The Pillars of the House, V1

by Шарлотта Мэри Йондж

  It must soon be over, and Felix seemed to be enjoying it thoroughly; and Wilmet could tolerate a great deal when either Felix or Alda enjoyed. He was much too busy with Christmas accounts to undertake any part that needed learning, but he was pressed into the service as a courtier, only with a dispensation from either speaking or rehearsing; while Wilmet utterly scouted any idea of taking any share in the drama, having enough to do in her own character.

  And in that character she was left alone to entertain the guests, for even Cherry was in request as prompter and assistant dresser-nay, with the assistance of Theodore's accordion, formed the whole band of musicians at the ball which opened the performance, and which required the entire corps dramatique. Robina, as the Elderly Princess, demonstratively dropped her bracelet, with a ruby about as big as a pigeon's egg (being the stopper of a scent-bottle), and after the dancers had taken some trouble not to step on it, they retired, and it was stolen by the gang of robbers, cloaked up to their corked eyebrows and moustaches.

  Then appeared in his loft-supplied with straw culled from packages at the printing-house-the poet, well got up in his knickerbockers and velvet smoking-cap, scarf and guitar, soliloquising in burlesque rhyme on his fallen state and hopeless admiration, and looking very handsome and disconsolate, until startled by the cry behind the scenes-

  'O yes! O yes! O yes!

  By command of her Highness!

  Lost, stolen, or strayed,

  Gone to the dogs or mislaid,

  Her Highness' splendid ruby.

  Whoso finds it-wit or booby,

  Tinker, tailor, soldier, lord-

  Let him ask what he will, he shall have his reward.'

  Thereupon the poet, communicating his designs in a stage soliloquy, disguised himself in a tow wig and beard, and a railway rug turned up with yellow calico; and the scene shifting to the palace, he introduced himself to the Elderly Princess as the greatest of spiritualists-so great, that-

  'Detective police are an ignorant fable:

  No detective can equal a walnut-wood table.'

  But he required as a medium a maiden fair and lovely, but with a heart as yet untouched, otherwise the spirits might be offended. The only lady who was available was, of course, the youthful princess Fiordespina, whose alarm and reluctance had been contrived so as to be highly flattering to the disguised poet.

  The dinner scenes, at which the robbers presented themselves in turn, and imagined that they heard themselves counted, went off in due order; also the test, when the courtiers tried to pose the spiritualist with making him divine what they brought him in a covered dish, and were disconcerted by his sighing out,

  'Alas! alas! see envy batten

  On the unhappy Master Ratton!'

  while the rat leaped out from beneath the lid!

  Then came the avowal by the robber: but the conclusion was so far varied, that the jewel having been judiciously hidden, the poet made use of his voice and his guitar to throw the Lady Fiordespina into a mesmeric sleep before the court, and then to cause a table to rap out the letters, which she interpreted so as to lead to the spot.

  It was the prettiest scene of all, his music and song were so graceful; and in spite of some suppressed giggling, the attitude and countenance of Fiordespina were so very pretty in her trance. Nothing more was left save the restoration of the ruby, the claiming of the reward, and the final tableau, in which Ratton and Fiordespina, in their native good mien, had their hands joined by the benignant Elderly Princess; while, to the equal amusement and confusion of all, good old Mrs. Froggatt fairly burst out crying with excitement and admiration!

  Mrs. Vincent, the young widow, was likewise enchanted, and so was Miss Maria Pearson; but Wilmet could not quite fathom the tone of the elder and graver sister, or decide whether it were her own dissatisfaction that made her think Miss Pearson had not expected to see such a role bestowed upon her niece.

  The doors between the drawing-room and the theatre were opened again; the boys handed round negus and lemonade; and Felix, standing over Cherry, said, 'Lance's circus speculation would not be a bad one. There's plenty of dramatic talent in the family.'

  'Did you like it, Felix!'

  'I could tell exactly which parts were yours and which Edgar's,' was the ambiguous answer, as he turned to secure the Princess Fiordespina for the dance that was to crown the performance.

  'O Mr. Underwood! Oh yes, thank you! but-'

  'Is it part of the programme that wizard and medium should dance together?'

  'Oh no! Only it seems so funny to think of your dancing.'

  'What, you thought a stationer must be stationary?'

