Cotillion

The Frenchman stiffened, and paused for a moment before reply: ‘In effect, you are offensive, sir!’

‘Oh, no, no!’ Mr Westruther said gently. ‘You mistake!’

‘I must believe you to be my enemy!’

‘Again you mistake. I am sufficiently—how shall I put it?—an âme de boue!—to derive considerable enjoyment from watching your progress, Chevalier! It commands my admiration. Indeed, I should be sorry to see it blighted, and I wish you all success with the Yalding. There will be certain difficulties, of course, but she is both headstrong and obstinate, while you are adroit, and I am persuaded you will overcome them, carrying her off, as it were, in Annerwick’s teeth. That will afford quite a number of persons enjoyment. You are not acquainted with Lady Maria’s Papa? You are to be felicitated: an unlovable man! And here we are at Duke Street!’

‘I must thank you, sir, for bringing me here!’ said the Chevalier formally, preparing to alight.

‘A pleasure, believe me!’ smiled Mr Westruther. ‘Au revoir, my dear sir!’

Two days later, when driving Kitty in the Park, at the fashionable hour, he was able to observe the fruits of his encounter with her cousin. London was still a little thin of company, but the unusually clement weather, which had brought the hunting season to an early close, had tempted many to return to town. Quite a number of notabilities were to be seen, riding or driving in the Park, and Kitty was kept very well-entertained by Mr Westruther’s pithy descriptions of their identities, their manners, and their foibles. It was when they were approaching the Riding House on their second circuit that they met Lady Maria Yalding’s barouche. A press of vehicles had brought both the barouche and the curricle momentarily to a standstill, and they stood alongside each other for long enough for the occupants of each to have time for recognition, and greetings. Beside Lady Maria’s buxom form, splendidly attired in purple, abov

e which her high-coloured face rose triumphant, sat the Chevalier, listening with an air of absorbed interest to what she was saying. Upon the lady’s hailing Mr Westruther in her bluff, rather loud-voiced way, he glanced up quickly, met Mr Westruther’s eyes, and at once turned his attention to Kitty, saying, as he took off his hat, and sketched a bow: ‘Ah, well met, my dear cousin! I do not know, Lady Maria, if you are acquainted with Miss Charing?’

The protuberant eyes stared at Kitty. Lady Maria said: ‘Oh, yes! Met you somewhere, I believe, Miss Charing. Staying with Lady Buckhaven, aren’t you? Lovely weather, isn’t it? I say, Westruther, do you see the Angleseys are back in town? Just met Anglesey, with his girls. My dear Camille, what is holding us up for so long? Some fool trying to lionize, I daresay, with a badly broke horse! Oh, now we are off! Goodbye! Happy to meet you again some day, Miss—can’t remember names!’

Mr Westruther allowed his pair to have their heads a little, and as they were on the fret Kitty was whisked off before she could reply to this brusque speech. She said, in a tone of strong displeasure: ‘What very odd manners, to be sure!’

‘You need not regard her: all the Annerwicks are famed for their rudeness,’ responded Mr Westruther. ‘They are convinced, you see, that they are vastly superior to the rest of mankind, and so have no need to waste civility.’

‘I am astonished that Camille should be so often in her company,’ Kitty remarked, wrinkling her brow. ‘He escorted her to the play last night, you know: I saw him, for I was there with Freddy, and the Legerwoods. It is quite impossible that he should like her! But they must be upon excessively friendly terms for her to call him Camille in that odious way! It doesn’t seem to me at all the thing.’

‘It should perhaps be explained to you that Lady Maria is a very rich woman.’

‘That is what Freddy said, but I will not allow it to be true that Camille is a fortune-hunter!’

He was amused. ‘What a high flight!’

‘It is odious, Jack! Surely you must perceive that!’

‘Not at all. Think of the offers you yourself received when it became known you were an heiress!’

She coloured. ‘Indeed, I thought them odious too!’

‘Dear me! Even Freddy’s?’

She knew not how to reply to this; and, after a moment, said rather lamely: ‘He did not offer for that reason.’

‘Or at all?’ suggested Mr Westruther.

She put up her chin. ‘Of course! You may ask George and Hugh if you don’t believe me! They were both present! Besides—what an absurd thing to say! Pray, how could I be engaged to him if he had not offered for me?’

‘Well, you might have offered for him,’ said Mr Westruther thoughtfully.

She was now very much flushed, and answered with some difficulty: ‘I wish you will not talk such nonsense!’

‘And I wish that you would stop behaving so nonsensically, foolish child! Freddy, indeed! As well ask me to believe that you mean to marry Dolphinton!’

Her eyes flashed. ‘How dare you say such a thing, Jack? To compare Freddy with poor Dolph—! It is the most infamous thing, and I won’t endure it!’

His brows rose. ‘But what heat! It does you the greatest credit, my dear, but it is quite uncalled for. I intended no comparison: merely the one is as unlikely a suitor as the other. Am I forgiven?’

‘I am sure it is of no consequence,’ she said stiffly. ‘Oh, there is Miss Broughty, walking with her cousins! Pray, will you pull up for a moment?’

‘No,’ he said. ‘I have no wish to talk to Miss Broughty, or her deplorable cousins, and I would advise you, my love, to be a little more careful what friends you make in London. This connection cannot add to your credit, believe me!’

‘I have no patience with such stupid pride!’ she said. ‘It is all folly and self-consequence!’