Hathercourt

She dances featly.”

A Winter’s Tale.

The ball at Brocklehurst was this year anticipated with more than ordinary interest. It was to be an unusually good one, said the local authorities; all the “best” houses in the neighbourhood were to be filled for it; the regiment at the nearest garrison town was a deservedly popular one, and at least three recognised beauties were expected to be present.

All these facts were discussed with eagerness by the young people round about Brocklehurst, to whom a ball of any kind was an event, to whom this special ball was the event of the year. And in few family circles was it more talked about than in the isolated Rectory at Hathercourt, by few girls was it looked forward to with more anticipation of enjoyment than by the Western sisters. Yet it was not the first, nor the second, nor, in the case of Lilias, the third Brocklehurst ball even, at which they had “assisted,” and only a few weeks previous Miss Western had been seriously talking of declining for the future to take part in the great annual festivity. And here she was now, the week before, as interested in the question of the pretty fresh dresses, which, by an extra turn or two of the screw of economy, the mother had managed to provide for her girls, as if she were again a débutante of seventeen; and, more wonderful still, the excitement had proved infectious, for Mary, sober-minded Mary, was full of it too. She could think of little else than what Lilias was to wear, how Lilias was to look – but for Lilias, the consideration of what Mary was to wear, how Mary was to look, would have been very summarily dismissed.

It is not easy, even with the most unselfish and “managing” of mothers, with the most – theoretically, at least – indulgent of fathers; with two pair of fairly clever hands, and two or three numbers of the latest fashion books, it is not easy, out of what a girl like Alys Cheviott would have thought a not extravagant price for a garden-hat, or a new parasol, to devise for one’s self a ball-dress, in which to appear with credit to one’s self and one’s belongings, on such an occasion as a Brocklehurst ball. And at first the difficulties had appeared so insuperable that Mary had proposed that the whole of the funds should be appropriated to the purchase of a dress for Lilias only.

“You could get one really handsome dress – handsome of its kind, that is to say – for what will only provide two barely wearable ones,” she said, appealingly, “and, Lilias, you should be nicely dressed for once.”

“And you?” said Lilias, aghast.

Mary blushed, and stumbled over a proposal that she should wear some mythical attire which “really might be made to look decent,” out of the remains of the tarletans which had already done good duty on two, if not three previous occasions, “or,” she added, still more timidly, “if you don’t think I could go in that, Lilias, I don’t see why I should go at all this time. You know my pleasure, even selfishly speaking, would be far greater if you alone were to go, comfortably, than if we both went, feeling half ashamed of our clothes! It would spoil the enjoyment – there is no use denying it, however weak-minded it sounds to say so.”

“Of course it would,” said Lilias, promptly. “I am not at all ashamed of saying so. But I don’t despair yet, Mary – only listen to me. I will not go without you – do you hear, child? – I won’t go without you, and we shall be dressed exactly alike. Your dress must be precisely and exactly the same as mine, or I won’t go. There, now you know my decision, and you know that you’ll have to give in.”

She sat down as she spoke on the side of the bed in her room, on which was displayed such modest finery as was in their possession, and in presence of which the weighty discussion was taking place – she sat down on the side of the little bed, and looked Mary resolutely in the face.

“Mary,” she repeated, “you know you will have to give in.”

And Mary gave in on the spot.

That had been three weeks ago. Now it was within two or three days of the ball. How they had managed it, I cannot tell; what good fairy had helped them, I cannot say – none, I suspect, but their own light hearts and youthful energy, and love for each other – but Lilias’s prophesy had proved correct. The two dresses were ready, simple, but not shabby, perfectly suited to their wearers. “A dress,” thought Lilias, “which must make every one see how really pretty Mary is.”

“A dress,” thought Mary, “which Captain Beverley need not be afraid of his grand friends criticising, if, as they must, they notice him dancing with Lilias.”

They were in the midst of their admiration of the successful achievement, when there came an interruption – a noisy knock at the door, and Josey’s noisy voice.

“Lilias! Mary! let me in!” she exclaimed. “Mamma says you are to come down at once. Captain Beverley’s here; he has come back from London, and has walked over all the way from Romary. Come quick!”

Mary turned to Lilias. Lilias had grown scarlet.

