CHAPTER II.

FLOATING WITH THE STREAM.

Lady Dudgeon's morning-room in Harley Street. At her davenport near the window, pen in hand, sat her ladyship, where, indeed, she was to be found at eleven a.m. six mornings out of seven. On the ridge of her high nose was perched the double gold-rimmed eye-glass which she had taken to wearing of late in the privacy of the family circle, but the existence of which, outside that circle, was kept a profound secret.

On a low chair close by, in a pretty morning-dress, sat Eleanor Lloyd. London life and London hours were beginning to tell upon her already. There was a look of weariness in her eyes, and her cheeks had lost a little of that fresh, delicate bloom which she had brought with her from the country, but which cannot exist long in the atmosphere of Belgravian ballrooms.

At Lady Dudgeon's elbow stood Olive Deane, with her black dress, her snowy collar and cuffs, her colourless face, her black, lustreless hair, and her fathomless eyes--in every point precisely the same as at the time when first we met her. Her ladyship had just been issuing invitations for a grand ball to be given at Stammars, during the ensuing Easter recess, to Sir Thomas's chief supporters at the recent election.

"There, thank goodness, that finishes the last batch of twenty!" said her ladyship, as she put down her pen with an air of relief. "I don't think that I have forgotten any one, or, for the matter of that, invited any one that we could have afforded to ignore. There are eighty of them altogether, leaving out of question the tribe of wives and daughters--quite as many as we can reasonably accommodate." Then, turning to Olive, she added, "Will you kindly see that the whole of the invitations are sent off by this afternoon's post?"

"I will take care to post them myself. Has your ladyship any further commands?"

"None whatever at present, thank you."

Olive bowed, and left the room.

"On such an occasion as the present one Miss Deane is really invaluable," said Lady Dudgeon to Eleanor.

"If you would only let me help you in these little matters, instead of Miss Deane, you would please me more than I can tell YOU."

"My dear child, I could not think of such a thing," said her ladyship, with dignity. "I did not bring you to London to make a drudge of you; I brought you here that you might enjoy yourself."

"I should enjoy myself far better if I had a little more to do sometimes. I might as well be a china figure under a glass shade in the drawing-room, for any use I seem to be in the world."

"My dear, all pretty objects have their uses in the world, if it be only to please the eye and educate the taste of others. Be satisfied at present with trying to look as pretty as you can."

"That seems to me a very empty sort of life indeed."

"Ah, you young people never know what you would be at. You, for instance, my dear, have youth, good looks, and money, and yet you grumble! But about this ball. I mean it to be a great success. It will make Sir Thomas even more popular in the borough than he is now, and no one can stigmatize it as being either bribery or corruption. There is some talk of a general election next autumn, so that we must keep our supporters well in hand."

"You are quite a tactician," laughed Eleanor.

"In these days, my dear, it doesn't do to let one's wits grow rusty. You will derive great amusement at the ball from a study of the toilettes of some of the worthy tradespeople's wives and daughters who will honour us with their company. The originality of idea displayed by some of them is truly astounding. And the waistcoats of the gentlemen are hardly less wonderful."

At this moment a footman brought a letter for her ladyship.

"What a charming surprise, my dear!" she said, as she glanced over it. "Invitations for a private concert at Lady Camperdown's. Most exclusive. That sweet Lady Camperdown! There will be a carpet-dance afterwards. I must write off at once and order our dresses."

"But surely, Lady Dudgeon, one of the ten or fifteen dresses that I have already would do for such an occasion."

"My dear Eleanor! Go to Lady Camperdown's concert in a dress that you have ever worn before! Such a thing is not to be thought of. It would not be doing your duty in that state of life to which it has pleased Providence to call you." Here her ladyship looked at her watch. "My dear, I expect Captain Dayrell here about twelve, and I should like you to change your dress before he arrives. He told me last evening that he wanted to see me to-day, so I asked him to call early, as I am going shopping immediately after luncheon."

"But Captain Dayrell is coming to see you, Lady Dudgeon. There is no occasion for him to see me."

