‘What roses?’ Jack demanded.
‘Yours. The ones she carried!’
‘They were not mine!’ Jack said, his eyes kindling. ‘By Jupiter, Tom, I have a mind to call you out for thinking I would serve you such a backhanded turn! It passes everything, so it does!’
‘Not yours?’ ejaculated Tom.
Sir Gavin coughed deprecatingly. ‘If you refer to the roses Miss Treen carried last night, they were mine!’ They stared at him. ‘I hope you will not both call me out,’ he said, ‘but the fact is that Miss Treen has done me the honour to become my affianced wife. Our betrothal was announced at supper last night.’
This was shocking news. Each unsuccessful suitor tried to realize that his life was blighted, and failed. Tom said, with dignity: ‘You might have told us so last night, sir!’
‘I might, of course, but I had the oddest notion that it wouldn’t have been of the least avail,’ confessed Sir Gavin.
They thought this over. A reluctant grin overset Tom’s dignity. ‘Well, perhaps not,’ he conceded.
Jack executed his best bow. ‘We must beg leave to wish you happy, sir,’ he said nobly.
‘I am very much obliged to you,’ responded Sir Gavin, with great civility.
‘I suppose,’ said Tom, blushing, ‘you think we have made great cakes of ourselves, sir?’
‘Not at all,’ said Sir Gavin. ‘You have conducted yourselves with perfect propriety, and I am happy to have assisted in an affair of honour so creditable to both parties. Let us repair to the inn beyond this charming coppice, and partake of breakfast! I bespoke it half an hour ago, and I am sure it will by now be awaiting us. Besides, I do not care to keep my horses standing any longer.’
‘I should think not indeed!’ Tom exclaimed. ‘I say, sir, what a bang-up set-out it is! Real blood-and-bone!’
‘I am so glad you like them,’ said Sir Gavin. ‘Do, pray, try their paces as far as to the Rising Sun! If you will allow me, I will drive the gig.’
It was rather too much to expect two budding whips to nurse their broken hearts when offered the chance of driving a match-pair of thoroughbreds. Briefly but fervently thanking Sir Gavin, Tom and Jack hurried off to the curricle, arguing with some heat on which of them was first to handle the ribbons.
Sir Gavin, devoutly trusting that his confidence in their ability to cope with a high-couraged pair had not been misplaced, took his fellow-second by the arm, and pushed him gently towards the humbler gig.
A Clandestine Affair
MISS TRESILIAN SURVEYED the young couple before her with perturbation in her usually humorous grey eyes. Not that there was anything in the picture presented by Mr Rosely and Miss Lucy Tresilian to dismay the most captious of critics, for a better-looking pair would have been hard to find: the lady was a glowing brunette, the gentleman a fair youth with golden locks, classic features, and a graceful figure. He was dressed very correctly for a morning visit in a blue coat, with fawn pantaloons and Hessian boots; and if the folds of his neckcloth did not aspire to dandified heights it was easy to see that he had arranged these to the best of his ability. Mr Rosely, in fact, was doing justice to a momentous occasion: he had come to make an offer for the hand of Miss Tresilian’s niece.
He said, with a shy smile: ‘It can’t, I fancy, come as a surprise to you, ma’am! You have been so kind that I’m persuaded – that is, I have ventured to indulge the hope that you wouldn’t be displeased.’
No, it had not come as a surprise to Miss Tresilian. It was nearly a year since Mr Rosely had been introduced to Lucy in the Lower Rooms, at Bath; but although Lucy did not want for admirers, and it was scarcely to be supposed that anyone so handsomely endowed in face and fortune as Mr Rosely had not had a great many caps set at him, neither had swerved in allegiance since that date. Nor could Miss Tresilian deny that she had favoured the match: it had seemed so eminently suitable!
‘Of course she’s not displeased!’ said Lucy. ‘You knew from the start how it was, didn’t you, Aunt Elinor?’
‘Yes,’ acknowledged Miss Tresilian. ‘But I didn’t know until I brought you to London, love, that the connection was disliked by Arthur’s family.’
‘Oh, no!’ he said quickly. ‘Only by Iver! My sister likes it excessively!’
‘And Lord Iver is only Arthur’s cousin,’ said Lucy. ‘Removed, too! Scarcely a relation at all!’