“I don’t know that I shall go down,” she said. “I must put away all these things, and I wanted you to help me to fold these dresses, Mary. But mother will be vexed if one of us does not go. Josey, send Alexa up to help me – tell mother Mary is just coming, but that I am very busy.”

“I’ll tell Captain Beverley so,” said Josephine, maliciously.

Mary said nothing, but set to work at folding the dresses, and Lilias assisting her, they were all carefully disposed of before Alexa made her appearance.

“Now, Lilias, be sensible, and come down with me,” said the younger sister. “He has walked all the way from Romary, you hear, and I think its very nice of him. He hardly expected to be able to see us again before the ball, and it looks like affectation not to give him a cordial reception.”

But still Lilias hesitated.

“It isn’t affectation,” she said at last, “but – Mary,” she went on, suddenly breaking off her sentence, “I think it is horrid to talk of such things before there is actually anything to talk of, but to you I don’t mind. I cannot understand Captain Beverley quite; that is why I said I was not sure that I should go down. I don’t understand why – why he has never yet said anything definite. He has been on the verge of it a dozen times at least, and then he has seemed to hesitate.”

Mary looked at her sister anxiously.

“Perhaps he is not sure of you,” she said. “You know, Lilias, what a way you have of turning things into jest very often.”

Lilias shook her head. “No,” she said, “it isn’t that. He knows,” she hesitated, and again her fair face grew rosy, “he knows I like him. No, it is as if there were, some difficulty on his side – his friends perhaps.”

“It can’t be that,” said Mary, decidedly. “He has no parents, no very near friends. He must be free to act for himself, Lilias. I think too highly of him to doubt it, for it has been all so entirely his own doing – from the very first – and if he were in any way not free, it would have been shameful;” her face darkened, and a look came into her eyes which told that Mary Western would not be one to stand by silently and see another wronged, whatever powers of endurance she might have on her own account. But it cleared off again quickly, and she smiled at her sister re-assuringly.

“I am fanciful where you are concerned, Lilias,” she said. “There is no reason for misgiving, I feel sure. I think Captain Beverley is good and true, and it will all be right. Come down-stairs now – mother will not like our leaving her so long alone.”

Lilias made no further objection, and they went down together to the drawing-room, where it would be difficult to say which of the two, Mrs Western or Captain Beverley, was the more eagerly expecting them.

It was only three or four days since the young man had been at the Rectory, for the period of his mysterious absence from Miss Winstanley’s house had really, little as the Cheviotts suspected it, been spent at Hathercourt.

But during those three or four days he had been to town and back again, and now he had left the Edge and taken up his quarters at Romary. A great deal seemed to have happened in these few days, and, in her secret heart, Lilias Western had looked forward to them as to a sort of crisis.

“He will, probably, have been talking over things with his cousin, Mr Cheviott,” she said to herself, “and, naturally, he wishes to have some points settled before speaking to papa or me.”

And it was, therefore, with a sort of expectancy, half hope, half timidity, that added an indefinable charm to her whole bearing and expression, that Lilias met her all but declared lover this afternoon. He felt that she was more attractive than ever, “she grows lovelier every time I see her,” he said to himself, with a sigh, and then tried to forget that he had anything to sigh about, and gave himself up to the pleasure of being again beside her – to the consciousness that his presence was not distasteful to her, and smothered all misgivings with a vague, boyish confidence that, somehow or other, things would all come right in the end.

There could be no doubt about it – he was more devoted than ever – what nineteenth century preux chevalier could give greater proof of his devotion than a ten miles’ walk on a dull December day, for the sake of an hour’s enjoyment of his lady-love’s company, and a cup of tea from her fair hands? Yet when their guest rose to go – he had arranged, he told them, for a dog-cart from Romary to meet him at the Edge Farm – Lilias was conscious of a chill of disappointment. True, he had not been alone with her, but had he sought any opportunity of being so? And Mr Western was at home, sitting reading, as usual, in his study; nothing could have been more easily managed than an interview with him, had Captain Beverley wished it. But a word or two that passed, as he was saying good-bye, again put her but half-acknowledged misgivings to flight.

“Then when shall I see you again?” he said, as he held her hand in his for an instant, unobserved in the little bustle of taking leave.