  'O Mr. Underwood, what a shocking pun!' and she was led off sparkling with pretty laughter; while the conjuror muttering,

  'The gouty oak began to move

  And flounder into hornpipes,'

  turned graciously on little Susie Vincent, and scared as much as he elevated her, by claiming her as his partner.

  Will Harewood, dashing across the room, and looking earnestly with his bold and now flushed face up to Wilmet, blurted out, 'Miss Underwood, now please, let me dance with you.'

  'Thank you,' she said graciously; 'but I believe I must play for them.'

  'I'll do that,' said Clement, over her head.

  'The Dead March in Saul?' murmured Edgar.

  'Nonsense!' broke out Mrs. Vincent, starting up; 'what am I good for but to play?'

  So Clement, who thought he had found an escape, was reduced to the necessity of asking the other little Vincent; and Wilmet's smile of consent so elated Bill Harewood, that he could not help flying across to that very happy and well-matched pair, the Elderly Princess and First Robber, to tell them, 'I've got her.'

  'Who?'

  'Why, your sister.'

  'You've never been and made up to Wilmet!' said Lance, as if this instance of valour crowned his merits.

  'Yes, I have; and she will. You see there ain't another gentleman out of the family except the old Froggy, and the little one has got him. Well, I always wished beyond anything to dance with Miss Underwood!'

  'Did you?' said Robina. 'I never should have thought of that.'

  'Most likely not,' said Bill; 'but she is the most beautiful woman I ever did or shall see in all my life;' and he flew back to her side.

  'Is she?' said Robina, altogether amazed.

  'Well, perhaps,' said Lance; 'you know one might go a long way without finding any one so handsome.'

  'Then I wish people wouldn't say so. It seems making our Wilmet common, like any other girl, to care for her being pretty.'

  'So Froggy's dancing with Stella,' observed Lance. I declare I'll try if Mrs. Frog won't stand up with me. Some one ought. You'll not mind waiting, Bobbie. It is not often one has the chance to dance with a cap like that.'

  Bobbie resigned herself amicably, and Lance, with his bright arch face, made his bow and half polite, half saucy addresses to Mrs. Froggatt in her magnificent head-gear, making her laugh herself almost to tears again as she declined. He held the Miss Pearsons in greater awe, and ventured on neither; so that Robina had him for Sir Roger de Coverley, where the sole contretemps arose from Angel and Bear being in such boisterous spirits that Wilmet decreed that they must not be partners again. Of the rest, some had a good deal of dancing-master experience; Mrs. Harewood's impromptu merry-makings had afforded plenty of practice to the two choristers; even Clement had had a certain school-feast training; and Felix, with a good ear, ready eye, and natural ease of movement, acquitted himself to Miss Knevett's eagerly expressed admiration.

  'Take care, Master Ratton will be jealous,' said Edgar, as he claimed her for the next dance, a quadrille.

  'Jealous! oh no! Some people one never thinks of complimenting.'

  Cherry caught the words, and wondered what they meant.

  A few more dances, and then came Wilmet's anxiously contrived supper.

  'I say,' observed Will Harewood to Lance, 'why can't we have things like this at
home?'

  ''Tisn't their nature to,' judiciously responded Lance.

  'This cream is quite up to the grub we get after a crack let-off in the Close,' added Will; for requisitions for their voices at private concerts had made the choir connoisseurs in the relics of feasts.

  'Better, I should say,' returned Lance. 'Mettie doesn't make it of soap, or arsenic, or verdigris, like old Twopenny.'

  'What! you don't mean that she made it herself!'

  'Of course! who else should?'

  'My eyes! And to see her looking like that!' Then, with a deep sigh, 'If I could only book her for my wife on the spot!'

  Whence it may be inferred, that Stella's birthday party was not only a brilliant success, but might, in Wilmet's phrase, 'lead to something.' All it seemed to have led to at present was a discovery on the part of the good Miss Pearsons, that the household they had been wont to pity as small orphan children, now contained three fine young men.

  At least Geraldine connected this with the desire they expressed that Alice might enjoy the same opportunities as Robina of giving her acquirements a final polish, up to diploma pitch. A correspondence commenced, resulting in Miss Knevett being engaged as teacher, being remunerated by lessons in languages and accomplishments. The arrangement gave universal satisfaction; Cherry could not detect any regret on the part of Felix; Alice would still spend her holidays with her aunts; and the sense that her departure was near made the intercourse between the two houses more frequent and familiar than it had ever yet been.

