Lothair was quite glad to see Mr. Putney Giles. That gentleman indeed was a universal favorite. He was intelligent, acquainted with every thing except theology and metaphysics, to oblige, a little to patronize, never made difficulties, and always overcame them. His bright blue eyes, open forehead, and sunny face, indicated a man fall of resources, and with a temper of natural sweetness.
The lawyer and his noble client had a great deal of business to transact. Lothair was to know his position in detail preparatory to releasing his guardians from their responsibilities, and assuming the management of his own affairs. Mr. Putney Giles was a first-rate man of business. With all his pleasant, easy manner, he was precise and methodical, and was not content that his client should be less master of his own affairs than his lawyer. The mornings passed over a table covered with dispatch boxes and piles of ticketed and banded papers, and then they looked after the workmen who were preparing for the impending festivals, or rode over the estate.
“That is our weak point,” said Mr. Putney Giles, pointing to a distant part of the valley. “We ought to have both sides of the valley. Your lordship will have to consider whether you can devote the two hundred thousand pounds of the second and extinct trust to a better purpose than in obtaining that estate.”
Lothair had always destined that particular sum for the cathedral, the raising of which was to have been the first achievement of his majority; but he did not reply.
In a few days the guests began to arrive, but gradually. The duke and duchess and Lady Corisande came the first, and were one day alone with Lothair, for Mr. Putney Giles had departed to fetch Apollonia.
Lothair was unaffectedly gratified at not only receiving his friends at his own castle, but under these circumstances of intimacy. They had been the first persons who had been kind to him, and he really loved the whole family. They arrived rather late, but he would show them to their rooms—and they were choice ones—himself, and then they dined together in the small green dining-room. Nothing could be more graceful or more cordial than the whole affair. The duchess seemed to beam with affectionate pleasure as Lothair fulfilled his duties as their host; the duke praised the claret, and he seldom praised any thing; while Lady Corisande only regretted that the impending twilight had prevented her from seeing the beautiful country, and expressed lively interest in the morrow’s inspection of the castle and domain. Sometimes her eyes met those of Lothair, and she was so happy that she unconsciously smiled.
“And-to-morrow,” said Lothair, “I am delighted to say, we shall have to ourselves; at least all the morning. We will see the castle first, and then, after luncheon, we will drive about everywhere.”
“Everywhere,” said Corisande.
“It was very nice your asking us first, and alone,” said the duchess.
“It was very nice in your coming, dear duchess,” said Lothair, “and most kind—as you ever are to me.”
“Duke of Brecon is coming to you on Thursday,” said the duke; “he told me so at White’s.”
“Perhaps you would like to know, duchess, whom you are going to meet,” said Lothair.
“I should much like to hear. Pray tell us.”
“It is a rather formidable array,” said Lothair, and he took out a paper. “First, there are all the notables of the county. I do not know any of them personally, so I wrote to each of them a letter, as well as sending them a formal invitation. I thought that was right.”
“Quite right,” said the duchess. “Nothing could be more proper.”
“Well, the first person, of course, is the lord-lieutenant. He is coming.”
“By-the-by, let me see, who is your lord-lieutenant?” said the duke.
“Lord Agramont.”
“To be sure. I was at college with him; a very good fellow; but I have never met him since, except once at Boodle’s; and I never saw a man so red and gray, and I remember him such a good-looking fellow! He must have lived immensely in the country, and never thought of his person,” said the duke in a tone of pity, and playing with his mustache.
“Is there a Lady Agramont?” inquired the duchess.
“Oh, yes! and she also honors me with her presence,” said Lothair.
“And who was Lady Agramont?”
“Oh! his cousin,” said the duke. “The Agramonts always marry their cousins. His father did the same thing. They are so shy. It is a family that never was in society, and never will be. I was at Agramont Castle once when I was at college, and I never shall forget it. We used to sit down forty or fifty every day to dinner, entirely maiden aunts and clergymen, and that sort of thing. However, I shall be truly glad to see Agramont again, for, notwithstanding all these disadvantages, he is a thoroughly good fellow.”
“Then there is the high-sheriff,” continued Lothair; “and both the county members and their wives; and Mrs. High-Sheriff too. I believe there is some tremendous question respecting the precedency of this lady. There is no doubt that, in the county, the high-sheriff takes precedence of every one, even of the lord-lieutenant; but how about his wife? Perhaps your grace could aid me? Mr. Putney Giles said he would write about it to the Heralds’ College.”
“I should give her the benefit of any doubt,” said the duchess.
“And then our bishop is coming;” said Lothair.
“Oh! I am so glad you have asked the bishop,” said Lady Corisande.
