"My dear!"

"I shall go to Clara Winsleigh this morning--and see what she means to do in the matter. Poor Clara! She must be disgusted at the whole affair!"

"She had rather a liking for Errington, hadn't she?" inquired Mr.

Marvelle, folding up the _Times_ in a neat parcel, preparatory to taking it with him in order to read it in peace on his way to the Law Courts.

"Liking? Well!" And Mrs. Marvelle, looking at herself once more in the gla.s.s, carefully arranged the ruffle of Honiton lace about her ma.s.sive throat,--"It was a little more than liking--though, of course, her feelings were perfectly proper, and all that sort of thing,--at least, I suppose they were! She had a great friendship for him,--one of those emotional, perfectly spiritual and innocent attachments, I believe, which are so rare in this wicked world." Mrs. Marvelle sighed, then suddenly becoming practical again, she continued. "Yes, I shall go there and stop to luncheon, and talk this thing over. Then I'll drive on to the Van Clupps, and bring Marcia home to dinner. I suppose you don't object?"

"Object!" Mr. Marvelle made a deprecatory gesture, and raised his eyes in wonder. As if he dared object to anything whatsoever that his wife desired!

She smiled graciously as he approached, and respectfully kissed her smooth cool cheek, before taking his departure for his daily work as a lawyer in the city, and when he was gone, she betook herself to her own small boudoir, where she busied herself for more than an hour in writing letters, and answering invitations.

She was, in her own line, a person of importance. She made it her business to know everything and everybody--she was fond of meddling with other people's domestic concerns, and she had a finger in every family pie. She was, moreover, a regular match-maker,--fond of taking young ladies under her maternal wing, and "introducing" them to the proper quarters, and when, as was often the case, a distinguished American of many dollars but no influence offered her three or four hundred guineas for chaperoning his daughter into English society and marrying her well, Mrs. Rush-Marvelle pocketed the _douceur_ quite gracefully, and did her best for the girl. She was a good-looking woman, tall, portly, and with an air of distinction about her, though her features were by no means striking, and the smallness of her nose was out of all proportion to the majesty of her form--but she had a very charming smile, and a pleasant, taking manner, and she was universally admired in that particular "set"

wherein she moved. Girls adored her, and wrote her gushing letters, full of the most dulcet flatteries--married ladies on the verge of a scandal came to her to help them out of their difficulties--old dowagers, troubled with rheumatism or refractory daughters, poured their troubles into her sympathizing ears--in short, her hands were full of other people's business to such an extent that she had scarcely any leisure to attend to her own. Mr. Rush-Marvelle,--but why describe this gentleman at all? He was a mere nonent.i.ty--known simply as the husband of Mrs.

Rush-Marvelle. He knew he was n.o.body--and, unlike many men placed in a similar position, he was satisfied with his lot. He admired his wife intensely, and never failed to flatter her vanity to the utmost excess, so that, on the whole, they were excellent friends, and agreed much better than most married people.

It was about twelve o'clock in the day, when Mrs. Rush-Marvelle's neat little brougham and pair stopped at Lord Winsleigh's great house in Park Lane. A gorgeous flunkey threw open the door with a virtuously severe expression on his breakfast-flushed countenance,--an expression which relaxed into a smile of condescension on seeing who the visitor was.

"I suppose Lady Winsleigh is at home, Briggs?" inquired Mrs. Marvelle, with the air of one familiar with the ways of the household.

"Yes'm," replied Briggs slowly, taking in the "style" of Mrs.

Rush-Marvelle's bonnet, and mentally calculating its cost. "Her ladyship is in the boo-dwar."

"I'll go there," said Mrs. Marvelle, stepping into the hall, and beginning to walk across it, in her own important and self-a.s.sertive manner. "You needn't announce me."

Briggs closed the street-door, settled his powdered wig, and looked after her meditatively. Then he shut up one eye in a sufficiently laborious manner and grinned. After this he retired slowly to a small ante-room, where he found the _World_ with its leaves uncut. Taking up his master's ivory paper-knife, he proceeded to remedy this slight inconvenience,--and, yawning heavily, he seated himself in a velvet arm-chair, and was soon absorbed in perusing the pages of the journal in question.

