The Parson O' Dumford Part 32

"My dear Miss Pelly," he said, laughing, "I like every innocent game. I think they all are as medicine to correct the acidity and bitterness of some of the hard work of life."

"Then you'll play croquet with us?"

"That I will."

"Oh, I am glad," cried Eve, with almost childish pleasure. "I can beat d.i.c.k easily now, Mr Selwood, for he neglects his croquet horribly.

Mind I don't beat you."

"I won't murmur," he said, laughing.

"But where's aunt?" cried Eve. "She came down before me."

"Aunt" had gone straight into the dining-room to see that all things were in a proper state of preparation, and had stopped short in the doorway on seeing Eve's reception of their guest.

She was about to step forward, when, unseen by him, she caught a glimpse of her son's countenance, as he watched the vicar. His teeth were set, his lips drawn slightly back, and a fierce look of anger puckered his forehead, as with fists clenched he made an involuntary movement after the couple who had entered the drawing-room.

Mrs Glaire drew back softly, and laying her hand on her beating heart, she walked to the other end of the dining-room, seating herself in one of the windows, half concealed by the curtain.

There was a smile upon her face, for, quick as lightning, a thought had flashed across her mind.

Here was the means at hand to bring her son to his senses. She had meant to take the vicar into her confidence, and ask his aid, stranger though he was, for she felt that his position warranted it; but now things had shaped themselves so that he was thoroughly playing into her hands.

She knew Eve, that she was ingenuous and truthful, and looked upon her marriage with her cousin as a matter of course. She was a girl who would consider a flirtation to be a crime towards the man who loved her; but the vicar would evidently be very attentive even as he had begun to be, and already Richard's ire was aroused. Richard jealous, she meditated, and he would be roused from his apathetic behaviour to Eve, and all would come right.

"And the vicar?" she asked herself.

Oh, he meant nothing, would mean nothing. He knew the relations of Richard and his cousin, and the plan would--must succeed.

But was she wrong? Was Richard annoyed at the vicar's demeanour towards Eve, or was it her imagination?

The answer came directly, for Richard flung into the room, took up a sherry decanter, and filling a gla.s.s, tossed it off.

"Curse him! I won't have him here," he said aloud. "What does he mean by talking to me like that? by hanging after Eve? I won't have it. You there, mother?"

"Yes, my son," she replied, rising and looking him calmly in the face.

"Look here, mother, I won't have that clerical cad here. What do you mean by asking him to dinner?"

"I asked him as a guest who has behaved very kindly to us, Richard. He is my guest. I asked him because I wished to have him; and you must recollect that he is a clergyman and a gentleman."

"If he wasn't a parson," cried Richard, writhing beneath his mother's clear cold glance, for it seemed to his guilty conscience that she could read in his face that he had broken his word about Daisy--"if he wasn't a parson I'd break his neck."

"Richard, I insist," cried his mother, in a tone that he had not heard since he had grown to manhood, and which reminded him of the days when he was sternly forced to obey, "if you insult Mr Selwood, you insult your mother."

"But the cad's making play after Eve--he's smiling and squeezing her hand, and the little jilt likes it."

"No wonder," said Mrs Glaire, calmly. "Women like attentions. You have neglected the poor girl disgracefully."

"What! are you going to allow it?" cried Richard. "I tell you he's making play for her."

"I shall not interfere," said Mrs Glaire, coldly. "I think Eve ought to have a good husband."

"But she's engaged to me!" half-shrieked Richard.

"Well," said his mother, coldly, though her heart was beating fast, "you are a man, and should counteract it. This is England, and in English society, little as I have seen of it, I know that engaged girls are not prisoners. They are, to a certain extent, free."

"I'll soon stop it," cried Richard, fiercely. "Stop it then, my son, but mind this: I insist upon proper respect being paid to Mr Selwood."

"I will," cried Richard, speaking in a deep-pitched voice. "I'll do something."

"Then I should take care that my pretensions to her hand were well known," said Mrs Glaire, with a peculiar look.

"Pretensions--her hand!" said Richard, with a sneer. "Are you mad, mother, that you take this tone? I will soon let them see. I'm not going to be played with."

He was about leaving the room, when his mother laid her hand upon his arm.

"Stop, Richard," she said, firmly. "Recollect this--"

"Well, what?"

"That it was the clear wish of your father and myself to make you a gentleman."

"Well, I am a gentleman," cried Richard, angrily.

"Bear it in mind then, my son; and remember that rude, rough ways disgust Eve, and injure your cause. Mr Selwood is a gentleman, and you must meet him as a gentleman."

"I don't know what you mean, mother," cried the young man, angrily.

"I mean this, that my son occupies the position of the first man in Dumford; and though his father was a poor workman, and his mother a workman's daughter--"

"There, don't always get flinging my birth in my teeth, mother--do, pray, sink the shop."

"I have no wish to remind you of your origin, Richard," said Mrs Glaire, with a sigh; "only I wish to make you remember that we educated you to be a gentleman, and that we have given you the means. Act like one."

"I shall do that; don't you be afraid," said Richard.

"And mind, Richard, a true gentleman keeps his word," said Mrs Glaire, meaningly.

"Well, so do I," exclaimed the young man, flus.h.i.+ng up. "What are you hinting at now?"

"I hope you do, my son; I hope you do," said Mrs Glaire, looking at him fixedly; and then, as a sharp knock came at the front door, she glided out of the room, and her voice was heard directly after in conversation with the bluff doctor.

"Oh, he's here, too, is he?" muttered d.i.c.k, biting his nails. "Hang it all! Curse it, how crookedly things go. I--there, hang it all!"

He stood, thinking, with knitted brows, and then hastily pouring out and tossing off another gla.s.s of sherry, and smiling in a way that looked very much like the twitch of the lip when a cur means to bite, he said, in a mock melodramatic voice--

"Ha--ha! we must dissemble!" and strode out of the room.