He demurred at this, saying diffidently: ‘Well, it’s more than that, for he has been my guardian, you know. I wouldn’t for the world displease him, only that in this case he fancies we are both of us too young – or some such nonsense! He will come about! Particularly if I am able to tell him you don’t frown on the marriage, ma’am!’
‘No, I don’t frown upon it,’ said Miss Tresilian, ‘but I agree with Lord Iver that you are very young. This is Lucy’s first season, you know, and –’
‘How can you, aunt?’ protested her niece. ‘I may not have been regularly presented until last month, but you know you would have brought me to town a year ago if Aunt Clara hadn’t insisted she was too unwell to be left alone! Why, I am nineteen, and have been out in Bath above a twelve-month!’
‘Yes, my dear, but I never knew until just the other day how awkwardly Arthur is situated. Or even that he had a guardian, much less –’
‘No, no, ma’am!’ interrupted Mr Rosely anxiously. ‘Iver isn’t my guardian now that I am of age, but only my trustee! He has no power to prevent my marriage – no authority over me at all!’
‘It appears to me that if he holds your purse-strings until you are five-and-twenty he has a great deal of power over you,’ responded Miss Tresilian dryly.
He looked troubled, but said: ‘He wouldn’t – I know he wouldn’t! People think him tyrannical, but he has never been so to me! The kindest of guardians – and he must have wished me at the devil, for I was only eight when my father died, and he not much above five-and-twenty. I wonder he didn’t leave me to be reared in my own house, for I was used to follow him about like a tanthony-pig!’
Miss Tresilian refrained from comment. It seemed to her unlikely that Mr Rosely had ever offered Lord Iver the least pretext for a display of tyranny, for while she could not but acknowledge the sweetness of his disposition she did not feel that resolution was amongst his many virtues. No hint of a strong will was to be detected in his delicate countenance, none of the determination that characterized Lucy.
‘And even if he doesn’t consent, we shall come off all right,’ said Lucy cheerfully. ‘After all, I have quite a genteel fortune of my own, and we can subsist on that, until your stupid Trust comes to an end.’
But at this Miss Tresilian intervened, saying firmly that neither she nor Lucy’s papa could countenance an engagement entered into without Lord Iver’s sanction. Lucy, always outspoken, said: ‘Dearest, you know that’s fudge! All Papa would say is that you must settle it as you think best!’
Miss Tresilian laughed, but said: ‘Well, I can’t settle it, precisely, but I can and must forbid an engagement at this present. I am very sorry for you both, but unless Lord Iver should change his mind I am afraid there is nothing for it but to wait until Arthur’s fortune passes into his own hands.’
It was not to be expected that two young persons deep in love could view with anything but dismay the prospect of waiting more than three years before becoming engaged. Mr Rosely took a dejected leave of the ladies, and went away, saying that he was sure he must be able to prevail upon Iver to relent; and Lucy at once set about the task of convincing her aunt that her attachment to her Arthur was no girlish fancy to be speedily forgotten.
It was unnecessary. Although she had been virtually in her aunt’s charge since her childhood only fifteen years separated them, and the bonds of affection between them were strong. Miss Tresilian knew that her niece was neither volatile nor impressionable. She had been much courted in Bath, but none of her suitors, before the arrival on the scene of Mr Rosely, had done so much as turn her head. But she had fallen in lov
e with Mr Rosely at first sight, and not for the sake of his handsome face. ‘Handsome?’ said Lucy. ‘I suppose he is – oh, yes, of course he is! Everyone says so! But, to own the truth, I don’t in general care about fair men, and try as I will I cannot admire Grecian profiles!’ She added, such a glow in her eyes as Miss Tresilian had never before seen: ‘His nature is by far more beautiful than his countenance. He has so much sensibility – such quickness of apprehension! It is as though we had known each other all our lives. Oh, my dearest aunt, I never dreamed I could be so happy!’
No, Lucy was not likely to fall out of love, nor was it possible to suppose her to be infatuated. She seemed to be aware of the flaw in his character, for when her aunt ventured to suggest that his amiability perhaps made him a trifle too persuadable she replied without hesitation: ‘Exactly so! I don’t mean to say that he could be persuaded to do wrong, for his principles are fixed; but his nature is gentle, and his diffidence leads him to rely more on another’s judgment than his own. That is one reason why I can’t and won’t wait for nearly four years before marrying him!’
