Lady Ayr at the end of the London season had for years been accustomed to carry out some innocent plan for the improvement and discomfort of her family. One year she dragged them along the castles by the Loire, another she forced them, as if by pumping, through the picture galleries of Holland, and this summer she proposed to show them a quant.i.ty of the English cathedrals. These abominable pilgrimages were made pompously and economically: they stayed at odious inns, where she haggled and bargained with the proprietors, but on the other hand she informed the petrified vergers and custodians whom she conducted (rather than was conducted by) round the cathedrals or castles in their charge, that she was the Marchioness of Ayr, was directly descended from the occupants of the finest and most antique tombs, that the castle in question had once belonged to her family, or that the gem of the Holbeins represented some aunt of hers in bygone generations. Here pomp held sway, but economy came into its own again over the small silver coin with which she rewarded her conductor. On English lines she had a third cla.s.s carriage reserved for her and beguiled the tedium of journeys by reading aloud out of guide-books an account of what they had seen or what they were going to visit. Generally they put up at "temperance" hotels, and she made a point of afternoon tea being included in the exiguous terms at which she insisted on being entertained. John aided and abetted her in those tours, exhibiting an ogreish appet.i.te for all things Gothic and mental improvement; and her husband followed her with a white umbrella and sat down as much as possible. Esther's part in them was that of a resigned and inattentive martyr, and she fired off picture postcards of the places they visited to Nadine and others with "This is a foul hole,"

or "The beastliest inn we have struck yet" written on them, while Seymour revenged himself on the discomforts inflicted on him, by examining his mother as to where they had seen a particular rose-window or portrait by Rembrandt, and then by the aid of a guide-book proving she was wrong. Why none of them revolted and refused to go on these annual journeys, now that they had arrived at adult years, they none of them exactly knew, any more than they knew why they went, when summoned, to their mother's dreadful dinner-parties, and it must be supposed that there was a touch of the inevitable about such diversions: you might grumble and complain, but you went.

This year the tour was to start with the interesting city of Lincoln and the party a.s.sembled on the platform at King's Cross at an early hour.

The plan was to lunch in the train, so as to start sight-seeing immediately on arrival, and continue (with a short excursion to the hotel in order to have the tea which had been included in the terms) until the fading light made it impossible to distinguish ancestral tombs or Norman arches. Lady Ayr had not seen Seymour since his engagement, and, as she ate rather grisly beef sandwiches, she gave him her views on the step. Though they were all together in one compartment the conversation might be considered a private one, for Lord Ayr was sleeping gently in one corner, John was absorbed in the account of the Roman remains at Lincoln (Lindum Colonia, as he had already announced), and Esther with a slightly leaky stylograph was writing a description of their depressing journey to Nadine.

"What you are marrying on, Seymour, I don't know," she said. "Neither your father nor I will be able to increase your allowance, and Nadine Waldenech has the appearance of being an expensive young woman. I hope she realizes she is marrying the son of a poor man, and that we go third cla.s.s."

"She is aware of all that," said Seymour, wiping his long white finger-tips on an exceedingly fine cambric handkerchief, after swallowing a sandwich or two, "and we are marrying really on her money."

"I am not sure that I approve of that," said his mother.

"The remedy is obvious," remarked Seymour. "You can increase my allowance. I have no objection. Mother, would you kindly let me throw the rest of that sandwich out of the window? It makes me ill to look at it."

"We are not talking about sandwiches. Why do you not earn some money like other younger sons?"

"I do. I earned four pounds last week, with describing your party and other things, and there is my embroidery as well, which I shall work at more industriously. I shall do embroidery in the evening after dinner while Nadine smokes."

Lady Ayr looked out of the window and pointed magisterially to the towers of some great church in the town through which the train was pa.s.sing.

"Peterborough," she said. "We shall see Peterborough on our way back.

Peterborough, John. Ayr and Esther, we are pa.s.sing through Peterborough."

Esther looked out upon the mean backs of houses.

"The sooner we pa.s.s through Peterborough the better," she observed.

John turned rapidly over the leaves of his guide-book.

"Peterborough is seventy-eight miles from London, and contains many buildings of interest," he informed them.

Lady Ayr returned to Seymour.

"I hope you will insist on her leaving off smoking when you are married to her," she said. "I cannot say she is the wife I should have chosen for you."

"I chose her myself," observed Seymour.

"Tell me more about her. Certainly the Waldenechs are a very old family, there is that to be said. Is she serious? Does she feel her responsibilities? Or is she like her mother?"

Seymour brushed a few remaining sandwich-crumbs off his trousers.

"I think Aunt Dodo is one of the most serious people I know," he said.

"She is serious about everything. She does everything with all her might. Nadine is not quite so serious as that. She is rather flippant about things like food and dress. However, no doubt my influence will make her more serious. But as a matter of fact I can't tell you about Nadine. A fortnight ago, when I proposed to her, I could have. I could have given you a very complete account of her. But I can't any longer: I am getting blind about her. I only know that it is she. Not so long ago I told her a quant.i.ty of her faults with ruthless accuracy, but I couldn't now. I can't see them any more: there's a glamor."

Esther looked up.

"Oh, Seymour," she said, "are you talking about Nadine? Are you falling in love with her? How very awkward! Does she know?"

Seymour pointed a withering finger at his sister.

"Little girls should mind their own business," he said.

"Oh, but it is my business. Nadine matters far more than any one else.

She might easily think it not right to marry you if you were in love with her."

Lady Ayr turned a petrifying gaze from one to the other.

"She seems a very extraordinary young person," she said. "And in any case Esther has no business to know anything about it."

"Whether she thinks it right or not, she is going to marry me," said Seymour.

Esther shook her head.

"You are indeed blind about Nadine," she said, "if you think she would ever do anything she thought wrong."

"You might be describing John," said Seymour rather hotly.

"Anyhow, Nadine is not like John."

"I see no resemblance," said Lady Ayr. "But it is something to know she would not do anything she thought wrong."

"When you say it in that voice, Mother," said Esther, "you make nonsense of it."

"The same words in any voice mean the same thing," said Lady Ayr.

Seymour sighed.

"I am on Esther's side for once," he said.

Esther turned to her brother.

"Seymour, you ought to tell Nadine you are falling in love with her,"

she said. "I really don't think she would approve. Why, you might become as bad as Hugh. Of course you are not so stupid as Hugh--ah, stupid is the wrong word--you haven't got such a plain kind of intellect as Hugh--which was Nadine's main objection--"

Seymour patted Esther's hand with odious superiority. "You are rather above yourself, my little girl," he said, "because just now I agreed with you. It has gone to your head, and makes you think yourself clever.

Shut your eyes till we get to Lincoln. You will feel less giddy by degrees. And when you open them again, you can mind your own business, and mother will tell you about the Goths and Vandals who built the cathedral. You are a Vandal yourself: you will have a fellow-feeling.

Mother, dear, put down that window. I am going to see cathedrals to please you, but I will not be stifled to please anybody. The carriage reeks of your beef sandwiches. But I think I have some scent in my bag."

"I am quite sure you have," said Esther scornfully. "I am writing to Nadine, by the way. I shall tell her you are falling in love with her."

"You can tell her exactly what you please," said Seymour suavely. "Ah, here is some wall-flower scent. It is like a May morning. Yes, tell Nadine what you please, but don't bother me. What is the odious town we are coming to? I think it must be Lincoln. John, here is Lincoln, and all the people are ancient Romans."

Seymour obligingly sprayed the expensive scent about the carriage, even though they were so shortly to disembark.

"The river Witham," said John, pointing to a small and fetid ditch.

"Remains of Roman villas--"