Meanwhile Mrs. Marvelle, in her way across the great hall to the "boo-dwar," had been interrupted and nearly knocked down by the playful embrace of a handsome boy, who sprang out upon her suddenly with a shout of laughter,--a boy of about twelve years old, with frank, bright blue eyes and cl.u.s.tering dark curls.

"Hullo, Mimsey!" cried this young gentleman-"here you are again! Do you want to see papa? Papa's in there!"--pointing to the door from which he had emerged--"he's correcting my Latin exercise. Five good marks to-day, and I'm going to the circus this afternoon! Isn't it jolly?"

"Dear me, Ernest!" exclaimed Mrs. Marvelle half crossly, yet with an indulgent smile,--"I wish you would not be so boisterous! You've nearly knocked my bonnet off."

"No, I haven't," laughed Ernest; "it's as straight as--wait a bit!" And waving a lead pencil in the air, he drew an imaginary stroke with it.

"The middle feather is bobbing up and down just on a line with your nose--it couldn't be better!"

"There, go along, you silly boy!" said Mrs. Marvelle, amused in spite of herself. "Get back to your lessons. There'll be no circus for you if you don't behave properly! I'm going to see your mother."

"Mamma's reading," announced Ernest. "Mudie's cart has just been and brought a lot of new novels. Mamma wants to finish them all before night. I say, are you going to stop to lunch?"

"Ernest, why are you making such a noise in the pa.s.sage?" said a gentle, grave voice at this juncture. "I am waiting for you, you know. You haven't finished your work yet. Ah, Mrs. Marvelle! How do you do?"

And Lord Winsleigh came forward and shook hands. "You will find her ladyship in, I believe. She will be delighted to see you. This young scapegrace," here he caressed his son's cl.u.s.tering curls tenderly--"has not yet done with his lessons--the idea of the circus to-day seems to have turned his head."

"Papa, you promised you'd let me off Virgil this morning!" cried Ernest, slipping his arm coaxingly through his father's. Lord Winsleigh smiled.

Mrs. Rush-Marvelle shook her head with a sort of mild reproachfulness.

"He really ought to go to school," she said, feigning severity. "You will find him too much for you, Winsleigh, in a little while."

"I think not," replied Lord Winsleigh, though an anxious look troubled for an instant the calm of his deep-set grey eyes. "We get on very well together, don't we, Ernest?" The boy glanced up fondly at his father's face and nodded emphatically. "At a public-school, you see, the boys are educated on hard and fast lines--all ground down to one pattern,--there's no chance of any originality possible. But don't let me detain you, Mrs. Marvelle--you have no doubt much to say to Lady Winsleigh. Come, Ernest! If I let you off Virgil, you must do the rest of your work thoroughly."

And with a courteous salute, the grave, kindly-faced n.o.bleman re-entered his library, his young son clinging to his arm and pouring forth boyish confidences, which seemingly received instant attention and sympathy,--while Mrs. Rush-Marvelle looked after their retreating figures with something of doubt and wonder on her placid features. But whatever her thoughts, they were not made manifest just then. Arriving at a door draped richly with old-gold plush and satin, she knocked.

"Come in!" cried a voice that, though sweet in tone, was also somewhat petulant.

Mrs. Marvelle at once entered, and the occupant of the room sprang up in haste from her luxurious reading-chair, where she was having her long tresses brushed out by a prim-looking maid, and uttered an exclamation of delight.

"My dearest Mimsey!" she cried, "this is quite too sweet of you! You're just the very person I wanted to see!" And she drew an easy fauteuil to the sparkling fire,--for the weather was cold, with that particularly cruel coldness common to an English May,--and dismissed her attendant.

"Now sit down, you dear old darling," she continued, "and let me have all the news!"

