I lay awake quite half an hour that night, and I made up my mind—just as seriously as though my feelings were likely to prove an important influence—that I would in no way try to my father in his decision about taking a bailiff. But real as was my trouble about this matter that to me was so , it was all put to flight the next morning by an occurrence of more personal and interest. Such is the blessed of youth. The occurrence was one which not only brought the remembrance of Captain Forrester, and my romantic dreams for Joyce, once more to my mind, but it also gave no small promise of to myself. It consisted in the sudden appearance of a from the , who delivered into my hands a note for mother.
It was morning when he came; mother was still in the kitchen with Deborah, and Joyce and I had not finished making our beds and dusting our room. But I do not think there was any delay in the answering of that door-bell. I remember how cross I was when mother would insist on finishing all her business before she opened the note; she went into the poultry-yard and what chickens and what ducks should be killed for the week's dinners, she went into the dairy to look at the cream, she even went up herself into the to get apples before she would go and find her spectacles in the . And yet any one could have imagined that a note from the meant something very important. And so, indeed, it did. It contained a formal invitation to a grand ball to be given at the Manor-house. The card did not say a "grand" ball, but of course we knew that it would be a grand ball. We were fairly dazed with excitement. Actually a ball in our quiet little village. Such a thing had not been known since I had been grown up, and I had not even heard of its having occurred since the days when young Mrs. Broderick had come to the Manor as a bride. Of course we had been to dances in town once or twice—once to the Hoads', and once to a county ball, got up at the White Hart Inn, but I think these were really the only two occasions on which I had danced anywhere out of the dancing academy. Joyce, being a little older, could count about three more such exciting moments in her life. The card was passed round from hand to hand, and then stuck up on the mantle-shelf in front of the clock, as though there were any danger that any of the family would be likely to forget on what day and at what hour Squire Broderick had invited us to "dancing" at the Manor.
"I wonder what has made the squire give a ball now," said mother. "I suppose it's the of the elections. He thinks he owes it to the county."
"Why on earth should he owe the county a ball because of the elections?" cried I. "He is not going to stand, and I don't think he can suppose that a ball would be likely to do the Farnham interests much good, if that's the only man they have got to put forward on the Conservative side."
"I don't think it's a young girl's business to talk in that flippant way, Margaret," said the mother. Father was not present just then. "I don't think it's becoming in young folk to talk about matters they can't possibly understand."
I was at this, but I did not dare to answer mother back.
"You never heard your father talk like that of Mr. Farnham, I'm sure," added mother. "He likes him a great deal better than he does Mr. Thorne, although Mr. Thorne is a ."
"Well, I should think so! Mr. Thorne is a capitalist, and father doesn't think that men who have made such large fortunes in business ought to exist," cried I, boldly, applying a theory to an individual as I thought I had been taught. "It is no use his being a Radical, nor giving money to the poor, because he oughtn't to have the money. It's dreadful to think of his having bought a beautiful old place like the Priory with money that he has ground out of his workpeople. No, nobody will ever like Mr. Thorne in the neighborhood."
"I know squire and he don't hold together at all," answered mother. "Though they do say Mr. Thorne bought the property through that handsome young spark of a nephew of the squire's. The families were acquainted up North."
"Who told you that, mother?" asked I, quickly.
"Miss Farnham said so when she called yesterday," replied mother. "And she said it was Mr. Thorne was going to contest the seat with her brother, so I don't know how Mr. Hoad could have come suggesting that young captain to your father as he did yesterday. A rich man like the manufacturer would be sure to have much more chance."
I was silent. I was a little out of my depth. "I don't believe Mr. Hoad knew anything at all about it," I said. "How could a man be going to contest a seat against the candidate that his own uncle was backing? It's ridiculous. Mr. Hoad has always got something to say."
"Margaret, you really shouldn't allow yourself to pass so many opinions on folk," repeated mother. "First Mr. Farnham, and then Mr. Thorne, and now Mr. Hoad. It's not pretty in young women."
