CHAPTER XXX.COMPANY AT SCHUYLER HILL.
In the course of two or three weeks nearly everybody of any social standing in Hampstead called upon the bride. Mrs. Barton and her daughter Rosamond from the Ridge drove over at a very early day, much to the discomfiture of Miss Rossiter, who had told her nieces in confidence that “Mrs. Barton had no intention of calling upon a governess,” that “Mrs. Schuyler need not expect much attention from thebeau monde.” Great, then, was her surprise when she went down to meet them; and greeted them a little coldly even while affecting to appropriate their call to herself. But neither Mrs. Barton nor Rosamond seemed to notice her perturbation, and both were delighted with Mrs. Schuyler, who looked and appeared as if all her life had been passed amid just such surroundings as these at Schuyler Hill.
Miss Rossiter saw this, and thought best to change her tactics altogether; and when, as she accompanied her friend to the door, the latter said to her, “I find your sister-in-law very charming,” she replied:
“Yes, I am glad you like her; and it was so kind in you to call. I appreciate it, I assure you.”
And this was the ground she constantly took. Whoevercalled came expressly for her sake and the sake of the family, rather than from any desire to be polite to the bride.
“The Schuylers are so highly respected, and sister Emily was such a favorite with everybody that you must expect attention, of course,” she would say to Edith, who smiled quietly, and understood what was meant quite as well as if it had been put in plainer words.
Miss Rossiter did not like her, but had she been asked a reason for her dislike she could not have given one or brought a single accusation against Edith, except that she was not to the purple born, and was there in Emily’s place. That was all, and that was enough. She had declared war against her, and she meant to carry it out.
But Edith understood her, and parried all her little mean thrusts, and, when questioned before the young ladies of her life in England and the people she knew, answered that she knew nobody except the families where she had taught, and spoke unhesitatingly of her mother, who took lodgers to eke out her slender income; and, when Miss Rossiter suggested to her that it might be as well not to speak of her mother’s lodgers, and offered her advice on certain points of etiquette, telling her it was better not to laugh quite so much, and that such and such dresses were not just the thing for certain occasions, Edith answered good-humoredly, and thanked Miss Rossiter for her advice; but laughed just the same, and shocked the spinster every day at dinner with the sight of her fair, creamy arms and neck, and devoutly wished the lady would return to New York, and leave her in peace. But Miss Rossiter was in no haste to do this; she was averse to exertion of any kind, and found her brother in law’s home so much to her taste and the bride so much better than she had feared, that she had decided to remain in Hampstead until after the grand party, which was to be given at Schuyler Hill, and for which great preparations were making, both in the kitchen, where Mrs. Tiffe was in the full tide of cake and cream and jelly, and in the town, where everybody with any claim to society expected an invitation.
Mine came to the school-room, and I read it after school, with Gertie standing at my side and looking over my shoulder.
“Oh, that’s the party I’ve heard about! They are to have a band and lights in the trees, and colored waiters in white gloves, and everything. Oh, I wish I could go! Do you think they will invite children like me?” Gertie said, excitedly.
It did not occur to her that there could be any reason why she should not be invited except that she was a child, and I did not enlighten her, but said she was probably too young.
The next morning her face was very bright as she told me what she had heard from Norah, who was down to see her mother. Mrs. Rogers was to assist in the evening, and Gertie was to go, too, and perhaps see the dancing from some post of observation, while Norah had promised to ask Mrs. Schuyler if she might come in and see her after she was dressed, and before she went down stairs.
“And then,” Gertie added, “next week they are to have the Church Sociable, and everybody goes to that, you know, and auntie is to do up my muslin dress, and I shall dance, maybe with Mr. Godfrey. Oh, I wish it was now!”
She was quite as wild over the Church Sociable as the Hampstead ladies were over the party, which came off the 10th of October, and was a grand affair. The night was soft and warm as June, and though there was no moon the lanterns in the trees and on the pedestals lighted up the grounds sufficiently to show their beauty, and make it pleasant to walk about in them. The house itself was ablaze with light, and brilliant with rare and costly flowers, while the band played several sweet airs before the guests began to arrive. In her room upstairs Edith stood dressed in her bridal robes, and looking more beautiful than she had upon her wedding day, for her cheeks were rounder now, with a soft, delicate pink showing through the dazzling white, while her eyes had in them a new brightness, and shone like the diamonds Norah was clasping on her neck and arms.
“Oh, how lovely you are,” Norah said, when the last touch was given to her mistress’s toilet, and she stood back to admireher. Then after a moment’s hesitancy, she added: “There is a little girl down stairs dying to see you, ma’am, in your party dress, Gertie Westbrooke. My cousin is here assisting, you know, and brought the child. Would you mind her coming up the back way just to look at you?”
