Sprig Muslin

She sat staring at him, rather pale at first, and then flushing, and turning away her face. ‘Papa, pray – ! If you are funning, it is not a kind jest!’

‘Of course I’m not funning!’ he answered. ‘Though it don’t surprise me you should think so. I don’t mind owning to you, Hester, that when he broke it to me that it was my permission to address you th

at he was after I thought either he was foxed, or I was!’

‘Perhaps you were – both of you!’ she said, trying for a lighter note.

‘No, no! No such thing! But for him to be taking a fancy for you, when I daresay there are a dozen females trying to fix his interest, and everyone of ’em as well-born as you, besides being younger, and devilish handsome into the bargain – well, I never was nearer to being grassed in all my life!’

‘It isn’t true. Sir Gareth never had a fancy for me. Not even when I was young, and, I think, quite pretty,’ said Hester, with the ghost of a smile.

‘Oh, lord, no! Not then!’ said his lordship. ‘You were well-enough, but you couldn’t have expected him to look at you when the Lincombe chit was alive.’

‘No. He didn’t look at me,’ she agreed.

‘Well, well!’ the Earl said tolerantly. ‘She had ’em all beaten to flinders. By all accounts, he never cast so much as a glance at any other girl. And I’ve made up my mind to it that that’s why he’s offered for you.’ He saw that she was looking bewildered, and said with impatience: ‘Now, don’t be a pea-goose, girl! It’s as plain as a pikestaff that what Ludlow wants is a quiet, well-bred female who won’t have her head stuffed with romantic nonsense, or expect him to be thrown into a transport of passion. The more I think of it, the more it seems to me that he’s acting like a man of sense. If he’s still hankering after Clarissa Lincombe, it wouldn’t suit him at all to offer for some out-and-outer who would expect him to be dangling after her for ever, carried away by the violence of his feelings, or some such flummery. At the same time, it’s his duty to marry, and you may depend upon it he made up his mind to that when that brother of his got himself killed in Spain. Well, I don’t scruple to tell you that I never thought to see such a piece of good fortune befall you, Hester! To think that you should make a better match than any of your sisters, and at your age, too! It is beyond anything great!’

‘Beyond anything – oh, beyond anything!’ she said, in a queer voice. ‘And he is coming here, with your consent! Could you not have asked me first what my sentiments were? I do not wish for this splendid match, Papa.’

He looked as though he could hardly credit his ears. ‘Don’t wish for it?’ he repeated, in a stupefied tone. ‘You must be out of your senses!’

‘Perhaps I am.’ The ghostly smile that was at once nervous and mischievous again flitted across her face. ‘You should have warned Sir Gareth of it, sir. I am persuaded he cannot wish to marry an idiot.’

‘If,’ said his lordship awfully, ‘you fancy that that is a funny thing to say, let me tell you that it is not!’

‘No, Papa.’

He eyed her in uncertainty, feeling that in some strange way she was eluding him. She had always been an obedient, even a meek, daughter, but he had several times suffered from the uncomfortable suspicion that behind the cloud of gentle compliance there existed a woman who was quite unknown to him. He saw that it behoved him to tread warily, so he curbed his exasperation, and said, with a very fair assumption of paternal solicitude: ‘Now, what maggot has got into your head, my dear? You won’t tell me you don’t wish to be married, for every female must wish that!’

‘Yes, indeed!’ she sighed.

‘Can it be that you dislike Ludlow?’

‘No, Papa.’

‘Well, I was sure of that! I daresay there isn’t a better liked man in England, and as for you ladies – ! The caps that have been set at him! You will be the envy of every unmarried woman in town!’

‘Do you think so indeed, Papa? How delightful that would be! But perhaps I might feel strange, and unlike myself. It wouldn’t be comfortable, not to be acquainted with myself.’

This baffling, and (he considered) very nonsensical observation, threw him out of his stride, but he persevered, saying with as much patience as he could command: ‘Well, never mind that! To be sure, I never thought he was trying to fix your interest, but I am sure I have seen him stand up with you at balls a hundred times! Ay, and sit talking to you, when one might have supposed that he would have been making up to one of the beauties that have been hanging out lures to him for ever!’

‘He is very civil,’ she agreed. ‘He was used to talk to me of Clarissa, because I knew her too, and no one else would ever mention her name within his hearing.’

‘What, is he still doing so?’ exclaimed the Earl, feeling that here must be the clue to the mystery.

‘Oh, no!’ she replied. ‘Not for a long time now.’

‘Then why the devil, if he don’t want to talk of the Lincombe beauty, should he seek you out?’ he demanded. ‘Depend upon it, it has been to attach you!’

‘He does not precisely seek me out,’ she responded. ‘Only, if we meet at parties, he is too kind, and, I think, too great a gentleman, to pass me by with no more than a common bow.’ She paused, and sighed, blinking at her father. ‘How silly! I expect you are quite right, and he has had this notion of offering for me ever since Major Ludlow was killed.’

‘Of course I am right, and a fine compliment he is paying you!’

‘Oh, no!’ she said, and relapsed into silence, gazing thoughtfully before her.

He began to feel uneasy. It was impossible to read her countenance. It was mournful, yet tranquil; but in the tone of her voice there was an alarming note which recalled to his mind her contumacious behaviour when he had disclosed to her the only other offer he had ever received for her hand. He remembered how meekly she had borne every manifestation of his wrath, how dutifully she had begged his pardon for disobliging him. That had been five years ago, but here she was, still a spinster. After eyeing her for a moment or two, he said: ‘If you let this chance of achieving a respectable alliance slip, you are a bigger fool than I take you for, Hester!’

Her eyes came round to his face, a smile quivered for an instant on her lips. ‘No, how could that be, Papa?’