MARGERY FFOLLIOT.

"H'm, now that's not what I should have expected," Miss Gallup said in a disappointed tone. "_I_ should have thought she'd 'a said, 'Mr and Mrs Ffolliot presents their compliments to Mr Gallup, and requests the pleasure of his company at a dinner-party'--I know there is a party, for Dorcas did tell Em'ly-Alice there was going to be one; only last night she was talking about it--it's downright blunt that note--I call it----"

Eloquent laughed. "All the same I've accepted, and now do explain why I can't sleep here instead of trailing all the way back into Marlehouse at that time of night."

"If you can't _see_, why you must just take my word for it. You and me's in different walks of life, and it's my bounden duty to see as you don't bemean yourself. I'm always pleased to see you in a quiet way, but there's no use in strangers knowing we're relations."

"What nonsense," Eloquent exclaimed hotly, "I've only got one aunt in the world, and I'm very proud of her, so let there be an end of this foolishness."

Miss Gallup wiped her eyes. "In some ways, Eloquent," she said huskily, "with all your politics an' that, you're no better than a child."

"I'm hanged if I can see what you're driving at," Eloquent exclaimed in great irritation. "Once more, Aunt Susan, will you give me a bed on Thursday?"

"Don't ask me, my dear, don't ask me. It's for your good as I refuse.

_I_ can see the difference between us if you can't, and when you took on so with politics, and then your father left all that fortune so as you could leave the likes of the Golden Anchor, I said to myself, 'Now, Martha Gallup, don't you interfere. Don't you go intrudin' on your brother's child. If he sees fit to keep friendly it shows he's a good heart, but you keep your place.' . . . An' I've kep' it; never have I been near you in Marlehouse, as you know--Not but what you've as't me, and very pleased I was to be as't . . ."

"And very displeased I was that you would never come," Eloquent interrupted.

"I know my place," Miss Gallup persisted. "I don't mind the likes of the Ffolliots knowing we're related. . . . They're bound to know, and they're not proud, none of 'em exceptin' Squire, that is to say, and he wouldn't think it worth while to be proud to the likes of me. But I don't want to hang on and keep you down, and there's some as would think less of you for me bein' your aunt, so where's the use of flaunting an old-fashioned piece like me in their faces. . . . If you'll come out next day and tell me all about the party, I'd take it most kind of you, Eloquent, that I should."

"Why shouldn't I come here straight that night? I shouldn't have forgotten anything by then."

"No," Miss Gallup said firmly. "I'd much rather you didn't come to me from that 'ouse nor go there from me. You go back 'ome like a good boy. It isn't as if you couldn't afford a chaise to bring you."

Eloquent saw that she really meant what she said. He was puzzled and rather hurt, for it had never occurred to him that his aunt was anything but his aunt: a kindly garrulous old lady who had always been extremely good to him, whom it was his duty to cherish, who looked upon him in the light of a son.

He was a simple person and never realised that this simplicity and directness had a good deal to do with the undoubted cordiality of certain persons, who, apart from politics, were known to be very exclusive in the matter of their acquaintance; and that it was largely owing to the fact that he never showed the smallest false shame as to his origin, that members of his party who had at first consented to know him solely for political reasons, continued to know him when the Liberal Government was for a second time firmly established. They perceived his primness, were faintly amused by his immense earnestness, and they respected his sincerity.

The manner of his arrival on the fateful night was settled for him by Sir George Campion, who, meeting him in the street, offered him a seat in their motor. Eloquent never knew that Mrs Ffolliot had asked Sir George to do this, thinking that it would make things easier and pleasanter for the guest who was the one stranger to the a.s.sembled party.

On the night of the dinner Mary was dressed early and went to her mother's room to see if she could help her.

Mrs Ffolliot was standing before her long gla.s.s and Sophia was shaking out the train of her dress, a soft grey-blue dress full of purple shadows and silvery lights.

She turned and looked at her tall young daughter, critically, fondly, with the pride and fear and wonder a woman, above all a beautiful woman, feels as she realises that for her child everything is yet to come; the story all untold.

"You may go, Sophia," she said gently. "I think Miss Mary looks nice, don't you? It's her first real evening frock, you know."

Sophia looked from the one to the other and her severe face relaxed a little. "It fits most beautiful," she vouchsafed.

"Mother," Mary said when Sophia had gone, "I wanted to catch you just a minute--I've seen Mr Gallup since that night he came to tell us about Buz . . ."

"You've met?" Mrs Ffolliot exclaimed, "where? and why have you never told me?"

"It was while you were away. Miss Gallup had been ill and I went to ask for her and he was there, and he walked home with me . . ."

Mrs Ffolliot raised her eyebrows.

