Airy Fairy Lilian Part 34

She moves him aside with one small finger, the better to see how charming she is in another gla.s.s. This one reveals to her all the sweetness she has seen before--and something more. Scarcely has she glanced into it, when her complexion, that a moment since was a soft and lovely pink, changes suddenly, and flames into a deep crimson. There, at the farthest end of the long room reflected in the gla.s.s,--staring back at her,--coatless, motionless, with a brush suspended from each hand, stands a man, lost in wonder and most flattering astonishment.

Miss Chesney, turning round with a start, finds that this vision is not belonging to the other world, but is a real _bona fide_ creature of flesh and blood,--a young man, tall, broad-shouldered, and very dark.

For a full minute they stare silently at each other, oppressed with thoughts widely different in character, while Taffy remains blissfully ignorant of the situation, being now engaged in a desperate conflict with a refractory tie. Then one of the brushes falls from the stranger's hand, and the spell is broken. Miss Chesney, turning impetuously, proceeds to pour out the vials of her wrath upon Taffy.

"I think you might have told me," she says, in clear, angry tones, casting upon him a glance meant to wither. But Mr. Musgrave distinctly refuses to be withered.

"Eh? What? _By Jove!_" he says, vaguely, as the awful truth dawns upon him. Meanwhile Lilian sweeps majestically to the door, her velvets trailing behind her. All her merry kittenish ways have disappeared; she walks as a young queen might who has been grossly affronted in open court.

"Give you my honor I quite forgot him," murmurs Taffy, from the spot where he is rooted through sheer dismay. His tones are dismal in the extreme, but Miss Chesney disdains to hear or argue, and, going out, closes the door with much determination behind her. The stranger, suppressing a smile, stoops to pick up the fallen brush, and the scene is at an end.

Down the stairs, full of vehement indignation, goes Lilian, thoughts crowding upon her thick and heavy. Could anything be more unfortunate?

Just when she had got herself up in the most effective style,--just when she had hoped, with the aid of this velvet gown, to make a pleasing and dignified _entree_ into his presence in the drawing-room below,--she has been led into making his acquaintance in Taffy's bedroom! Oh! horror!

She has been face to face with him in his s.h.i.+rt-sleeves, with his odious brushes in his hands, and a stare of undeniable surprise upon his hateful face! Oh! it is insupportable!

And what was it she said to Taffy? What did she do? Hastily her mind travels backward to the conversation that has just taken place.

First, _she combed Taffy's hair_. Oh! miserable girl! She closes two azure eyes with two slender fingers from the light of day, as this thought occurs to her. Then, she smirked at her own graceful image in Taffy's gla.s.s, and made all sorts of conceited remarks about her personal appearance, and then she said she hoped to subjugate "_him_."

What "him" could there be but this one? and of course he knows it. Oh!

unhappy young woman!

As for Taffy, bad, bad boy that he is, never to give her a hint.

Vengeance surely is in store for him. What right had he to forget? If there is one thing she detests, it is a person devoid of tact. If there is one thing she could adore, it would be the power to shake the wretched Taffy out of his shoes.

What is there left to her but to gain her room, plead bad headache, and spend the remainder of the evening in retirement? In this mood she gains the drawing-room door, and, hesitating before it, thinks better of the solitary-confinement idea; and, entering the room, seats herself in a cozy chair and prepares to meet her fate with admirable calmness.

Dinner is ready,--waiting,--and still no Archibald. Then there is a step in the hall, the door is thrown open, and he enters, as much hurried as it is possible for a well-bred young man to be in this nineteenth century.

Lady Chetwoode instantly says, with old-fas.h.i.+oned grace, the sweeter that it is somewhat obsolete,----

"Lilian, permit me to introduce to you your cousin, Archibald Chesney."

Whereupon Lilian bows coldly and refuses to meet her cousin's eyes, while kind Lady Chetwoode thinks it is a little stiff of the child, and most unlike her, not to shake hands with her own kin.

An awkward pause is almost inevitable, when Taffy says out loud, to no one in particular, but with much gusto:

"How odd it is they should never have seen each other until now!" after which he goes into silent agonies of merriment over his own wit, until brought to his senses by an annihilating glance from Lilian.

The dinner-hour is remarkable for nothing except Lilian's silence. This, being so utterly unexpected, is worthy of note. After dinner, when the men gain the drawing-room, Archibald, coming over, deliberately pushes aside Miss Chesney's velvet skirts, and seats himself on the low ottoman beside her with modest determination.

Miss Chesney, raising her eyes, regards him curiously.

