CHAPTER x.x.xIX.

WHY SHOULD HE GO?

"I am well aware, Mr. Staveley, that you are one of those gentlemen who amuse themselves by frequently saying such things to girls. I had learned your character in that respect before I had been in the house two days."

"Then, Miss Furnival, you learned what was very false. May I ask who has blackened me in this way in your estimation?" It will be easily seen from this that Mr. Augustus Staveley and Miss Furnival were at the present moment alone together in one of the rooms at Noningsby.

"My informant," she replied, "has been no one special sinner whom you can take by the throat and punish. Indeed, if you must shoot anybody, it should be chiefly yourself, and after that your father, and mother, and sisters. But you need not talk of being black. Such sins are venial now-a-days, and convey nothing deeper than a light shade of brown."

"I regard a man who can act in such a way as very base."

"Such a way as what, Mr. Staveley?"

"A man who can win a girl's heart for his own amus.e.m.e.nt."

"I said nothing about the winning of hearts. That is treachery of the worst dye; but I acquit you of any such attempt. When there is a question of the winning of hearts men look so different."

"I don't know how they look," said Augustus, not altogether satisfied as to the manner in which he was being treated--"but such has been my audacity,--my too great audacity on the present occasion."

"You are the most audacious of men, for your audacity would carry you to the feet of another lady to-morrow without the slightest check."

"And that is the only answer I am to receive from you?"

"It is quite answer enough. What would you have me do? Get up and decline the honour of being Mrs. Augustus Staveley with a curtsy?"

"No--I would have you do nothing of the kind. I would have you get up and accept the honour,--with a kiss."

"So that you might have the kiss, and I might have the--; I was going to say disappointment, only that would be untrue. Let me a.s.sure you that I am not so demonstrative in my tokens of regard."

"I wonder whether you mean that you are not so honest?"

"No, Mr. Staveley; I mean nothing of the kind; and you are very impertinent to express such a supposition. What have I done or said to make you suppose that I have lost my heart to you?"

"As you have mine, it is at any rate human nature in me to hope that I might have yours."

"Psha! your heart! You have been making a shuttlec.o.c.k of it till it is doubtful whether you have not banged it to pieces. I know two ladies who carry in their caps two feathers out of it. It is so easy to see when a man is in love. They all go cross-gartered like Malvolio;--cross-gartered in their looks and words and doings."

"And there is no touch of all this in me?"

"You cross-gartered! You have never got so far yet as a lack-a-daisical twist to the corner of your mouth. Did you watch Mr.

Orme before he went away?"

"Why; was he cross-gartered?"

"But you men have no eyes; you never see anything. And your idea of love-making is to sit under a tree wishing, wondering whether the ripe fruit will fall down into your mouth. Ripe fruit does sometimes fall, and then it is all well with you. But if it won't, you pa.s.s on and say that it is sour. As for climbing--"

"The fruit generally falls too fast to admit of such exercise," said Staveley, who did not choose that all the sharp things should be said on the other side.

"And that is the result of your very extended experience? The orchards which have been opened to you have not, I fear, been of the first quality. Mr. Staveley, my hand will do very well by itself.

Such is not the sort of climbing that is required. That is what I call stooping to pick up the fruit that has fallen." And as she spoke, she moved a little away from him on the sofa.

"And how is a man to climb?"

"Do you really mean that you want a lesson? But if I were to tell you, my words would be thrown away. Men will not labour who have gotten all that they require without work. Why strive to deserve any woman, when women are plenty who do not care to be deserved? That plan of picking up the fallen apples is so much the easier."

The lesson might perhaps have been given, and Miss Furnival might have imparted to Mr. Staveley her idea of "excelsior" in the matter of love-making, had not Mr. Staveley's mother come into the room at that moment. Mrs. Staveley was beginning to fear that the results of her Christmas hospitality would not be satisfactory. Peregrine Orme, whom she would have been so happy to welcome to the warmest corner of her household temple as a son, had been sent away in wretchedness and disappointment. Madeline was moping about the house, hardly making an effort to look like herself; attributing, in her mother's ears, all her complaint to that unexpected interview with Peregrine Orme, but not so attributing it--as her mother fancied--with correctness. And there was Felix Graham still in the room up stairs, the doctor having said that he might be moved in a day or two;--that is, such movement might possibly be effected without detriment;--but having said also that another ten days of uninterrupted rest would be very desirable.

