'You don't feel – it has occurred to me that you might perhaps say something to Kilbride?'
'My dear girl, it is not in the least necessary that I should do so. He may flirt with her, but he won't go beyond flirtation, believe me! He is no coward, but he is as little anxious to risk a meeting with me, as I am to force one on him. You may rest assured that I shan't do so, for nothing could be more prejudicial to Lucilla's reputation than the scandal that would create! Take that anxious frown off your face! It doesn't become you! I perceive that Lady Wychwood is about to descend on you, so we had better part: she clearly feels it to be her duty to come between us! I wonder what harm she thinks I could do you in such a public place as this?'
Eleven
In assuming that Lady Wychwood was coming towards them to protect Annis, Mr Carleton wronged her. She had swallowed the glass of hot water, had enjoyed a comfortable chat with Mrs Stinchcombe, and she now wished to go back to Camden Place, to take Tom for a gentle airing in the crescent-shaped garden which lay between Upper and Lower Camden Place. Not being in the habit of indulging ridiculous fancies, the fear that Mr Carleton could do Annis a particle of bodily harm in the Pump Room never entered her head; and as for the danger of his ingratiating himself with her to her undoing, she thought this equally ridiculous. While she talked to Mrs Stinchcombe, she had contrived to watch, from the tail of her eye, the brief tête-à-tête between Annis and this reputed profligate, and she was perfectly assured that her lord had allowed his brotherly anxiety to overcome his good sense. She was going to occupy herself during the afternoon by writing a soothing letter to him, and she said, as she and Annis left the Pump Room: 'I can't for the life of me conceive, dearest, what can have made Geoffrey take such a maggot into his head as to suppose that there was the least fear of that disagreeable man's making you the object of his gallantry – if gallantry it can be called! I promise you, I mean to give him a severe scold, for supposing that you, of all people, could possibly develop a tendre for such a brusque, and extremely ungallant man!'
'Deplorably rag-mannered, isn't he?' agreed Annis.
'Oh, shockingly! I could see that he had made you as cross as crabs, and positively quaked for fear that you would fly up into the boughs, which wouldn't have astonished me, but which would have been a very improper thing to have done in the Pump Room. How unfortunate it is that you are obliged to be on terms with him! Forgive me if I say that I think the sooner he removes Lucilla from your house the better it will be for you! What was he looking so black about?'
'Denis Kilbride,' replied Miss Wychwood, calmly, but with a gleam in her eyes hard to interpret.
'Denis Kilbride?' echoed Lady Wychwood, too much surprised to notice either the gleam, or the little smile that hovered at the corners of Miss Wychwood's mouth. 'Why, what has he to say to anything?'
'Too much!' said Miss Wychwood, with a wry grimace. 'I fear he may be in a fair way towards capturing Lucilla's silly heart, and although that possibility doesn't seem to worry Mr Carleton much, what does worry him, and made him try to ring a peal over me just now, is the circumstance of Kilbride's having escorted Lucilla yesterday all the way from Camden Place to Laura Place. It was unfortunate, for several people saw them, and if you had ever lived in Bath, Amabel, you would know that it is a veritable hotbed of gossip!'
'But surely, Annis, it is perfectly permissible for a gentleman to accompany a girl through the town, in the daytime, and with her maid walking behind, as I don't doubt Lucilla's maid did!' expostulated Lady Wychwood. 'Why, it is quite the thing for a gentleman to take up some young female beside him in his curricle, or his phaeton, or whatever sporting vehicle he happens to be driving! And without her maid!'
'Perfectly permissible, my dear, but not if the gentleman is Denis Kilbride! At the best, he is recognized as a dangerous flirt, and at the worst, a confirmed fortune-hunter.'