He is tall, and eminently gloomy in appearance. His hair is of a rare blackness, his eyes are dark, so is his skin. His eyebrows are slightly arched, which gives him an air of melancholy protest against the world in general. His nose is of the high and mighty order that comes under the denomination of aquiline, or hooked, as may suit you best. Before his arrival Cyril used to tell Lilian that if Nature had meant him for anything it was to act as brigand in a private theatre; and Lilian, now calling to mind this remark, acknowledges the truth of it, and almost laughs in the face of her dark-browed cousin. Nevertheless she refrains from outward mirth, which is wisdom on her part, as ridicule is his _bete noir_.

Despite the extreme darkness of his complexion he is unmistakably handsome, though somewhat discontented in expression. Why, no one knows.

He is rich, courted, as are all young men with a respectable rent-roll, and might have made many a t.i.tled _debutante_ Mrs. Chesney had he so chosen. He has not even a romantic love-affair to fall back upon as an excuse for his dejection; no unfortunate attachment has arisen to sour his existence. Indeed, it is seldom the owner of landed property has to complain on this score, all such luxuries being reserved for the poor of the earth.

Archibald Chesney's gloom, which is becoming if anything, does not sink deeper than his skin. It gives a certain gentleness to his face, and prevents the ignorant from guessing that he is one of the wildest, maddest young men about London. Lilian, regarding him with quiet scrutiny, decides that he is good to look at, and that his eyes are peculiarly large and dark.

"Are you angry with me for what happened up-stairs?" he asks, gently, after a pause spent in as earnest an examination of her as any she has bestowed upon him.

"Up-stairs?" says Lilian, with raised brows of inquiry and carefully studied ignorance.

"I mean my unfortunate _rencontre_ with you in Musgrave's room."

"Oh, dear, no," with clear denial. "I seldom grow angry over _trifles_.

I have not thought of it since." She utters her fib bravely, the truth being that all during dinner she has been consumed with shame.

"Have you not? _I_ have. I have been utterly miserable ever since you bestowed that terrible look upon me when your eyes first met mine. Won't you let me explain my presence there? I think if you do you will forgive me."

"It was not your fault: there is nothing about which you need apologize," says Lilian; but her tone is more cordial, and there is the faintest dimpling of a smile around her mobile lips.

"Nevertheless I hate myself in that I caused you a moment's uneasiness,"

says Mr. Chesney, that being the amiable word he employs for her ill-temper. "I shall be discontented until I tell you the truth: so pray let me."

"Then tell it," says Lilian.

"I have a man, a perfect treasure, who can do all that man can possibly do, who is in fact faultless,--but for one small weakness."

"And that is?"

"Like Mr. Stiggins, his vanity is--brandy hot. Now and then he drinks more of it than is good for him, though to do him justice not very often. Once in six months, regular as clockwork, he gets hopelessly drunk, and just now the time being up, he, of course, chose this particular day to make his half-yearly exhibition of himself, and having imbibed brandy _ad lib._, forgot to bring himself and my traps to Chetwoode in time for the first dressing-bell."

"What a satisfactory sort of servant!"

"He is, very, when he is sober,--absolutely invaluable. And then his little mistakes occur so seldom. But I wish he had not chosen this night of all others in which to play me false. I don't know what I should have done had I not thrown myself upon Musgrave's mercy and borrowed his brushes and combs and implements of war generally. As it was, I had almost given up hope of being able to reach the drawing-room at all to-night, when just at the last moment my 'treasure' arrived with my things and--any amount of concealed spirits. Do I bore you with my explanation? It is very good of you to listen so patiently, but I should have been too unhappy had I been prevented from telling you all this."

"I think, after all, it is I should explain my presence in that room,"

says Lilian, with a gay, irresistible laugh that causes Guy, who is at the other end of the room, to lift his head and regard her anxiously.

He is sitting near Florence, on a sofa (or rather, to speak more correctly, she is sitting near him), and is looking bored and _gene_.

Her laugh pains him unaccountably; glancing next at her companion he marks the still admiration in the dark face as it gazes into her fair one. Already--_already_--he is surely _empresse_.

"But the fact is," Lilian is saying, "I have always been in the habit of visiting Taffy's room before he has quite finished his dressing, to see if there be any little final touch required that I might give him. Did you meet him in London?"

"No; never saw him until a couple of hours ago. Very nice little fellow, I should say. Cousin of yours?"

"Yes: isn't he a pet?" says Lilian, eagerly, always glad to hear praise of her youthful plunger. "There are very few like him. He is my nearest relative, and you can't think how I love that boy."

"That boy is, I should say, older than you are."

"Ye--es," doubtfully, "so he says: about a year, I think. Not that it matters," says Miss Chesney, airily, "as in reality I am any number of years older than he is. He is nothing but a big child, so I have to look after him."

"You have, I supposed, const.i.tuted yourself his mother?" asks Archibald, intensely amused at her pretty a.s.sumption of maternity.

"Yes," with a grave nod, "or his elder sister, just as I feel it my duty at the moment to pet or scold him."

"Happy Taffy!"