The Testing of Diana Mallory by Mrs. Humphry Ward (dark books to read txt) 📕

Colwood saw the kindling of his eyes as they fell on the girl's morning freshness. No sharpness in the voice now!--he was all eagerness to escort and serve his guests.

He led them to the breakfast-room, which seemed to be in an uproar, caused apparently by Bobbie Forbes and Lady Niton, who were talking at each other across the table.

"What is the matter?" asked Diana, as she slipped into a place to which Sir James Chide smilingly invited her--between himself and Mr. Bobbie.

Sir James, making a pretence of shutting his ears against the din, replied that he believed Mr. Forbes was protesting against the tyranny of Lady Niton in obliging him to go to church.

"She never enters a place of worship herself, but she insists that her young men friends shall go.--Mr. Bobbie is putting his foot down!"

"Miss Mallory, let me get you some fish," said Forbes, turning to her with a flushed and determined countenance. "I have now vindicated the rights of man, and am ready to attend--if you will allow me--to the wants of woman. Fish?--or bacon?"

Diana made her choice, and the young man supplied her; then bristling with victory, and surrounded by samples of whatever food the breakfast-table afforded, he sat down to his own meal. "No!" he said, with energy, addressing Diana. "One must really draw the line. The last Sunday Lady Niton took me to church, the service lasted an hour and three-quarters. I am a High Churchman--I vow I am--an out-and-outer. I go in for snippets--and shortening things. The man here is a dreadful old Erastian--piles on everything you can pile on--so I just felt it necessary to give Lady Niton notice. To-morrow I have work for the department--_at home!_ Take my advice, Miss Mallory--don't go."

"I'm not staying over Sunday," smiled Diana.

The young man expressed his regret. "I say," he said, with a quick look round, "you didn't think I was rude last night, did you?"

"Rude? When?"

"In not listening. I can't listen when people talk politics. I want to drown myself. Now, if it was poetry--or something reasonable. You know the only things worth looking at--in this beastly house"--he lowered his voice--"are the books in that glass bookcase. It was Lady Lucy's father--old Lord Merston--collected them. Lady Lucy never looks at them. Marsham does, I suppose--sometimes. Do you know Marsham well?"

"I made acquaintance with him and Lady Lucy on the Riviera."

Mr. Bobbie observed her with a shrewd eye. In spite of his inattention of the night before, the interest of Miss Mallory's appearance upon the scene at Tallyn had not been lost upon him, any more than upon other people. The rumor had preceded her arrival that Marsham had been very much "smitten" with her amid the pine woods of Portofino. Marsham's taste was good--emphatically good. At the same time it was clear that the lady was no mere facile and commonplace girl. It was Forbes's opinion, based on the scene of the previous evening, that there might be a good deal of wooing to be done.

* * * * *

"There are so many things I wanted to show you--and to talk about!" said Oliver Marsham, confidentially, to Diana, in the hall after breakfast--"but this horrid shoot will take up all the day! If the weather is not too bad, I think some of the ladies meant to join us at luncheon. Will you venture?"

His tone was earnest; his eyes indorsed it. Diana hoped it might be possible to come. Marsham lingered beside her to the last minute; but presently final orders had to be given to keepers, and country neighbors began to arrive.

"They do the thing here on an enormous scale," said Bobbie Forbes, lounging and smoking beside Diana; "it's almost the biggest shoot in the county. Amusing, isn't it?--in this Radical house. Do you see that man McEwart?"

Diana turned her attention upon the young member of Parliament who had arrived the night before--plain, sandy-haired, with a long flat-backed head, and a gentlemanly manner.

"I suspect a good deal's going on here behind the scenes," said Bobbie, dropping his voice. "That man Barton may be a fool to talk, but he's a great power in the House with the other Labor men. And McEwart has been hand and glove with Marsham all this Session. They're trying to force Ferrier's hand. Some Bill the Labor men want--and Ferrier won't hear of. A good many people say we shall see Marsham at the head of a Fourth Party of his own very soon, _Se soumettre, ou se demettre!_--well, it may come to that--for old Ferrier. But I'll back him to fight his way through."

"How can Mr. Marsham oppose him?" asked Diana, in wonder, and some indignation with her companion. "He is the Leader of the party, and besides--they are such friends!"

Forbes looked rather amused at her womanish view of things. "Friends? I should rather think so!"

By this time he and Diana were strolling up and down the winter garden opening out of the hall, which was now full of a merry crowd waiting for the departure of the shooters. Suddenly Forbes paused.

"Do you see that?"

Diana's eyes followed his till they perceived Lady Lucy sitting a little way off under a camellia-tree covered with red blossom. Her lap was heaped with the letters of the morning. Mr. Ferrier, with a cigarette in his mouth, stood beside her, reading the sheets of a letter which she handed to him as she herself finished them. Every now and then she spoke to him, and he replied. In the little scene, between the slender white-haired woman and the middle-aged man, there was something so intimate, so conjugal even, that Diana involuntarily turned away as though to watch it were an impertinence.

