Conversation within the Rectory garden did not, could not, revive until the young footman, released from his urn-bondage, could bring out the tea-tray. Punctually with that glittering apparatus came the Rector and Lord Cantacute, prosperous, clean, leisurely gentlemen both: the peer with a huntsman’s face and white whiskers, a square-topped felt hat and neatly folded white tie with a foxhead pin, Mr. James Germain, thin, smiling, and fastidious, amused at his own benevolence. A little desultory talk flickered up on their approach; the Rector was packed off to say Grace for what the revellers might be about to receive. Lord Cantacute took his tea and asked, “Where’s Hertha?” Miss Hertha de Speyne was only child of his noble house. “Hertha’s gone to play tennis at the cottage—in this grilling heat,” said her ladyship. “But she’s to be here to tea. Mrs. Duplessis is very sadly, I’m told. Ah!” and she put up her lorgnette. “Here they come, dear things.”
A tall young man in white flannels accompanied a tall young lady, also in white, round the house.
“What a pair!” murmured Mrs. Bingham to her eldest daughter, and caused Lady Cantacute to say rather sharply, “Not at all. They’ve known each other from the cradle.”
Mr. Tristram Duplessis was this young man—a cousin of Mrs. James Germain’s. He was good-looking, every foot of him, and there were six, high-coloured, light in the eye. He had a profusion of fair and straight hair, which he was accustomed to jerk away from his forehead, and a trick of knitting his brows, as if he scowled, and of biting his cheek, as if he was annoyed. Very frequently he was. Apart from these peculiarities, his manners were easy—Mr. John Germain thought, much too easy. One of his least pleasing habits was his way of looking at you in conversation as if you were either ridiculous or his property. Mr. Germain, very sure of being neither, did not pretend to like this youth.
He was greeted with “How’s your mother, Tristram?” from Lady Cantacute, and replied, “I believe she’s ill—at least, she says so;” whereat the second Miss Bingham choked in her tea-cup, and Mr. Duplessis looked at her for a minute with narrowed eyes.
Mrs. Bingham said, “Oh, I hope not,” with solicitude.
“Naturally,” said Duplessis, “and so do I. I can only tell you what she says.” He helped himself to bread, butter, and jam, took the chair which had of late been Mr. John Germain’s, and ate in silence and complete comfort. Miss de Speyne helped herself, too. Her tennis dress had the air of a riding habit, and her person that of a young Amazon. She was not only sumptuous, but severe, a golden beauty, as nearly indifferent to the fact as a girl may be. “Helen of Troy, fancy-free, before Paris beguiled her,” she had been called—but the Diana of the Louvre comes readiest to mind.
Mr. John Germain, seeing his chair in possession—and in that of Duplessis—crossed the railing and walked over the field towards the trestle-tables where the scholars feasted. Miss Bingham—the eldest—and Duplessis were now side by side. “Your young lady has made another conquest,” she told him, and nodded towards the severe, retreating form. Duplessis observed her calmly. “It’s no good, Mildred,” he said. “You can’t get a rise out of me, you know.” She laughed. “I think I’ve been saved the trouble, I was only calling your attention to it. He is greatly interested.” The young man’s answer was to look at Mr. Germain, retreating still in a stately manner, and then at Mildred Bingham. Graphic commentary enough.
When Mr. Germain approached the tables, Miss Middleham, who had been very aware of his coming, became instantly circumspect. He advanced deliberately and stood by her side for a while without speaking: he then offered himself to hand tea-cups, and when she assured him that the work was done, held to his post without any more words or seeming embarrassment. He was affable to Mr. Soames, if somewhat lofty; spoke of cricket and cricketers, the performances of Somerset, and of its champion, whom he was careful to call Mr. Palairet. For Berks, his own county, he apologized. He had a theory, not fully worked out yet, that the Scandinavian blood in us produced the best athletes. Consider Yorkshire and Lancashire. Kent, too: there was an undoubted strain of the Norseman in Kent. Surrey was against him—apparently; but he could not admit it. Of course, London gave the pick of everything; Surrey, a metropolitan shire, could hardly be reckoned, nor, by a parity of reasoning, Middlesex. Mr. Soames, who had not hitherto considered the ethnological side of his game, shook his head and said, “No, by jingo!” then plunged to another table and appeared to be busy. Mr. Germain turned to Miss Middleham and begged to know how he could be of service. “I must make good my boast: I rely upon the loyalty of Miss Cecily Bingham. Do you play after tea?” She said that there would be games. “For instance?” he inquired, and Mr. Soames, who was now hovering near again, said, “We shall finish the match. Perhaps you would care to umpire?” But Mr. Germain had picked up a small wooden implement and was turning it about like a fan. Bat, trap, and ball, he supposed? She laughed him yes. “Very well, then,” said he, “you shall allow me to help you in bat, trap, and ball.” Cecily Bingham’s eyes had now to be avoided at all costs.
The tall, stiff-shouldered gentleman made good his word—if that can be called playing the game where a player never hits the ball, frequently himself, and once (with a resounding smack) the boy fielding behind him. Grouped girls admired with open mouths; but the temptation to giggle when he caught himself for the second time upon the elbow and betrayed something of the torment he suffered was not to be resisted. Miss Middleham bit her lip, but turned to rend one of her pupils. “Gracie,” she said in a fierce whisper, “if you dare to laugh I’ll never speak to you again.”
“Here comes Tristram,” said Cecily, but Miss Middleham had no need to be told that. She was very busy teaching a small boy how to wield the bat which Mr. Germain now hastened to discard. “Thank you, Mr. Germain,” she said sincerely. “It’s very kind of you.”
“I am delighted to have been of the least service to you,” he replied with a bow. “You set us all an example which I, for one, am proud to follow.”
The games languished, flickered out under the calm eyes of Mr. Duplessis, but he took no part in reviving them. Nor did Miss Middleham do more than pretend to instruct. He stood, hands in pockets, for a while, looking at nothing, whistling softly to himself, then strolled towards Mary Middleham and, without looking at her, said two or three words. She listened to them intently without turning her head, said, “Yes,” and went on with her business of the moment. Still whistling, Duplessis strolled away, and, in passing, tweaked Cecily Bingham’s straight hair.
Mr. Germain, after salutations of a courtly kind, had returned leisurely to the Rectory Garden—to help his sister-in-law feel the early peaches on the wall.