[Ill.u.s.tration: "Was it not a lie?"]

But, then, his mother! and the sneers of the world, which would have declared that she had set her trap, and caught the foolish young lord! Her pride would not have submitted to that. Strong as her love was, yet her pride was, perhaps, stronger--stronger at any rate during that interview.

But how was she to forgive herself the falsehood she had told?

CHAPTER XVII.

MRS. PROUDIE'S CONVERSAZIONE.

It was grievous to think of the mischief and danger into which Griselda Grantly was brought by the worldliness of her mother in those few weeks previous to Lady Lufton's arrival in town--very grievous, at least, to her ladyship, as from time to time she heard of what was done in London. Lady Hartletop's was not the only objectionable house at which Griselda was allowed to reap fresh fashionable laurels. It had been stated openly in the _Morning Post_ that that young lady had been the most admired among the beautiful at one of Miss Dunstable's celebrated _soirees_, and then she was heard of as gracing the drawing-room at Mrs. Proudie's conversazione.

Of Miss Dunstable herself Lady Lufton was not able openly to allege any evil. She was acquainted, Lady Lufton knew, with very many people of the right sort, and was the dear friend of Lady Lufton's highly conservative and not very distant neighbours, the Greshams. But then she was also acquainted with so many people of the bad sort. Indeed, she was intimate with everybody, from the Duke of Omnium to old Dowager Lady Goodygaffer, who had represented all the cardinal virtues for the last quarter of a century. She smiled with equal sweetness on treacle and on brimstone; was quite at home at Exeter Hall, having been consulted--so the world said, probably not with exact truth--as to the selection of more than one disagreeably Low Church bishop; and was not less frequent in her attendance at the ecclesiastical doings of a certain terrible prelate in the Midland counties, who was supposed to favour stoles and vespers, and to have no proper Protestant hatred for auricular confession and fish on Fridays. Lady Lufton, who was very staunch, did not like this, and would say of Miss Dunstable that it was impossible to serve both G.o.d and Mammon.

But Mrs. Proudie was much more objectionable to her. Seeing how sharp was the feud between the Proudies and the Grantlys down in Ba.r.s.etshire, how absolutely unable they had always been to carry a decent face towards each other in church matters, how they headed two parties in the diocese, which were, when brought together, as oil and vinegar, in which battles the whole Lufton influence had always been brought to bear on the Grantly side;--seeing all this, I say, Lady Lufton was surprised to hear that Griselda had been taken to Mrs.

Proudie's evening exhibition. "Had the archdeacon been consulted about it," she said to herself, "this would never have happened."

But there she was wrong, for in matters concerning his daughter's introduction to the world the archdeacon never interfered.

On the whole, I am inclined to think that Mrs. Grantly understood the world better than did Lady Lufton. In her heart of hearts Mrs.

Grantly hated Mrs. Proudie--that is, with that sort of hatred one Christian lady allows herself to feel towards another. Of course Mrs.

Grantly forgave Mrs. Proudie all her offences, and wished her well, and was at peace with her, in the Christian sense of the word, as with all other women. But under this forbearance and meekness, and perhaps, we may say, wholly unconnected with it, there was certainly a current of antagonistic feeling which, in the ordinary unconsidered language of every day, men and women do call hatred. This raged and was strong throughout the whole year in Ba.r.s.etshire, before the eyes of all mankind. But, nevertheless, Mrs. Grantly took Griselda to Mrs.

Proudie's evening parties in London.

In these days Mrs. Proudie considered herself to be by no means the least among bishops' wives. She had opened the season this year in a new house in Gloucester Place, at which the reception rooms, at any rate, were all that a lady bishop could desire. Here she had a front drawing-room of very n.o.ble dimensions, a second drawing-room rather n.o.ble also, though it had lost one of its back corners awkwardly enough, apparently in a jostle with the neighbouring house; and then there was a third--shall we say drawing-room, or closet?--in which Mrs. Proudie delighted to be seen sitting, in order that the world might know that there was a third room; altogether a n.o.ble suite, as Mrs. Proudie herself said in confidence to more than one clergyman's wife from Ba.r.s.etshire. "A n.o.ble suite, indeed, Mrs. Proudie!" the clergymen's wives from Ba.r.s.etshire would usually answer.

For some time Mrs. Proudie was much at a loss to know by what sort of party or entertainment she would make herself famous. b.a.l.l.s and suppers were of course out of the question. She did not object to her daughters dancing all night at other houses--at least, of late she had not objected, for the fashionable world required it, and the young ladies had perhaps a will of their own--but dancing at her house--absolutely under the shade of the bishop's ap.r.o.n--would be a sin and a scandal. And then as to suppers--of all modes in which one may extend one's hospitality to a large acquaintance, they are the most costly.