‘Lucy dear, could you be happy with a husband who would allow you to rule the roast?’
‘To own the truth,’ replied Lucy mischievously, ‘I have a strong notion that I couldn’t be happy with any other! You know what a detestably managing disposition I have!’ She added, in a more serious tone: ‘Please help me, dear Aunt Elinor! If there were any reason for Lord Iver’s refusal to give his consent I promise you I would respect it! There is none! But Arthur has been so much in the habit of deferring to him that if all must remain at a stand for nearly four years – Oh, aunt, he is the horridest creature, and my enemy besides! I couldn’t mistake! I have met him only once, when Mrs Crewe took me to the Waltons’ ball, and Arthur brought him up to me, but he looked at me in such a way! If I had been a shabby-genteel wretch on the catch for a rich husband he couldn’t have been more repelling! But he must know I’m nothing of the kind, for Lady Windlesham does – and if Arthur’s sister likes the match I wish you will tell me what right Lord Iver has –’ She checked herself. ‘Well! Talking won’t pay toll. Think for me, Aunt Elinor! Useless to suppose that Arthur will be able to bring that creature about!’
Even less than her niece did Miss Tresilian believe that Mr Rosely’s efforts would meet with success, and much more astonished than Lucy was she when, two days later, Lord Iver came to call at the slim house in Green Street which she had hired for the season. Indeed, the news that he was awaiting her in the drawing-room startled her into exclaiming: ‘Oh, no! No, no, I cannot –!’ However, she recollected herself almost immediately, sent the servant down again to tell his lordship she would be with him directly, and turned to cast an anxious glance at her reflection in the mirror.
With the buoyancy of youth, Lucy was much inclined to think that Lord Iver had miraculously capitulated, and had come to discuss the marriage settlements. Miss Tresilian, with no such expectation, begged her not to indulge optimism, and trod resolutely downstairs, pledged to support the lovers’ cause.
The visitor was standing with his back to the room, looking out of the window, but when he heard the door open he turned, and stared with hard, challenging eyes at his hostess.
She shut the door, but remained by it, meeting that fierce scrutiny resolutely. For a minute neither spoke, but each scanned the other, the lady perceiving a powerfully-built man, harsh-featured and swarthy, whose close-cropped hair, sporting neckcloth, and gleaming top-boots proclaimed the Corinthian; the gentleman gazing at an uncommonly pretty woman. Miss Tresilian was on the shady side of thirty, but although she had lately taken to wearing a cap over her soft brown curls, and bore herself with the assurance of her years, she retained the face and figure of a much younger woman.
It was she who broke the silence, saying, as she moved forward: ‘You wished, I think, to see me, sir. May I know why?’
He bowed stiffly. ‘I am obliged to you for receiving me, ma’am. As to my wishes –! I thought it best to come here in person, that there should be no misunderstanding between us.’
‘Pray be seated, sir!’ said Miss Tresilian, disposing herself gracefully in a winged armchair.
He did not avail himself of this invitation, but said abruptly: ‘I imagine you must know what my errand is. If you are indeed your niece’s guardian – but you will permit me to say that I find it incredible that you should be! She has a father, and you are by far too young to be her guardian!’
‘Certainly she has a father,’ replied Miss Tresilian coldly. ‘When he married again, however, it was agreed that his daughter should remain in my charge. Let me remind you that I am no longer a young woman, sir!’
At this point, the conversation, which had been conducted with the appearance at least of formality, underwent a change. ‘I know to a day how old you are, so don’t talk nonsense to me!’ said his lordship impatiently. ‘A more ramshackle arrangement –! Is your sister with you?’
‘No,’ said Miss Tresilian, eyeing him with hostility, ‘she is not! The indifferent state of her health –’
He gave a crack of sardonic laughter. ‘You needn’t tell me! Still suffering spasms and vapours to throw a rub in your way, is she?’
‘Pray, did you come here merely to discuss my sister’s constitution?’ demanded Miss Tresilian.
‘You know very well why I am here! This lamentable affair between your niece and my cousin – which you appear to have encouraged!’