“There could be no doubt about it,” said Lothair.
“I do not know how his lordship will get on with one of my guardians, the cardinal; but his eminence is not here in a priestly character; and, as for that, there is less chance of his differing with the cardinal than with my other guardian Lord Culloden, who is a member of the Free Kirk.”
“Is Lord Culloden coming?” said the duchess.
“Yes, and with two daughters, Flora and Grizell. I remember my cousins, good-natured little girls; but Mr. Putney Giles tells me that the shortest is six feet high.”
“I think we shall have a very amusing party,” said the duchess.
“You know all the others,” said Lothair. “No, by-the-by, there is the dean of my college coming, and Monsignore Catesby, a great friend of the St. Jeromes.”
Lady Corisande looked grave.
“The St. Jeromes will be here to-morrow,” continued Lothair, “and the Montairys and the St. Aldegondes. I have half an idea that Bertram and Carisbrooke and Hugo Bohun will be here to-night—Duke of Brecon on Thursday; and that, I think, is all, except an American lady and gentleman, whom, I think, you will like—great friends of mine; I knew them this year at Oxford, and the were very kind to me. He is a man of considerable fortune; they have lived at Paris a good deal.”
“I have known Americans who lived at Paris,” said the duke; “very good sort of people, and no end of money some of them.”
“I believe Colonel Campian has large estates in the South,” said Lothair; “but, though really I have no right to speak of his affairs, he must have suffered very much.”
“Well, he has the consolation of suffering in a good cause,” said the duke. “I shall be happy to make his acquaintance. I look upon an American gentleman with large estates in the South as a real aristocrat; and; whether he gets his rents, or whatever his returns may be, or not, I should always treat him with respect.”
“I have heard the American women are very pretty,” said Lady Corisande.
“Mrs. Campian is very distinguished,” said Lothair; “but I think she was an Italian.”
“They promise to be an interesting addition to our party,” said the duchess, and she rose.
There never was any thing so successful as the arrangements of the next day. After breakfast they inspected the castle, and in the easiest manner, without form and without hurry, resting occasionally in a gallery or a saloon, never examining a cabinet, and only looking at a picture now and then. Generally speaking, nothing is more fatiguing than the survey of a great house; but this enterprise was conducted with so much tact and consideration, and much which they had to see was so beautiful and novel, that every one was interested, and remained quite fresh for their subsequent exertions. “And then the duke is so much amused,” said the duchess to her daughter, delighted at the unusual excitement of the handsome, but somewhat too serene, partner of her life.
After luncheon they visited the gardens, which had been formed in a sylvan valley, enclosed with gilded gates. The creator of this paradise had been favored by Nature, and had availed himself of this opportunity. The contrast between the parterres, blazing with color, and the sylvan background, the undulating paths over romantic heights, the fanes and the fountains, the glittering statues, and the Babylonian terraces, formed a whole, much of which was beautiful, and all of which was striking and singular.
“Perhaps too many temples,” said Lothair; “but this ancestor of mine had some imagination.”
A carriage met them on the other side of the valley, and then they soon entered the park.
“I am almost as much a stranger here as yourself, dear duchess,” said Lothair; “but I have seen some parts which, I think, will please you.” And they commenced a drive of varying, but unceasing, beauty.
“I hope I see the wild-cattle,” said Lady Corisande.
Lady Corisande saw the wild-cattle, and many other things, which gratified and charmed her. It was a long drive, even of hours, and yet no one was, for a moment, wearied.
“What a delightful day!” Lady Corisande exclaimed in her mother’s dressing-room. “I have never seen any place so beautiful.”
“I agree with you,” said the duchess; “but what pleases me most are his manners. They were always kind and natural; but they are so polished—so exactly what they ought to be; and he always says the right thing. I never knew any one who had so matured.”
“Yes; it is very little more than a year since he came to us at Brentham,” said Lady Corisande, thoughtfully. “Certainly he has greatly changed. I remember he could hardly open his lips; and now I think him very agreeable.”
“He is more than that,” said the duchess; “he is interesting.”
“Yes,” said Lady Corisande; “he is interesting.”
“What delights me,” said the duchess, “is to see his enjoyment of his position. He seems to take such an interest in every thing. It makes me happy to see him so happy.”
“Well, I hardly know,” said Lady Corisande, “about that. There is something occasionally about his expression which I should hardly describe as indicative of happiness or content. It would be ungrateful to describe one as distrait, who seems to watch all one wants, and hangs on every word; and yet—especially as we returned, and when we were all of us a little silent—there was a remarkable abstraction about him; I caught it once or twice before, earlier in the day; his mind seemed in another place, and anxiously.”
