CHAPTER XXXVI.THE EVENINGWilliam Maubray was bidden to luncheon, and was sad and abstemious at that pleasant refection, and when it was over Mrs. Kincton Knox said—“My dear Clara, it’s quite out of the question my going with you to-day, I’m suffering so—that horrid neuralgia.”“Oh! darling! how sorry I am!” exclaimed Miss Clara, with a look of such beautiful pity and affection as must have moved William Maubray if he had the slightest liking for ministering angels. “WhatcanI do for you? You must, you know, try something.”“No, love, no; nature—nature and rest. I shall lie down for a little; but you must have your ride all the same to Coverdale, and I am certain Mr. Herbert will be so kind as to accompany you.”William Maubray would have given a great deal for a solitary ramble; but of course, he was only too happy, and the happy pair scampered off on their ponies side by side, and two hours after Miss Clara walked into her mamma’s room, looking cross and tired, and sat down silently in a chair before the cheval glass.“Well, dear?” inquired her mother inquisitively.“Nothing, mamma. I hope your head’s better?”“My head? Oh! yes, better, thanks. But how did you like your ride?”“Very stupid,” answered the young lady.“I suppose you’ve been in one of your tempers, and never spoke a word—and you know he’s so shy? Will you ever learn, Miss Kincton Knox, to command your miserable temper?” exclaimed her mother very grimly, but the young lady only flapped the folds of her skirt lazily with her whip.“You quite mistake, mamma, I’m not cross; I’m only tired. I’m sorry you did not let him go off to the sick old man. He’s plainly pining to go and give him his gruel and his medicine.”“Did he speak of him?” asked the old lady.“No, nor of anything else: but he’s plainly thinking of him, and thinks he has murdered him—at least he looks as if he was going to be hanged, and I don’t care if he was,” answered Miss Clara.“You must make allowances, my dear Clara,” said she. “You forget that the circumstances are very distressing.”“Very cheerful, I should say.Why, he hates his father, I dare say. Did not you hear the picture he drew of him? and it’s all hypocrisy, and I don’t believe his father has really anything to do with his moping.”“And what do you supposeisthe cause of it?” inquired Mrs. Kincton Knox.“I really can’t tell; perhaps he’s privately married, or in love with a milliner perhaps, andthathas been the cause of this quarrel,” she said with an indolent mockery that might be serious, and, at all events, puzzled the elder lady.“Ho! stuff, my dear child!” exclaimed her mother, with an uneasy scorn. “You had better call Brookesand get your habit off. And where did you leave him?”“At the hall door,” replied Miss Clara, as she walked out of the room.“H’m, stuff!” repeated Mrs. Kincton Knox, still more uneasily, for she knew that Clara had her wits about her.“Married, indeed! It’s probably just this—Vane Trevor has come here with a long foolish exhortation from Doctor—what’s his name?—Sprague—and upset the young man a little, and perhaps agitated him. He’ll be quite a different person to-morrow.”And so indeed it proved. Whatever his secret feelings, William Maubray was externally a great deal more like himself. In the state which follows such a shock as William had experienced before the monotony of sadness sets in, there is sometimes an oscillation of spirits from extreme depression to an equally morbid hilarity, the symbol of excitement only. So in a long ride, which William took with the young lady to-day, accompanied by his pupil, who, on his pony, entertained himself by pursuing the sheep on the hill side, Miss Clara found him very agreeable, and also ready at times to philosophise, eloquently and sadly, in the sort of Byronic vein into which bitter young lovers will break. So the sky was brightening, and William, who suspected nothing of the peculiar interest with which his varying moods were observed, was yet flattered by the gradual but striking improvement of his relations, accepted the interest displayed by the ladies as a feminine indication of compassion and appreciation, and expressed a growing confidence and gratitude, the indirect expressions of which they, perhaps, a little misapprehended.In the evening Mrs. Kincton Knox called again for the “Lord of Burleigh,” not being fertile in resource—MissClara turned her chair toward the fire, and with her feet on a boss, near the fender, leaned back, with a handscreen in her fingers, and listened.“Thatiswhat I call poetry!” exclaimed the matron with the decision of a brigadier, and a nod of intimidating approbation, toward William, “and socharminglyread!”“I’m afraid Miss Knox must have grown a little tired of it,” suggested William.“One can never tire of poetry so true to nature,” answered Miss Clara.