"It is horrid to think that we should go out among our friends for the mere sake of eating and drinking," Mrs. Proudie would say to the clergymen's wives from Ba.r.s.etshire. "It shows such a sensual propensity."

"Indeed it does, Mrs. Proudie; and is so vulgar too!" those ladies would reply.

But the elder among them would remember with regret the unsparing, open-handed hospitality of Barchester palace in the good old days of Bishop Grantly--G.o.d rest his soul! One old vicar's wife there was whose answer had not been so courteous--

"When we are hungry, Mrs. Proudie," she had said, "we do all have sensual propensities."

"It would be much better, Mrs. Athill, if the world would provide for all that at home," Mrs. Proudie had rapidly replied; with which opinion I must here profess that I cannot by any means bring myself to coincide.

But a conversazione would give play to no sensual propensity, nor occasion that intolerable expense which the gratification of sensual propensities too often produces. Mrs. Proudie felt that the word was not all that she could have desired. It was a little faded by old use and present oblivion, and seemed to address itself to that portion of the London world that is considered blue, rather than fashionable.

But, nevertheless, there was a spirituality about it which suited her, and one may also say an economy. And then as regarded fashion, it might perhaps not be beyond the power of a Mrs. Proudie to regild the word with a newly burnished gilding. Some leading person must produce fashion at first hand, and why not Mrs. Proudie?

Her plan was to set the people by the ears talking, if talk they would, or to induce them to show themselves there inert if no more could be got from them. To accommodate with chairs and sofas as many as the furniture of her n.o.ble suite of rooms would allow, especially with the two chairs and padded bench against the wall in the back closet--the small inner drawing-room, as she would call it to the clergymen's wives from Ba.r.s.etshire--and to let the others stand about upright, or "group themselves," as she described it. Then four times during the two hours' period of her conversazione tea and cake were to be handed round on salvers. It is astonishing how far a very little cake will go in this way, particularly if administered tolerably early after dinner. The men can't eat it, and the women, having no plates and no table, are obliged to abstain. Mrs. Jones knows that she cannot hold a piece of crumbly cake in her hand till it be consumed without doing serious injury to her best dress. When Mrs. Proudie, with her weekly books before her, looked into the financial upshot of her conversazione, her conscience told her that she had done the right thing.

Going out to tea is not a bad thing, if one can contrive to dine early, and then be allowed to sit round a big table with a tea urn in the middle. I would, however, suggest that breakfast cups should always be provided for the gentlemen. And then with pleasant neighbours,--or more especially with a pleasant neighbour,--the affair is not, according to my taste, by any means the worst phase of society. But I do dislike that handing round, unless it be of a subsidiary thimbleful when the business of the social intercourse has been dinner.

And indeed this handing round has become a vulgar and an intolerable nuisance among us second-cla.s.s gentry with our eight hundred a year--there or thereabouts;--doubly intolerable as being destructive of our natural comforts, and a wretchedly vulgar aping of men with large incomes. The Duke of Omnium and Lady Hartletop are undoubtedly wise to have everything handed round. Friends of mine who occasionally dine at such houses tell me that they get their wine quite as quickly as they can drink it, that their mutton is brought to them without delay, and that the potato-bearer follows quick upon the heels of carnifer. Nothing can be more comfortable, and we may no doubt acknowledge that these first-cla.s.s grandees do understand their material comforts. But we of the eight hundred can no more come up to them in this than we can in their opera-boxes and equipages. May I not say that the usual tether of this cla.s.s, in the way of carnifers, cup-bearers, and the rest, does not reach beyond neat-handed Phyllis and the greengrocer? and that Phyllis, neat-handed as she probably is, and the greengrocer, though he be ever so active, cannot administer a dinner to twelve people who are prohibited by a Medo-Persian law from all self-administration whatever? And may I not further say that the lamentable consequence to us eight hundreders dining out among each other is this, that we too often get no dinner at all. Phyllis, with the potatoes, cannot reach us till our mutton is devoured, or in a lukewarm state past our power of managing; and Ganymede, the greengrocer, though we admire the skill of his necktie and the whiteness of his unexceptionable gloves, fails to keep us going in Sherry.

Seeing a lady the other day in this strait, left without a small modic.u.m of stimulus which was no doubt necessary for her good digestion, I ventured to ask her to drink wine with me. But when I bowed my head at her, she looked at me with all her eyes, struck with amazement. Had I suggested that she should join me in a wild Indian war-dance, with nothing on but my paint, her face could not have shown greater astonishment. And yet I should have thought she might have remembered the days when Christian men and women used to drink wine with each other.