  One evening Cherry, while looking up a quotation for Felix in Southey's Doctor, lit on his quaint theory of the human soul having previously migrated through successive stages of vegetable and animal life, and still retaining something characteristic from each transmigration. Her brothers were a good deal tickled with the idea; and Lance exclaimed, 'I know who must have been rhubarb, queen-wasp, and a hen-harrier.'

  'Oh, that's too bad!' cried Robina.

  'Why a hen-harrier?' asked Felix, recognising, like almost all the others.

  'One of the birds of prey where the female is bigger than her mate,' drily observed Edgar.

  'Besides,' said Cherry,' recollect the hen-harrier's countenance in pictures, with beady eyes, and a puffed supercilious smile about the beak.'

  'Why, that's Lady Price!' chimed in Alice, making the discovery at last.

  Lengthily and gravely Edgar uttered the words, 'Puzzle-monkey, praying mantis, sacred stork, howler.'

  Lance and Robin roared with merriment, and after one glance at Clement's half virtuous, half offended countenance, Felix and Cherry fell into like convulsions; while Alice exclaimed, 'But who is it?' and Angel shouted the sufficiently evident answer, 'Clement, oh! the howler, the black preaching monkey in a natural surplice!'

  'I can't think how you do it!' exclaimed Alice.

  'I object to the mantis,' Cherry struggled to say. 'Nasty hypocritical creature that eats things up.'

  'Praying for its living, eh, Cherry?' said wicked Edgar. 'If you had ever seen the long thin animal, with head back, hands joined, and pious attitude, you couldn't doubt.'

  And as he spoke he sketched his mischievous likeness, at which the mirth grew more furious; while Cherry, always the most easily excited, uttered in a strangled voice, 'A parsnip, a barn-door hen, a dilapidated Guernsey cow, an old mother whale.'

  'O Cherry, Cherry, you've immortalised yourself!' shouted Lance. 'How did you hit off the parsnip? the very thing that had stumped me.'

  'The colour, and the odd sort of sweetness,' said Cherry.

  'Won't we have fun with it when I go back!' cried Lance.-'Not tell? Nonsense! Why, no one will enjoy it like Mother Harewood herself.'

  'Only don't say I made it. There, Edgar has got one.'

  'Touch-me-not balsam, blister-fly, bantam-cock (full strut), black terrier.'

  He did not caricature this time except with the muscles of his face, and with these he contrived to put on four different aspects, each so exactly like Mr. Mowbray Smith that not even Alice required the proclamation of the name; and Wilmet gravely said, 'I do not think this is a proper sort of game. It must be ill-natured or irreverent.'

  'That depends,' said Geraldine, now thoroughly in the swing.-Here! Hawthornden apple-tree, stickleback, goldfinch, beaver.'

  'The hardy Norseman's house of yore

  Was on the foaming wave,'

  sang out Lance, recalling Theodore's substitute for Felix's name.

  'Exactly like-figures, tastes, and all,' said Edgar, scanning Felix's clear, bright, fresh face, glossy hair, and rather short figure, at once trim and sturdy. 'The goldfinch hit him off exactly, but I don't see the force of the apple-tree.'

  'You would,' said Cherry, 'if you were properly acquainted with our three trees and their individualities. The Hawthornden is a resolute looking fellow, but it indulges in the loveliest pink and white blossoms, and waxen, delicate, peachy fruit.'

  'Uncommonly sour! Thank you, Cherry,' said Felix.

  'Not in a pie,' suggested Alice.

  'Properly treated and sweetened, eh ?' asked he, smiling on her.

  'But why is Felix like a stickleback?' said Angela.

  'Don't you know?' said Cherry; 'a beautiful bright little fish, and the good male one swims up and down taking care of the nest.'

  'I do like the beaver,' allowed Wilmet. 'It always was my favourite beast.'

  'It hits off the respectable householder element,' added Edgar. 'Three flaps of his broad tail rule beaverdom like Jupiter's nod.'

  'I have one,' interposed Robina.-'Bella-donna lily, working bee, menura-'

  'Hold hard!' called Lance; 'is a menura fish, flesh, or fowl?'

  'Fowl: the lyre-tailed pheasant, that makes a shelter for its nest with its own tail.'

