Molly Bawn Part 48

"Specially blessed," he repeats. "I had reason to be proud of them.

Each child as he or she married gave me fresh cause for joy. Marcia's mother was an Italian dancer."

"She was an actress," Marcia interposes, calmly, not a line of displeasure, not the faintest trace of anger, discernible in her pale face. "I do not recollect having ever heard she danced."

"Probably she suppressed that fact. It hardly adds to one's respectability. Philip's father was a spendthrift. His son develops day by day a very dutiful desire to follow in his footsteps."

"Perhaps I might do worse," Shadwell replies, with a little aggravating laugh. "At all events, he was _beloved_."

"So he was,--while his money lasted. Eleanor's father----"

With a sudden, irrepressible start Molly rises to her feet and, with a rather white face, turns to her grandfather.

"I will thank you, grandpapa, to say nothing against _my_ father,"

she says, in tones so low, yet so full of dignity and indignation, that the old man actually pauses.

"High tragedy," says he, with a sneer. "Why, you are all wrongly a.s.sorted. The actress should have been your mother, Eleanor."

Yet it is noticeable that he makes no further attempt to slight the memory of the dead Ma.s.sereene.

"I shan't be able to stand much more of this," says Mr. Potts, presently, coming behind the lounge on which sit Lady Stafford and Molly. "I shall infallibly blow out at that obnoxious old person, or else do something equally reprehensible."

"He is a perfect bear," says Cecil angrily.

"He is a wicked old man," says Molly, still trembling with indignation.

"He is a jolly old snook," says Mr. Potts. But as neither of his listeners know what he means, they do not respond.

"Let us do something," says Plantagenet, briskly.

"But what? Will you sing for us, Molly? 'Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast.'"

"It would take a good deal of music to soothe our _bete noire_,"

says Potts. "Besides--I confess it,--music is not what Artemus Ward would call my 'forte.' I don't understand it. I am like the man who said he only knew two tunes in the world: one was 'G.o.d save the Queen,'

and the other wasn't. No, let us do something active,--something unusual, something wicked."

"If you can suggest anything likely to answer to your description, you will make me your friend for life," says Cecil, with solemnity. "I feel bad."

"Did you ever see a devil?" asks Mr. Potts, in a sepulchral tone.

"A what?" exclaim Cecil and Molly, in a breath.

"A devil," repeats he, unmoved. "I don't mean our own particular old gentleman, who has been behaving so sweetly to-night, but a regular _bona fide_ one."

"Are you a spiritualist?" Cecil asks with awe.

"Nothing half so paltry. There is no deception about my performance. It is simplicity itself. There is no rapping, but a great deal of powder.

Have you ever seen one?"

"A devil? Never."

"Should you like to?"

"Shouldn't I!" says Cecil, with enthusiasm.

"Then you shall. It won't be much, you know, but it has a pretty effect, and anything will be less deadly than sitting here listening to the honeyed speeches of our host. I will go and prepare my work, and call you when it is ready."

In twenty minutes he returns and beckons them to come; and, rising, both girls quit the drawing-room.

With much glee Mr. Potts conducts them across the hall into the library, where they find all the chairs and the centre table pushed into a corner, as though to make room for one soup-plate which occupies the middle of the floor.

On this plate stands a miniature hill, broad at the base and tapering at the summit, composed of blended powder and water, which Mr. Potts has been carefully heating in an oven during his absence until, according to his lights, it has reached a proper dryness.

"Good gracious! what is it?" asks Molly.

"Powder," says Potts.

"I hope it won't go off and blow us all to bits," says Cecil, anxiously.

"It will go off, certainly, but it won't do any damage," replies their showman, with confidence; "and really it is very pretty while burning.

I used to make 'em by hundreds when I was a boy, and nothing ever happened except once, when I blew the ear off my father's coachman."

This is not rea.s.suring. Molly gets a little closer to Cecil, and Cecil gets a little nearer to Molly. They both sensibly increase the distance between them and the "devil."

"Now I am going to put out the lamp," says Plantagenet, suiting the action to the word and suddenly placing them in darkness. "It don't look anything if there is light to overpower its own brilliancy."

Striking a match, he applies it to the little black mountain, and in a second it turns into a burning one. The sparks fly rapidly upward. It seems to be pouring its fire in little liquid streams all down its sides.

Cecil and Molly are in raptures.

"It is Vesuvius," says the former.

"It is Mount Etna," says the latter, "except much better, because they don't seem to have any volcanoes nowadays. Mr. Potts, you deserve a prize medal for giving us such a treat."

"Plantagenet, my dear, I didn't believe it was in you," says Cecil.

"Permit me to compliment you on your unprecedented success."

Presently, however, they slightly alter their sentiments. Every school-boy knows how overpowering is the smell of burnt powder.

"What an intolerable smell!" says Molly, when the little mound is half burned down, putting her dainty handkerchief up to her nose. "Oh! what is it? Gunpowder? Brimstone? _Sulphur?_"

"And extremely appropriate, too, dear," says Cecil, who has also got her nose buried in her cambric; "entirely carries out the character of the entertainment. You surely don't expect to be regaled with incense or attar of roses. By the bye, Plantagenet, is there going to be much more of it,--the smell, I mean?"

"Not much," replies he. "And, after all, what is it? If you went out shooting every day you would think nothing of it. For my part I almost like the smell. It is wholesome, and--er---- Oh, by Jove!"

There is a loud report,--a crash,--two terrified screams,--and then utter darkness. The base of the hill, being too dry, has treacherously gone off without warning: hence the explosion.

"You aren't hurt, are you?" asks Mr. Potts, a minute later, in a terrified whisper, being unable to see whether his companions are dead or alive.