"Oh, you think it funny too? It couldn't be helped--old Miss Gallup seemed to think it was the proper thing and sent him--and father was waiting for me at the gate and was awfully cross. . . . Mother, how _did_ you persuade him to let you ask Mr Gallup?"

Mrs Ffolliot turned to her dressing-table and began to collect fan and handkerchief. She looked in the gla.s.s and saw Mary behind her, eager, radiant, slim, upright, and gloriously young. She began to see why father was so awfully cross. There was more excuse than usual.

"Why don't you answer me, mother? didn't you hear what I said?"

"I heard, my darling. Father needed no persuasion. He simply changed his mind; but I can't think why you never told me you had met Mr Gallup already."

Mary blushed. The warm colour dyed forehead and neck and ears, and faded into the exceedingly white chest and shoulders, revealed to the world for the first time.

Mrs Ffolliot saw all this in the gla.s.s, wondered if she could have imagined it, and turned to face her daughter.

"Mother"--what honest eyes the child had, to be sure--"it wasn't the first time I'd spoken to him."

"Really, Mary, you are very mysterious----"

"I met him in the woods once before Christmas, and he was lost, and I showed him the way out, and father saw us . . . and was just as cross."

Mrs Ffolliot felt more in sympathy with her husband than usual. But all she said was, "Well, well, it's evident you don't need an introduction. I forgot you'd seen him when he called. I'm glad you told me in time to prevent it, or he would have thought it so odd--come, my child, we must go down."

"_You_ aren't cross, are you, mother?" Mary asked wistfully.

"Cross!" Mrs Ffolliot repeated, "at your first party. What is there to be cross about? Yes, my child, that dress is quite charming--father was right, you can stand that dead white--but it's trying to some people--come."

The Campions called for Eloquent, and he found himself seated side by side with Sir George on one of the little seats, while Lady Campion and a pretty niece called Miss Bax sat opposite. Miss Bax was disposed to be friendly and conversational, but to Eloquent the fact that he was going to Redmarley was no ordinary occurrence, and he would infinitely have preferred to have driven out alone, or, better still, to have walked through the soft spring night from his aunt's house to the Manor, which still held something of the glamour that had surrounded it in his childhood.

For him it was still "the Manshun," immense, remote, peopled by inhabitants fine and strange, and far removed from ordinary life. A house whose interior common folk were, it is true, occasionally allowed to see, walking on tiptoe, speaking in whispers, led and instructed by an important rustling old lady who wore an imposing cap and a silk ap.r.o.n; a strange, silent house where none save servants ever seemed to come and go. He had not yet quite recovered from the shock it was to him to hear voices and laughter in that old panelled hall which he had known in childhood as so vast and shadowy. He liked to remember all this, and to feel that he was going there as THEIR guest, to be with THEM on intimate friendly terms. It was wonderful, incredible; it was part of the dream.

". . . don't you think so, Mr Gallup?" asked Miss Bax, and Eloquent woke with a start to realise that he had not heard a word his pretty neighbour was saying. He was thankful that the motor was dark and that the others could not notice how red he was.

"I beg your pardon," he said loudly, leaning forward, "I didn't catch what you said."

"Is the man deaf?" Miss Bax wondered, for the motor was a Rolls-Royce and singularly smooth and noiseless. "I was saying," she went on aloud, "that it will probably be my lot to go in to dinner with Grantly Ffolliot, and that cadets as a cla.s.s are badly in need of snubbing; don't you agree with me?"

"I haven't met any except young Mr Ffolliot," Eloquent said primly, "and I must say he did not strike me as a particularly conceited young man."

"He isn't," Sir George broke in, "he's an exceedingly nice boy, they all are. Their mother has seen to that."

"Boys are so difficult to talk to," Miss Bax lamented; "their range is so limited, and my enthusiasm for football is so lukewarm."

"Try him on his profession," Lady Campion suggested.

"That would be worse. Cadets do nothing but tell you how hard they are worked, and what a fearful block there is in the special branch of the army they are going in for. Is young Ffolliot going to be a Sapper by any chance? for they're the worst of all--considering themselves, as they do, the brains of the army."

"I don't think so," said Sir George; "he's not clever enough. He's only got moderate ability and an uncommonly pretty seat on a horse.

He'll get Field all right. But why are you so sure, my dear, that he'll be your fate? Why not Gallup here? and you could try and convert him to your views on the Suffrage question? He'd be some use, you know. He _has_ a vote."

Again Eloquent blessed the darkness as he coloured hotly and brought his mind back to the present with a violent wrench. He knew he ought to say something, but what? He fervently hoped they would not a.s.sign him to this severe self-possessed young lady who thought cadets conceited and had political views. Heavens! she might be another Elsmaria b.u.t.termish with no blessed transformation later on into something human and approachable.