And now, in addition to this, her son Augustus was to be found on every wet morning closeted somewhere with Sophia Furnival;--on every wet morning, and sometimes on dry mornings also!

[Ill.u.s.tration: Lady Stavely interrupting her Son and Sophia Furnival.]

And then, on this very day, Lady Staveley had discovered that Felix Graham's door in the corridor was habitually left open. She knew her child too well, and was too clear and pure in her own mind, to suppose that there was anything wrong in this;--that clandestine talkings were arranged, or anything planned in secret. What she feared was that which really occurred. The door was left open, and as Madeline pa.s.sed Felix would say a word, and then Madeline would pause and answer him. Such words as they were might have been spoken before all the household, and if so spoken would have been free from danger.

But they were not free from danger when spoken in that way, in the pa.s.sage of a half-closed doorway;--all which Lady Staveley understood perfectly.

"Baker," she had said, with more of anger in her voice than was usual with her, "why do you leave that door open?"

"I think it sweetens the room, my lady;" and, indeed, Felix Graham sometimes thought so too.

"Nonsense; every sound in the house must be heard. Keep it shut, if you please."

"Yes, my lady," said Mrs. Baker--who also understood perfectly.

"He is better, my darling," said Mrs. Baker to Madeline, the same day; "and, indeed, for that he is well enough as regards eating and drinking. But it would be cruelty to move him yet. I heard what the doctor said."

"Who talks of moving him?"

"Well, he talks of it himself; and the doctor said it might be possible. But I know what that means."

"What does it mean?"

"Why, just this: that if we want to get rid of him, it won't quite be the death of him."

"But who wants to get rid of him?"

"I'm sure I don't. I don't mind my trouble the least in life. He's as nice a young gentleman as ever I sat beside the bed of; and he's full of spirit--he is."

And then Madeline appealed to her mother. Surely her mother would not let Mr. Graham be sent out of the house in his present state, merely because the doctor said it might be possible to move him without causing his instant death! And tears stood in poor Madeline's eyes as she thus pleaded the cause of the sick and wounded. This again tormented Lady Staveley, who found it necessary to give further caution to Mrs. Baker. "Baker," she said, "how can you be so foolish as to be talking to Miss Madeline about Mr. Graham's arm?"

"Who, my lady? I, my lady?"

"Yes, you; when you know that the least thing frightens her. Don't you remember how ill it made her when Roger"--Roger was an old family groom--"when Roger had that accident?" Lady Staveley might have saved herself the trouble of the reminiscence as to Roger, for Baker knew more about it than that. When Roger's scalp had been laid bare by a fall, Miss Madeline had chanced to see it, and had fainted; but Miss Madeline was not fainting now. Baker knew all about it, almost better than Lady Staveley herself. It was of very little use talking to Baker about Roger the groom. Baker thought that Mr. Felix Graham was a very nice young man, in spite of his "not being exactly handsomelike about the physgognomy," as she remarked to one of the younger maids, who much preferred Peregrine Orme.

Coming away from this last interval with Mrs. Baker, Lady Staveley interrupted her son and Sophia Furnival in the back drawing-room, and began to feel that her solicitude for her children would be almost too much for her. Why had she asked that nasty girl to her house, and why would not the nasty girl go away? As for her going away, there was no present hope; for it had been arranged that she should stay for another fortnight. Why could not the Fates have been kind, and have allowed Felix Graham and Miss Furnival to fall in love with each other? "I can never make a daughter of her if he does marry her,"

Lady Staveley said to herself, as she looked at them.

Augustus looked as though he were detected, and stammered out some question about his mother and the carriage; but Miss Furnival did not for a moment lose her easy presence of mind. "Lady Staveley," said she, "why does not your son go and hunt, or shoot, or fish, instead of staying in the house all day? It seems to me that his time is so heavy on his hands that he will almost have to hang himself."