jeffray had taken lodgings at tunbridge wells over a stationer’s shop, peter gladden, pompously indefatigable, having discharged all the petty preliminaries for his master. the windows of the parlor gave a slanting view of the pantiles, and a broad glimpse of the common, gilded with gorse, its may-trees bursting into snow, the rocks sleeping like toads on the sunny slopes. the woods of eridge bristled beyond, and crowborough beacon climbed purple into the south-western sky. the village with its biblically-named hills seemed gay with spruce gentlemen, beflowered ladies, lackeys, and such gaudy beetles. the frivolous little sybaris nestled amid the dazzling freshness of spring, orchards still white upon the slopes, flowers thick in every meadow.
it was a dewy morning after rain, the landscape a-shimmer in the sun when peter gladden shaved and valeted his master, and prepared him for a parade upon the pantiles and the public walks where he might study the life of the place. jeffray, who still wore black and dressed without great respect to fashion, discovered himself scrutinized with some closeness by the smart idlers whose lives appeared consecrated to studying the shape of a buckle or the cock of a hat.
jeffray sat down on a seat in the public walk and watched the people go to and fro. a strutting, waddling crowd it was, picturesque at a distance, with its brocades and colors, but, like a bold and splashing picture, disclosing its artifices and its flaws to the close observer. the men, with a few signal exceptions, appeared to belong to that indefinable order of beings who combined the semi-sentimental spirit of libertinism with the coarse arrogance of an aristrocratic animal. what thrusting out of elbows was there; what delicate dabbings of the nose with lace; what strutting and smirking; what showing off of legs and gesturings with white ruffled hands! it was a clever crowd, too, with the exception of a few clumsy squires who lumbered through it, and the open-mouthed toadies gaping and ready like stupid codfish for “my lord’s joke.” shallow and superficial seemed the gay, epigrammatic philosophy of such people. jeffray felt that fashion was justified of her children, and that even the pageantry of life could not make such mumming bearable.
at three o’clock jeffray dined at a quiet “ordinary” preparatory to paying a state call on the lady letitia. he took his meal in a little white-fronted inn whose casements opened on trim lawns, fruit-trees, and white palings. the beds cut in the grass were bright with pansies, stocks, and arabis. a broad brick path led up to the trellised porch.
even in this quaint, black-beamed old place the same feeling of artificiality haunted him. the bobbing, scurrying waiter was a servile offence against liberty, while at a table in one corner three young exquisites were discussing the virtues of a new shoe-buckle and the piquances of the latest demi-mondaine of the place. the proprietor of the inn, a fat, tallow-faced foreigner in black, scuttled hither and thither, and beamed with delight when jeffray spoke to him in italian. richard felt that the fellow would have licked the dust off any great, little gentleman’s shoes had his highness honored him with such an order. money, impudence, and ostentation were the only noble necessities amid such surroundings. beggared, sea-stained ulysses would have had the dogs set on him in such a pace.
richard, after being conducted to the gate by the proprietor, who jabbered italian, and appeared ready to embrace his patron had not etiquette intervened, strolled down the village towards the pantiles, and looked for the house where the lady letitia was staying. a rat-tat from a brass knocker on a green front door brought jeffray face to face with the dowager’s footman in cerise and buff. the man’s smug face relaxed into a grin as he bowed richard into the narrow hall, and surrendered him to the urbanity of mr. parsons. the lady letitia was at home, and expected a few folk of some consequence to tea and cards. the major-domo dared to assure richard that her ladyship would be rejoiced at seeing him.
when jeffray was ushered into his aunt’s room, he found the old lady seated alone at one of the windows overlooking the pantiles. two card-tables were set out at the upper end, and a great silver tray ladened with choice china in blue and gold stood on a gate-legged table by the fire. for the rest, the room appeared shabby and colorless, the gilding on the walls dull and cracked, the carpet worn, the brocades and tapestries faded. certainly its atmosphere was one of genteel elegance, and in a fashionable health resort even a grocer’s parlor was considered elegant. it was the inmates who mattered, not the upholstery and the chandeliers.
the lady letitia received her nephew with absolute effusion. she tottered up, putting aside her stick, and held out two gouty hands to him with the smile of a most amiable of grandmothers. the recollection of her hurried flight from rodenham did not appear to disturb her equanimity, for the old lady had grown accustomed to forgetting “incidents” in her day. she kissed jeffray on both cheeks, leaving in each case a patch of powder behind, and then held him at arm’s length, gazing in his face.
“ha, ha, mon cher; why, you look quite brave and well, though a little thin. by the queen of hearts, i am overjoyed at seeing you, with hardly a spot or a pock-mark either! you are a credit to your physician, richard; all’s well that ends well; a wise proverb. and when did you arrive, sir? what, last night! to be sure, richard, you ought to have shown yourself to a poor old woman earlier. and how is the dear jilian, is she with you?”
the lady letitia, still talking, subsided again into her chair. she looked very yellow and ugly despite her rouge, and she was short of breath, as richard noticed. age seemed to be gaining fast on her, and even a liberal remittance from her bankers could not keep her from growing feeble. jeffray was astonished at the change that even two months had wrought in her. her fierce, peering eyes were bright as ever, but he could see that her hands trembled, and that a senile tremor was shaking the feathers in her “head.”
