Hester · Chapter 18 (1/2)

XVIII

A Family Party

“A grandson of Captain Morgan! Well, that is not much to meet us at our wedding dinner⁠—at least, if it is not our wedding dinner⁠—Oh, I know there was our state one, and we met all the old fogies whom I detest!” cried Mrs. Algernon Merridew, born Ellen Vernon; “but this is only the second, and the second is quite as important as the first. She should have asked the county first, to introduce us properly⁠—and then the town; but Aunt Catherine is one of the people who never do what’s expected of them. Besides, I don’t want to meet her relations on the other side. They’re nobodies. She spends quantities of money upon them which she has no business to do, seeing it’s the Vernons’ money and not hers at all, if you come to that.”

“Come, Nell,” said her husband with a laugh. He was a dark young man, as was to be expected⁠—seeing that she was so fair a young woman⁠—good-looking, with whiskers, which were the fashion in those days, of a bushy blackness, and hair which suggested pomade. “Come, Nell,” he said, “strike fair. Catherine Vernon does a great deal of good with her money, and doesn’t spare upon the Vernons⁠—all the town knows that.”

“Oh no, she doesn’t spare upon the Vernons⁠—all those useless old creatures that she has up there in that horrid old-fashioned house! I think if she did a little more for real relations, and left those old fogies alone, it would be more like⁠—Expecting one to call upon them, and take all sorts of trouble! And look at poor old Harry kept with his nose at his desk forever.”

“Poor old Harry is very lucky, I think. Fair play is a jewel. If she doesn’t do all you want, who do you expect would?”

“You, of course!” cried Ellen, as was natural: and they were so newly married that he thought it very pretty; “that is the good of you; and if you go in for Aunt Catherine too, when you know I can’t endure her⁠—”

“Of course the good of me is to do whatever you want,” he said, with various honeymoon demonstrations; “but as for going in for Aunt Catherine⁠—you must know this, Nelly, that I’m very proud of being connected with Catherine Vernon. I have heard of her all my life as a sort of goddess, you know. You must not put me off it all at once⁠—I couldn’t be put off it. There now, there’s nothing to look sulky about.”

“You are such an old Redborough person,” Ellen said, with a little pout: which was very true. He was not, indeed, at all a good match for a Vernon; but his whiskers⁠—things much admired in those days⁠—and her self-will had worsted all opposition. He was no more than the son of the perfectly respectable and very well-to-do solicitor, who was universally respected in Redborough, and though Algernon had been in town and sown his wild oats, he had never entirely got out of his mind the instinctive conviction that Redborough was the centre of the world; and to feel himself within the charmed circle in which Catherine Vernon moved was a promotion which was intoxicating to the young man. Not even his devotion to his pretty wife, which was great, could bring him to disown that allegiance to Catherine Vernon which every Redborough man was born with. It was a sort of still more intoxicating proof of the dignity he had come to, that the pretty wife herself turned up her little nose at Catherine. That Mrs. Algernon should be so familiar with the highest excellence known to them, as to venture to do this, was to the whole family of the Merridews an admiration⁠—just as a family entirely loyal might be flattered by having a princess among them who should permit herself to laugh at the majesty of the king; but this did not shake their own fidelity. And Algernon, though he ventured with bated breath to say “Aunt Catherine” when he spoke of her in his own family, had not got over his veneration for Miss Vernon. He had taken her in to dinner on the occasion of the great banquet, which Ellen described so lightly, with a sensation bordering upon the hysterical. Rapture, and pride, and panic were in it. He did not know, according to the vulgar description, whether he were on his head or his heels, and his voice made a buzzing in his own ears as he talked. The second time was to be in the intimacy of the domestic circle⁠—if it had been to meet a crossing-sweeper it would still have been a bewildering gratification; but all the more, his wife’s criticism and her indifference, and even discontent with the notice which to him seemed so overpowering an honour, pleased the young man. She felt herself every bit as good as Catherine, and yet she was his⁠—Mrs. Algernon Merridew! The thought was one adapted to make his head swim with pride and delight.

