The Eldest Son Part 18

"Well," said the Judge reflectively, "I'm bound to say it surprises me, but there is every sign of his holding out till Doomsday, or, which puts a more likely period to it, till something unforeseen happens."

"Till he hears that d.i.c.k has married her, for instance."

"There wouldn't be much object in his holding out after that. But there is seldom much object in Edward's divagations. He is swayed by his prejudices and by the impulses of the moment. Still, I'll do him justice: he is acting as sensibly as he knows how in this crisis. I believe he loves d.i.c.k better than any being upon earth, with the possible exception of himself. I really believe he loves him better than himself. Of course d.i.c.k represents Kencote, and the family, and the line, and all the whole clamjamphrie, which partly accounts for it.

At any rate he is causing his stupid old self an infinity of worry and annoyance, and all for the sake of what he considers a principle. I should say that d.i.c.k is acting foolishly in holding off altogether. I dare say Nina told you he has not answered a single letter. It has always struck me that he had Edward completely under his thumb, and I should have said that he had only to hang on here and play his cards well and Edward would have given way. Now he is stiffening himself up."

"I suppose they are both stiffening themselves up."

"You put it in a nutsh.e.l.l. Fancy Edward giving up his season's hunting so that he shan't be obliged to set eyes on his aversion! That impresses me. He is in dead earnest. He will stop this marriage if he can."

"But d.i.c.k is just as obstinate."

"It is the case of the irresistible body and the immovable force."

"Didn't you make any suggestion?"

"Yes, I did. I suggested that he should stipulate for a year's delay.

I pointed out that if the lady was the bad character he supposes her to be, d.i.c.k, with the sense he has inherited from his father--I said that, G.o.d forgive me--would come to see it in that time."

"Did he take to the idea?"

"Not at all. When did Edward ever take to any idea at first sight?

But it will sink in, and I shall give Tom Beach a hint to follow it up."

"I believe it will be the best way, and Nina is going to try and see d.i.c.k when she comes up with me next week."

The Judge stroked his chin. "H'm!" he said. "I'm afraid Nina has very little power to help matters."

"I am much more sorry for Nina than I am for Edward."

"Oh, so am I," interpolated the Judge.

"It is the thing I can least forgive d.i.c.k--his treating his mother practically in the same way as Edward treats her--as if she were of no account. It doesn't promise well for the happiness of this Lady George, or whoever he does come to marry."

"Let's hope for her own sake that she won't make Nina's mistake."

"You mean----"

"Oh, Nina laid herself down to be trampled on from the very first. She had plenty of character. She could have stood out. Now, whatever character she has has been buried under a mountain weight of stolid stupidity. She can't call her soul her own."

"I think she would act--and against Edward--if she saw her way to act effectively."

"She would be laying up a pretty bad time for herself if she did act against Edward in any way."

"Oh, but she wouldn't mind that if she thought it was her duty."

"Well, she can try. And she might put that idea of mine to d.i.c.k. Let him promise not to marry the lady for a year. He has been a bachelor for thirty-five or so, and he can stand another. I believe it might be the solution. I suppose we had better be going down now."

It was an unusually large party for Kencote that a.s.sembled at dinner.

The Squire took in Lady Aldeburgh, who must have been five-and-forty if a day, but either by a special dispensation of Providence, or by mysterious arts marvellously concealed, was still enabled to present herself to the world as eight-and-twenty. The Squire did not quite approve of this, but the illusion was so complete that he found himself talking to her as if she were a girl. She was beautifully gowned in blue and silver, and wore the Aldeburgh diamonds, which sparkled on the clear white skin of her neck, on her corsage, and in the smooth ripples of her hair. She was attractive enough to the eye to make it possible for her to indulge in moods for the heightening of her charm.

Sometimes she was all childish gaiety and innocence; sometimes the deep melancholy of her soul looked out of her violet eyes, which were so good that they had to be given their chance; sometimes she was ice.

This evening she had begun on a pouting note, which she had often found effective with elderly gentlemen, but finding the Squire impervious to its appeal and plainly puzzled by it, remembering also that she had on her diamonds, she had exchanged it for the air of a _grande dame_, humanised by maternal instinct.