'Oh, dear!' said Lady Wychwood, sadly shocked. 'I know Geoffrey didn't at all like it when Kilbride was courting you, when we were all three of us in London. He said he was a hereand-thereian; and I do recall that he once said he suspected him of hanging out for a rich wife. I didn't set much store by that, for Geoffrey does sometimes say things he doesn't really mean, when he takes anyone in dislike, and he never desired me not to receive him, or to invite him to my parties. And when, last year, he had been visiting his grandmother, and had ridden over to Twynham to pay his respects to us, Geoffrey received him with perfect complaisance.'
'By that time, Geoffrey knew that there was no fear of my succumbing to Kilbride's wiles,' said Annis, with a touch of cynicism. 'He is everywhere received, even in Bath! In part, this is due to the respect in which old Lady Kilbride is held; and in part because he is regarded as an amusing rattle, whose presence can be depended on to enliven the dullest party. For myself, though I can imagine few worse fates than to be legshackled to him, I like him, I invite him to my own parties, I frequently dance with him at the Assemblies. But although – in Geoffrey's opinion – I set too little store by the conventions! – I take care not to see so much of him as to give even the most censorious critic reason to say that I live in his pocket! Because I was well-acquainted with him before I came to reside in Bath, he is thought to be an old friend of mine, and as such his presence at my parties, the free-and-easy terms on which we stand are looked on with indulgence. But although I am no girl, and might be supposed to be past the age of looking for a husband, I should hesitate very much to drive with him, ride with him, or even walk with him. Not because I am not very well able to check his familiarities, but because I know just how many malicious tongues would start to wag if I were to be seen tête-â-tête with him! So, with the best will in the world to do so, I cannot blame Mr Carleton for having raked me down!'
'I consider it to have been excessively impertinent of him, and I hope you gave him a set-down!' said Lady Wychwood roundly.
Annis made no reply to this, but it occurred to her that giving Mr Carleton a set-down was something she had never yet succeeded in doing. She thought that it would perhaps be as well if she didn't discuss his character with her sister-in-law, for she had made the disconcerting discovery that however much she herself criticized his faults an almost overmastering impulse to defend them arose in her when anyone else did so. So she turned the subject by directing Lady Wychwood's attention to a very pretty bonnet displayed in a milliner's window. The rest of the walk was beguiled by an animated discussion of all the latest quirks of fashion, which lasted until they reached Upper Camden Place, and Lady Wychwood caught sight of her small son, playing ball in the garden with Miss Farlow. This made her exclaim: 'Oh, look! Maria has taken Tom into the garden! What a good, kind creature she is, Annis!'
'I wish I were rid of her!' replied Annis, with considerable feeling.
Lady Wychwood was shocked. 'Wish you were rid of her? Oh, no, how can you say so, dearest? I am sure there was never anyone more amiable, and obliging! You cannot be serious!'
'I am very serious. I find her a dead bore.'
Lady Wychwood thought this over for a moment, and then said slowly: 'She isn't bookish, of course, and not clever, as you are. And she does talk a great deal, I own. Geoffrey calls her a gabble-grinder, but gentlemen, you know, don't seem to like chatty females, and even he recognizes her many excellent qualities.'
'Are you trying to hoax me into thinking that you don't find her a bore?' demanded Annis incredulously.
'No, indeed! I mean, I truly don't. Oh, sometimes she does chatter rather too much, but, in general, I enjoy talking with her because she is interested in the things which don't interest you. Little things, such as household matters, and the children, and – and new recipes, and a host of things of that nature!' She hesitated, and then said simply: 'You see, dearest, I'm not clever, as you are! Indeed, I often wonder whether you don't find me a dead bore!'
Annis instantly disclaimed, and warmly enough to win a grateful smile from Lady Wychwood; but in her secret heart she knew that fond though she was
of her gentle sister-in-law she did find most of her conversation insipid.
'What I like in her so much,' pursued Lady Wychwood, in a thoughtful tone, 'is the way she enters into all one's chiefest concerns, as one couldn't expect even Geoffrey to do, gentlemen not being able to share one's anxieties about household matters, and croup, and the red gum. And the way she busies herself with any small difficulty that arises, without having been asked to do so – which I hope I should never do! I cannot tell you what a support she was to me when I arrived here, with poor little Tom frantic with the toothache! She went with us to Mr Westcott's, and actually held Tom's hands down – which I, alas, had not the resolution to do – when he pulled out the offending tooth.'