"He is coming to see me, it is true: but I rather suspect it is about a matter that intimately concerns you."

"Indeed! But I really cannot see in what way Captain Dayrell's visit can concern me."

"It may concern you very nearly. I have every reason to believe that Captain Dayrell is coming here this morning to ask my sanction to his making you a formal offer of marriage."

"To make me an offer of marriage! You must be jesting."

"I was never more serious in my life. You could not fail to see with what attention Captain Dayrell treated you at the ball the other evening. And on the two or three previous occasions when he has met you in society, there has been an empressement in his manner which has led me to suspect that he was only waiting to see a little more of you before making up his mind to ask you to become his wife."

"Only waiting to see a little more of me! I am overwhelmed by Captain Dayrell's preference."

"Don't try to be sarcastic, Eleanor. Sarcasm in young people is little less than odious."

Eleanor rose. There was a heightened colour in her cheeks, an added brightness in her eyes. "Lady Dudgeon, should Captain Dayrell come here this morning on such an errand as the one you have mentioned, you can give him his congé as soon as you please. And I beg that you will not send for me, as I shall certainly decline to see him."

"Tut tut, child! you don't know what you are talking about. A little maidenly shyness is all very nice and proper, especially when the offer is a first one. But prudery may be carried too far; and, in the case of Captain Dayrell, a pretended rejection might perhaps frighten him away altogether."

"A pretended rejection, Lady Dudgeon! I fail to understand you."

"It was very foolish on my part," said her ladyship, complacently, without noticing the interruption, "to mention the subject to you at all. I have only succeeded in startling you. I ought to have left Captain Dayrell to plead his own cause with you. Gentlemen, on such occasions, are generally very eloquent after they have made the first plunge."

"I am sorry that you should so persistently misunderstand me," said Eleanor, not without a touch of impatience. "You compel me to speak plainly, and in a way that is most repugnant to my feelings. Under no circumstances could I agree to become the wife of Captain Dayrell. And I trust there will be no necessity for his name ever to be mentioned between us again."

Lady Dudgeon turned slowly on her chair, and surveyed Eleanor through her eye-glass as though she could hardly believe the evidence of her ears.

"You cannot marry Captain Dayrell, Eleanor Lloyd?" she said, with some severity of tone. "May I ask what there is to prevent your marrying him? I hope there is no prior engagement in the case, of which I have been kept in ignorance."

"Were I engaged to anyone, your ladyship would certainly not be kept in ignorance of the fact."

"Instead of engagement, I ought, perhaps, to have used the word 'attachment.'"

"Applied to me, one word would be just as incorrect as the other."

"Then may I ask what particular objection you can have to receive the addresses of Captain Dayrell?"

"My particular objection is that I could never care sufficiently for Captain Dayrell to become his wife."

"I certainly gave you credit for more common sense, Eleanor, than to think that you would allow any foolish sentiment to stand in the way of your proper settlement in life. My theory is this--and I daresay, when you shall have lived as long in the world as I have, you will agree that it is by no means a bad theory--that any girl who has been correctly brought up, and whose affections have not been tampered with, can school herself; without much difficulty, to look with affectionate eyes on whatever suitor her relations or friends may offer to her notice as eligible, in their estimation, to make her happy: and a really good girl will always find half her own happiness in the knowledge that she is making others happy at the same time."

"In a matter involving consequences so serious, I should prefer to make my own choice."

"No doubt you would," said her ladyship drily. "But if young ladies would only be guided by the choice of their best friends, rather than by their own headstrong wills, we should hear far less about unhappy marriages, and the evils they bring." To this Eleanor made no answer. "Most people would agree with me, my dear, that you ought to consider yourself a very lucky girl to have drawn such a prize as Captain Dayrell. A man still young--he can't be more than three or four and thirty--handsome, accomplished, of an excellent family--he is first cousin to Lord Coniston--tolerably rich, and of such an easy, good-natured disposition, that any woman of tact would soon learn to twine him round her finger: what more could any reasonable being wish for?"

"Does affection count for nothing in your estimate of marriage, Lady Dudgeon?"

