The Duke advances, chivalric pa.s.sion in his every gesture. The Lady Alice rushes to his arms with that look of trembling transport which tells the tale of stolen love. They fall into a group which would have made the fortune of an Annual.

IV.

Then let us hope, when next I sing, And all the rest are dancing, Our Childe a gentle bride may bring, All other joys enhancing.

Then we will bless the twilight hour That call'd him to a lady's bower.

The Duke led Mrs. Dallington to the dancers with courtly grace. There was great applause, but the spirit of fun and one-and-twenty inspired him, and he led off a gallop. In fact, it was an elegant romp. The two Baronets started from their slumbers, and Lord Mildmay called for Mademoiselle Dacre. The call was echoed. Miss Dacre yielded to the public voice, and acted to the life the gratified and condescending air of a first-rate performer. Lord Mildmay called for Madame Dallington.

Miss Dacre led on her companion as Sontag would Malibran. There was no wreath at hand, but the Duke of St. James robbed his coat of its rose, and offered it on his knee to Mademoiselle, who presented it with Parisian feeling to her rival. The scene was as superb as anything at the _Academie_.

CHAPTER XII.

_An Impromptu Excursion_

'WE CERTAINLY must have a masque,' said the young Duke, as he threw himself into his chair, satisfied with his performance.

'You must open Hauteville with one,' said Mrs. Dallington.

'A capital idea; but we will practise at Dacre first.'

'When is Hauteville to be finished?' asked Mrs. Dallington. 'I shall really complain if we are to be kept out of it much longer. I believe I am the only person in the Riding who has not been there.'

'I have been there,' said the Duke, 'and am afraid I must go again; for Sir Carte has just come down for a few days, and I promised to meet him.

It is a sad bore. I wish it were finished.'

'Take me with you,' said Mrs. Dallington; 'take us all, and let us make a party.'

'An admirable idea,' exclaimed the young Duke, with a brightening countenance. 'What admirable ideas you have, Mrs. Dallington! This is, indeed, turning business into pleasure! What says our hostess?'

'I will join you.'

'To-morrow, then?' said the Duke.

'To-morrow! You are rapid!'

'Never postpone, never prepare: that is your own rule. To-morrow, to-morrow, all must go.'

'Papa, will you go to-morrow to Hauteville?'

'Are you serious?'

'Yes,' said Miss Dacre: 'we never postpone; we never prepare.'

'But do not you think a day, at least, had better intervene?' urged Mr.

Dacre; 'we shall be unexpected.'

'I vote for to-morrow,' said the Duke.

'To-morrow!' was the universal exclamation. Tomorrow was carried.

'I will write to Blanche at once,' said the Duke.

Mrs. Dallington Vere ran for the writing materials, and his Grace indicted the following pithy note:--

'Half-past Ten, Castle Dacre.

'Dear Sir Carte,

'Our party here intend to honour Hauteville with a visit to-morrow, and antic.i.p.ate the pleasure of viewing the improvements, with yourself for their cicerone. Let Rawdon know immediately of this. They tell me here that the sun rises about six. As we shall not be with you till noon, I have no doubt your united energies will be able to make all requisite preparations. We may be thirty or forty. Believe me, dear Sir Carte,

'Your faithful servant,

'St. James.

'Carlstein bears this, which you will receive in an hour. Let me have a line by return.'

CHAPTER XIII.

_The Charms of Hauteville_

IT WAS a morning all dew and sunshine, soft yet bright, just fit for a hawking party, for dames of high degree, feathered cavaliers, ambling palfreys, and tinkling bells. Our friends rose early, and a.s.sembled punctually. All went, and all went on horseback; but they sent before some carriages for the return, in case the ladies should be wearied with excessive pleasure. The cavalcade, for it was no less, broke into parties which were often out of sight of each other. The Duke and Lord St. Jerome, Clara Howard and Charles Faulcon, Miss Dacre and Mrs.

Dallington, formed one, and, as they flattered themselves, not the least brilliant. They were all in high spirits, and his Grace lectured on riding-habits with erudite enthusiasm.

