Valerie Part 7

"I certainly am," replied I. "You informed Mason that I was to go, previous to having my decision; and therefore I gladly withdraw myself from the company of those who have made up their minds to get rid of me."

"I certainly did tell Mason that there was a prospect of your quitting me," replied Madame Bathurst, colouring up; "but--however, it's no use entering into an investigation of what I really said, or catechising my maid: one thing is clear, we have been mutually disappointed with each other, and therefore it perhaps is better that we should part. I believe that I am in your debt, Mademoiselle de Chatenoeuf. Have you reckoned how long you have been with me?"

"I have reckoned the time that I instructed Caroline."

"_Miss_ Caroline, if you please, Mademoiselle de Chatenoeuf."

"Well, then, madame, Miss Caroline, since you wish it; it is five months and two weeks," replied I, rising from my chair.

"You may sit down, mademoiselle, while I make the calculation," said Madame Bathurst.

"It is too great an honour for a Chatenoeuf to sit in your presence,"

replied I, quietly, remaining on my feet.

Madame Bathurst made no reply, but calculating the sum of money due to me on a sheet of note paper, handed it to me and begged me to see if it was correct.

"I have no doubt of it, madame," replied I, looking at it and then laying it down on the desk before her.

Madame Bathurst put the sum in bank-notes and sovereigns down before me, and said, "Do me the favour to count it, and see if it is correct;" and then rising, said, "your wishes will be complied with by my servants as usual, mademoiselle, as long as you remain under my roof. I wish you farewell."

The last words were accompanied with a low courtesy, and she then quitted the room.

I replied with a salute as formal as her own, and mortified at the treatment I had received, I sat down, and a few tears escaped, but my pride came to my a.s.sistance, and I soon recovered myself.

This scene was, however, another proof to me of what I must in future expect; and it had the effect of hardening me and blunting my feelings.

"_Miss_ Caroline!" said I to myself, "when the _protegee_ of Madame d'Albret, and the visitor of Madame Bathurst, it was Caroline and dear Valerie. She might have allowed me to quit her without pointing out to me in so marked a manner how our relative positions have been changed.

However, I thank you, Madame Bathurst; what obligations I may have been under to you are now cancelled, and I need not regret the weight of them as I might have done. Ah! Madame d'Albret, you took me from my home that I might not be buffeted by my mother, and now you have abandoned me to be buffeted by the whole world; well, be it so, I will fight my way, nevertheless;" and as I left the room to pack up my trunks, I felt my courage rise from this very attempt on the part of Madame Bathurst to humiliate me.

The letter of Madame Bathurst to Lady R--, brought the latter to the house that afternoon. I was up in my room when I was informed by the servants that she waited below to see me. When I entered she was alone, Madame Bathurst having gone out in her carriage, and as soon as she saw me, she rushed into my arms almost, taking me by both hands, and saying how happy she was that she had acquired such a treasure as a friend and companion; wished to know whether I could not come with her immediately, as her carriage was at the door, and went on for nearly ten minutes without a check, asking fifty questions, and not permitting me to answer one. At last I was able to reply to the most important, which was, that I would be happy to come to her on the following morning, if she would send for me. She insisted that I should come to breakfast, and I acceded to her request, as Madame Bathurst, who was not an early riser, would not be down at the hour mentioned, and I wished to leave the house without seeing her again, after our formal adieux. Having arranged this, she appeared to be in a great hurry to be off, and skipped out of the room before I could ring the bell to order her carriage.

I completed my preparations for departure, and had some dinner brought into my own room, sending down an excuse for not joining Madame Bathurst, stating that I had a bad headache, which was true enough. The next morning, long before Madame Bathurst was up, I was driven to Baker Street, Portman Square, where Lady R--resided. I found her ladys.h.i.+p in her _robe de chambre_.

"Well," said she, "this is delightful. My wishes are crowned at last.

I have pa.s.sed a night of uncertainty, rolling about between hopes and fears, as people always do when they have so much at stake. Let me show you your room."

I found a very well-furnished apartment prepared for me, looking out upon the street.

"See, you have a front view," she said, "not extensive, but still you can rise early and moralise. You can see London wake up. First, the drowsy policeman; the tired cabman and more tired horse after a night of motion, seeking the stable and repose; the housemaid, half awake, dragging on her clothes; the kitchen-wench was.h.i.+ng from the steps the dirt of yesterday; the milkmaid's falsetto and the dustman's ba.s.s; the baker's boys, the early post delivery, and thus from units to tens, and from tens to tens of thousands, and London stirs again. There is poetry in that, and now let us down to breakfast. I always breakfast in my _robe de chambre_; you must do the same, that is if you like the fas.h.i.+on. Where's the page?"

Lady R--rang the bell of the sitting-room, which she called a boudoir, and a lad of fourteen, in a blue blouse and leather belt made his appearance.

"Lionel, breakfast in a moment. Vanish, before the leviathan can swim a league--bring up hot rolls and b.u.t.ter."