“He has a great deal to think of,” said the duchess.
“I fear it is that dreadful Monsignore Catesby,” said Lady Corisande, with a sigh.
The arrival of the guests was arranged with judgment. The personal friends came first; the formal visitors were invited only for the day before the public ceremonies commenced. No more dinners in small green dining-rooms. While the duchess was dressing, Bertha St. Aldegonde and Victoria Montairy, who had just arrived, came in to give her a rapid embrace while their own toilets were unpacking.
“Granville, has come, mamma; I did not think that he would till the last moment. He said he was so afraid of being bored. There is a large party by this train; the St. Jeromes, Bertram, Mr. Bohun, Lord Carisbrooke, and some others we do not know.”
The cardinal had been expected to-day, but he had telegraphed that his arrival must be postponed in consequence: of business until the morrow, which day had been previously fixed for the arrival of his fellow guardian and trustee, the Earl of Culloden, and his daughters, the Ladies Flora and Grizell Falkirk. Monsignore Catesby had, however, arrived by this train, and the persons “whom they did not know,” the Campians.
Lothair waited on Colonel Campian immediately and welcomed him, but he did not see Theodora. Still he had inquired after her, and left her a message, and hoped that she would take some tea; and thus, as he flattered himself, broken a little the strangeness of their meeting under his roof; but, notwithstanding all this, when she really entered the drawing-room he was seized with such a palpitation of the heart that for a moment he thought he should be unequal to the situation. But the serenity of Theodora reassured him. The Campians came in late, and all eyes were upon them. Lothair presented Theodora to the duchess, who, being prepared for the occasion, said exactly the right thing in the best manner, and invited Mrs. Campian to sit by her, and then, Theodora being launched, Lothair whispered something to the duke, who nodded, and the colonel was introduced to his grace. The duke, always polite but generally cold, was more than courteous—he was cordial; he seemed to enjoy the opportunity of expressing his high consideration for a gentleman of the Southern States.
So the first step was over; Lothair recovered himself; the palpitation subsided; and the world still went on. The Campians had made a good start, and the favorable impression hourly increased. At dinner Theodora sat between Lord St. Jerome and Bertram, and talked more to the middle-aged peer than to the distinguished youth, who would willingly have engrossed her attention. All mothers admire such discretion, especially in a young and beautiful married woman, so the verdict of the evening among the great ladies was, that Theodora was distinguished, and that all she said or did was in good taste. On the plea of her being a foreigner, she was at once admitted into a certain degree of social intimacy. Had she had the misfortune of being native-born and had flirted with Bertram, she would probably, particularly with so much beauty, have been looked upon as “a horrid woman,” and have been relegated for amusement, during her visit, to the attentions of the dark sex. But, strange to say, the social success of Colonel Campian was not less eminent than that of his distinguished wife. The character which the duke gave of him commanded universal sympathy. “You know he is a gentleman,” said the duke; “he is not a Yankee. People make the greatest mistakes about these things. He is a gentleman of the South; they have no property, but land; and I am told his territory was immense. He always lived at Paris, and in the highest style—disgusted, of course, with his own country. It is not unlikely he may have lost his estates now; but that makes no difference to me. I shall treat him, and all Southern gentlemen, as our fathers treated the emigrant nobility of France.”
“Hugo,” said St. Aldegonde to Mr. Bohun, “I wish you would tell Bertha to come to me. I want her. She is talking to a lot of women at the other end of the room, and, if I go to her, I am afraid they will get hold of me.”
The future duchess, who lived only to humor her lord, was at his side in an instant. “You wanted me, Granville?”
“Yes; you know I was afraid, Bertha, I should be bored here. I am not bored. I like this American fellow. He understands the only two subjects which interest me; horses and tobacco.”
“I am charmed, Granville, that you are not bored; I told mamma that you were very much afraid you would be.”
“Yes; but I tell you what, Bertha, I cannot stand any of the ceremonies. I shall go before they begin. Why cannot Lothair be content with receiving his friends in a quiet way? It is all humbug about the county. If he wants to do something for the county, he can build a wing to the infirmary, or something of that sort, and not bore us with speeches and fireworks. It is a sort of thing I cannot stand.”
“And you shall not, dear Granville. The moment you are bored, you shall go. Only you are not bored at present.”
“Not at present; but I expected to be.”
“Yes; so I told mamma; but that makes the present more delightful.”