“She’s all romance, that creature,” confidentially murmured her mamma, with a compassionating smile.“What is it?” inquired Miss Clara.“You’re not to hear, but we were saying, weren’t we, Mr. Herbert? that she has not a particle of romance in her nature,” replied her mamma with her gloomy pleasantry.“No romance certainly, and I’m afraid no common sense either,” replied the young lady naively.“Do you write poetry?” asked the old lady of William.“You need not ask him, he could not read as he did, if he did not write,” said Miss Clara turning round in an eager glow, which momentary enthusiasm some other feeling overpowered, and she turned away again a little bashfully.“Youdowrite, I see it confessed in your eyes,” exclaimed Mrs. Kincton Knox. “He does, Clara, you’re right. I really think sometimes she’s a—a—fairy.”“Ask him, mamma, to read us some of his verses,” pleaded Clara, just a little timidly.“You reallymust, Mr. Herbert—no, no, I’ll hear of no excuses; our sex has its privileges, you know, and where we say must, opposition vanishes.”“Really,” urged William, “any little attempts of mine are so unworthy⸺”“We must and will have them to-morrow evening;dearme, how the hoursdofly. You have no idea, Clara dear, how late it is, quite dreadful. I’m really angry with you, Mr. Herbert, for beguiling us into such late hours.”So the party broke up, and when Mrs. Kincton Knox entered her daughter’s room where she was in a dishevelled stage of preparation for bed, she said, her maid being just despatched on a message—“I really wish, mamma, you’d stop about that Lord of Burleigh; I saw him look quite oddly when you asked for it again to-night, and he must know, unless he’s a fool, that you don’t care two pence about poetry, and you’ll just make him think we know who he is.”“Pooh! nonsense, Clara! don’t be ridiculous,” said her mother, a little awkwardly, for she had a secret sense of Clara’s superiority. “I don’t wantyouto teach me what I’m to do, I hope, and whobroughthim here, pray, and investigated, and, in fact—here’s Brookes back again—and you know we are to have his own verses to-morrow night, so we don’t want that, nor any more, if you’d rather not, and you can’t possibly be more sick of it than I am.”So, on the whole well pleased, the ladies betook themselves to their beds, and Mrs. Kincton Knox lay long awake, constructing her clumsy castles in the air.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
THE EVENING
THE EVENING
THE EVENING
William Maubray was bidden to luncheon, and was sad and abstemious at that pleasant refection, and when it was over Mrs. Kincton Knox said—
“My dear Clara, it’s quite out of the question my going with you to-day, I’m suffering so—that horrid neuralgia.”
“Oh! darling! how sorry I am!” exclaimed Miss Clara, with a look of such beautiful pity and affection as must have moved William Maubray if he had the slightest liking for ministering angels. “WhatcanI do for you? You must, you know, try something.”
“No, love, no; nature—nature and rest. I shall lie down for a little; but you must have your ride all the same to Coverdale, and I am certain Mr. Herbert will be so kind as to accompany you.”
William Maubray would have given a great deal for a solitary ramble; but of course, he was only too happy, and the happy pair scampered off on their ponies side by side, and two hours after Miss Clara walked into her mamma’s room, looking cross and tired, and sat down silently in a chair before the cheval glass.
“Well, dear?” inquired her mother inquisitively.
“Nothing, mamma. I hope your head’s better?”
“My head? Oh! yes, better, thanks. But how did you like your ride?”
“Very stupid,” answered the young lady.
“I suppose you’ve been in one of your tempers, and never spoke a word—and you know he’s so shy? Will you ever learn, Miss Kincton Knox, to command your miserable temper?” exclaimed her mother very grimly, but the young lady only flapped the folds of her skirt lazily with her whip.
“You quite mistake, mamma, I’m not cross; I’m only tired. I’m sorry you did not let him go off to the sick old man. He’s plainly pining to go and give him his gruel and his medicine.”
“Did he speak of him?” asked the old lady.
“No, nor of anything else: but he’s plainly thinking of him, and thinks he has murdered him—at least he looks as if he was going to be hanged, and I don’t care if he was,” answered Miss Clara.
“You must make allowances, my dear Clara,” said she. “You forget that the circumstances are very distressing.”
“Very cheerful, I should say.Why, he hates his father, I dare say. Did not you hear the picture he drew of him? and it’s all hypocrisy, and I don’t believe his father has really anything to do with his moping.”
“And what do you supposeisthe cause of it?” inquired Mrs. Kincton Knox.
