Molly Bawn Part 59

There is a decided pause. Dropping the check and coloring deeply, Cecil moves back a step or two. She betrays a little indignation in her glance,--a very little, but quite perceptible. Stafford sees it.

"I beg your pardon," he says, hastily, an expression of mingled pain and shame crossing his face. "I was wrong, of course. I will not buy your kisses. Here, take this bit of paper, and--forgive me."

He closes her somewhat reluctant fingers over the check. She is still blus.h.i.+ng, and has her eyes fixed on the ground, but her faint anger has disappeared. Then some thought--evidently a merry one--occurs to her; the corners of her mouth widen, and finally she breaks into a musical laugh.

"Thank you--very much," she says. "You are very good. It is something to have a husband, after all. And--if you would really care for it--I--don't mind letting you have one----Oh! here is somebody coming."

"There always _is_ somebody coming when least wanted," exclaims Sir Penthony, wrathfully, pus.h.i.+ng back his chair with much suppressed ire, as the door opens to admit Mr. Potts.

"'I hope I don't intrude,'" says Potts, putting his comfortable face and rosy head round the door; "but I've got an idea, and I must divulge it or burst. You wouldn't like me to burst, would you?" This to Lady Stafford, pathetically.

"I would not,--here," replies she, with decision.

"For fear you might, I shall take my departure," says Sir Penthony, who has not yet quite recovered either his disappointment or his temper, walking through the conservatory into the grounds beyond.

"I really wish, Plantagenet," says Lady Stafford, turning upon the bewildered Potts with most unaccountable severity, "you could manage to employ your time in some useful way. The dreadful manner in which you spend your days, wandering round the house without aim or reason, causes me absolute regret. _Do_ give yourself the habit of reading or--or doing something to improve your mind, whenever you have a spare moment."

So saying, she sweeps past him out of the room, without even making an inquiry about that priceless idea, leaving poor Potts rooted to the ground, striving wildly, but vainly, to convict himself of some unpardonable offense.

CHAPTER XXII.

"Love, thou art bitter."

--Blaine.

Mr. Amherst, having in a weak moment given his consent to the ball, repays himself by being as unamiable afterward as he can well manage.

"You can have your music and the supper from London, if you wish it,"

he says to Marcia, one day, when he has inveighed against the whole proceeding in language that borders on the abusive; "but if you think I am going to have an army of decorators down here, turning the house into a fancy bazar, and making one feel a stranger in one's own rooms, you are very much mistaken."

"I think you are right, dear," Marcia answers, with her customary meekness: "people of that kind are always more trouble than anything else. And no doubt we shall be able to do all that is necessary quite as well ourselves."

"As to that you can, of course, please yourself. Though why you cannot dance without filling the rooms with earwigs and dying flowers I can't conceive."

Mr. Amherst's word being like the law of the Medes and Persians, that altereth not, no one disputes it. They couple a few opprobrious epithets with his name just at first, but finally, putting on an air of resolution, declare themselves determined and ready to outdo any decorators in the kingdom.

"We shall wake up in the morning after the ball to find ourselves famous," says Lady Stafford. "The county will ring with our praises.

But we must have help: we cannot depend upon broken reeds." With a reproachful glance at Sir Penthony, who is looking the picture of laziness. "Talbot Lowry, of course, will a.s.sist us; _he_ goes without saying."

"I hope he will come without saying," puts in Sir Penthony; "it would be much more to the purpose. Any smart young tradesmen among your fellows, Mottie?"

"Unless Grainger. You know Grainger, Lady Stafford?"

"Indeed I do. What! is he stationed with you now? He must have re-joined very lately."

"Only the other day. Would he be of any use to you?"

"The very greatest."

"What! Spooney?" says Tedcastle, laughing. "I don't believe he could climb a ladder to save his life. Think of his pretty hands and his sweet little feet."

"And his lisp,--and his new eyegla.s.s," says Stafford.

"Never mind; I _will_ have him here," declares Cecil, gayly. "In spite of all you say, I positively adore that Grainger boy."

"You seem to have a pa.s.sion for fools," says Sir Penthony, a little bitterly, feeling some anger toward her.

"And you seem to have a talent for incivility," retorts she, rather nettled. This ends the conversation.

Nevertheless Mr. Grainger is asked to come and give what a.s.sistance he can toward adorning Herst, which, when they take into consideration the ladylike whiteness of his hands and the general imbecility of his countenance, is not set at a very high value.

He is a tall, lanky youth, with more than the usual allowance of bone, but rather less of intellect; he is, however, full of ambition and smiles, and is amiability itself all round. He is also desperately addicted to Lady Stafford. He has a dear little moustache, that undergoes much encouragement from his thumb and first finger, and he has a captivating way of saying "How charming!" or, "Very sweet," to anything that pleases him. And, as most things seem to meet his approbation, he makes these two brilliant remarks with startling frequency.

To Cecil he is a joy. In him she evidently finds a fund of amus.e.m.e.nt, as, during the three days it takes them to convert the ball-room, tea-room, etc., into perfumed bowers, she devotes herself exclusively to his society.

Perhaps the undisguised chagrin of Sir Penthony and Talbot Lowry as they witness her civility to Grainger goes far to add a zest to her enjoyment of that young man's exceedingly small talk.

After dinner on the third day all is nearly completed. A few more leaves, a few more flowers, a wreath or two to be distributed here and there, is all that remains to be done.

"I hate decorating in October," Cecil says. "There is such a dearth of flowers, and the gardeners get so greedy about the house plants. Every blossom looks as if it had been made the most of."

"Well, I don't know," replies Mr. Grainger, squeezing his gla.s.s into his eye with much difficulty, it being a new importation and hard to manage. When he has altered all his face into an appalling grin, and completely blocked the sight of one eye, he goes on affably: "I think all this--er--very charming."

"No? Do you? I'm _so_ glad. Do you know I believe you have wonderful taste? The way in which you tied that last bunch of trailing ivy had something about it absolutely artistic."

"If it hadn't fallen to pieces directly afterward, which rather spoiled the effect," says Sir Penthony, with an unkind smile.

"Did it? How sad! But then the idea remains, and that is everything.

Now, Mr. Grainger, please stand here--(will you move a little bit, Sir Penthony? Thanks)--just here--while I go up this ladder to satisfy myself about these flowers. By the bye,"--pausing on one of the rungs to look back,--"suppose I were to fall? Do you think you could catch me?"

"I only wish you would give me the opportunity of trying," replies he, weakly.

"Beastly puppy!" mutters Sir Penthony, under his breath.

"Perhaps I shall, if you are good. Now look. Are they straight? Do they look well?" asks Cecil.

"Very sweet," replies Mr. Grainger.

"Potts, hand me up some nails," exclaims Lowry, impatiently, who is on another ladder close by, and has been an attentive and disgusted listener; addressing Potts, who stands lost in contemplation of Grainger. "Look sharp, can't you? And tell me what you think of this."

Pointing to his design on the wall. "Is it 'all your fancy painted it?'

Is it 'lovely' and 'divine?' Answer."

"Very sour, I think," returns Mr. Potts, hitting off Grainger's voice to a nicety, while maintaining a countenance sufficiently innocent to border on the imbecile.