'Sister,' said Annis, solemnly, but with wickedly dancing eyes, 'I have long wanted to make you a present of real value, and you have now shown me how I may do it! I will bestow Maria upon you!'
'How can you be so absurd?' said Lady Wychwood laughingly. 'As though I would dream of taking her away from you!'
No more was said, Tom, by this time, having seen his mother, and run to the railings to greet her. She entered the garden, and Annis went on by herself to the house. Lucilla was spending the rest of the day with the Stinchcombes, and as Mrs Stinchcombe had promised to have her escorted back to Camden Place in time for dinner she felt herself relieved of responsibility. She could not help feeling glad of it, for not only was the entertainment of a lively seventeen-year-old a more onerous charge than she had foreseen, but what Mr Carleton had said to her had made her realize that a period of quiet reflection was her most immediate need. Unless she had been wholly mistaken in the meaning of his cryptic utterance in the Pump Room, she could not doubt that he had the intention of making her an offer of marriage. It would have been false to have said that such a notion had never before occurred to her: it had occurred, but only as a suspicion, which she had been able, without very much difficulty, to banish from her mind. Now that the suspicion had been confirmed she felt that she had been taken by surprise, and was vexed by the realization that she was shaken quite out of her calm self-possession, and was suffering all the fluttering uncertainties of a girl in her first Season. She had been for so long a single woman that it had become a habit with her to think herself beyond marriageable age, and even more beyond the age of falling in love. It was a shock to discover that this had suddenly become a question open to doubt, and that it was a matter for doubt made her out of reason cross with herself, for she ought, surely, to be old enough and wise enough to know her own mind. But the melancholy truth was that she didn't know it. She told herself, in a scolding way, that it ought to be obvious to her that Mr Carleton possessed none of the attributes (except fortune, which was of no interest to her) which could be supposed to make him an acceptable suitor to a lady who had had many suitors, nearly all of whom had been blessed with good-looks, excellent address, polished manners, and a considerable degree of charm. To none of these attributes could Mr Carleton lay claim: it made her smile to think of setting even one of them to his credit; and as she smiled the thought darted through her mind that perhaps it was his lack of social grace which attracted her. It seemed absurd that this should be so, but it was undeniable that not the most charming of her suitors had so much as scratched her heart. She thought that if she had been left without the means to support herself she might have accepted an offer from that particular man, for she liked him very well, and felt reasonably sure that he would be an amiable husband; but when he did make her an offer she unhesitatingly declined it; and, far from regretting her decision, was thankful that her circumstances did not compel her to accept it. She had been sorry for him, because he had been desperately in love with her, and had exerted himself in every imaginable way to win her regard. The only effect her snubs had seemed to have on him had been to make him redouble his efforts to please her. She thought, recollecting his courtship, that he had been quite her most assiduous suitor; and as she remembered the attentions he had lavished on her she instantly contrasted him with Mr Carleton, and gave an involuntary chuckle. No two men could be more unlike. The one had employed every art known to him to bring his courtship to a successful conclusion; the other employed no arts at all. In fact, thought Miss Wychwood judicially, he seemed to lose no opportunity to alienate her. He was ruthlessly blunt, too often brusque to the point of incivility, paid her no extravagant compliments, and showed no disposition to go out of his way to please her. A very odd courtship – if courtship it was – and why he should have seriously disturbed her tranquillity, which, since she was too honest to deceive herself, she owned that he had done, was a problem to which she could discover no answer, the only solution which presented itself to her, that her well-regulated mind had become disordered, being wholly unaccept able to her. She wondered if she was refining too much on the few signs he had given of having fallen in love with her, whether they betokened nothing more than a wish to engage her in a flirtation. This idea no sooner occurred to her than she dismissed it: he had never tried to flirt with her, and the indifference of manner which characterized him did not belong to a man bent on idle dalliance. She thought that the best thing for her peace of mind would be for him to go back to London; and instantly realized that she did not wish him to do so. But she found herself unable to decide whether she wished to become his wife, or what she was to say if he did propose to her. She had always supposed that if ever she had the good fortune to meet the man destined to reach her heart she would recognize him immediately, but it seemed that either she had been mistaken in this belief, or that he was not that man.