“Certainly not,” Edith replied; and in a few moments Gertie came in, her face glowing and sparkling with delight as she saw the beautiful woman standing before the long mirror, decked in satin and lace and diamonds, her golden brown hair curled as she used to wear it in her girlhood, and falling over a comb behind.
“Oh, my lady! oh, Mrs. Schuyler, you ought to be the queen, only you are a thousand times handsomer than she!” Gertie cried, clasping her hands together, while tears started to her eyes and dropped from her eyelashes.
“Why, child, what is the matter? What makes you cry?” Edith asked, and Gertie replied:
“I don’t know, I always cry when I see a beautiful picture or hear the grand music and the band playing outside, and the house and grounds lighted up, and you so glorious. I can’t help it. Oh, if I only were rich, and could go with the people below!”
“Poor child,” Edith said softly, as she laid her hand on the wavy hair of the little girl. “You might not be as happy as you are now, and then if you were rich you are too young to attend a party of this kind.”
“Yes, I know,” Gertie answered; “but I like fine dresses, and things, and people, and I do wish I might some day be dressed just like you, and stand where you do with my train so long behind me, and I waiting for somebody.”
“Gertie,” the lady said, after a moment’s reflection, “the guests are to remove their wraps in the large room opposite, and by sitting in that chair and turning the gas down you can see them as they pass. Would you like it?”
“Yes, so much,” was the eager reply, and just then the colonel came for his bride to lead her to the drawing-room.
He saw Gertie, but thought she was there to render someservice to his wife and paid no attention to her. The moment he was gone Gertie turned down the gas, and ensconcing herself in the large easy-chair waited the coming of the guests. And while she waited Godfrey looked in, and seeing the little figure in the chair, walked up to it and said:
“Who’s there? Gertie, as I live! What are you doing?”
“Mrs. Schuyler said I might sit here and see the ladies pass in their gay dresses, so I’m making believe I’m one of them, and at the party, too. Oh if it was only real, and I could dance the Lancers!”
“Gertie, I say, how are you dressed?” Godfrey asked, turning up the gas and inspecting the child. “No, that won’t do,—not the ‘wedding garments,’ you know. Gertie, I tell you what, we are to have the church sociable next week, and that is a heap nicer than a party. Come, then, and I’ll dance your shoes off with you. There’s a ring,—I must go. When you get tired of making believe here, go round to the north staircase, and you can look down into the hall and dining-room. Good-by.”
He was gone just as the first arrivals came up the stairs and into the room opposite where Gertie sat. And Gertie watched them eagerly and heard all they said, and mentally commented upon their attire, and compared them with Edith; and then, when they were all gone, crept cautiously round to the north staircase where Godfrey had said she could see the dancing.
The party was a great success, with no drawback whatever, except the fact that Tom Barton from the Ridge drank too much champagne and became noisy and uproarious, and when by chance he stumbled upon Gertie, who was making her way to the kitchen through a side passage, he told her: “Ze was ze pressiest girl there, by gorrie,” and emphasized his compliment with a kiss. For this audacity Godfrey, who happened to be in sight, seized him by the collar and thrust him headlong out of doors, bidding him stay there till he could behave.
Edith was pronounced perfectly charming by every one, and no young girl received as much flattery and attention as the beautiful mistress of the festivities, who bore herself like a princess,and received the commendations of those about her with a sweet graciousness of manner which won every heart. She was not fond of dancing and only went on the floor twice, once with Godfrey and once with Robert Macpherson, who was quite a lion with the girls, especially as he was new and a foreigner.
“The Macphersons are very rich, and there’s a title in the family; he only paints and sketches because he likes it; he is not obliged to do it,” Julia explained to Rosamond Barton, who was questioning his antecedents and pronouncing him “splendid anddistingué, with a face like a poet.”
It was very late when the party broke up, and it was later still when Mrs. Rogers’ duties were over and she led the tired, sleepy Gertie by the hand through the morning moonlight to the cottage by the bridge. Gertie had seen a great deal of the party, and had envied the young ladies whom Godfrey whirled in the dance, and wished herself one of them. But there had been a comfort in knowing that her turn would come next week at the sociable, to which everybody was invited on the following Sunday, when the Rev. Mr. Marks, the new Rector at St. Luke’s, gave notice that the first church sociable of the season would be at Schuyler Hill on Thursday evening, adding that as the proceeds were to be appropriated for a new melodeon, which was greatly needed at the Mission School, a full attendance was desired.