THE trim little maid-servant ran upstairs from her modest little kitchen, trembling at the terrible prospect of having to open the door. Miss Pink, deafened by the barking, had just time to say, “What a very ill-behaved dog!” when a sound of small objects overthrown in the hall, and a scurrying of furious claws across the oil-cloth, announced that Tommie had invaded the house. As the servant appeared, introducing Lady Lydiard, the dog ran in. He made one frantic leap at Isabel, which would certainly have knocked her down but for the chair that happened to be standing behind her. Received on her lap, the faithful creature half smothered her with his caresses. He barked, he shrieked, in his joy at seeing her again. He jumped off her lap and tore round and round the room at the top of his speed; and every time he passed Miss Pink he showed the whole range of his teeth and snarled ferociously at her ankles. Having at last exhausted his superfluous energy, he leaped back again on Isabel’s lap, with his tongue quivering in his open mouth — his tail wagging softly, and his eye on Miss Pink, inquiring how she liked a dog in her drawing-room!
“I hope my dog has not disturbed you, ma’am?” said Lady Lydiard, advancing from the mat at the doorway, on which she had patiently waited until the raptures of Tommie subsided into repose.
Miss Pink, trembling between terror and indignation, acknowledged Lady Lydiard’s polite inquiry by a ceremonious bow, and an answer which administered by implication a dignified reproof. “Your Ladyship’s dog does not appear to be a very well-trained animal,” the ex-schoolmistress remarked.
“Well trained?” Lady Lydiard repeated, as if the expression was perfectly unintelligible to her. “I don’t think you have had much experience of dogs, ma’am.” She turned to Isabel, and embraced her tenderly. “Give me a kiss, my dear — you don’t know how wretched I have been since you left me.” She looked back again at Miss Pink. “You are not, perhaps, aware, ma’am, that my dog is devotedly attached to your niece. A dog’s love has been considered by many great men (whose names at the moment escape me) as the most touching and disinterested of all earthly affections.” She looked the other way, and discovered the lawyer. “How do you do, Mr. Troy? It’s a pleasant surprise to find you here The house was so dull without Isabel that I really couldn’t put off seeing her any longer. When you are more used to Tommie, Miss Pink, you will understand and admire him. You understand and admire him, Isabel — don’t you? My child! you are not looking well. I shall take you back with me, when the horses have had their rest. We shall never be happy away from each other.”
Having expressed her sentiments, distributed her greetings, and defended her dog — all, as it were, in one breath — Lady Lydiard sat down by Isabel’s side, and opened a large green fan that hung at her girdle. “You have no idea, Miss Pink, how fat people suffer in hot weather,” said the old lady, using her fan vigorously.
Miss Pink’s eyes dropped modestly to the ground —“fat” was such a coarse word to use, if a lady must speak of her own superfluous flesh! “May I offer some refreshment?” Miss Pink asked, mincingly. “A cup of tea?”
Lady Lydiard shook her head.
“A glass of water?”
Lady Lydiard declined this last hospitable proposal with an exclamation of disgust. “Have you got any beer?” she inquired.
“I beg your Ladyship’s pardon,” said Miss Pink, doubting the evidence of her own ears. “Did you say — beer?”
Lady Lydiard gesticulated vehemently with her fan. “Yes, to be sure! Beer! beer!”
Miss Pink rose, with a countenance expressive of genteel disgust, and rang the bell. “I think you have beer downstairs, Susan?” she said, when the maid appeared at the door.
“Yes, miss.”
“A glass of beer for Lady Lydiard,” said Miss Pink — under protest.
“Bring it in a jug,” shouted her Ladyship, as the maid left the room. “I like to froth it up for myself,” she continued, addressing Miss Pink. “Isabel sometimes does it for me, when she is at home — don’t you, my dear?”
Miss Pink had been waiting her opportunity to assert her own claim to the possession of her own niece, from the time when Lady Lydiard had coolly declared her intention of taking Isabel back with her. The opportunity now presented itself.
“Your Ladyship will pardon me,” she said, “if I remark that my niece’s home is under my humble roof. I am properly sensible, I hope, of your kindness to Isabel, but while she remains the object of a disgraceful suspicion she remains with me.”
Lady Lydiard closed her fan with an angry snap.
“You are completely mistaken, Miss Pink. You may not mean it — but you speak most unjustly if you say that your niece is an object of suspicion to me, or to anybody in my house.”