"Yes, my lady," replied the lad, pertly, "I'll be up again before the chap can swim a hundred yards," and he shot out of the room in a second.

"There's virtue in that boy, he has wit enough for a prime minister or a clown at Astley's. I picked him up by a mere chance; he is one of my models."

What her ladys.h.i.+p meant by models I could not imagine, but I soon found out; the return of the lad with breakfast put an end to her talking for the time being. When we had finished, the page was again summoned.

"Now then, Lionel, do your spiriting gently."

"I know," said the boy, "I'm not to smash the cups and saucers as I did yesterday."

The lad collected the breakfast things on a tray with great rapidity, and disappeared with such a sudden turn round, that I fully antic.i.p.ated he would add to yesterday's damage before he was down the stairs.

As soon as he was gone, Lady R--coming up to me, said, "And now let me have a good look at you, and then I shall be content for some time.

Yes, I was not mistaken, you are a perfect model, and must be my future heroine. Yours is just the beauty that I required. There, that will do, now sit down and let us converse. I often have wanted a companion.

As for an amanuensis that is only a nominal task, I write as fast as most people, and I cannot follow my ideas, let me scribble for life, as I may say; and as for my writing being illegible, that's the compositor's concern not mine. It's his business to make it out, and therefore I never have mine copied. But I wanted a beautiful companion and friend--I wouldn't have an ugly one for the world, she would do me as much harm as you will do me service."

"I am sure I hardly know how I am to do you service, Lady R--, if I do not write for you."

"I daresay not, but when I tell you that I am more than repaid by looking at you when I feel inclined, you will acknowledge that you do me service; but we will not enter into metaphysics or psychological questions just now, it shall all be explained by-and-bye. And now the first service I ask of you is at once to leap over the dull fortnight of gradual approaching, which at last ends in intimacy. I have ever held it to be a proof of the suspiciousness of our natures and unworthy. You must allow me to call you Valerie at once, and I must entreat of you to call me Semp.r.o.nia. Your name is delightful, fit for a first-cla.s.s heroine. My real baptismal name is one that I have abjured, and if my G.o.dfathers and G.o.dmothers did give it to me, I throw it back to them with contempt. What do you think it was?--Barbara. Barbara, indeed.

'My mother had a _maid_ called Barbara,' Shakespeare says, and such a name should be a.s.sociated with brooms and yellow soap. Call me Semp.r.o.nia from this time forward, and you confer a favour on me. And now I must write a little, so take a book and a seat on the sofa, for, at the opening of this chapter my heroine is exactly in that position, 'in maiden meditation, fancy free.'"

CHAPTER SEVEN.

Lady R--sat down before her writing materials, and I took my seat on the sofa, as she had requested, and was soon occupied with my reading. I perceived that, as she wrote, her ladys.h.i.+p continually took her eyes off her paper, and fixed them upon me. I presumed that she was describing me, and I was correct in my idea, for, in about half-an-hour, she threw down her pen, and cried:

"There, I am indebted to you for the best picture of a heroine that I ever drew! Listen."

And her ladys.h.i.+p read to me a most flattering description of my sweet person, couched in very high-flown language.

"I think, Lady R--," said I, when she had finished, "that you are more indebted to your own imagination than to reality in drawing my portrait."

"Not so, not so, my dear Valerie. I may have done you justice, but certainly not more. There is nothing like having the living subject to write from. It is the same as painting or drawing, it only can be true when drawn from nature; in fact, what is writing but painting with the pen?"

As she concluded her sentence, the page, Lionel, came in with a letter on a waiter, and hearing her observation, as he handed the letter, he impudently observed:

"Here's somebody been painting your name on the outside of this paper; and as there's 7 pence to pay, I think it's rather dear for such a smudge."

"You must not judge from outside appearance, Lionel," replied Lady R--: "the contents may be worth pounds. It is not prepossessing, I grant, in its superscription, but may, like the toad, ugly and venomous, wear a precious jewel in its head. That was a vulgar error of former days, Lionel, which Shakespeare has taken advantage of."

"Yes, that chap painted with a pen at a fine rate," replied the boy, as Lady R--opened the letter and read it.

"You may go, Lionel," said she, putting the letter down.

"I just wanted to know, now that you've opened your toad, if you have found the jewel, or whether it's a vulgar error?"

"It's a vulgar letter, at all events, Lionel," replied her ladys.h.i.+p, "and concerns you; it is from the shoemaker at Brighton, who requests me to pay him eighteen s.h.i.+llings for a pair of boots ordered by you, and not paid for."

"Well, my lady, I do owe for the boots, true enough; but it's impossible for me always to recollect my own affairs, I am so busy with looking after yours."

"Well, but now you are reminded of them, Lionel, you had better give me the money, and I will send it to him."

At this moment Lady R--stooped from her chair to pick up her handkerchief. There were some sovereigns lying on the desk, and the lad, winking his eye at me, took one up, and, as Lady R--rose up, held it out to her in silence.

"That's right, Lionel," said Lady R--; "I like honesty."