G.o.d be with the good old days when I could hobn.o.b with my friend over the table as often as I was inclined to lift my gla.s.s to my lips, and make a long arm for a hot potato whenever the exigencies of my plate required it.

I think it may be laid down as a rule in affairs of hospitality, that whatever extra luxury or grandeur we introduce at our tables when guests are with us, should be introduced for the advantage of the guest and not for our own. If, for instance, our dinner be served in a manner different from that usual to us, it should be so served in order that our friends may with more satisfaction eat our repast than our everyday practice would produce on them. But the change should by no means be made to their material detriment in order that our fashion may be acknowledged. Again, if I decorate my sideboard and table, wishing that the eyes of my visitors may rest on that which is elegant and pleasant to the sight, I act in that matter with a becoming sense of hospitality; but if my object be to kill Mrs.

Jones with envy at the sight of all my silver trinkets, I am a very mean-spirited fellow. This, in a broad way, will be acknowledged; but if we would bear in mind the same idea at all times,--on occasions when the way perhaps may not be so broad, when more thinking may be required to ascertain what is true hospitality,--I think we of the eight hundred would make a greater advance towards really entertaining our own friends than by any rearrangement of the actual meats and dishes which we set before them.

Knowing as we do, that the terms of the Lufton-Grantly alliance had been so solemnly ratified between the two mothers, it is perhaps hardly open to us to suppose that Mrs. Grantly was induced to take her daughter to Mrs. Proudie's by any knowledge which she may have acquired that Lord Dumbello had promised to grace the bishop's a.s.sembly. It is certainly the fact that high contracting parties do sometimes allow themselves a lat.i.tude which would be considered dishonest by contractors of a lower sort; and it may be possible that the archdeacon's wife did think of that second string with which her bow was furnished. Be that as it may, Lord Dumbello was at Mrs.

Proudie's, and it did so come to pa.s.s that Griselda was seated at the corner of a sofa close to which was a vacant s.p.a.ce in which his lordship could--"group himself."

They had not been long there before Lord Dumbello did group himself.

"Fine day," he said, coming up and occupying the vacant position by Miss Grantly's elbow.

"We were driving to-day, and we thought it rather cold," said Griselda.

"Deuced cold," said Lord Dumbello, and then he adjusted his white cravat and touched up his whiskers. Having got so far, he did not proceed to any other immediate conversational efforts; nor did Griselda. But he grouped himself again as became a marquis, and gave very intense satisfaction to Mrs. Proudie.

"This is so kind of you, Lord Dumbello," said that lady, coming up to him and shaking his hand warmly; "so very kind of you to come to my poor little tea-party."

"Uncommonly pleasant, I call it," said his lordship. "I like this sort of thing--no trouble, you know."

"No; that is the charm of it: isn't it? no trouble, or fuss, or parade. That's what I always say. According to my ideas, society consists in giving people facility for an interchange of thoughts--what we call conversation."

"Aw, yes, exactly."

"Not in eating and drinking together--eh, Lord Dumbello? And yet the practice of our lives would seem to show that the indulgence of those animal propensities can alone suffice to bring people together. The world in this has surely made a great mistake."

"I like a good dinner all the same," said Lord Dumbello.

"Oh, yes, of course--of course. I am by no means one of those who would pretend to preach that our tastes have not been given to us for our enjoyment. Why should things be nice if we are not to like them?"

"A man who can really give a good dinner has learned a great deal,"

said Lord Dumbello, with unusual animation.

"An immense deal. It is quite an art in itself; and one which I, at any rate, by no means despise. But we cannot always be eating--can we?"

"No," said Lord Dumbello, "not always." And he looked as though he lamented that his powers should be so circ.u.mscribed.

And then Mrs. Proudie pa.s.sed on to Mrs. Grantly. The two ladies were quite friendly in London; though down in their own neighbourhood they waged a war so internecine in its nature. But nevertheless Mrs.

Proudie's manner might have showed to a very close observer that she knew the difference between a bishop and an archdeacon. "I am so delighted to see you," said she. "No, don't mind moving; I won't sit down just at present. But why didn't the archdeacon come?"

"It was quite impossible; it was indeed," said Mrs. Grantly. "The archdeacon never has a moment in London that he can call his own."

"You don't stay up very long, I believe."

"A good deal longer than we either of us like, I can a.s.sure you.

London life is a perfect nuisance to me."