The St. Jeromes were going to Italy and immediately. Their departure had only been postponed in order that they might be present at the majority of Lothair. Miss Arundel had at length succeeded in her great object. They were to pass the winter at Rome. Lord St. Jerome was quite pleased at having made the acquaintance at dinner of a Roman lady, who spoke English so perfectly; and Lady St. Jerome, who in consequence fastened upon Theodora, was getting into ecstasies, which would have been embarrassing had not her new acquaintance skilfully checked her.
“We must be satisfied that we both admire Rome,” said Mrs. Campian, “though we admire it for different reasons. Although a Roman, I am not a Roman Catholic; and Colonel Campian’s views on Italian affairs generally would, I fear, not entirely agree with Lord St. Jerome’s.”
“Naturally,” said Lady St. Jerome, gracefully dropping the subject, and remembering that Colonel Campian was a citizen of the United States, which accounted in her apprehension for his peculiar opinions.
Lothair, who had been watching his opportunity the whole evening, approached Theodora. He meant to have expressed his hope that she was not wearied by her journey, but instead of that he said, “Your presence here makes me inexpressibly happy.”
“I think everybody seems happy to be your guest,” she replied, parrying, as was her custom, with a slight kind smile, and a low, sweet, unembarrassed voice, any personal allusion from Lothair of unusual energy or ardor.
“I wanted to meet you at the station to-day,” he continued, “but there were so many people coming, that—” and he hesitated.
“It would really have been more embarrassing to us than to yourself,” she said. “Nothing could be better than all the arrangements.”
“I sent my own brougham to you,” said Lothair. “I hope there was no mistake about it.”
“None: your servant gave us your kind message; and as for the carriage, it was too delightful. Colonel Campian was so; pleased with it, that he has promised to give me one, with your permission, exactly the same.”
“I wish you would accept the one you used to-day.”
“You are too magnificent; you really must try to forget, with us, that you are the lord of Muriel Towers. But I will willingly use your carriages as much as you please, for I caught glimpses of beauty to-day in our progress from the station that made me anxious to explore your delightful domain.”
There was a slight burst of merriment from a distant part of the room, and everybody looked around. Colonel Campian had been telling a story to a group formed of the duke, St. Aldegonde, and Mr. Bohun.
“Best story I ever heard In my life,” exclaimed St. Aldegonde, who prided himself, when he did laugh, which was rare, on laughing loud. But even the duke tittered, and Hugo Bohun smiled.
“I am glad to see the colonel get on so well with every one,” said Lothair; “I was afraid he might have been bored.”
“He does not know what that means,” said Theodora; “and he is so natural and so sweet-tempered, and so intelligent, that it seems to me he always is popular.”
“Do you think that will be a match?” said Monsignore Catesby to Miss Arundel.
“Well, I rather believe in the Duke of Brecon,” she replied. They were referring to Lord Carisbrooke, who appeared to be devoted to Lady Corisande. “Do you admire the American lady?”
“Who is an Italian, they tell me, though she does not look like one. What do you think of her?” said the monsignore, evading, as was his custom, a direct reply.
“Well, I think she is very distinguished: unusual. I wonder where our host became acquainted with them? Do you know?”
“Not yet: but I dare say Mr. Bohun can tell us;” and he addressed that gentleman accordingly as he was passing by.
“Not the most remote idea,” said Mr. Bohun. “You know the colonel is not a Yankee; he is a tremendous swell. The duke says, with more land than he has.”
“He seems an agreeable person,” said Miss Arundel.
“Well, he tell anecdotes; he has just been telling one; Granville likes anecdotes; they amuse him, and he likes to be amused: that is all he cares about. I hate anecdotes, and I always get away when conversation falls into, what Pinto calls, its anecdotage.”
“You do not like to be amused?”
“Not too much; I like to be interested.”
“Well,” said Miss Arundel, “so long as a person can talk agreeably, I am satisfied. I think to talk well a rare gift; quite as rare as singing; and yet you expect every one to be able to talk, and very few to be able to sing.”
“There are amusing people who do not interest,” said the monsignore, “and interesting people who do not amuse. What I like is an agreeable person.”
“My idea of an agreeable person,” said Hugo Bohun, “is a person who agrees with me.”
“Talking of singing, something is going to happen,” said Miss Arundel.
A note was heard; a celebrated professor had entered the room and was seated at the piano, which he had just touched. There was a general and unconscious hush, and the countenance of Lord St. Aldegonde wore a rueful expression. But affairs turned out better than could be anticipated. A young and pretty girl, dressed in white, with a gigantic sash of dazzling beauty, played upon the violin with a grace, and sentimental and marvellous skill, and passionate expression, worthy of St. Cecilia. She was a Hungarian lady, and this was her English debut. Everybody praised her, and every body was pleased; and Lord St. Aldegonde, instead of being bored, took a wondrous rose out of his button-hole and presented it to her.