Mr. Troy, quietly listening up to this point now interposed to stop the discussion before it could degenerate into a personal quarrel. His keen observation, aided by his accurate knowledge of his client’s character, had plainly revealed to him what was passing in Lady Lydiard’s mind. She had entered the house, feeling (perhaps unconsciously) a jealousy of Miss Pink, as her predecessor in Isabel’s affections, and as the natural protectress of the girl under existing circumstances. Miss Pink’s reception of her dog had additionally irritated the old lady. She had taken a malicious pleasure in shocking the schoolmistress’s sense of propriety — and she was now only too ready to proceed to further extremities on the delicate question of Isabel’s justification for leaving her house. For Isabel’s own sake, therefore — to say nothing of other reasons — it was urgently desirable to keep the peace between the two ladies. With this excellent object in view, Mr. Troy seized his opportunity of striking into the conversation for the first time.
“Pardon me, Lady Lydiard,” he said, “you are speaking of a subject which has been already sufficiently discussed between Miss Pink and myself. I think we shall do better not to dwell uselessly on past events, but to direct our attention to the future. We are all equally satisfied of the complete rectitude of Miss Isabel’s conduct, and we are all equally interested in the vindication of her good name.”
Whether these temperate words would of themselves have exercised the pacifying influence at which Mr. Troy aimed may be doubtful. But, as he ceased speaking, a powerful auxiliary appeared in the shape of the beer. Lady Lydiard seized on the jug, and filled the tumbler for herself with an unsteady hand. Miss Pink, trembling for the integrity of her carpet, and scandalized at seeing a peeress drinking beer like a washer-woman, forgot the sharp answer that was just rising to her lips when the lawyer interfered. “Small!” said Lady Lydiard, setting down the empty tumbler, and referring to the quality of the beer. “But very pleasant and refreshing. What’s the servant’s name? Susan? Well, Susan, I was dying of thirst and you have saved my life. You can leave the jug — I dare say I shall empty it before I go.”
Mr. Troy, watching Miss Pink’s face, saw that it was time to change the subject again.
“Did you notice the old village, Lady Lydiard, on your way here?” he asked. “The artists consider it one of the most picturesque places in England.”
“I noticed that it was a very dirty village,” Lady Lydiard answered, still bent on making herself disagreeable to Miss Pink. “The artists may say what they please; I see nothing to admire in rotten cottages, and bad drainage, and ignorant people. I suppose the neighborhood has its advantages. It looks dull enough, to my mind.”
Isabel had hitherto modestly restricted her exertions to keeping Tommie quiet on her lap. Like Mr. Troy, she occasionally looked at her aunt — and she now made a timid attempt to defend the neighborhood as a duty that she owed to Miss Pink.
“Oh, my Lady! don’t say it’s a dull neighborhood,” she pleaded. “There are such pretty walks all round us. And, when you get to the hills, the view is beautiful.”
Lady Lydiard’s answer to this was a little masterpiece of good-humored contempt. She patted Isabel’s cheek, and said, “Pooh! Pooh!”
“Your Ladyship does not admire the beauties of Nature,” Miss Pink remarked, with a compassionate smile. “As we get older, no doubt our sight begins to fail —”
“And we leave off canting about the beauties of Nature,” added Lady Lydiard. “I hate the country. Give me London, and the pleasures of society.”
“Come! come! Do the country justice, Lady Lydiard!” put in peace-making Mr. Troy. “There is plenty of society to be found out of London — as good society as the world can show.”
“The sort of society,” added Miss Pink, “which is to be found, for example, in this neighborhood. Her Ladyship is evidently not aware that persons of distinction surround us, whichever way we turn. I may instance among others, the Honorable Mr. Hardyman —”
Lady Lydiard, in the act of pouring out a second glassful of beer, suddenly set down the jug.
“Who is that you’re talking of, Miss Pink?”
“I am talking of our neighbor, Lady Lydiard — the Honorable Mr. Hardyman.”
“Do you mean Alfred Hardyman — the man who breeds the horses?”
“The distinguished gentleman who owns the famous stud-farm,” said Miss Pink, correcting the bluntly-direct form in which Lady Lydiard had put her question.
“Is he in the habit of visiting here?” the old lady inquired, with a sudden appearance of anxiety. “Do you know him?”
“I had the honor of being introduced to Mr. Hardyman at our last flower show,” Miss Pink replied. “He has not yet favored me with a visit.”
Lady Lydiard’s anxiety appeared to be to some extent relieved.
“I knew that Hardyman’s farm was in this county,” she said; “but I had no notion that it was in the neighborhood of South Morden. How far away is he — ten or a dozen miles, eh?”
“Not more than three miles,” answered Miss Pink. “We consider him quite a near neighbor of ours.”
Renewed anxiety showed itself in Lady Lydiard. She looked round sharply at Isabel. The girl’s head was bent so low over the rough head of the dog that her face was almost entirely concealed from view. So far as appearances went, she seemed to be entirely absorbed in fondling Tommie. L............