"Rather touching, isn't it?" said the youth, smiling benevolently. "Of course you know--there's a romance, or rather _was_--long ago. My mother knew all about it. Since old Marsham's death, Lady Lucy's never done a thing without Ferrier to advise her. Why she hasn't married him, that's the puzzle.--But she's a curious woman, is Lady Lucy. Looks so soft, but--" He pursed up his lips with an important air.

"Anyhow, she depends a lot on Ferrier. He's constantly here whenever he can be spared from London and Parliament. He got Oliver into Parliament--his first seat I mean--for Manchester. The Ferriers are very big people up there, and old Ferrier's recommendation of him just put him in straight--no trouble about it! Oh! and before that when he was at Eton--and Oxford too--Ferrier looked after him like a father.--Used to have him up for exeats--and talk to the Head--and keep his mother straight--like an old brick. Ferrier's a splendid chap!"

Diana warmly agreed.

"Perhaps you know," pursued the chatterbox, "that this place is all hers--Lady Lucy's. She can leave it and her money exactly as she pleases. It is to be hoped she won't leave much of it to Mrs. Fotheringham. _Isn't_ that a woman! Ah! you don't know her yet. Hullo!--there's Marsham after me."

For Marsham was beckoning from the hall. They returned hurriedly.

"Who made Oliver that waistcoat?" said Lady Niton, putting on her spectacles.

"I did," said Alicia Drake, as she came up, with her arm round the younger of Lady Niton's nieces. "Isn't it becoming?"

"Hum!" said Lady Niton, in a gruff tone, "young ladies can always find new ways of wasting their time."

Marsham approached Diana.

"We're just off," he said, smiling. "The clouds are lifting. You'll come?"

"What, to lunch?" said Lady Niton, just behind. "Of course they will. What else is there for the women to do? Congratulate you on your waistcoat, Oliver."

"Isn't it superb?" he said, drawing himself up with mock majesty, so as to show it off. "I am Alicia's debtor for life."

Yet a careful ear might have detected something a little hollow in the tone.

Lady Niton looked at him, and then at Miss Drake, evidently restraining her sharp tongue for once, though with difficulty. Marsham lingered a moment making some last arrangements for the day with his sister. Diana noticed that he towered over the men among whom he stood; and she felt herself suddenly delighting in his height, in his voice which was remarkably refined and agreeable, in his whole capable and masterful presence. Bobbie Forbes standing beside him was dwarfed to insignificance, and he seemed to be conscious of it, for he rose on his toes a little, involuntarily copying Marsham's attitude, and looking up at him.

As the shooters departed, Forbes bringing up the rear, Lady Niton laid her wrinkled hand on his arm.

"Never mind, Bobbie, never mind!"--she smiled at him confidentially. "We can't all be six foot."

Bobbie stared at her--first fiercely--then exploded with laughter, shook off her hand and departed.

Lady Niton, evidently much pleased with herself, came back to the window where most of the other ladies stood watching the shooters with their line of beaters crossing the lawn toward the park beyond. "Ah!" she said, "I thought Alicia would see the last of them!"

For Miss Drake, in defiance of wind and spitting rain, was walking over the lawn the centre of a large group, with Marsham beside her. Her white serge dress and the blue shawl she had thrown over her fair head made a brilliant spot in the dark wavering line.

"Alicia is very picturesque," said Mrs. Fotheringham, turning away.

"Yes--and last summer Oliver seemed to be well aware of it," said Lady Niton, in her ear.

"Was he? He has always been very good friends with Alicia."

"He could have done without the waistcoat," said Lady Niton, sharply.

"Aren't you rather unkind? She began it last summer, and finished it yesterday. Then, of course, she presented it to him. I don't see why that should expose her to remarks."

"One can't help making remarks about Alicia," said Lady Niton, calmly, "and she can defend herself so well."

"Poor Alicia!"

"Confess you wouldn't like Oliver to marry her."

"Oliver never had any thought of it."

Lady Niton shook her queer gray head.

"Oliver paid her a good deal of attention last summer. Alicia must certainly have considered the matter. And she is a young lady not easily baffled."

"Baffled!" Mrs. Fotheringham laughed. "What can she do?"

"Well, it's true that Oliver seems to have got another idea in his head. What do you think of that pretty child who came yesterday--the Mallory girl?"

Mrs. Fotheringham hesitated, then said, coldly:

"I don't like discussing these things. Oliver has plenty of time before him."

"If he is turning his thoughts in that quarter," persisted Lady Niton, "I give him my blessing. Well bred, handsome, and well off--what's your objection?"

Mrs. Fotheringham laughed impatiently. "Really, Lady Niton, I made no objection."

"You don't like her!"

"I have only known her twenty-four hours. How can I have formed any opinion about her?"

"No--you don't like her! I suppose you thought she talked stuff last night?"

"Well, there can be no two opinions about that!" cried Mrs. Fotheringham. "Her father seems to have filled her head with all sorts of false Jingo notions, and I must say I wondered Oliver was so patient with her."

Lady Niton glanced at the thin fanatical face of the speaker.

"Oliver had great difficulty in holding his own. She is