drawings of it--it"s not like that at all. The girls think I"m silly to talk of it--oh! they don"t say it--they"re very good to me. But I can see they do. Only--they"ve so many things to be proud of. Susy"s so clever--she knows Greek and all that kind of thing.
And Lydia"s drawing is so wonderful. Do you know she has made twenty pounds out of her sketches this week!"
"Capital!" said Lady Tatham smiling.
"Ah, it means a great deal to us! You see"--Mrs. Penfold looked round her--"when you"re very rich, and have everything you want, you can"t understand--at least I don"t think you can--how it feels to have twenty pounds you don"t expect. Lydia just danced about the room. And I"m to have a new best dress--she insists on it. Well, you see"--the little pink and white face of the speaker broke into smiles--"that"s all so _amusing_. It puts one in good spirits. It"s just as though one were rich, and made a thousand pounds. I daresay"--she looked, awestruck, at the Burne-Jones sketch--"that"s worth our whole income. But we"re very happy. We never fret. Lydia and Susy both help in the housework. And I make their blouses."
"How clever of you! That"s a Fra Angelico"--said Lady Tatham pointing, and not knowing what to do with these confidences--"an Annunciation."
Mrs. Penfold thought it quite lovely. Lydia, when she was studying in London, had copied one like it in the National Gallery. And her poor father had liked it so. As they wandered on through the pictures, indeed, Lady Tatham soon came to know a great deal about Lydia"s "poor father"--that he had been a naval officer, a Captain Penfold, who had had to retire early on half-pay because of ill-health, and had died just as the girls had grown up. "He felt it so--he was so proud of them--but he always said, "If one of us is to go, why, it had better be me, Rosina--because you have such spirits--you"re so cheerful." And I am.