‘I can assure you, however, that had I known of Mr Rosely’s relationship to you, sir, I should have done my utmost to discourage an affair which I dislike quite as much as you do!’
‘A pretty sort of guardian, not to have made it your business to enquire who were Arthur’s relations!’ he said scathingly.
‘And did you make it your business to acquaint yourself with all Lucy’s remote cousins?’ she retorted.
‘It was unnecessary. I knew her to be your niece, and that was enough! In plain words, I don’t wish for the connection, and shall do what I may to put an end to it. Don’t under-rate me! you’ll find I can do a great deal!’
‘Do rid your mind of the notion that the connection is any more welcome to me than it is to you!’ begged Miss Tresilian. ‘Nothing could be more repugnant to me than an alliance with any member of your family!’
‘So I should suppose – since you made it plain enough when you jilted me!’
‘If you mean by that that I terminated an unfortunate engagement which you were regretting quite as much as I –’
‘I didn’t come here to discuss ancient history!’ he interrupted roughly.
‘Well, if you came merely to inform me that you don’t wish your precious cousin to marry Lucy you’ve wasted your time!’ she countered.
‘Ah!’ instantly responded his lordship. ‘So you do support them, do you? I might have known it!’
She was about to repudiate this suggestion when it occurred to her that to do so would scarcely be in accordance with her promise to help her niece. It cost her a severe struggle, but she managed to summon up a smile, and to say with creditable composure: ‘Come! It won’t serve for us to rip up at each other, Iver. We may regret this business, but a twelve-year-old quarrel between us doesn’t constitute a bar to these children’s marriage.’
‘Have you told your niece?’
‘No – any more than you, I collect, have told your cousin! Much good would that do! They would say, and rightly, that it was no concern of theirs!’
‘Well, I won’t have it!’ he announced.
‘Now, don’t fly into a pelter!’ she begged. ‘Our differences apart, what is there to be said against the match? Nothing, I dare say, could be more suitable!’ She hesitated, and then added, with a little difficulty: ‘How odiously selfish we should be if we were to let them break their hearts only because we once quarrelled!’
His lips curled disdainfully. ‘Hearts are not so easily broken!’
‘No one knows that better than I
!’ she retorted.
‘We need not, then, discuss such an absurdity.’
Realizing, too late, the infelicity of her retort, she tried to recover lost ground. ‘Neither of us is in a position to judge what may be the sufferings of two people who truly love one another! Lucy’s character is unlike mine: her affection is not easily won, and is by far more tenacious than mine.’
‘It could hardly be less!’ he interpolated. ‘Spare me any more moving speeches! She is young enough to recover from her disappointment, and will no doubt transfer her affections soon enough to some other, and, I trust, equally eligible suitor!’
Stung, she retaliated: ‘She might well do that!’
‘Oh, play off no airs for my edification!’ he said angrily. ‘You won’t hoax me into believing that you are not well aware that my cousin is one of the biggest prizes in the Matrimonial Mart! A feather in any girl’s cap!’
Rising hastily to her feet, she said: ‘If I have anything to say to it, he won’t be a feather in Lucy’s cap, and that, my lord, you may depend on!’
‘Thank you!’ he replied. ‘You have given me the assurance I sought, and I have nothing further to do here than to take my leave of you! Your obedient servant, ma’am!’
‘Lucy,’ said Miss Tresilian, with determined calm, ‘if your pride doesn’t revolt at the imputation of having snared a rich matrimonial prize, mine does! I am not asking you to put all thought of Arthur out of your head: I am merely saying that until he is in every respect his own master, and you have come of age, I will neither countenance his visits to this house, nor allow you to go where there is the least likelihood of your meeting him.’
The youngest Miss Tresilian said, with a brave attempt to speak lightly: ‘Dearest, do you mean to lock me up? I must meet him at all the ton parties, and at Almack’s too!’
‘I know it,’ said her aunt. ‘And you know I don’t mean to lock you up! I have a much better scheme in mind, and one which I think you must like. Indeed, I know you will, for you have always wished to visit foreign countries, only, of course, while that dreadful Bonaparte was at large it was impossible. Now, however –’
Snowdrift and Other Stories Page 7