Their road lay through a country wild and woody, where crag and copse beautifully intermixed with patches of rich cultivation. Halfway, they pa.s.sed Rosemount, a fanciful pavilion where the Dukes of St. James sometimes sought that elegant simplicity which was not afforded by all the various charms of their magnificent Hauteville. At length they arrived at the park-gate of the castle, which might itself have pa.s.sed for a tolerable mansion. It was ancient and embattled, flanked by a couple of st.u.r.dy towers, and gave a n.o.ble promise of the baronial pile which it announced. The park was a petty princ.i.p.ality; and its apparently illimitable extent, its rich variety of surface, its ancient woods and numerous deer, attracted the attention and the admiration even of those who had been born in such magical enclosures.

Away they cantered over the turf, each moment with their blood more sparkling. A turn in the road, and Hauteville, with its donjon keep and lordly flag, and many-windowed line of long perspective, its towers, and turrets, and terraces, bathed with the soft autumnal sun, met their glad sight.

'Your Majesty is welcome to my poor castle!' said the young Duke, bowing with head uncovered to Miss Dacre.

'Nay, we are at the best but captive princesses about to be immured in that fearful keep; and this is the way you mock us!'

'I am content that you shall be my prisoner.'

'A struggle for freedom!' said Miss Dacre, looking back to Mrs.

Dallington, and she galloped towards the castle.

Lord Mildmay and Lady St. Jerome cantered up, and the rest soon a.s.sembled. Sir Carte came forward, all smiles, with a clerk of the works bearing a portfolio of plans. A crowd of servants, for the Duke maintained an establishment at Hauteville, advanced, and the fair equestrians were dismounted. They shook their habits and their curls, vowed that riding was your only exercise, and that dust in the earthly economy was a blunder. And then they entered the castle.

Room after room, gallery after gallery; you know the rest. Shall we describe the silk hangings and the reverend tapestry, the agate tables and the tall screens, the china and the armour, the state beds and the curious cabinets, and the family pictures mixed up so quaintly with Italian and Flemish art? But we pa.s.s from meek Madonnas and seraphic saints, from gleaming Claudes and Guidos soft as Eve, from Rubens's satyrs and Albano's boys, and even from those gay and natural medleys, paintings that cheer the heart, where fruit and flower, with their brilliant bloom, call to a feast the b.u.t.terfly and bee; we pa.s.s from these to square-headed ancestors by Holbein, all black velvet and gold chains; cavaliers, by Vand.y.k.e, all lace and spurs, with pointed beards, that did more execution even than their pointed swords; patriots and generals, by Kneller, in Blenheim wigs and Steen-kirk cravats, all robes and armour; scarlet judges that supported ship-money, and purple bishops, who had not been sent to the Tower. Here was a wit who had sipped his coffee at b.u.t.ton's, and there some mad Alcibiades duke who had exhausted life ere he had finished youth, and yet might be consoled for all his flashing follies could he witness the bright eyes that lingered on his countenance, while they glanced over all the patriotism and all the piety, all the ill.u.s.trious courage and all the historic craft, which, when living, it was daily told him that he had shamed. Ye dames with dewy eyes that Lely drew! have we forgotten you? No! by that sleepy loveliness that reminds us that night belongs to beauty, ye were made for memory! And oh! our grandmothers, that we now look upon as girls, breathing in Reynolds's playful canvas, let us also pay our homage to your grace!

The chapel, where you might trace art from the richly Gothic tomb, designed by some neighbouring abbot, to the last effort of Flaxman; the riding-house, where, brightly framed, looked down upon you with a courtly smile the first and gartered duke, who had been Master of the Horse, were alike visited, and alike admired. They mounted the summit of the round tower, and looked around upon the broad county, which they were proud to call their own. Amid innumerable seats, where blazed the hearths of the best blood of England, they recognised, with delight, the dome of Dacre and the woods of Dallington. They walked along a terrace not unworthy of the promenade of a court; they visited the flower gardens, where the peculiar style of every nation was in turn imitated; they loitered in the vast conservatories, which were themselves a palace; they wandered in the wilderness, where the invention of consummate art presented them with the ideal of nature. In this poetic solitude, where all was green, and still, and sweet, or where the only sound was falling water or fluttering birds, the young Duke recurred to the feelings which, during the last momentous week, had so mastered his nature, and he longed to wind his arm round the beautiful being without whom this enchanting domain was a dreary waste.