"Mother is telling Mr. Clinton how she has devoted herself to my bringing-up," whispered Lady Susan to Humphrey. "Is he likely to be impressed at all, do you think?"

"He is likely to be bowled over by the result," replied Humphrey gallantly, and Lady Susan, who was not so pretty as her mother, and only slightly more sensible, told him not to be an idiot.

Of Lady Birkett's two daughters, Beatrice, the elder, had been accompanied by her husband, Sir George Senhouse, the rising young politician, whose handsome, intellectual head would have made him remarked anywhere, but whose bent shoulders, grey temples, and carelessness of dress made him seem older than his years. The younger, Angela, sat by the man she was going to marry, Hammond-Watt, the youngest K.C. at the Bar. The inclusion of these two men in the party had caused Bobby Trench, Humphrey's friend, to ask if he had come to Kencote for a ball or a political meeting, and to suggest the advisability of clearing out again before he should be asked for a speech. This young gentleman, to whom the accident of birth had brought the privilege of taking in his hostess, and whose other neighbour had been Beatrice Birkett, asked himself before dinner was over what he had come for, ball or no ball. He was accustomed to s.h.i.+ne in smart country houses, and Kencote was not at all smart. He had found Mrs. Clinton unresponsive to his light chatter, and Angela Birkett so taken up with the conversation of her K.C. that she had little attention to spare for him. George Senhouse, who sat opposite to him, made no effort to follow his lead, and, in fact, ignored him as far as possible, which secretly annoyed him. Lady Aldeburgh, who would have permitted him to flirt with her, was beyond his reach, and her daughter was too much taken up with Humphrey to do more than exchange a light sally or two with him. He was reduced to eating his dinner, which was a very good one, and, in large intervals of silence, to gazing around upon the company and inwardly ejaculating, "Never again!"

When the ladies had left the room the Squire, with old-fas.h.i.+oned courtesy, brought the decanters down to his end of the table and engaged him in conversation about his father.

"I recollect very well," said the Squire, in his loud, confident tones, "when Cane Chair won the Derby at thirty-to-one, by George!--dear me, I should be afraid to say how many years ago. He belonged to your grandfather, and of course we were all on him. Your father and I----"

"Oh yes, he's told me that story dozens of times," said Bobby Trench.

"Oh!" said the Squire, somewhat disconcerted. "Yes, I suppose he has."

"We haven't heard it dozens of times," said George Senhouse. "What was the story, Mr. Clinton?"

The Squire turned towards him and his face lightened. "I haven't thought about it for years," he said. "It's just come back to me. Jim Trench and I made up our minds we would go and see the horse run, so we got out of a window at four o'clock in the morning--did I say it was when we were at Cambridge together?--and drove tandem to Hitchin, where we got a train to London. I recollect we had sent on a change of horses to--to some place half-way. We slunk about amongst the crowd, as Jim's father was particular--wouldn't bet even on his own horses and all that sort of thing, and I don't blame him; I haven't had a bet on a horse since I was in the Blues;--and he wouldn't have taken it well to see Jim at Epsom when he ought to have been at Cambridge. Well, we saw the horse win, and, by George! I should be afraid to say how much money your father"--here he turned again towards Bobby Trench--"took off the bookies."

"Pots," said Bobby laconically. "But he lost it all over the Leger."

"Ah, well, the best thing he could have done," said the Squire. "I had put on a tenner, and both of us had had a little ready-money transaction on the course after we'd seen the horse canter; so we went back to London with a pocketful each, and by George!"--here the Squire laughed his great laugh--"we'd dropped it all to a pack of card-sharpers before we got there. We were pretty green in those days, and it was all our own fault, so we didn't quarrel with the fellows--we'd tried to have them, and they'd had us instead. We made 'em show us how it was done, so that we shouldn't be had again, and I recollect they said we were a couple of good sportsmen and gave us a sovereign or two back to get us to Cambridge, or we should have had to walk there, by George!

"But that wasn't the end of it," proceeded the Squire after he had done justice to his youthful memories with a hearty laugh. "We celebrated the occasion with a supper of the True Blue Club, in your father's rooms--has he told you that?"