Lilias glanced round hastily; her mother and Mary were hardly within hearing.

“I really cannot say,” she replied, somewhat coldly, drawing her hand away as she spoke. “I suppose Mary and I will go to the ball on Thursday, with Mrs Greville, but – ”

“Suppose,” repeated Captain Beverley, hastily interrupting her. “Are not you sure of going? I should not have promised to go had I not thought you were certain to be there.”

“Are you going to the ball from Romary?” asked Mary, coming up to where they were standing, before Lilias had time to reply.

“I don’t know exactly,” replied Captain Beverley. “I am not sure what I shall do.”

Mary looked up in surprise, and Lilias saw the look.

“Mary and I will have a very long drive,” she said. “You know we are going with Mrs Greville from Uxley.”

Captain Beverley’s face cleared.

“I shall get there somehow,” he said, brightly, “and you must not forget the dances you have promised me, Miss Western.” And then he said good-bye again, and really took his departure. Lilias’s good spirits did not desert her through the evening, and Mary was glad to see it, and tried to banish the misgivings that had been left in her own mind by her conversation with her sister. But she did not succeed in doing so quite effectually.

“I wonder,” she said to herself – “I wonder why Captain Beverley did not order the dog-cart to come here to meet him. And I wonder, too, why he says so little about the Cheviotts. Under the circumstances, it would be only natural that we should know something of them – he has so often said Miss Cheviott was just like a sister to him.”

“Miss Cheviott is to be at the ball, I suppose,” she said to Lilias the next day. “Does she count as one of the three beauties we heard about, do you think?”

“I suppose so,” said Lilias, rather shortly.

“Did Captain Beverley not say anything about her going?” persisted Mary.

Lilias turned round sharply.

“You heard all he said,” she exclaimed. “He was speaking to you quite as much as to me. I don’t think he mentioned the Cheviotts at all, and I don’t care to hear about them. It is not as if they were Captain Beverley’s brother and sister.”

“I didn’t mean to vex you, Lilias,” said Mary, and then the subject dropped.

Mrs Greville was a very good sort of person to be a chaperon. She was her husband’s second wife, a good many years his junior, and she had no daughters of her own. She was pretty well off, but owing to Mr Greville’s delicate health, her allowance of amusement was, even for a clergyman’s wife, moderate in the extreme, and she had very little occupation of any kind; there were no poor people in the very well-to-do parish of Uxley, and her two boys were at school. She liked chaperoning the Western girls, Lilias especially, as her beauty was sure of receiving attention, and both she and Mary were quickly grateful for a little kindness, unexacting, and ready to be pleased. So, all things considered, she looked forward to the Brocklehurst ball with scarcely less eagerness then the sisters themselves.

“I am so pleased that you have got such pretty dresses this year,” said Mrs Greville, when she and her charges found themselves fairly launched on the eventful evening. She had chartered the roomiest of the Withenden flys, as much less damaging to their attire during a seven miles’ drive than her own little pill-box, in which, carefully wrapped in innumerable mufflers and overcoats, Mr Greville followed meekly behind. “Yes, I am particularly pleased you have got such pretty dresses, for I quite think it is going to be a very brilliant ball. You have heard that there are to be three beauties —noted beauties, have you not? There’s young Mrs Heron-Wyvern, the bride, you know; she is of Spanish origin; her father was a General Monte something or other, and they say she is lovely; and Sir Thomas Fforde’s niece, Miss – oh, I always forget names, but she is very pretty – handsome, rather – she is not so very young; and then there is Miss Cheviott of Romary. I have not seen her since she was quite a little girl, but she was pretty then, even.”

“Are the Cheviotts at Romary now?” asked Mary, when she got a chance of speaking.

“Oh, yes, I believe so, and very much liked, I hear,” replied Mrs Greville. “There was an impression that Mr Cheviott was stiff and ‘stuck up,’ but I believe it’s not at all the case when you know him. I hear Romary is likely to be one of the pleasantest houses in the county. I dare say Miss Cheviott will be making some grand match before long, though I have heard – ”

But just at this moment the sudden rattle of the wheels upon the unmistakable cobble stones of Brocklehurst High Street distracted Mrs Greville’s attention.

