Airy Fairy Lilian Part 47

"Wrong, Tom. Yesterday I made it up. I like the 'infant' best. But what really saddens me is that I am by no means sure he likes _me_ best. He is terribly fond of Tom, and I sometimes fear thinks him the better fellow of the two."

At this moment the door opens and Taffy comes in.

"Why! Here is my 'infant,'" exclaims Mabel, surprised. "Dear Mr.

Musgrave, I had no idea I should meet you here."

"My dear Mrs. Steyne! I had no idea such luck was in store for me. I am so glad to see you again! Lilian, why didn't you break it to me? Joyful surprises are sometimes dangerous."

"I thought you knew. We have been discussing 'Mabel's' coming," with a shy smile, "all the past month."

"But how could I possibly guess that the 'Mabel' who was occupying everybody's thoughts could be my Mrs. Steyne?"

"Ours!" murmurs Tom, faintly.

"Yes, mine," says Taffy, who is not troubled with over-much shyness.

"Mr. Musgrave is your cousin?" Mabel asks, turning to Lilian.

"No, I am her son," says Taffy: "you wouldn't think it--would you? She is a good deal older than she looks, but she gets herself up wonderfully. She is not a bad mother," reflectively, "when one comes to think of it."

"I dare say if you spoke the truth you would confess her your guardian angel," says Mabel, letting a kindly glance fall on pretty Lilian. "She takes care of you, no doubt."

"And such care," answers Lilian; "but for me I do believe Taffy would have gone to the bad long ago."

"'Taffy'! what a curious name. So quaint,--and pretty too, I think. May I," with a quick irrepressible glance, that is half fun, half natural coquetry, "call you Taffy?"

"You may call me anything you like," returns that young gentleman, with the utmost _bonhommie_

"Call me Daphne, call me Chloris, Call me Lalage, or Doris, Only--_only_--call me thine!"

"It is really mortifying that I can't," says Mrs. Steyne, while she and the others all laugh.

"Sir," says Tom Steyne, "I would have you remember the lady you are addressing is my wife."

Says Taffy, reproachfully:

"Do you think I don't remember it,--to my sorrow?"

They have got down to dinner and as far as the fish by this time, so are all feeling friendly and good-natured.

"Tell you what you'll do, Mab," says Guy. "You shall come over here next week to stay with us, and bring baby and nurse with you,--and Tom, whether he likes it or not. We can give him as much good shooting as will cure him of his laziness."

"Yes, Mabel, indeed you must," breaks in Lady Chetwoode's gentle voice.

"I want to see that dear child very badly, and how can I notice all her pretty ways unless she stays in the house with me?"

"Say yes, Mrs. Steyne," entreats Taffy: "I shall die of grief if you refuse."

"Oh, that! Yes, auntie, I shall come, thank you, if only to preserve Mr.--Taffy's life. But indeed I shall be delighted to get back to the dear old home for a while; it is so dull at Steynemore all by ourselves."

"Thank you, darling," says Tom, meekly.

After dinner Mrs. Steyne, who has taken a fancy to Lilian, seats herself beside her in the drawing-room and chatters to her unceasingly of all things known and unknown. Guy, coming in later with the other men, sinks into a chair near Mabel, and with Miss Beauchamp's Fanchette upon his knee employs himself in stroking it and answering Mabel's numerous questions. He hardly looks at Lilian, and certainly never addresses her, in which he shows his wisdom.

"No, I can't bear the country," Mrs. Steyne is saying. "It depresses me."

"In the spring surely it is preferable to town," says Lilian.

"Is it? I suppose so, because I have so often heard it; but my taste is vitiated. I am not myself out of London. Of course Tom and I go somewhere every year, but it is to please fas.h.i.+on we go, not because we like it. You will say I exaggerate when I tell you that I find music in the very roll of the restless cabs."

Lilian tells her that she will be badly off for music of that kind at Steynemore; but perhaps the birds will make up for the loss.

"No, you will probably think me a poor creature when I confess to you I prefer Albani to the sweetest nightingale that ever trilled; that I simply detest the discordant noise made by the melancholy lamb; that I think the cuckoo tuneless and unmusical, and that I find no transcendent pleasure in the cooing of the fondest dove that ever mourned over its mate. These beauties of nature are thrown away upon me. Woodland groves and leafy dells are to me suggestive of suicide, and make me sigh for the 'sweet shady side of Pall Mall.' The country, in fact, is lonely, and my own society makes me shudder. I like noise and excitement, and the babel of tongues."

"You forget the flowers," says Lilian, triumphantly.

"No, my dear; experience has taught me I can purchase them cheaper and far finer than I can grow them for myself. I am a skeptic, I know,"

smiling. "I will not try to convert you to my opinion."

"Certainly I can see advantages to be gained from a town life," says Lilian, thoughtfully, leaning her elbow on a small table near her, and letting her chin sink into her little pink palm. "One has a larger circle of acquaintances. Here everything is narrowed. One lives in the house with a certain number of persons, and, whether one likes them or the reverse, one must put up with them. There is no escape. Yes,"--with an audible and thoroughly meant sigh,--"that is very sad."

This little ungracious speech, though uttered in the most innocent tone, goes home (as is intended) to Guy's heart. He conceals, however, all chagrin, and pulls the ears of the sleepy s...o...b..ll he is caressing with an air of the calmest unconcern.

"You mention a fact," says Mrs. Steyne, the faintest inflection of surprise in her manner. "But you, at least, can know nothing of such misery. Chetwoode is famous for its agreeable people, and you,--you appear first favorite here. For the last hour I have been listening, and I have heard only 'Lilian, look at this,' or, 'Lilian, listen to that,'

or 'Lilian, child, what was it you told me yesterday?' You seem a great pet with every one here."

Lilian laughs.

"Not with every one," she says.

"No?"--raising her straight dark brows. "Is there then an enemy in the camp? Not Cyril, surely?"

"Oh, no, not Cyril."

Their voices involuntarily have sunk a little, and, though any one near can still hear distinctly, they have all the appearance of people carrying on a private conversation.

"Guy?"

Lilian is silent. Guy's face, as he still strokes the dog dreamily, has grown haughty in the extreme. He, like Mabel, awaits her answer.

"What?" says Mrs. Steyne, in an amused tone, evidently treating the whole matter as a mere jest. "So you are not a pet with Guy! How horrible! I cannot believe it. Surely Guy is not so ungallant as to have conceived a dislike for you? Guy, do you hear this awful charge she is bringing against you? Won't you refute it? Dear boy, how stern you look!"

"Do I? I was thinking of something disagreeable."

"Of me?" puts in Lilian, _sotto voce_, with a faint laugh tinged with bitterness. "Why should you think what I say so extraordinary? Did you ever know a guardian like his ward, or a ward like her guardian? I didn't--especially the latter. They always find each other _such_ a mistake!"

Sir Guy, raising his head, looks full at Lilian for a moment; his expression is almost impossible to translate; then, getting up, he crosses the room deliberately and seats himself beside Florence, who welcomes him with one of her conventional smiles that now has something like warmth in it.