The performance only lasted half an hour, and then the ladies began to think of their bowers. Lady St. Aldegonde, before she quit the room, was in earnest conversation with her lord.
“I have arranged all that you wished, Granville,” she said, speaking rapidly and holding a candlestick. “We are to see the castle to-morrow, and the gardens and the parks and every thing else, but you are not to be bored at all, and not to lose your shooting. The moors are sixteen miles off, but our host says, with an omnibus and a good team—and he will give you a first-rate one—you can do it in an hour and ten minutes, certainly an hour and a quarter; and you are to make your own party in the smoking-room to-night, and take a capital luncheon with you.”
“All right: I shall ask the Yankee; and I should like to take that Hungarian girl too, if she would only fiddle to us at luncheon.”
Next day the cardinal, with his secretary and his chaplain, arrived. Monsignore Catesby received his eminence at the station and knelt and kissed his hand as he stepped from the carriage. The monsignore had wonderfully manoeuvred that the whole of the household should have been marshalled to receive this prince of the Church, and perhaps have performed the same ceremony: no religious recognition, he assured them, in the least degree involved, only an act of not unusual respect to a foreign prince; but considering that the bishop of the diocese and his suite were that day expected, to say nothing of the Presbyterian guardian, probably arriving by the same train, Lothair would not be persuaded to sanction any ceremony whatever. Lady St. Jerome and Miss Arundel, however, did their best to compensate for this omission with reverences which a posture-master might have envied, and certainly would not have surpassed. They seemed to sink into the earth, and then slowly and supernaturally to emerge. The bishop had been at college with the cardinal and intimate with him, though they now met for the first time since his secession—a not uninteresting rencounter. The bishop was high-church, and would not himself have made a bad cardinal, being polished and plausible, well-lettered, yet quite a man of the world. He was fond of society, and justified his taste in this respect by the flattering belief that by his presence he was extending the power of the Church; certainly favoring an ambition which could not be described as being moderate. The bishop had no abstract prejudice against gentlemen who wore red hats, and under ordinary circumstances would have welcomed his brother churchman with unaffected cordiality, not to say sympathy; but in the present instance, however gracious his mien and honeyed his expressions, he only looked upon the cardinal as a dangerous rival, intent upon clutching from his fold the most precious of his flock, and he had long looked to this occasion as the one which might decide the spiritual welfare and career of Lothair. The odds were not to be despised. There were two monsignores in the room besides the cardinal, but the bishop was a man of contrivance and resolution, not easily disheartened or defeated. Nor was he without allies. He did not count much on the university don, who was to arrive on the morrow in the shape of the head of an Oxford house, though he was a don of magnitude. This eminent personage had already let Lothair slip from his influence. But the bishop had a subtle counsellor in his chaplain, who wore as good a cassock as any monsignore, and he brought with him also a trusty archdeacon in a purple coat, whose countenance was quite entitled to a place in the Acta Sanctorum.
It was amusing to observe the elaborate courtesy and more than Christian kindness which the rival prelates and their official followers extended to each other. But under all this unction on both sides were unceasing observation, and a vigilance that never flagged; and on both sides there was an uneasy but irresistible conviction that they were on the eve of one of the decisive battles of the social world. Lord Culloden also at length appeared with his daughters, Ladies Flora and Grizell. They were quite as tall as Mr. Putney Giles had reported, but very pretty, with radiant complexions, sunny blue eyes, and flaxen looks. Their dimples and white shoulders and small feet and hands were much admired. Mr. Giles also returned with Apollonia, and, at length, also appeared the rival of Lord Carisbrooke, his grace of Brecon.
Lothair had passed a happy morning, for he had contrived, without difficulty, to be the companion of Theodora during the greater part of it. As the duchess and Lady Corisande had already inspected the castle, they disappeared after breakfast to write letters; and, when the after-luncheon expedition took place, Lothair allotted them to the care of Lord Carisbrooke, and himself became the companion of Lady St. Jerome and Theodora.
Notwithstanding all his efforts in the smoking-room, St. Aldegonde had only been able to induce Colonel Campian to be his companion in the shooting expedition, and the colonel fell into the lure only through his carelessness and good-nature. He much doubted the discretion of his decision as he listened to Lord St. Aldegonde’s reasons for the expedition, in their rapid journey to the moors.
“I do not suppose,” he said, “we shall have any good sport; but when you are in Scotland, and come to me, as I hope you will, I will give you something you will like. But it is a great thing to get off seeing the Towers, and the gardens, and all that sort of thing. Nothing bores me so much as going over a man’s house. Besides, we get rid of the women.”