Throwing herself back on her lounge, she laughed, and tossed her waving hair loose over her shoulders, as the maid had left it,--then she arranged, with a coquettish touch here and there, the folds of her pale pink dressing-gown, showered with delicate Valenciennes. She was undeniably a lovely woman. Tall and elegantly formed, with an almost regal grace of manner, Clara, Lady Winsleigh, deserved to be considered, as she was, one of the reigning beauties of the day. Her full dark eyes were of a bewitching and dangerous softness,--her complexion was pale, but of such a creamy, transparent pallor as to be almost brilliant,--her mouth was small and exquisitely shaped. True,--her long eyelashes were not altogether innocent of "kohl,"--true, there was a faint odor about her as of rare perfumes and cosmetics,--true, there was something not altogether sincere or natural even in her ravishing smile and fascinating ways--but few, save cynics, could reasonably dispute her physical perfections, or question the right she had to tempt and arouse the pa.s.sions of men, or to trample underfoot? with an air of insolent superiority, the feelings of women less fair and fortunate. Most of her s.e.x envied her,--but Mrs. Rush-Marvelle, who was past the prime of life, and, who, moreover, gained her social successes through intelligence and tact alone, was far too sensible to grudge any woman her beauty. On the contrary, she was a frank admirer of handsome persons, and she surveyed Lady Winsleigh now through her gla.s.ses with a smile of bland approval.

"You are looking very well, Clara," she said. "Let me see--you went to Kissingen in the summer, didn't you?"

"Of course I did," laughed her ladyship. "It was delicious! I suppose you know Lennie came after me there! Wasn't it ridiculous!"

Mrs. Marvelle coughed dubiously. "Didn't Winsleigh put in an appearance at all?" she asked.

Lady Clara's brow clouded. "Oh yes! For a couple of weeks or so. Ernest came with him, of course, and they rambled about together all the time.

The boy enjoyed it."

"I remember now," said Mrs. Marvelle. "But I've not seen anything of you since you came back, Clara, except once in the park and once at the theatre. You've been all the time at Winsleigh Court--by-the-by, was Sir Francis Lennox there too?"

"Why, naturally!" replied the beauty, with a cool smile. "He follows me everywhere like a dog! Poor Lennie!"

Again the elder lady coughed significantly.

Clara Winsleigh broke into a ringing peal of laughter, and rising from her lounge, knelt beside her visitor in a very pretty coaxing att.i.tude.

"Come, Mimsey!" she said, "you are not going to be proper at this time of day! That would be a joke! Darling, indulgent, good old Mimsey!--you don't mean to turn into a prim, prosy, cross Mrs. Grundy! I won't believe it! And you mustn't be severe on poor Lennie--he's such a docile, good boy, and really not bad-looking!"

Mrs. Marvelle fidgeted a little on her chair. "I don't want to talk about _Lennie_, as you call him," she said, rather testily--"Only I think you'd better be careful how far you go with him. I came to consult you on something quite different. What are you going to do about the Bruce-Errington business? You know it was in the Post to-day that they've arrived in town. The idea of Sir Philip bringing his common wife into society!--It's too ridiculous!"

Lady Winsleigh sprang to her feet, and her eyes flashed disdainfully.

"What am I going to do?" she repeated, in accents of bitter contempt.

"Why, receive them, of course! It will be the greatest punishment Bruce-Errington can have! I'll get all the best people here that I know--and he shall bring his peasant woman among them, and blush for her! It will be the greatest fun out! Fancy a Norwegian farmer's girl lumbering along with her great feet and red hands! . . . and, perhaps, not knowing whether to eat an ice with a spoon or with her fingers! I tell you Bruce-Errington will be ready to die for shame--and serve him right too!"

Mrs. Marvelle was rather startled at the harsh, derisive laughter with which her ladyship concluded her excited observations, but she merely observed mildly--

"Well, then, you will leave cards?"

"Certainly?"

"Very good--so shall I," and Mrs. Marvelle sighed resignedly. "What must be, must be! But it's really dreadful to think of it all--I would never have believed Philip Errington could have so disgraced himself!"

"He is no gentleman!" said Lady Winsleigh freezingly. "He has low tastes and low desires. He and his friend Lorimer are two _cads_, in my opinion!"