“I really can’t tell; perhaps he’s privately married, or in love with a milliner perhaps, andthathas been the cause of this quarrel,” she said with an indolent mockery that might be serious, and, at all events, puzzled the elder lady.
“Ho! stuff, my dear child!” exclaimed her mother, with an uneasy scorn. “You had better call Brookesand get your habit off. And where did you leave him?”
“At the hall door,” replied Miss Clara, as she walked out of the room.
“H’m, stuff!” repeated Mrs. Kincton Knox, still more uneasily, for she knew that Clara had her wits about her.
“Married, indeed! It’s probably just this—Vane Trevor has come here with a long foolish exhortation from Doctor—what’s his name?—Sprague—and upset the young man a little, and perhaps agitated him. He’ll be quite a different person to-morrow.”
And so indeed it proved. Whatever his secret feelings, William Maubray was externally a great deal more like himself. In the state which follows such a shock as William had experienced before the monotony of sadness sets in, there is sometimes an oscillation of spirits from extreme depression to an equally morbid hilarity, the symbol of excitement only. So in a long ride, which William took with the young lady to-day, accompanied by his pupil, who, on his pony, entertained himself by pursuing the sheep on the hill side, Miss Clara found him very agreeable, and also ready at times to philosophise, eloquently and sadly, in the sort of Byronic vein into which bitter young lovers will break. So the sky was brightening, and William, who suspected nothing of the peculiar interest with which his varying moods were observed, was yet flattered by the gradual but striking improvement of his relations, accepted the interest displayed by the ladies as a feminine indication of compassion and appreciation, and expressed a growing confidence and gratitude, the indirect expressions of which they, perhaps, a little misapprehended.
In the evening Mrs. Kincton Knox called again for the “Lord of Burleigh,” not being fertile in resource—MissClara turned her chair toward the fire, and with her feet on a boss, near the fender, leaned back, with a handscreen in her fingers, and listened.
“Thatiswhat I call poetry!” exclaimed the matron with the decision of a brigadier, and a nod of intimidating approbation, toward William, “and socharminglyread!”
“I’m afraid Miss Knox must have grown a little tired of it,” suggested William.
“One can never tire of poetry so true to nature,” answered Miss Clara.
“She’s all romance, that creature,” confidentially murmured her mamma, with a compassionating smile.
“What is it?” inquired Miss Clara.
“You’re not to hear, but we were saying, weren’t we, Mr. Herbert? that she has not a particle of romance in her nature,” replied her mamma with her gloomy pleasantry.
“No romance certainly, and I’m afraid no common sense either,” replied the young lady naively.
“Do you write poetry?” asked the old lady of William.
“You need not ask him, he could not read as he did, if he did not write,” said Miss Clara turning round in an eager glow, which momentary enthusiasm some other feeling overpowered, and she turned away again a little bashfully.
“Youdowrite, I see it confessed in your eyes,” exclaimed Mrs. Kincton Knox. “He does, Clara, you’re right. I really think sometimes she’s a—a—fairy.”
“Ask him, mamma, to read us some of his verses,” pleaded Clara, just a little timidly.
“You reallymust, Mr. Herbert—no, no, I’ll hear of no excuses; our sex has its privileges, you know, and where we say must, opposition vanishes.”
“Really,” urged William, “any little attempts of mine are so unworthy⸺”
“We must and will have them to-morrow evening;dearme, how the hoursdofly. You have no idea, Clara dear, how late it is, quite dreadful. I’m really angry with you, Mr. Herbert, for beguiling us into such late hours.”
So the party broke up, and when Mrs. Kincton Knox entered her daughter’s room where she was in a dishevelled stage of preparation for bed, she said, her maid being just despatched on a message—
“I really wish, mamma, you’d stop about that Lord of Burleigh; I saw him look quite oddly when you asked for it again to-night, and he must know, unless he’s a fool, that you don’t care two pence about poetry, and you’ll just make him think we know who he is.”
“Pooh! nonsense, Clara! don’t be ridiculous,” said her mother, a little awkwardly, for she had a secret sense of Clara’s superiority. “I don’t wantyouto teach me what I’m to do, I hope, and whobroughthim here, pray, and investigated, and, in fact—here’s Brookes back again—and you know we are to have his own verses to-morrow night, so we don’t want that, nor any more, if you’d rather not, and you can’t possibly be more sick of it than I am.”
So, on the whole well pleased, the ladies betook themselves to their beds, and Mrs. Kincton Knox lay long awake, constructing her clumsy castles in the air.