The meeting between the two guardians did not promise to be as pleasant as that between the bishop and the cardinal, but the crusty Lord Culloden was scarcely a match for the social dexterity of his eminence. The cardinal, crossing the room, with winning ceremony approached and addressed his colleague.
“We can have no more controversies, my lord, for our reign is over;” and he extended a delicate hand, which the surprised peer touched with a huge finger.
“Yes; it all depends on himself now,” replied Lord Culloden, with a grim smile; “and I hope he will not make a fool of himself.”
“What have you got for us to-night?” inquired Lothair of Mr. Giles, as the gentlemen rose from the dining-table.
Mr. Giles said he would consult his wife, but Lothair observing he would himself undertake that office, when he entered the saloon, addressed Apollonia. Nothing could be more skilful than the manner in which Mrs. Giles, in this party, assumed precisely the position which equally became her and suited her own views; at the same time the somewhat humble friend, but the trusted counsellor, of the Towers, she disarmed envy and conciliated consideration. Never obtrusive, yet always prompt and prepared with unfailing resource, and gifted apparently, with universal talents, she soon became the recognized medium by which every thing was suggested or arranged; and before eight-and-forty hours had passed she was described by duchesses and their daughters as that “dear Mrs. Giles.”
“Monsieur Raphael and his sister came down in the train with us,” said Mrs. Giles to Lothair; “the rest of the troupe will not be here until to-morrow; but they told me they could give you a perfect proverbe if your lordship would like it; and the Spanish conjuror is here; but I rather think, from what I gather, that the young ladies would like a dance.”
“I do not much fancy acting the moment these great churchmen have arrived, and with cardinals and bishops I would rather not have dances the first-night. I almost wish we had kept the Hungarian lady for this evening.”
“Shall I send for her? She is ready.”
“The repetition would be too soon, and would show a great poverty of resources,” said Lothair, smiling; “what we want is some singing.”
“Mardoni ought to have been here to-day,” said Mrs. Giles; “but he never keeps his engagements.”
“I think our amateur materials are rather rich,” said Lothair.
“There is Mrs. Campian,” said Apollonia in a low voice; but Lothair shook his head.
“But, perhaps, if others set her the example,” he added, after a pause; “Lady Corisande is first rate, and all her sisters sing; I will go and consult the duchess.”
There was soon a stir in the room. Lady St. Aldegonde and her sisters approached the piano, at which was seated the eminent professor. A note was heard, and there was silence. The execution was exquisite; and, indeed, there are few things more dainty than the blended voices of three women. No one seemed to appreciate the performance more than Mrs. Campian, who, greatly attracted by what was taking place, turned a careless ear, even to the honeyed sentences of no less a personage than the lord-bishop.
After an interval Lady Corisande was handed to the piano by Lothair. She was in fine voice, and sang with wonderful effect. Mrs. Campian, who seemed much interested, softly rose, and stole to the outward circle of the group which had gathered round the instrument. When the sounds had ceased, amid the general applause her voice of admiration was heard. The duchess approached her, evidently prompted by the general wish, and expressed her hope that Mrs. Campian would now favor them. It was not becoming to refuse when others had contributed so freely to the general entertainment, but Theodora was anxious not to place herself in competition with those who had preceded her. Looking over a volume of music, she suggested to Lady Corisande a duet, in which the peculiarities of their two voices, which in character were quite different, one being a soprano and the other a contralto, might be displayed. And very seldom, in a private chamber, had any thing of so high a class been heard. Not a lip moved except those of the singers, so complete was the fascination, till the conclusion elicited a burst of irresistible applause.
“In imagination I am throwing endless bouquets,” said Hugo Bohun.
“I wish we could induce her to give us a recitation from Alfieri,” said Mrs. Putney Giles in a whisper to Lady St. Aldegonde. “I heard it once: it was the finest thing I ever listened to.”
“But cannot we?” said Lady St. Aldegonde.
Apollonia shook her head. “She is extremely reserved. I am quite surprised that she sang; but she could not well refuse after your ladyship and your sisters had been so kind.”
“But if the Lord of the Towers asks her,” suggested Lady St. Aldegonde.
“No, no,” said Mrs. Giles, “that would not do; nor would he. He knows she dislikes it. A word from Colonel Campian, and the thing would be settled; but it is rather absurd to invoke the authority of a husband for so light a matter.”
“I should like so much to hear her,” said Lady St. Aldegonde. “I think I will ask her myself. I will go and speak to mamma.”
