Peter's Mother Part 5

"We know your rights, Mary," said Miss Crewys. "Never shall it be said that dear Timothy's sisters ousted his wife from her proper place, because she did not happen to be present to occupy it."

"Besides," said Lady Belstone, "you have, no doubt, some excellent reason, my love, for the delay."

Lady Mary's blue eyes, glancing at John, said quite plainly and beseechingly to his understanding, "They are old, and rather cranky, but they don't mean to be unkind. Do forgive them;" and John smiled rea.s.suringly.

"I'm afraid I haven't much excuse to offer," she said ingenuously. "I was out late, and I tired myself; and then I heard Sir Timothy had come back, so I went to see him. And then I made haste to change my dress, and it took a long time--and that's all."

The three gentlemen laughed forgivingly at this explanation, and the two ladies exchanged shocked glances.

"Our cousin John did his best to entertain us, and we him," said Lady Belstone, stiffly.

"His best--and how good that must be!" said Lady Mary, with pretty spirit. "The great counsel whose eloquence is listened to with breathless attention in crowded courts, and read at every breakfast-table in England."

"That is a very delightful picture of the life of a briefless barrister," said John Crewys, smiling.

"Mary," said Miss Crewys, in lowered tones of reproof, "I understood that _divorce_ cases, unhappily, occupied the greater part of our cousin John's attention."

"We've heard of you, nevertheless--we've heard of you, Mr. Crewys,"

said the canon, nervously interposing, "even in this out-of-the-way corner of the west."

"But there is one breakfast-table, at least, in England, where divorce cases are _not_ perused, and that is my brother Timothy's breakfast-table," said Lady Belstone, very distinctly.

John hastened to fill up the awkward pause which ensued, by a reference to the beauty of the hall.

"I'm afraid we don't live up to our beautiful old house," said Lady Mary, shaking her head. "There are some lovely things stored away in the gallery upstairs, and some beautiful pictures hanging there, including the Vandyck, you know, which Charles II. gave to old Sir Peter, your cavalier ancestor. But the gallery is almost a lumber-room, for the floor is too unsafe to walk upon. And down here, as you see, we are terribly Philistine."

"This hall was furnished by my grandmother for her son's marriage,"

said Miss Crewys.

"And she sent all your great-grandmother's treasures to the attics,"

said Lady Mary, with rather a wilful intonation. "I always long to bring them to light again, and to make this place livable; but my husband does not like change."

"Dear Timothy is faithful to the past," said Miss Crewys, majestically.

"I wish old Lady Crewys had been as faithful," said Lady Mary, shrugging her shoulders.

"Young people always like changes," said Lady Belstone, more leniently.

"Young people!" said Lady Mary, with a rather pathetic smile.

"John will think you are laughing at me. Am I to be young still at five-and-thirty?"

"To be sure," said John, "unless you are going to be so unkind as to make a man only ten years your senior feel elderly."

Miss Crewys interposed with a simple statement. "In my day, the age of a lady was never referred to in polite conversation. Least of all by herself. I never allude to mine."

"You are unmarried, Georgina," said Lady Belstone, unexpectedly turning upon her ally. "Unmarried ladies are always sensitive on the subject of age. I am sure I do not care who knows that my poor admiral was twenty years my senior. And _his_ age can be looked up in any book of reference. It would have been useless to try and conceal it,--a man so well known."

"A woman is as old as she looks," said the canon, soothingly, for the annoyance of Miss Crewys was visible. "I am bound to say that Miss Crewys looks exactly the same as when I first knew her."

"Of course, a spinster escapes the wear and tear of matrimony," said Miss Crewys, glaring at her widowed relative.

"H'm, h'm!" said Dr. Blundell. "By-the-by, have you inspected the old picture gallery, Mr. Crewys?"

"Not yet," said John.

Lady Belstone shot a glance of speechless indignation at her sister.

Sympathy between them was immediately restored. Prompt action was necessary on the part of the family, or this presumptuous physician would be walking round the house to show John Crewys the portraits of his own ancestors.

"_I_ shall be delighted to show our cousin the pictures in the gallery and in the dining-room," said Miss Crewys, "if my sister Isabella will accompany me, and if Lady Mary has no objections."

"You are very kind," said John. He rose and walked to a small rosewood cabinet of curios. "I see there are some beautiful miniatures here."

"Oh, those do not belong to the family."

"They are Setoun things--some of the few that came to me," said Lady Mary, rather timidly. "I am afraid they would not interest you."

"Not interest me! But indeed I care only too much for such things,"

said John. "Here is a Cosway, and, unless I very much mistake, a Plimer,--and an Engleheart."

Lady Mary unlocked the cabinet with pretty eagerness, and put a small morocco case into his hands.

"Then here is something you will like to see."

For a moment John did not understand. He glanced quickly from the row of tiny, pearl-framed, old-world portraits, of handsome n.o.bles and rose-tinted court dames, to the very indifferent modern miniature he held.

The portrait of a schoolboy,--an Eton boy with a long nose and small, grey eyes, and an expression distinctly rather sulky and lowering than open or pleasing. Not a stupid face, however, by any means.

"It is my boy--Peter," said Lady Mary, softly.

To her the face was something more than beautiful. She looked up at John with a happy certainty of his interest in her son.

"Here he is again, when he was younger. He was a pretty little fellow then, as you see."

"Very pretty. But not very like you," said John, scarcely knowing what he said.

He was strangely moved and touched by her evident confidence in his sympathy, though his artistic tastes were outraged by the two portraits she asked him to admire. He reflected that women were very extraordinary creatures; ready to be pleased with anything Providence might care to bestow upon them in the shape of a child, even cross-looking boys with long noses and small eyes. The heir of Barracombe resembled his aunts rather than his parents.

"He is a thorough Crewys; not a bit like me. All the Setouns are fair, I believe. Peter is very dark. He is such a big fellow now; taller than I am. I sometimes wish," said Lady Mary, laying the miniature on the table as though she could not bear to shut it away immediately, "that one's children never grew up. They are such darlings when they are little, and they are bound, of course, to disappoint one sometimes as they grow older."

John Crewys felt almost murderously inclined towards Peter. So the young cub had presumed to disappoint his mother as he grew older! How dared he?

Poor Lady Mary was quite unconscious of the feelings with which he gazed at the little case in his hand.

"Not that my boy has ever _really_ disappointed me--yet," she said, with her pretty apologetic laugh. "I only mean that, in the course of human nature, it's bound to come, now and then."

"No doubt," said John, gently.

Then she allowed him to examine the rest of the cabinet, whilst she talked on, always of Peter--his horsemans.h.i.+p and his shooting and his prowess in every kind of sport and game.