"Very well, mother, I won't do it again," said I, merrily. "At all events Parliament doesn't matter much, father says so; and anyhow, squire's going to give us a ball, and nothing can matter so much as that."
Nothing did matter half so much to us three just then, it is true. Mother was just as much excited as we were, and we all fell to discussing the fashions with just as much eagerness, if not as much knowledge, as if we had been London born and bred.
"You must look over your clothes and see you have got everything neat. Joyce, I suppose you will wear your white 'India'?" said the mother. And from that it was a very natural step to go and look at the white muslin, and at the other clothes that our simple wardrobes boasted, so that we spent every bit of that morning that was not taken up with urgent household duties in turning over frocks and laces and ribbons, and determining what we should wear, and what wanted washing before we did wear it. Yes, I think I thought of my dress that day for the first time in my life. There was no need to think of Joyce's, because she was sure to be admired, but if there was any chance of my looking well it could only be because of some happy thought with regard to my costume; and so when mother suggested that she should give me her lovely old sea-green shot silk to be made up for the occasion, my heart leaped for joy. I was very much excited. For Joyce, because I had quite made up my mind that it was Captain Forrester who had persuaded the squire to give this ball; and for myself, because it was really a great event in the life of any girl, and I was fond of dancing. I spent the afternoon washing my old lace , and pulling them out tenderly before the fire, and all the time I was humming waltz , and wondering who would dance with me, and picturing Joyce to myself whirling round in the arms of Captain Forrester. I thought of Joyce and her lover so much that it was scarcely a surprise to me when, just as the light was beginning to fade and tea-time was near, I heard a sharp ring at the front door, and running to the back passage window with my lace in my hand, I saw that Squire Broderick was in the porch, and with him his nephew Captain Forrester. I heard Joyce fly through the hall to the kitchen. I think she must have seen the two gentlemen pass down the road, and then she ran back again into the parlor, and Deborah went to the door.
"Mrs. Maliphant at home?" said the squire's cheery voice; and scarcely waiting for a reply, he strode through to the front room.
I threw down my lace, turned down my sleeves, and without any more attention to my toilet I ran down-stairs. Mother had gone to do some little errands in the village and had not come in; Joyce stood alone with the visitors. She had her plain dark-blue every-day gown on, but the soft little frills at her throat and wrists were clean. I remember thinking how fortunate it was that they were clean. She was standing in the window with Captain Forrester, who was admiring our view over the .
"It's a most beautiful country," said he. And his eyes wandered from the plain without that the shades of evening were slowly darkening to the face at his side that shone so fair against the little frilled muslin curtain which she held aside with her hand.
The squire sat at the table; he had taken up the morning paper, and I supposed that the frown on his face was summoned there by something that he read in the columns of this the Liberal journal. Captain Forrester left Joyce and came towards me as soon as I entered the room.
"Miss Maliphant, I am delighted to meet you again," said he, with his pleasant polished manner that had the art of never making one feel that he was saying a thing merely to be agreeable. "After our little adventure of the other day, I felt that it was impossible for me to leave the neighborhood without trying to make our acquaintance fast."
"Oh, are you leaving the neighborhood?" said I—I am afraid a little too anxiously.
"Well, not just yet," smiled Captain Forrester. "I think I shall stay till over the ball."
"Nonsense, Frank," said the squire, rising and pushing the paper away from him. "Of course you will stay over the ball." Then turning to me, he said, merrily, "No difficulty about you young ladies coming, I hope?"
"I don't know, Mr. Broderick," answered I. "You must wait and ask mother. It's a very grand affair for two such simple girls as Joyce and me."
"Oh, Margaret, I think we shall be allowed to go," put in Joyce, in her gentle, matter-of-fact voice. "You know we went to a very late ball last Christmas in town."
Considering that we had been sitting over frocks all the morning, this would have been nonsense, excepting that Joyce never could see a joke.
