Mildred Arkell Volume Iii Part 31

"That was just the reason," returned Travice, in his usual candid manner; "I waited until she should be gone."

If there was one thing that vexed Mrs. Arkell worse than the fact itself, it was the open way in which her son steadily resisted the hints to him on the subject of Miss Fauntleroy. She felt at times that she could have beaten him; she was feeling so now. Her temper turned acrid, her face flushed, her voice rose.

"Travice, if you persist in this systematic rudeness----"

"Pardon me, mother. I wish you would refrain from bringing up the subject of Miss Fauntleroy to me. I do not care to hear of her in any way; she----Who's that? Why, I do believe it's Lucy's voice!"

The colloquy with Mrs. Arkell had taken place in the hall. Travice made one bound to the drawing-room. The sudden flush on the pale face, the glad eagerness of the tone, struck dismay to the heart of Mrs. Arkell.

She quickly followed him, and saw that he had taken both of Lucy's hands in greeting.

"Oh, Lucy! are you here this morning? I know you have come to stay the day! Take your things off."

Lucy laughed--and Mrs. Arkell had the pleasure of seeing that _her_ cheeks wore an answering flush. She shook her head and drew her hands from Travice, who seemed as if he could have kept them for ever.

"Do I spend a day here so often that you think I can come for nothing else? I only came with papa, and I am going back with him soon."

But Travice pressed the point of staying. Charlotte also--feeling, perhaps, that even Lucy was a welcome break to the monotony the house had fallen into--urged it. Mrs. Arkell maintained a marked silence; and in the midst of it the two gentlemen came in. Mr. Arkell kissed Lucy, and said she had better stop.

But Peter settled it the other way. Lucy must go home with him then, he said; but if she liked to come down in the afternoon, and stay for the rest of the day, she could. It was so settled, and they took their departure. Mr. Arkell walked with Peter across the court-yard, talking.

Travice, in the very face and eyes of his mother, gave his arm to Lucy.

"Why did you not stay?" he whispered, as they arrived at the gates.

"Lucy, do you know that to part with you is to part with my life's suns.h.i.+ne?"

Mrs. Arkell was standing at the door as he turned, and beckoned to him from the distance.

"I wish to speak with you," she said, as he approached.

She led the way into the dining-room, and closed the door on them, as if for some formidable interview. Travice saw that she was in a scarcely irrepressible state of anger, and he perched himself on a vacant side-table--rather a favourite way of his. He began humming a tune; gaily, but not disrespectfully.

"What possesses you to behave in this absurd manner to Lucy Arkell?" she began, in pa.s.sion.

"What have I done now?" asked Travice.

"You are continually, in some way or other, contriving to thrust that girl's company upon us! I will not permit it, Travice; I have borne with it too long. I----"

"Why, she is not here twice in a twelvemonth," interrupted Travice.

"Don't say absurd things. She is. And she is not fit society for your sisters."

"If they were only half as worthy of her society as she is superior to them, they would be very different girls from what they are," spoke Travice, with a touch of his father's old heat. "If there's one thing that Lucy is, pre-eminently, it's a gentlewoman. Her mother was one before her."

Mrs. Arkell grew nearly black in the face. While she was trying to speak, Travice went on.

"Ask my father what his opinion of Lucy is. _He_ does not say she is here too much."

"Your father is a fool in some things, and so are you!" retorted Mrs.

Arkell, a sort of scream in her voice. "How dare you oppose me in this way, Travice?"

"I am very sorry to do so," returned the young man; "and I beg your pardon if I say more than you think I ought. But I cannot join in your unjust feeling against Lucy, and I will not tolerate it. I wish you would not bring up this subject at all: it is one we never can agree upon."

"You requested me just now not to 'bring up' the subject of Miss Fauntleroy to you," said Mrs. Arkell, in a tone of irony. "How many other subjects would you be pleased to interdict?"

"I don't want to hear even the name of those Fauntleroys!" burst out Travice, losing for a moment his equanimity. "Great brazen milkmaids!"

"No! you'd rather hear Lucy's!" screamed Mrs. Arkell. "You'd----"

"Lucy! Don't name them with Lucy, my dear mother. They are not fit to tie Lucy's shoes! She has more sense of propriety in her little finger, than they have in all their great overgrown bodies!"

This was the climax. And Mrs. Arkell, suppressing the pa.s.sion that shook her as she stood, spoke with that forced calmness that is worse than the loudest fury. Her face had turned white.

"Continue your familiar intercourse with that girl, if you will; but, listen!--you shall never make a wife of anyone so paltry and so pitiful!

I would pray Heaven to let me follow you to your grave, Travice, rather than see you marry Lucy Arkell."

She spoke the words in her blind rage, never reflecting on their full import; never dreaming that a day was soon to come, when their memory would return to her in her extremity of vain and hopeless repentance.

CHAPTER XII.

MISCONCEPTION.

"It shall be put a stop to! it shall be put a stop to!" murmured Mrs.

Arkell to herself, as she sat alone when Travice had left her, trying to recover her equanimity. "Once separated from that wretched Lucy, he would soon find charms in Barbara Fauntleroy."

There was no time to be lost; and that same afternoon, when Lucy arrived, according to promise, crafty Mrs. Arkell began to lay the foundation stone. Lucy found her in the drawing-room alone.

"I will take my bonnet upstairs," said Lucy. "Shall I find Charlotte and Sophy anywhere?"

"No," replied Mrs. Arkell, in a very uncompromising tone. "They have gone out with the Miss Fauntleroys."

"I was unwilling to come this afternoon," observed Lucy, as she returned and sat down, "for papa does not seem so well. I fear he may have taken cold to-day; but he got to his books and writing after dinner, as usual."

"Does he think of bringing out a new book?" asked Mrs. Arkell; and Lucy did not detect the irony of the question.

"Not yet. He is about half through one. Is there any meeting to-day, do you know, Mrs. Arkell?" she resumed. "I met several gentlemen hurrying up the street as I came along."

"I thought everybody knew of it," replied Mrs. Arkell. "A meeting of the manufacturers was convened at the Guildhall for this afternoon. Mr.

Arkell and Travice have gone to it."

"Their meetings seem to bring them no redress," returned Lucy, sadly.

"The English manufacturers have no chance against the French now."

"I don't know what is to become of us," e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mrs. Arkell.

"Charlotte, thank goodness, will soon be married and away; but there's Sophy! Travice will have enough to live upon, without business."

"Will he?" exclaimed Lucy, looking brightly up. "I am so glad to hear it! I thought your property had diminished until it was but small."