Margaret Capel Volume I Part 11

"Not longer? Why you must furnish all your friends with purses."

"But I seldom make them. This is only the second I have made with beads; one to learn by--and this other, to give to--somebody."

"To Mr. Grey!"

"You cannot be sure of that. It is a very good guess; but I have other friends. I might mean it for Mr. Warde."

"You glanced at Mr. Grey when you spoke of giving it away."

"Did I, indeed? You should not watch people."

"Is that a general rule? Or only applicable to the present company?"

Margaret laughed, and made no answer.

"Pray, has Mr. Warde begun to teach you Latin yet?" he asked.

"No," said Margaret.

"How is that? Are you afraid of your complexion? I think Mr. Grey threatened you with premature age, if you meddled with Latin. Did not he?"

"That is not the reason," said Margaret, "but I am too busy at present."

"I should like very much to know what is your favourite study just now.

Waltzing, I think."

"Waltzing, indeed!" said Margaret; "I could waltz years ago."

"You won't tell me then, what pursuit engrosses you at present; it must be something mysterious. Judicial astrology?"

Margaret turned away laughing, "I wish first that it was true, and next that I knew it," she said.

"Would you then like to read the future?" he asked.

"Perhaps not, when it came to the point," she replied.

"What, Land, here already?" said Mr. Grey, waking up at the jingle of the keys and candlesticks; "who would believe it was eleven o'clock?"

"Not I for one," whispered Mr. Haveloc, as he moved to open the door for Margaret.

She did not know how it was. She supposed he must have held out his hand; but she found herself actually shaking hands with him for the first time.

CHAPTER VIII.

_Ray._ You have a merry heart if you can guide it.

_Fol._ Yes faith, so, so; I laugh not at those whom I fear; I fear not those whom I love; and I love not any whom I laugh not at. Pretty strange humour, is't not?

_Ray._ To any one that knows you not, it is.

THE SUN'S DARLING.

The next morning Mr. Haveloc went to his estate as he had intended; and Margaret found herself again in undisturbed possession of Ashdale. But for fear she should enjoy her liberty too much, Hubert Gage found his way to the house almost every morning. He knew very well that when he could not obtain his sister's company, Margaret would not come down to see him, if he seemed to pay a formal visit, but he always contrived to have some message, or some piece of music, some excellent advice about her greyhound, or other trifling pa.s.sport to her presence; and when Elizabeth did go with him, it was very easy to loiter the whole morning there; that is to say, from a little before luncheon to a little before dinner.

Mr. Grey's only idea on the subject was, that Hubert Gage was a very fine young man, and very attentive to his sister.

Captain Gage was more clear-sighted; he told Elizabeth that Hubert seemed to have taken a fancy to Margaret; that she was a very nice little girl, well born and handsome; that he understood she had ten thousand pounds for her fortune, and it was very likely that Mr. Grey would leave her something very considerable; so that a younger son, as Hubert was, would have reason to think himself very well off if he could win her. That they were a couple of children, and that it was quite a consideration for the future. He should get him afloat again as soon he could, and if he came back in the same mind with regard to Margaret, then they would see about it.

Just at this time, the stability of his attachment was put to a slight test.

When he first returned home, his father wrote to his brother George who was with his regiment in Ireland, urging him to obtain leave of absence, that he might come over and see his brother. Captain Gage thus counted on having two of his sons at home together, for he was very much attached to his children, and nothing gave him greater satisfaction than to have them about him.

Now George Gage liked his brother very much, and would have had no objection to pay his father a visit, but it happened that a steeple-chase, in which he was deeply interested, was coming off at that time, so he wrote to say that he could not get leave of absence, which was so far true that he had never applied for it; but strongly recommended Hubert to take the trouble of crossing over to see him, holding out many inducements to that effect; the most powerful of which was the steeple-chase.

Captain Gage, who had pa.s.sed his life in the delusion that it was impossible for a gentleman to swerve by a hair's breadth from the truth, firmly believed his son's statement, and advised Hubert to set off at once for Ireland. It was provoking enough, he said, that George could not get leave at present, but since there was a way for them to meet, why the best thing was to avail himself of it without delay.