It was entirely a family party, as Catherine had said, and a very small one. The Miss Vernon-Ridgways had been invited, to make the number even, and their preparations for the unusual honour had taken up four days at least. When they sailed into the drawing-room at the Grange, having spent ten minutes in shaking out the flounces and arranging the flowers and ribbons with which they were ornamented, it would be impossible to attempt to describe the disgust of the bride. She turned her eyes upon her husband, who for his part was in a state of beatitude not to be disturbed by trifles, with a look of indignant rage which he did not understand. “To think she should ask those old things to meet us! I declare I have a great mind to go right away,” she whispered to Harry, who was more sympathetic. Harry allowed that it was almost beyond bearing. “But I wouldn’t make a quarrel if I were you,” he said. In the meantime the sisters went up beaming to their dear Catherine, whom they kissed with devotion. How well she was looking! how becoming her dress was! but that lovely lace would be becoming to anyone! they cried. Catherine received all these compliments with a smile, and she took great pleasure in Ellen’s disgust, and the way in which she turned her ear instead of her cheek to the salutations of the cousins, who were rapturous in their admiration of her in all her bridal finery. The entry of the stranger, who was unknown to any of them, made a diversion. Roland Ashton, when he was visible in the full light of Miss Vernon’s drawing-room, turned out, in appearance at least, a very valuable addition to the society. Ellen, who was critical, and inclined by nature to a poor opinion of old Captain Morgan’s grandson, looked at him with astonished, and indeed reluctant, approval. His whiskers were not so thick or so black as Algernon’s; but he had a fine mass of dark hair, wavy, and rather longer than is now permitted by fashion, fine features and dark eyes, with a paleness which was considered very interesting in those days. He was much taller and of more imposing aspect than Edward, whose stature was not great; he was far more intellectual than Harry; altogether of the four young men present, his was no doubt the most noticeable figure. They all appraised him mentally as he came in⁠—Catherine first of all, with a sensation of pride that the one individual who was her relation, without being the relation of her family, was a creditable novelty to introduce among them; the others, with various degrees of quickened curiosity and grudging. The grudge was intensified in the persons of the sisters, who could not endure this interloper. They had felt it their duty to draw the line at the Morgans long ago, and it was all they could do to behave with propriety at Catherine’s table when they were seated beside the descendant of the old people on whom Catherine spent her money in what they felt to be an entirely unjustifiable way. They were the only persons present who kept up their grudge to the end. In Ellen’s case it disappeared with the clear perception of his good looks. But when Mr. Ashton offered his arm to Miss Matilda Vernon-Ridgway, the look with which she received the offered courtesy was enough to freeze any adventurous young man into stone. It did not, however. It made him all but laugh as he glanced at Catherine, who for her part contemplated her cousins with much gratification. Miss Matilda placed the end of her finger upon the young man’s arm. She kept at as great a distance as possible as she crossed the hall by his side. To the little speech about the weather, which he thought it his duty to make her, she returned a sort of inarticulate reply⁠—a monosyllable, but conveying no meaning. When she was seated at table she flung herself, so to speak, upon her neighbour at the other side, who, as it happened, was Harry Vernon, and who was not prepared for the honour. All this was to Catherine as good as a play.

“What a climate, and what a poky old place this Redborough is,” said Ellen, preparing to lead the conversation, as she finished her soup. She spoke apparently to Edward, but in reality to the company, which was not too large for general conversation. “It is dreadful to come back here in the beginning of winter from Abroad. I declare I quite envy you, you people who have never been Abroad; you don’t know the difference. Bright sunshine all day long, and bands playing, and the best of music, and all your friends to talk to, sitting out under the trees. Compare that with Redborough, where, beyond a few tiresome little dinner parties, and perhaps three dances at Christmas⁠—”

“The White House used to be a great addition to the cheerfulness of the place,” said Edward. “Harry will have no heart to keep it up by himself now you have left him.”

“Oh, Harry shall marry,” said Ellen, “I have made up my mind to that; and as soon as we have got quite settled, I mean to set things a-going. I mean to have a Thursday, Aunt Catherine. We shall be glad if you’ll come. It is to be a Thé Dansante, which is quite a novelty here. You learn so much better about all these things Abroad.”

“Where is Abroad?” said Roland, in an undertone which was so confidential and intimate, that had he been anybody else, Miss Matilda must have yielded to its seduction. As it was, she only gave him a look of surprise at his ignorance, and cleared her throat and shook her bracelets in order to be able to strike in.

“A Thé Dansante is exactly the kind of entertainment that suits me,” Catherine said.

“Yes, won’t it be nice?” said Ellen, unconscious. “I learnt all the figures of the cotillion, which is the most amusing thing to end up with, and I made Algy learn it. As soon as ever our house is ready we shall start. It will be a new feature in society. As for Harry, till he’s married he’ll have to be content with bachelor’s dinners, for I can’t always be leaving Algy to look after him.”

Here Harry murmured something, stammering, and with a blush, to the intent that the bachelor’s dinners would last a long time.