“Here we are, I declare!” she exclaimed, “How quickly we seem to have come! I do hope the brougham is close behind, for Mr Greville has all the tickets;” and, in the bustle that ensued, what she had heard as to Miss Cheviott’s prospects or intentions was never revealed.

They were very early. Mrs Greville liked to be early, “to see all the people come in.” Hitherto, on such occasions, this weakness of her friend had been a sore trial to Lilias, but this year, for reasons of her own, she had made no objections to it, and had not, as formerly, exhausted her energies in search of some cleverly-laid scheme for making Mrs Greville late in spite of herself. And if Lilias was content, it never occurred to Mary to be anything else; so they all sat down together “in a nice corner out of the draught,” and listened to the discordant preliminaries of the band, and watched the gradually filling of the bare, chilly rooms, two hearts among the four caring for little but the confidently looked-for approach of a tall, manly figure, with a bright fair face, to claim his partner for the first two dances.

But time wore on; the first quadrille was a thing of the past, and still Lilias and Mary sat decorously beside their chaperon, each thinking to herself that “surely the Romary party was very late.” But when the second dance, a Waltt, had also come to an end, Lilias’s air changed; a proud flush of colour overspread her cheeks, and when Frank Bury, a Withenden curate of rather unclerical tastes, but decided in his admiration for Miss Western, begged for “the honour of the third dance,” she accepted at once – so much more amiably, and with so much sweeter smiles than usual, that the poor young man grew crimson with astonishment and delight. Mary longed, yet dared not, to interfere; there was “a look” in Lilias’s face as she walked away on Frank Bury’s arm that made Mary’s heart burn with anxiety for the possible issues of this evening.

“Oh,” said she, to herself, “if he were to come just now and think she would not wait for him!”

And she sat still in fear and trembling, longing for, yet dreading Captain Beverley’s appearance.

The dance was not half over when there came a little bustle at the principal door-way. Those nearest it stood back, and even through the music one discerned a slight hush of expectancy. Some new-comers were at hand; new-comers, too, of evident importance. Mrs Greville’s ears and eyes were equally wide awake.

“The Cleavelands party,” she whispered to Mary, “and I hear all the three beauties come with them! The Heron-Wyverns are staying there, and so are the Ffordes, and the Cheviotts. It looks as if it had been arranged on purpose to make a sensation.”

Mary would have cared little but for one thought. “Then there has been no party at Romary?” she asked.

“I suppose not – evidently not, for see, there is Mr Cheviott coming into the room with Sir Thomas’s niece on his arm – what a handsome couple! but he has a forbidding expression. Then that must be the bride, I suppose – oh, yes, look, Mary, she is going to dance with her husband, young Heron-Wyvern – he has reddish hair – and how, I wonder what has become of the third beauty, Miss Cheviott.”

But at this moment an acquaintance of Mrs Greville happening to take the vacant seat on her other side, her attention was distracted, and Mary’s eyes were left free to roam in search of one familiar figure. Her heart was beating fast with excitement and anxiety, her sight surely was growing confused, for could that be he? Over on the other side, through a bewilderment of faces, she espied the one she was in search of, gazing about in quest of Lilias, or disconsolately observing her defalcation. Ah no, Captain Beverley’s face was bent to meet the upturned glance of a beautiful woman on his arm she was smiling up at him; he, down upon her, “just,” thought Mary, with a thrill of something very nearly approaching agony, “just as I have seen him look at Lilias hundreds of times.” Never had he appeared to greater advantage, never had his fair, handsome face looked brighter or more attractive – and the lady – yes, in another instant, Mary was sure of it, recognised fully the slight, graceful figure, the peculiar “set” of the haughty little head, and the glance of the pretty violet eyes. Yes, they were nearer her now, the young lady was his cousin, the beautiful Miss Cheviott! In another instant his arm was round her waist, they were dancing together. And Mary, for the first time in her life, felt as if it might be possible to hate good-natured Mrs Greville, when a succession of lady-like nudges having compelled her attention, her chaperon whispered, triumphantly, “Look, Mary, quick, child, or you won’t see them —there is Miss Cheviott, isn’t she lovely? And she is dancing with her cousin, Captain Beverley. And Mr Knox tells me – he has just heard it on the best authority – they are engaged to each other.”