  'Decided liar tale,' muttered Edgar.

  'Go on, Bobbie,' Felix encouraged her. The pheasant suits both the twins as well as the bella-donna. Any more?'

  'Perhaps the leading stag of the herd.'

  'Don't make us like that proud, cowardly, tyrannical beast,' exclaimed Wilmet.

  'I have seen you look exactly like one,' said Geraldine. 'That and the pheasant both give the notion of your neck.'

  'Such a set of trumpery gaudy things!' grumbled Wilmet. 'Nothing but the bee is tolerable.'

  'I did think of a speckled Hamburg hen, and a nice quiet she-goat,' said Robina; 'but they are all dowdy, and would not suit Alda.'

  'There's something in the theory,' said Edgar. 'That belladonna approves itself perfectly-so delicate and stately, and yet so essentially unpoetical.'

  'That Mettie takes as a compliment,' said Felix, 'only she would rather have been a potato, or a cabbage.'

  'Now,' said Cherry, 'you will all know-bell-heather, the grasshopper, the lark, and the squirrel.'

  'Is this the lark's crest, or the squirrel's tail!' said Felix, giving an elder brother's pull to the boy's highest wave of hair.

  'Or the grasshopper's leap?' cried Lance, springing on him for a bout of buffeting and skirmishing; in the midst of which Alice was heard wondering how the riddles, as she thought them, were either made or guessed.

  'They come,' said Geraldine. 'I am only afraid we shall fall into a trick of making them for everybody.'

  'I wonder what you would make for me.'

  Geraldine had it on her tongue's end that Alice would be difficult, for want of anything distinctive, but Felix and Edgar were both jotting something down, and Robina was before-hand with either- 'Scarlet pimpernel, tortoiseshell butterfly, budgerigar, marmoset.'

  No one answered, for Felix had pushed a slip of paper over to Alice, on which she read-"'Forget-me-not, ladybird, linnet, kitten." I don't think I ever saw a linnet. Isn't it a little brown bird?'

  'With a rich glow of red, and a beautiful song,' said Felix, smiling; and the red glowed redder on her cheek, as she said, laughing, 'Kitten for mischief, eh? For shame, Mr. Underwood!-What, another! Dear me, I shall not know myself!'

  This had been sli
pped into her hand; and Cherry suspected that her exclamation had been a mistake of which she was conscious, as the colour deepened on her already blushing cheeks, and her eyes were cast down, while a demure smile played on her lips. The incautious exclamation had betrayed her, and the young ones clamoured to hear Edgar's view of her transmigration; but there was a little coy struggle of 'Oh no, she wouldn't, and she couldn't.'

  'She smiled and blushed, and oft did say

  Her pretty oath by yea or nay.'

  And in the midst came the message that the maid was arrived to take her home; and this being a cross stiff personage, who might never be kept waiting, she had to hurry away; and had no sooner gone than Angela burst out with, 'Here it is! I've got it! Listen to it: "Say, Lady-"'

  'Stay, Angela,' interrupted Felix. 'You have no business with that.'

  'Not Edgar's fun!' she exclaimed. 'Why, where is he?'

  'Surely he is not going home with her!' said Wilmet in some dismay.

  'Oh, but it is such fun,' went on Angela, 'only I can't make it out. You read it, Lance.'

  'Did she give it you?' said Felix.

  'No, I whipped it up when she dropped it. There's something about Ratton in it.'

  Felix quietly took the paper out of her hand, folded it, and put it into an envelope. 'You take it back to her the first thing to- morrow,' he said. 'Now go to bed.'

  Angela durst not oppose that tone, so unusually serious and authoritative; but she contrived to prolong her good-nights, and the putting away of her goods, with a kind of half droll, half sullen resignation; and just as Wilmet was hurrying her off, Edgar returned. He always spoilt Angela a little, and she sprang to him with a kind of droll pout. 'You'll not be cross, Edgar. You'll let us hear Alice's transmigrations. Look! here's Felix bottled them up in an envelope, and won't let us peep at them! But you'll let me hear. You won't order me off to bed.'

  Cherry fancied she saw a disconcerted look on his face when he saw the envelope held up to him; but if so, it instantly gave place to the mischievous entertainment of defeating a lesson on discretion.- 'The heads of the family must assert themselves sometimes, my dear, even about nothing,' he said consolingly.