“We don’t see you so often at our place as we used to do, Mr. Harry,” said Miss Matilda, sweetly. “It used to be quite a pleasure to watch for you; and the summer evenings were so tempting, weren’t they? Oh, fie! it is very naughty to love and to ride away. We always said that was what was likely to happen, didn’t we?” she said to her sister, on the other side of the table.

Miss Martha nodded and smiled in return, and cried⁠—

“Oh, always,” in a shriller tone.

“What’s that you thought likely to happen? Then it didn’t happen if it was Harry,” cried Ellen, instinctively, ranging herself on her brother’s side.

“But about this cotillion?” said Edward. “What is it? I thought it had something to say to a lady’s dress. I am sure it had in the eighteenth century. We shall have to go to school to learn what your novelty means.”

“She put me to school, I can tell you,” cried Algernon, from the other end of the table. “I had to work! She is the most dreadful little tyrant, though she looks so soft.”

“Dancing is neglected shamefully nowadays,” said Miss Matilda; “shamefully! We were taught very differently. Don’t you remember, dear, Mousheer D’Egmont and his little violin, Martha? we were taught the minuet first on account of our curtseys⁠—”

“Oh, the funny, old-fashioned thing! You never curtsey nowadays; even in the Lancers it is only a bob,” said Ellen, “or a bend mostly with your head. You never see such a thing nowadays.”

“My dear! In the presence of your sovereign,” said Miss Matilda, with dignity, “it always continues necessary. There is no change in that respect so far as I am aware, Martha, is there? You were in the habit of attending Drawing-rooms longer than I.”

“Oh, never any change in that!” cried Miss Martha, rising upon herself, so to speak, and erecting her head as she looked from one end of the table to another. It was not often that they had such a triumph. They had been Presented. They had made their curtseys to their Sovereign, as Miss Matilda said.

Silence fell upon the table, only broken by the jingle of Ellen’s bracelets, which she pushed up her arm in her mortification; and there were so many of them that they made a considerable noise. Even she was cowed for the moment; and what was worse was, that her husband being simple-minded, and getting a little familiar with Catherine, now turned his looks of awe and veneration upon the Miss Vernon-Ridgways, who were so well acquainted with the court and its ways.

And Catherine laughed.

“We are all behind in that respect,” she said. “I am fond of pomp and ceremonial for my part. It is a pretty thing, but I like it best at a distance. It is my fault, I have no doubt, that your wife is ignorant of Drawing-rooms, Mr. Merridew.”

“I always said so, Aunt Catherine,” cried Ellen, who was ready to cry, in the midst of her triumph. “It is horrid for girls to have relations with those out-of-the-way notions.”

Catherine only laughed; it was her habitual comment. She turned smiling to young Ashton by her side.

“You ought not to dislike state,” he said, in an undertone; “you who are a kind of queen yourself⁠—or, shall I say, grand duchess⁠—in your own town?”

“A queen without any subjects,” said Catherine, shaking her head. This time she did not laugh, and there was even a little glimmer of sadness in her eyes.

“Not so. I am a stranger, you know. When I go about the town, I hear of nothing but Catherine Vernon. They call you so, do you know⁠—tout court, without miss or madam⁠—that has a great effect upon one’s imagination.”

Young Merridew had thrust forward his head, and was listening, which perhaps was not very good manners.

“It is quite true,” he said eagerly. “Ellen says I am a very Redborough person. I have been born and bred here. I can’t remember the time when I didn’t look up to⁠—her, as if she was something above the human⁠—”

“And yet you have married a Vernon!” said Catherine; but she was pleased. “It is not an uncommon thing in this world,” she said. “People at a distance think more kindly of one than those who are near; but this is not talk for a dinner-table. Not to interfere with Ellen’s cotillion,” she said, in a louder tone, “I am thinking of a party for Christmas, young people. As it is for you, you must lay your heads together, and decide what it is to be.”

Then there arose a flutter of talk, chiefly maintained by the ladies, but in which young Merridew was appealed to by his wife; and Harry, stimulated by the same hand, and Edward, mindful of his duties, took part.

Catherine and her young relative were left, as it were, alone, amid the babble of tongues.

“I cannot allow myself to look at it gravely,” she said. “I laugh; it is the best way. They all take what they can get, but their opinions, if they were individually weighed, of Catherine Vernon, would surprise you. They don’t think much of me. I dare say I quite deserve it,” she said, after a pause, with another laugh. “Don’t you think that in most cases enthusiasm is confined to those people who personally know the least of the object of it? That’s an awkward sentence, but never mind.”

“Isn’t it the same thing as to say that a great man is never a hero to his valet, or that a prophet has no honour in his own country?”