"I think I shall have to take Mrs. Maliphant in hand myself if she makes any objection," said the squire, "for we certainly can't spare you and your sister."
Joyce blushed, and Captain Forrester turned to her and was going to say something which I think would have been , when father entered the room. He had his rough, brown, ill-cut suit on, and his blue handkerchief twisted twice round his neck and tied loosely in front, and did not look at all the same kind of man as the two in front of him. I noticed it for the first time that evening. I was not at all ashamed of it. If I had been questioned, I should have said that I was very proud of it, but I just noticed it, and I wondered if Captain Forrester noticed it too. It certainly was very odd that it never should have occurred to me before, that this lover whom I had picked out for Joyce belonged to the very same class as the squire, whom I thought so unsuitable to her. I suppose it was because Captain Forrester was not a landed , and that any man who belonged to the noble career of soldiering for his birth by his profession.
"How are you, Maliphant?" said the squire, grasping him by the hand as though there had been no such thing as any uncomfortable parting between them. "I'm glad to see you are none the worse for this cursed east wind. It's enough to upset many a younger and stronger man."
Father had taken the hand, but not very cordially. I am not sure that he ever shook hands very cordially with people; perhaps it was partly owing to the stiffness in his fingers, but I believe that he regarded it as a useless formality. I imagine this because I, too, have always had a dislike to kissings and hand-shakings, when a simple "good-day" seemed to me to serve the purpose well enough.
"Pooh!" said father, in answer to the squire's remark. "A man who has his work out-doors all the year round, Squire Broderick, needs must take little account whether the wind be in the east or the south, except as how it'll affect his crops and his flock."
The squire took no notice of this speech. It was so very evident that it was spoken with a view to the question.
"I've brought my nephew round," said he, and Captain Forrester left Joyce's side as he said it, and came forward with his pleasant smile and just the proper amount of added to his usual charming manner. "He wanted to see the Grange," added the squire, again with that frown upon his brow that I could not understand, but which no doubt proceeded, as he had affirmed, from the effect of the east wind upon his temper.
"I'm very glad to see you, sir," said father, shortly. "I hear you rendered my daughters some assistance the other day."
Captain Forrester smiled. "It could scarcely be called assistance," he said. "Your daughter"—and he looked at me to distinguish me from Joyce—"would have been capable of driving the horse, I am sure."
"Oh, I understood the reared," answered father.
"Well, she is not a good horse for a lady to drive," allowed Captain Forrester, as though the were from him; and I wondered how he guessed that it annoyed me to be thought of managing the mare. "But some women drive as well as any man."
The squire took up the paper again. I did not think it was good-manners of him.
"What a splendid view you have from this house," continued Captain Forrester. "I think it's much finer than from our place."
The squire's shoulders moved with an impatient movement. The article he was reading must decidedly have annoyed him.
"Yes," answered Joyce; "but you should come and see it in summer or in autumn. It's very now. The spring is so late this year."
"Ay; I don't remember a snowfall in March these five years," said father.
"But it has a beautiful effect on this plain," continued the young man, moving away into the window again. And then turning round to Joyce, he added, "Do you , Miss Maliphant?"
"No, no," answered father for her. "We have no time for such things. We have all of us plenty to do without any ."
"Miss Margaret can sing ' Adair,'" put in the squire, "as well as I want to hear it, accomplishments or not."
"Indeed," said Captain Forrester, with a show of interest. "I hope she will sing it to me some day."
He said it with a certain air of , which I found afterwards came from his own excellent knowledge of music.
"Are you fond of singing?" said I, simply. I was too much of a country girl to think of denying the charge. I was very fond of good music; it was second nature to me, inherited, I suppose, from some forgotten ancestor, and picking out tunes on the old piano was the only thing that ever kept me willingly in-doors. Father delighted in my simple singing of simple ditties, and so did the squire; I had grown used to thinking it was a talent in me, my only one, and I was not ashamed............