There was much whispering and consulting in the room, but unnoticed, as general conversation had now been resumed. The duchess sent for Lothair, and conferred with him; but Lothair seemed to shake his head. Then her grace rose and approached Colonel Campian, who was talking to Lord Culloden, and then the duchess and Lady St. Aldegonde went to Mrs. Campian. Then, after a short time, Lady St. Aldegonde rose and fetched Lothair.
“Her grace tells me,” said Theodora, “that Colonel Campian wishes me to give a recitation. I cannot believe that such a performance can ever be generally interesting, especially in a foreign language, and I confess that I would rather not exhibit. But I do not like to be churlish when all are so amiable and compliant, and her grace tells me that it cannot well be postponed, for this is the last quiet night we shall have. What I want is a screen, and I must be a moment alone, before I venture on these enterprises. I require it to create the ideal presence.”
Lothair and Bertram arranged the screen, the duchess and Lady St. Aldegonde glided about, and tranquilly intimated what was going to occur, so that, without effort, there was in a moment complete silence and general expectation. Almost unnoticed Mrs. Campian had disappeared, whispering a word as she passed to the eminent conductor, who was still seated at the piano. The company had almost unconsciously grouped themselves in the form of a theatre, the gentlemen generally standing behind the ladies who were seated. There were some bars of solemn music, and then, to an audience not less nervous than herself, Theodora came forward as Electra in that beautiful appeal to Clytemnestra, where she veils her mother’s guilt even while she intimates her more than terrible suspicion of its existence, and makes one last desperate appeal of pathetic duty in order to save her parent and her fated house:
“O amata madre,Che fai? Non credo io, no, che ardente fiammaIl cor ti avvampi.”
The ineffable grace of her action, simple without redundancy, her exquisite elocution, her deep yet controlled passion, and the magic of a voice thrilling even in a whisper—this form of Phidias with the genius of Sophocles—entirely enraptured a fastidious audience. When she ceased, there was an outburst of profound and unaffected appreciation; and Lord St. Aldegonde, who had listened in a sort of ecstasy, rushed forward, with a countenance as serious as the theme, to offer his thanks and express his admiration.
And then they gathered round her—all these charming women and some of these admiring men—as she would have resumed her seat, and entreated her once more—only once more—to favor them. She caught the adoring glance of the lord of the Towers, and her eyes seemed to inquire what she should do. “There will be many strangers here to-morrow,” said Lothair, “and next week all the world. This is a delight only for the initiated,” and he entreated her to gratify them.
“It shall be Alfieri’s ode to America, then,” said Theodora, “if you please.”
“She is a Roman, I believe,” said Lady St. Jerome to his eminence, “but not, alas! a child of the Church. Indeed, I fear her views generally are advanced,” and she shook her head.
“At present,” said the cardinal, “this roof and this visit may influence her. I should like to see such powers engaged in the cause of God.”
The cardinal was an entire believer in female influence, and a considerable believer in his influence over females; and he had good cause for his convictions. The catalogue of his proselytes was numerous and distinguished. He had not only converted a duchess and several countesses, but he had gathered into his fold a real Mary Magdalen. In the height of her beauty and her fame, the most distinguished member of the demi-monde had suddenly thrown up her golden whip and jingling reins, and cast herself at the feet of the cardinal. He had a right, therefore, to be confident; and, while his exquisite taste and consummate cultivation rendered it impossible that he should not have been deeply gratified by the performance of Theodora, he was really the whole time considering the best means by which such charms and powers could be enlisted in the cause of the Church.
After the ladies had retired, the gentlemen talked for a few minutes over the interesting occurrence of the evening.
“Do you know,” said the bishop to the duke and some surrounding auditors, “fine as was the Electra, I preferred the ode to the tragedy? There was a tumult of her brow, especially in the address to Liberty, that was sublime—quite a Moenad look.”
“What do you think of it, Carry?” said St. Aldegonde to Lord Carisbrooke.
“Brecon says she puts him in mind of Ristori.”
“She is not in the least like Ristori, or any one else,” said St. Aldegonde. “I never heard, I never saw any one like her. I’ll tell you what—you must take care what you say about her in the smoking-room, for her husband will be there, and an excellent fellow too. We went together to the moors this morning, and he did not bore me in the least. Only, if I had known as much about his wife as I do now, I would have stayed at home, and passed my morning with the women.”