He was very glad, he said to Elizabeth, to find by George's letter, how very anxious he was to have Hubert with him; for there was nothing so delightful as to see the members of a family attached to each other.

Elizabeth acceded to this remark, although she had not as firm a persuasion of her brother's warmth of feeling as her father had.

So Hubert set off in a day or two; after having called at Ashdale to take what he intended to be a very impressive farewell of Margaret; but it so happened that the antics of her Italian greyhound, which had become entangled in its silver chain, amused them both so highly, that they spent the whole time in laughing, so that when he rose to go, it was as much as he could manage to make his adieux intelligible.

Mrs. Somerton and her youngest daughter had returned to the vicarage, where they spent that part of the year which was not pa.s.sed in visiting among their relatives and friends. The eldest daughter had been invited by an aunt to spend the season in London, and Blanche took up her abode in the retired village of Ashdale with very decided feelings of discontent and mortification.

Now I am sorry to say that Blanche Somerton, although very pretty, was not very good. She was rather tall, and slightly made, with very small head, hands, and feet. Her complexion was delicately pale, and her face like a child's with bright black eyes, a short nose, and a pretty mouth always half open and displaying a set of small and pearly teeth. But as a set off to these attractions, she hardly ever told the truth, even in the veriest trifles. She would tell a falsehood about the colour of a ribbon, and would say that a friend wore a white dress, simply because it happened to be green. Sometimes these mistakes a.s.sumed a more serious character, but if she was found out in any of them she merely laughed.

They were very poor. Her mother was always embarra.s.sed in money matters, and although she had recourse to many contrivances to eke out her small income, they were insufficient to keep her out of debt. Had it not been for Mr. Warde's frequent kindness, I really believe the poor woman would have found her way to a prison. Their's was bitter poverty; far more bitter and hard to bear than the physical poverty of the poor. Their's was the constant effort at maintaining an appearance among their friends, almost all of whom were in a condition of life superior to their own. The wearing anxiety of heavy and increasing debts, and the dread lest the fact should become known, and prevent the girls from settling. She had applied so often and drawn so largely upon Mr. Warde, that she could not reasonably expect that he would do much more to a.s.sist her. She was again in debt, yet she continued to order at every house, where she had any credit left, all sorts of finery for herself and her daughters, in the hope that it might facilitate their establishment. She thought under these circ.u.mstances that it would be advisable for Blanche to marry Hubert Gage. He was a second son, and a Lieutenant in the Navy. These were not agreeable facts, but she took it for granted he would be made a Commander in a year or two, and then he might afford to marry if his father chose to "behave handsomely;" a comprehensive term, which seems to mean, a behaviour as opposed as possible to what you have any right to expect.

But although Mrs. Somerton sketched out a plan of action with great ease and rapidity, it was necessary that she should engage her daughter to carry it out, or her trouble would be in vain. These cabinet councils were seldom of a very placid character. It was, perhaps, natural that poverty should have embittered Mrs. Somerton's temper--it was never very even--and at this period it might be aptly described by the word fractious. One of Blanche's greatest faults was, that she would never submit in silence to her mother's peevish remonstrances, although they seldom made her angry; she either laughed, or turned them into ridicule.

Mrs. Somerton now stated the case to her daughter as strongly as she could, reproached her with being still single, reminded her that sailors were very easily attracted, and urged her to lose no time in supplanting Margaret, who she said must be a shockingly forward little creature to have made herself already the talk of the place with Hubert Gage.

Blanche was lying on the sofa reading a novel, and the only notice she took of her mother's eloquence was to nod her head, and turn over a page.

Mrs. Somerton naturally grew irritable and impetuous, and it was not until she was fairly angry that her daughter threw aside the book, and joined in the conversation.

"Yes--yes. Dear me! don't disturb yourself," said the amiable Blanche.

"I mean to detach Hubert from that pretty little doll; but I shall not throw myself away upon a beggar, and a second son, I a.s.sure you."

"Hubert Gage is not a beggar," interposed Mrs. Somerton, "he has five hundred a year of his own."

"The mighty sum!" exclaimed Blanche, "but I intend to have somebody else."

"Well, let me hear who it is?"