Red Hair Part 10

Poor Lady Katherine almost jumped, and the china rattled.

"Forgive me, Anderson," she said, humbly; "you were saying----?"

"Campion has thrown me over," glared Mr. Montgomerie.

"Then I have perhaps the very thing for you," Lady Katherine said, in a relieved way, returning to her letters. "Sophia Merrenden writes this morning, and among other things tells me of her nephew, Lord Robert Vavasour--you know, Torquilstone's half-brother. She says he is the most charming young man and a wonderful shot--she even suggests" (looking back a page), "that he might be useful to us, if we are short of a gun."

"d.a.m.ned kind of her!" growled Mr. Montgomerie.

I hope they did not notice, but I had suddenly such a thrill of pleasure that I am sure my cheeks got red. I felt frightfully excited to hear what was going to happen.

"Merrenden, as you know, is the best judge of shooting in England," Lady Katherine went on, in an injured voice. "Sophia is hardly likely to recommend his nephew so highly if he were not pretty good."

"But you don't know the puppy, Katherine."

My heart fell.

"That is not the least consequence; we are almost related. Merrenden is my first cousin, you forget that, I suppose!"

Fortunately I could detect that Lady Katherine was becoming obstinate and offended. I drank some more coffee. Oh, how lovely if Lord Robert comes!

Mr. Montgomerie "burrred" a lot first, but Lady Katherine got him round, and before breakfast was over it was decided she should write to Lord Robert and ask him to come to the shoot. As we were all standing looking out of the window at the dripping rain, I heard her say, in a low voice:

"Really, Anderson, we must think of the girls sometimes. Torquilstone is a confirmed bachelor and a cripple--Lord Robert will certainly one day be duke."

"Well, catch him if you can," said Mr. Montgomerie. He is coa.r.s.e sometimes.

I am not going to let myself think much about Lord Robert. Mr.

Carruthers has been a lesson to me. But if he does come, I wonder if Lady Katherine will think it funny of me not saying I knew him when she first spoke of him. It is too late now, so it can't be helped.

The Mackintosh party arrived this afternoon. Marriage must have quite different effects on some people. Numbers of the married women we saw in London were lovely--prettier, I always heard, than they had been before--but Mary Mackintosh is perfectly awful. She can't be more than twenty-seven, but she looks forty, at least; and stout, and sticking out all in the wrong places, and flat where the stick-outs ought to be. And the four children. The two eldest look much the same age, the next a little smaller, and there is a baby, and they all squall, and although they seem to have heaps of nurses, poor Mr. Mackintosh has to be a kind of under one. He fetches and carries for them, and gives his handkerchief when they s...o...b..r, but perhaps it is he feels proud that a person of his size had these four enormous babies almost all at once like that.

The whole thing is simply dreadful.

Tea was a pandemonium! The four aunts gus.h.i.+ng over the infants, and feeding them with cake, and gurgling with "tootsie-wootsie popsy-wopsy"

kind of noises. They will get to do "burrrrs," I am sure, when they get older. I wonder if the infants will come down every afternoon when the shoot happens. The guests will enjoy it.

I said to Jean as we came up-stairs that I thought it seemed terrible to get married; did not she? But she was shocked, and said no, marriage and motherhood were sacred duties, and she envied her sister.

This kind of thing is not my idea of bliss. Two really well-behaved children would be delicious, I think; but four squalling imps all about the same age is _bourgeois_, and not the affair of a lady.

I suppose Lord Robert's answer cannot get here till about Sat.u.r.day. I wonder how he arranged it? It is clever of him. Lady Katherine said this Mr. Campion who was coming is in the same regiment, the 3d Life Guards.

Perhaps when---- But there is no use my thinking about it, only somehow I am feeling so much better to-night--gay, and as if I did not mind being very poor--that I was obliged to tease Malcolm a little after dinner. I _would_ play Patience, and never lifted my eyes from the cards.

He kept trying to say things to me to get me to go to the piano, but I pretended I did not notice. A palm stands at the corner of a high Chippendale writing-bureau, and Jessie happened to have put the Patience-table behind that rather, so the rest of them could not see everything that was happening. Malcolm at last sat very near beside me, and wanted to help with the aces--but I can't bear people being close to me, so I upset the board, and he had to pick up all the cards on the floor. Kirstie, for a wonder, played the piano then--a cake-walk--and there was something in it that made me feel I wanted to move--to dance, to undulate--I don't know what--and my shoulders swayed a little in time to the music. Malcolm breathed quite as if he had a cold, and said, right in my ear, in a fat voice:

"You know you are a devil--and I----"

I stopped him at once, and looked up for the first time, absolutely shocked and surprised.

"Really, Mr. Montgomerie, I do not know what you mean," I said.

He began to fidget.

"Er--I mean--I mean--I awfully wish to kiss you."

"But I do not a bit wish to kiss you," I said, and I opened my eyes wide at him.

He looked like a spiteful bantam, and fortunately at that moment Jessie returned to the Patience, and he could not say any more.

Lady Katherine and Mrs. Mackintosh came into my room on the way up to bed. She--Lady Katherine--wanted to show Mary how beautifully they had had it done up; it used to be hers before she married. They looked all round at the dead-daffodil-colored cretonne and things, and at last I could see their eyes often straying to my night-gown, and dressing-gown, laid out on a chair beside the fire.

"Oh, Lady Katherine, I am afraid you are wondering at my having pink silk," I said, apologetically, "as I am in mourning; but I have not had time to get a white dressing-gown yet."

"It is not that, dear," said Lady Katherine, in a grave duty voice.

"I--I--do not think such a night-gown is suitable for a girl."

"Oh, but I am very strong," I said. "I never catch cold."

Mary Mackintosh held it up, with a face of stern disapproval. Of course it has short sleeves ruffled with Valenciennes, and is fine linen cambric nicely embroidered. Mrs. Carruthers was always very particular about them, and chose them herself at Doucet's. She said one never could know when places might catch on fire.

"Evangeline, dear, you are very young, so you probably cannot understand," Mary said. "But I consider this garment not in any way fit for a girl, or for any good woman for that matter. Mother, I hope my sisters have not seen it."

I looked so puzzled.

She examined the stuff, one could see the chair through it, beyond.

"What _would_ Alexander say if I were to wear such a thing!"

This thought seemed to almost suffocate them both; they looked genuinely pained and shocked.

"Of course it would be too tight for you," I said, humbly; "but it is otherwise a very good pattern, and does not tear when one puts up one's arms. Mrs. Carruthers made a fuss at Doucet's because my last set tore so soon, and they altered these."

At the mention of my late adopted mother, both of them pulled themselves up.

"Mrs. Carruthers, we know, had very odd notions," Lady Katherine said, stiffly. "But I hope, Evangeline, you have sufficient sense to understand now for yourself that such a--a--garment is not at all seemly."

"Oh, why not, dear Lady Katherine?" I said, "You don't know how becoming it is."

"Becoming!" almost screamed Mary Mackintosh, "But no nice-minded woman wants things to look becoming in bed!"

The whole matter appeared so painful to them I covered up the offending "nighty" with my dressing-gown, and coughed. It made a break, and they went away, saying good-night frigidly.

And now I am alone. But I do wonder why it is wrong to look pretty in bed, considering n.o.body sees one, too!