St. Aldegonde loved to preside over the mysteries of the smoking-room. There, enveloped in his Egyptian robe, occasionally blurting out some careless or headstrong paradox to provoke discussion among others, which would amuse himself, rioting in a Rabelaisan anecdote, and listening with critical delight to endless memoirs of horses and prima-donnas, St. Aldegonde was never bored. Sometimes, too, when he could get hold of an eminent traveller, or some individual distinguished for special knowledge, St. Aldegonde would draw him out with skill; himself displaying an acquaintance with the particular topic which often surprised his habitual companions, for St. Aldegonde professed never to read; but he had no ordinary abilities, and an original turn of mind and habit of life, which threw him in the way of unusual persons of all classes; from whom he imbibed or extracted a vast variety of queer, always amusing, and not altogether useless information.
“Lothair has only one weakness,” he said to Colonel Campian as the ladies disappeared; “he does not smoke. Carry, you will come?”
“Well, I do not think I shall to-night,” said Lord Carisbrooke. Lady Corisande, it appears, particularly disapproved of smoking.
“Hum!” said St. Aldegonde; “Duke of Brecon, I know, will come, and Hugo and Bertram. My brother Montairy would give his ears to come, but is afraid of his wife; and then there is the monsignore, a most capital fellow, who knows every thing.”
There were other gatherings, before the midnight bell struck at the Towers, which discussed important affairs, though they might not sit so late as the smoking-party. Lady St. Aldegonde had a reception in her room as well as her lord. There the silent observation of the evening found avenging expression in sparkling criticism, and the summer lightning, though it generally blazed with harmless brilliancy, occasionally assumed a more arrowy character. The gentlemen of the smoking-room have it not all their own way quite as much as they think. If, indeed, a new school of Athens were to be pictured, the sages and the students might be represented in exquisite dressing-gowns, with slippers rarer than the lost one of Cinderella, and brandishing beautiful brushes over tresses still more fair. Then is the time when characters are never more finely drawn, or difficult social questions more accurately solved; knowledge without reasoning and truth without logic—the triumph of intuition! But we must not profane the mysteries of Bona Dea.
The archdeacon and the chaplain had also been in council with the bishop in his dressing-room, who, while he dismissed them with his benison, repeated his apparently satisfactory assurance that something would happen “the first thing after breakfast.”
Lothair did not smoke, but he did not sleep. He was absorbed by the thought of Theodora. He could not but be conscious, and so far he was pleased by the consciousness, that she was as fascinating to others as to himself. What then? Even with the splendid novelty of his majestic home, and all the excitement of such an incident in his life, and the immediate prospect of their again meeting, he had felt, and even acutely, their separation. Whether it were the admiration of her by others which proved his own just appreciation, or whether it were the unobtrusive display of exquisite accomplishments, which, with all their intimacy, she had never forced on his notice—whatever the cause, her hold upon his heart and life, powerful as it was before, had strengthened. Lothair could not conceive existence tolerable without her constant presence; and with her constant presence existence would be rapture. It had come to that. All his musings, all his profound investigation and high resolve, all his sublime speculations on God and man, and life, and immortality, and the origin of things, and religious truth, ended in an engrossing state of feeling, which could be denoted in that form and in no other.
What, then, was his future? It seemed dark and distressing. Her constant presence his only happiness; her constant presence impossible. He seemed on an abyss.
In eight-and-forty hours or so one of the chief provinces of England would be blazing with the celebration of his legal accession to his high estate. If any one in the queen’s dominions had to be fixed upon as the most fortunate and happiest of her subjects, it might well be Lothair. If happiness depend on lofty station, his ancient and hereditary rank was of the highest; if, as there seems no doubt, the chief source of felicity in this country is wealth, his vast possessions and accumulated treasure could not easily be rivalled, while he had a matchless advantage over those who pass, or waste, their gray and withered lives in acquiring millions, in his consummate and healthy youth. He had bright abilities, and a brighter heart. And yet the unknown truth was, that this favored being, on the eve of this critical event, was pacing his chamber agitated and infinitely disquieted, and struggling with circumstances and feelings over which alike he seemed to have no control, and which seemed to have been evoked without the exercise of his own will, or that of any other person.
“I do not think I can blame myself,” he said; “and I am sure I cannot blame her. And yet—”
He opened his window and looked upon the moonlit garden, which filled the fanciful quadrangle. The light of the fountain seemed to fascinate his eye, and the music of its fall soothed him into reverie. The distressful images that had gathered round his heart gradually vanished, and all that remained to him was the reality of his happiness. Her beauty and her grace, the sweet stillness of her searching intellect, and the refined pathos of her disposition, only occurred to him, and he dwelt on them with spell-bound joy.
The great clock of the Towers sounded two.
“Ah!” said Lothair, “I must try to sleep. I have got to see the bishop to-morrow morning. I wonder what he wants?”