"I don't know whether he's ever told me the truth about it," admitted Bobby Trench.

"Weil, it's a long time ago," said the Squire, "and we were all young and foolish. It was a lively supper, and your father went out for a little fresh air. They used to keep the college b.u.t.tery stores in barges on the river in those days, and after wandering about a bit and climbing a few fences and gates for purposes of his own he found himself on the St. John's barge. Then he thought he'd like a bath, and it didn't somehow occur to him to go in over the side, so he knocked a hole in the bottom of the barge and sank her, by George!"

Here the Squire interrupted himself to laugh again. "He had all the bath he wanted, and the wonder is he wasn't drowned," he concluded.

"Well, we had some pretty lively times in those days, and it doesn't do you any harm to recall them occasionally. I should like to see your father again. It must be thirty years since I set eyes on him. Wonder if he'd care to come and shoot one of these days?"

Bobby Trench said he was sure he would be delighted, and undertook to deliver a message, which he fulfilled later on by informing his father that his one-time friend had developed into a regular old turnip-h.o.e.r, and if he wanted to sit and listen to long-winded yarns about nothing Kencote was the place to go to.

CHAPTER XIII

THE HUNT BALL

The a.s.sembly Room of the Royal Hotel at Bathgate had been the scene of many fas.h.i.+onable gatherings in days gone by, when London had not been so easy of access, and the rank and fas.h.i.+on of South Meads.h.i.+re had been wont to meet there for their mutual enjoyment, on nights when the moon was round and roads not too deep in mire. The Regent had once shown his resplendent presence there, having been entertained at Kencote by Beau Clinton, who hated the place and spent its revenues in London, but had furbished it up at rare expense--to the tradesmen who did the work--for the reception of his royal patron. The Prince had expressed himself pleased with what had been done, and told his host that it was surprising what you could do with a d.a.m.ned dull hole like that when you tried; but he had not repeated his visit, and Beau Clinton's extravagance had soon after been redeemed by his brother the merchant, who succeeded him as Squire of Kencote, and just in time, or there would have been nothing to succeed to.

The royal visit to the a.s.sembly at Bathgate was still to be recalled by the l.u.s.tre chandelier in the middle of the room which was surmounted by the Prince of Wales's feathers. The landlord of those days had followed the example of Beau Clinton, except in the matter of forgetting to pay his tradespeople, and spent a large sum in decorating the room; and he thought himself well repaid when the princely patron of the arts had remarked that it was "devilish chaste." It had hardly been touched since. The red silk panels on the walls were faded, and here and there frayed, and the white paint which surrounded them was much the worse for wear. Of the Sheraton settees that had once surrounded the walls only one remained, on the das at the end of the room. It was that on which the royal form had reposed, and the present landlord had refused, it was reported, a large sum for it. There was a musicians' gallery at the opposite end of the room, and sconces for candles between the panels. It was still a handsome room, and on the annual occasion of the South Meads.h.i.+re Hunt Ball, its shabbiness disguised with flowers, it had quite an air. But it was small for these latter days, and, for the dancers, apt to be inconveniently crowded. Bobby Trench, after he had had his toes trodden on and his s.h.i.+rt-front crumpled, inwardly repeated his e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns of dinner-time, "Never again!"

But he was, fortunately, in a minority. The bulk of the healthy open-air-looking young men and the pretty country-bred girls who footed it to the strains of a brisk and enlivening string band were not so particular as he. They smiled at the mishaps of others and laughed at their own, and enjoyed themselves thoroughly, as young men and women do who are not surfeited with pleasure. Their elders looked on from the rout seats placed round the room, or from their place of vantage on the das, and in the intervals of the babel of talk--for nearly all of them knew one another and had a great deal to say--thought of their own young days and were pleased to see their pleasure repeated by their sons and daughters. There is no ball like a country ball, not too overwhelmingly invaded from London or elsewhere. It has the essence of sociability, where people meet who do not meet too often, and there is something for the young ones to do and the old ones to look on at. If the Bobby Trenches who happen upon it compare it unfavourably with more splendid entertainments, it is to be doubted if those entertainments are so much enjoyed by those who take part in them, except perhaps by the novices, to whom all gaiety is glamour.