"What who say, Lord Rufford? People say anything,--the more ill-natured the better they like it, I think."

"Have you not heard what they say about you and Mr. Morton?"

"Just because mamma made a promise when in Washington to go to Bragton with that Mr. Gotobed. Don't you find they marry you to everybody?"

"They have married me to a good many people. Perhaps they'll marry me to you to-morrow. That would not be so bad."

"Oh, Lord Rufford! n.o.body has ever condemned you to anything so terrible as that."

"There was no truth in it then, Miss Trefoil?"

"None at all, Lord Rufford. Only I don't know why you should ask me."

"Well; I don't know. A man likes sometimes to be sure how the land lies. Mr. Morton looks so cross that I thought that perhaps the very fact of my dancing with you might be an offence."

"Is he cross?"

"You know him better than I do. Perhaps it's his nature. Now I must do one other dance with a native and then my work will be over."

"That isn't very civil, Lord Rufford."

"If you do not know what I meant, you're not the girl I take you to be." Then as she walked with him back out of the ball-room into the drawing-room she a.s.sured him that she did know what he meant, and that therefore she was the girl he took her to be.

She had determined that she would not dance again and had resolved to herd with the other ladies of the house,--waiting for any opportunity that chance might give her for having a last word with Lord Rufford before they parted for the night,--when Morton came up to her and demanded rather than asked that she would stand up with him for a quadrille. "We settled it all among ourselves, you know," she said.

"We were to dance only once, just to set the people off." He still persisted, but she still refused, alleging that she was bound by the general compact; and though he was very urgent she would not yield.

"I wonder how you can ask me," she said. "You don't suppose that after what has occurred I can have any pleasure in dancing." Upon this he asked her to take a turn with him through the rooms, and to that she found herself compelled to a.s.sent. Then he spoke out to her.

"Arabella," he said, "I am not quite content with what has been going on since we came to this house."

"I am sorry for that."

"Nor, indeed, have I been made very happy by all that has occurred since your mother and you did me the honour of coming to Bragton."

"I must acknowledge you haven't seemed to be very happy, Mr. Morton."

"I don't want to distress you;--and as far as possible I wish to avoid distressing myself. If it is your wish that our engagement should be over, I will endeavour to bear it. If it is to be continued,--I expect that your manner to me should be altered."

"What am I to say?"

"Say what you feel."

"I feel that I can't alter my manner, as you call it."

"You do wish the engagement to be over then?"

"I did not say so. The truth is, Mr. Morton, that there is some trouble about the lawyers."

"Why do you always call me Mr. Morton?"

"Because I am aware how probable it is that all this may come to nothing. I can't walk out of the house and marry you as the cookmaid does the gardener. I've got to wait till I'm told that everything is settled; and at present I'm told that things are not settled because you won't agree."

"I'll leave it to anybody to say whether I've been unreasonable."

"I won't go into that. I haven't meddled with it, and I don't know anything about it. But until it is all settled as a matter of course there must be some little distance between us. It's the commonest thing in the world, I should say."

"What is to be the end of it?"

"I do not know. If you think yourself injured you can back out of it at once. I've nothing more to say about it."

"And you think I can like the way you're going on here?"

"If you're jealous, Mr. Morton, there's an end of it. I tell you fairly once for all, that as long as I'm a single woman I will regulate my conduct as I please. You can do the same, and I shall not say a word to you." Then she withdrew her arm from him, and, leaving him, walked across the room and joined her mother. He went off at once to his own room resolving that he would write to her from Bragton. He had made his propositions in regard to money which he was quite aware were as liberal as was fit. If she would now fix a day for their marriage, he would be a happy man. If she would not bring herself to do this, then he would have no alternative but to regard their engagement as at an end.

At two o'clock the guests were nearly all gone. The Major was alive, and likely to live at least for some hours, and the Rufford people generally were glad that they had not put off the ball. Some of them who were staying in the house had already gone to bed, and Lady Penwether, with Miss Penge at her side, was making her last adieux in the drawing-room. The ball-room was reached from the drawing-room, with a vestibule between them, and opening from this was a small chamber, prettily furnished but seldom used, which had no peculiar purpose of its own, but in which during the present evening many sweet words had probably been spoken. Now, at this last moment, Lord Rufford and Arabella Trefoil were there alone together. She had just got up from a sofa, and he had taken her hand in his. She did not attempt to withdraw it, but stood looking down upon the ground. Then he pa.s.sed his arm round her waist and lifting her face to his held her in a close embrace from which she made no effort to free herself.

As soon as she was released she hastened to the door which was all but closed, and as she opened it and pa.s.sed through to the drawing-room said some ordinary word to him quite aloud in her ordinary voice. If his action had disturbed her she knew very well how to recover her equanimity.

CHAPTER XXV.

THE LAST MORNING AT RUFFORD HALL.

"Well, my love?" said Lady Augustus, as soon as her daughter had joined her in her bedroom. On such occasions there was always a quarter of an hour before going to bed in which the mother and daughter discussed their affairs, while the two lady's maids were discussing their affairs in the other room. The two maids probably did not often quarrel, but the mother and daughter usually did.

"I wish that stupid man hadn't got himself hurt."

"Of course, my dear; we all wish that. But I really don't see that it has stood much in your way."

"Yes it has. After all there is nothing like dancing, and we shouldn't all have been sent to bed at two o'clock."

"Then it has come to nothing?"

"I didn't say that at all, mamma. I think I have done uncommonly well. Indeed I know I have. But then if everything had not been upset, I might have done so much better."

"What have you done?" asked Lady Augustus, timidly. She knew perfectly well that her daughter would tell her nothing, and yet she always asked these questions and was always angry when no information was given to her. Any young woman would have found it very hard to give the information needed. "When we were alone he sat for five minutes with his arm round my waist, and then he kissed me. He didn't say much, but then I knew perfectly well that he would be on his guard not to commit himself by words. But I've got him to promise that he'll write to me, and of course I'll answer in such a way that he must write again. I know he'll want to see me, and I think I can go very near doing it. But he's an old stager and knows what he's about: and of course there'll be ever so many people to tell him I'm not the sort of girl he ought to marry. He'll hear about Colonel de B----, and Sir C. D----, and Lord E. F----, and there are ever so many chances against me. But I've made up my mind to try it. It's taking the long odds. I can hardly expect to win, but if I do pull it off I'm made for ever!" A daughter can hardly say all that to her mother. Even Arabella Trefoil could not say it to her mother,--or, at any rate, she would not. "What a question that is to ask, mamma?" she did say tossing her head.

"Well, my dear, unless you tell me something how can I help you?"

"I don't know that I want you to help me,--at any rate not in that way."

"In what way?"

"Oh, mamma, you are so odd."

"Has he said anything?"

"Yes, he has. He said he liked dry champagne and that he never ate supper."