“sit down, nephew, sit down. and how does miss jilian like the wells, sir? you ought to have brought her to see me, richard.”
jeffray had settled himself on a stool by the window. he was watching the gay stream of color in the walk below, one hand playing with the hilt of his sword.
“jilian is at hardacre, aunt,” he said.
“indeed, sir, indeed!”
“i was ordered here for my health by surgeon stott. it seems a gay place, madam. i have never before seen so many butterflies flitting about together.”
the lady letitia’s keen and angular face had taken on an expression of vivid alertness. her birdlike eyes twinkled over her nephew’s face. certainly he appeared more melancholy and self-centred than ever, and spoke listlessly, as though some trouble were weighing on his mind. the old lady’s insatiable curiosity was awake on the instant. it was her fate to be forever prying and peering into the affairs of others.
“i hope dear jilian is well, richard.”
“not very well, aunt.”
“eh, eh! what’s been the matter?”
“miss hardacre has had the small-pox.”
“the small-pox!”
“yes.”
the old lady’s eyes glittered shrewdly. she sat with her hands on the crook of her stick, looking at richard with penetration. there were cynical and amused wrinkles about her mouth. jeffray’s melancholy, his air of abstraction, expressed infinite things to the lady letitia. she could have chuckled over the apparent fulfilment of her prophecies. miss jilian, doubtless, had had her complexion shattered, and mr. richard was feeling utterly out of love with her.
“hum, richard, mon cher, pardon me, but you look worried, troubled. will you not confide in an old woman, eh? i have seen a great deal of the world.”
jeffray, who had been leaning with one elbow on the window-sill, and drumming on the glass with his fingers, turned suddenly, looking vexed and half ashamed. he had still enough mock pride left in him to resent the steady conviction that his elderly relative had warned him very shrewdly. he had always half despised the worldly old jezebel, but she seemed to have the laugh of him for the moment.
“to tell you the truth, madam,” he said, unbosoming himself with clumsy brusqueness and with an effort, “jilian has been much disfigured.”
the lady letitia leaned forward on her stick.
“there, there, mon cher richard, i understand.”
“i gave it to her.”
“and now you love her no longer, nephew, eh? do not contradict me, sir, i can see it in every line of your face. poor boy! poor boy! it is a mercy that you are not married.”
jeffray, who had been writhing and reddening before the old lady’s eyes, started and flashed a questioning look at her as the last words were uttered.
“a mercy, madam!” he exclaimed.
“of course, my dear.”
jeffray’s upper lip tightened, and he looked sullen about the eyes.
“it was all my fault,” he said. “i suppose i ought to act like a man of honor. i ought to marry her, i know.”
the lady letitia actually broke out into a merry laugh. her eyes twinkled, and she tapped on the floor applaudingly with her stick.
“richard, mon cher, when will you learn to put on the breeches?”
“madam!”
“lud, sir, when will you discover that these silly sentiments, these toys of honor, are only idols invented and decorated by us women to delude and impress the callow male. we must get husbands, and keep ’em, if we can. foh, sir, better marry a red-cheeked, bouncing wench who wants you because you are a man, than a fine spinster who is hunting for a household and for money.”
jeffray, sentimentalist that he was, looked surprised and even shocked.
“why, madam, you are a lady yourself, one of a class, and can you talk like this?”
the dowager chuckled with cynical delight.
“come, come, richard; i have played the game, have i not? i have schemed and plotted, tilted my nose, and rustled my silken skirts. yes, yes. but i know what it is worth, sir; i know the value of a pawn, a bishop, and a king. i have studied the moves, the openings, the finesse, the checkmate. it is only a game that we polite and religious gamblers cultivate. do not be deluded, sir. hearts are not broken at five-and-thirty; they are leather at twenty when the modesty dries up. do you think that miss hardacre would marry you if you were a common attorney or a penniless ensign? no, no. the illusions have gone. it is comfort, carriages, servants, baubles, money for cards. that is her disease, richard.”
jeffray hung his head and stroked his chin, yet discovered, despite his sensibility, a comforting flavor in the old lady’s words.
“it may be so,” he said, with the air of a fatalist.
the lady letitia, however, saw nothing inevitable in the marriage. she cackled with the greatest good humor, and tapped jeffray’s knee with the point of her stick.
“dear lord, richard, don’t pull such a very long face. do you think you are the first man who has grown tired of the angel? there is not a more scheming, artful, intrigue-eaten veteran in the county. why should you marry her because she wants your money? as for a betrothal, nephew, sensible people ought to regard it as a state trial, a bargain that either may break with honor, when it seems likely to prove a bad one. let the scandal-mongers go hang. when you have money, richard, you need not be afraid of people’s tongues. cock your hat at them all, step out and swagger. and how does the noble lancelot behave to you, sir?”
jeffray’s mouth hardened as he remembered his cousin’s red face and overbearing manner. the lady letitia had struck the right chord. the look on her nephew’s face applauded her diplomacy.
“do not be browbeaten by that oaf, richard,” she continued, with much spirit. “lot hardacre is a fine fellow to set himself up as a judge of honor. why, he has jilted three girls to my knowledge, and is content now to amuse himself with farmers’ daughters, without the burdens of matrimony. stand up to him, nephew; rattle your sword. the more you show your teeth in this world the better will people respect you. the christian fool is a poor creature. he gets an abundance of kicks, sir, and, by heaven! he deserves them. ah, here is my dear friend, dean stubbs. nephew, you must stay and drink tea with us, and take a hand at cards.”