It was with these tangled thoughts jostling against each other in her head that she joined Lady Wychwood and Miss Farlow to partake of a light luncheon, but she was too well-bred to allow the least sign of her mental perturbation to appear either in her face or in her manner. To invite anxious questions which she had no intention of answering would be to show a lamentable want of conduct: no woman of consideration wore her heart on her sleeve, or made her guests uncomfortable by behaving in such a way as to lead them to think she was bluedevilled, or suffering from a severe headache. So neither Lady Wychwood nor Miss Farlow suspected that she was not in spirits. She listened to their everyday chit-chat, responded to such remarks as were addressed to her, made such comments as occurred to her, all with her lovely smile which hid from them her entire lack of interest in what they were discussing. It was second-nature to her to maintain a boring conversation with the better part of her mind otherwhere, but she would have been hard put to it when she rose from the table to tell an enquirer what had been the subjects under discussion.
It was Lady Wychwood's custom to retire to her own bedchamber for an hour's repose in the early afternoon before spending the next hour with her much loved offspring; Miss Farlow, for reasons which she frequently gave at tedious length, never rested during the daytime, and brightly detailed the several tasks which awaited her. They ranged from mending a broken toy for Tom to darning a sad rent in the flounce of one of her dresses. 'How I came to tear it I cannot for the life of me conjecture!' she said. 'I haven't the smallest recollection of having caught it on anything, and I am persuaded I couldn't have done so without noticing it, and I am always careful to raise my skirt when I go upstairs so I cannot have trodden on it, for even if I did I should very likely have fallen, which I did once, when I was young and thoughtless. And I must have noticed that, for I daresay I should have bruised myself. Yes, and talking of bruises,' she added earnestly, 'it has me in a puzzle to know how it comes about that one can bruise oneself without having the least recollection of having done so! It seems to me to be most extraordinary that this should be so, for one would suppose it must have hurt one when it happened, but it is so. I well remember –'
But what it was she well remembered Miss Wychwood never knew, for she slipped away at this point, and sought refuge in her book-room, with the intention of dealing with her accounts. She did indeed make a determined effort to do so, but she made slow
progress, because her mind wandered in an exasperating way which put her out of all patience with herself. Mr Carleton's swarthy countenance, and his trenchant voice kept on obtruding themselves so that she continually lost count in the middle of a column of figures, and was obliged to start adding it up again. After she had arrived at three different answers to the sum, she was so cross that she uttered in a far from ladylike manner: 'Oh, the devil fly away with you! You needn't think I like you, for I don't! I hate you!'
She bent again to her task, but ten minutes later Mr Carleton again intruded upon her, this time in person. Limbury came into the room, carefully shutting the door behind him, and informed her that Mr Carleton had called, and begged the favour of a few words with her. She was immediately torn between conflicting emotions: she did not wish to see him; there was no one whom she wished to see more. She hesitated, and Limbury said, in deprecating accents: 'Knowing that you was busy, Miss Annis, I informed him of the circumstance, and ventured to say that I doubted if you was at home to visitors. But Mr Carleton, miss, is regrettably not one to take a hint, and instead of leaving his card with me, and going away, he desired me to convey to you the tidings that he had come to see you on a matter of considerable importance. So I agreed to do so, thinking that it was on some question concerning Miss Lucilla.'
'Yes, it must be, of course,' replied Miss Wychwood, with all her usual calm. 'I will join him immediately.'