“You forget that I know Captain Beverley,” Mary could not help rejoining, coldly; “he has called at the Rectory several times when he has been staying at the Edge Farm.”

“Ah, yes, to be sure. I wish he would come and ask you to dance,” said Mrs Greville, carelessly.

But Mary felt as if “the dance had all gone out of her.” Her mental tremors now took a new form – dread of her sister’s return, and, more in cowardice than because she had the slightest wish to move, she accepted Mr Greville’s offer of a convoy across the room “for a change; Mr Knox will look after my wife till your sister comes back,” he said, good-naturedly.

“Across the room,” Mary met with an unexpected invitation to “join the dance.” The major of the 210th was an old friend of Mr Greville’s, and being a quiet, retiring man, the number of his acquaintances at Brocklehurst was not large. He did not care much about dancing, but after chatting to Mr Greville for a minute or two, he discovered that the girl on his friend’s arm had a nice face and an undoubtedly beautiful pair of eyes, and, before Mary knew what she was about, she was dancing with Major Throckmorton, and engaged to him for the quadrille to follow. Between the dances her partner proposed that they should walk up and down the long corridor into which the ball-room opened, and Mary, caring little – so completely were her thoughts absorbed with Lilias – where she went, absently agreed. Major Throckmorton was so shy himself that he naturally attributed to the same cause the peculiarity of the young lady’s manner, and liked her none the less on account of it. But before the quadrille had reached the end of its first figure, his theory had received a shock. For suddenly his partner’s whole manner changed. She smiled, and talked, and laughed, and seemed interested; where before he had only succeeded in extracting the most indistinct of monosyllables, she now answered with intelligence and perfect self-possession, hazarding observations of her own in a way which proved her to be by no means the timid, ill-assured country maiden he had imagined her.

“What a curiously changeable girl!” he said to himself. “Five minutes ago I did not feel sure that she took in the sense of a word I said to her, and now she is as composed and rational as possible, and evidently a well-educated girl. What queer creatures women are!”

His glance ran down the lines of faces opposite them. Among them one arrested his attention. “What a beautiful girl,” he exclaimed; “the most beautiful in the room, in my opinion. Do you happen to know who she is, Miss Western?”

Mary’s eyes followed willingly in the direction he pointed out – whither, indeed, they had already been frequently wandering – and her whole face lighted up with a happy smile.

“Do you think her the most beautiful girl in the room?” she said. “I am so glad, for she is my sister. Do you know the gentleman she is dancing with?”

Major Throckmorton glanced at Lilias’s partner. “No,” he said, “I don’t think I do. I know so few people here. He is a good-looking fellow, and,” he hesitated, and glanced again in Miss Western’s direction, then added with a kindly smile, “it is evident he would agree with my opinion as to who is the most beautiful girl in the room.”

Mary smiled too, and blushed a little, and decided that her partner was one of the pleasantest men she had ever met. And poor Major Throckmorton thought how pretty she looked when she blushed, and said to himself that before long, very probably, some other fellow would be appropriating her, as her beautiful sister evidently was already appropriated, and he sighed to think that, not withstanding his eighteen years’ service, such good luck had never yet come in his way! For it was a case of “uncommonly little besides his pay,” and beautiful girls were not for such as he.

Chapter Ten

Throwing Down the Gauntlet

“The marvel dies, and leaves me fool’d and trick’d.And only wondering wherefore play’d upon!And doubtful whether I and mine be scorn’d.”Gareth and Lynette.

Major Throckmorton took Mary back to Mrs Greville, and after engaging her for another dance, later in the evening, strolled away again, considerably to her satisfaction, for she was now as anxious to see Lilias, and hear the explanation of Captain Beverley’s inconsistent behaviour, as she had before been to avoid her.

“Have you seen Lilias?” she asked Mrs Greville, eagerly, for no Lilias was as yet at the rendezvous. “She was near us in that last quadrille, but then, somehow, I lost sight of her in the crowd.”

“She is very content, wherever she is, I can assure you,” said Mrs Greville, significantly. “I don’t fancy either you or I will see much more of her for the rest of the evening. It is as clear as daylight,” she went on. “Why didn’t you tell me, Mary?”