"Oh, my dear, you may depend upon it that if there is no prior attachment you would soon learn to like him. Captain Dayrell is generally looked upon as a most fascinating man in society."

"Captain Dayrell may be all that you say he is," replied Eleanor, "but for all that, he can never be anything more to me than he is at the present moment."

"So be it. The likes and dislikes of young ladies are among the unaccountable things of this world. But I cannot help saying that your point-blank refusal even to see Captain Dayrell is a great disappointment to me."

"Do not say that, dear Lady Dudgeon!" cried Eleanor, and with that she took the elder lady's hand in hers, pressed it to her lips, and then nestled down on the little footstool by her knees. "Believe me, I am not ungrateful, not insensible to the kindness which prompted you to take an obscure country girl by the hand, and treat her more as a daughter of your own than anything else. But I cannot tell you how sorry I am to find that you should so far have misunderstood me as to think that you were doing me a kindness in endeavouring to secure for me the attention of Captain Dayrell."

"It is certainly a great disappointment to me," said Lady Dudgeon, with a sigh. "I had really set my heart on you and Captain Dayrell making a match of it."

"But cannot you understand that I have no wish to get married, nor any intention of changing my name for a long time to come--if ever?"

"Well, well, child; I only hope that what you say is right, and that there is indeed no prior attachment. But be careful that you do not fall into the hands of some swindling adventurer--of some romantic rogue, with a handsome face and a wheedling tongue, who, while persuading you that he loves you for yourself alone, cares, in reality, for nothing but the money you will bring him. The world abounds with such men. Be warned, or you may have to repent when repentance will be of no avail."

"Ah, Lady Dudgeon if I were not an heiress, what a happy girl I should be!"

"Child, you talk like a lunatic."

"It may be so, but this money weighs me down as though it were a millstone about my neck. And how sadly wise in the ways of the world I seem to have become in a few short months! Friendship--service--affection--I feel, nowadays, as if these treasures were offered me, not for myself, but simply because I am a little rich. In the old, happy days at home, before ever I dreamed of being an heiress, no such doubt ever crossed my mind. Friendship and love--my father's love--were mine: as freely and fully mine as the lilies that grew by the mill-pond brim, or the canary that woke me every morning with its song. But indeed, dear Lady Dudgeon, I am in no wise fitted for a life of fashionable pleasure. My tastes are too homely. Life seems to me far too real, far too earnest, to be frittered away in a perpetual round of balls and parties, of morning calls and drives in the Park. When I think of the poverty and wretchedness that I see on every side of me, every time I stir out of doors, and then of all those useless thousands that are said to be mine, I feel ashamed of myself, and think, with sorrow, how utterly I am living for myself alone. Oh, Lady Dudgeon! if you wish to make me happy, be my almoner; teach me how to employ, for the benefit of my poorer sisters and their little ones, that wealth which came to me so unexpectedly, and which I so little deserve. Teach me to do this, and you will make me happy indeed!"

Lady Dudgeon took a sniff at her salts before she spoke. "My dear Eleanor," she said at last, "if all people of wealth and social standing held the same terrible notions that you do, we should have chaos back again in a very little while. Your mind has been badly trained, child, and we must endeavour to eradicate the noxious weeds one by one. Meanwhile, you will be all the better for this little outburst, and I am not in the least offended by what you have said. And now as regards your costume for Lady Camperdown's concert. I think the new shade of green would harmonise admirably with your style and complexion. As for myself, I shall wear--" But at this juncture the door opened, and in came Sir Thomas with a budget of news, so the all-important subject of dress was put aside for the time being, to be discussed with due solemnity at a more fitting opportunity.

On the Friday following this scene Sir Thomas and Lady Dudgeon, accompanied by Miss Lloyd, went, by invitation, to spend a week at the house of an old family friend at Richmond. On Saturday morning certain important papers reached Gerald, who had been left in charge of matters in Harley Street, which necessitated an immediate consultation with Sir Thomas. Off by the next train hurried Gerald to Richmond, where he found Sir Thomas, in company with his friend Mr. Cromer, smoking a mild cheroot, in a garden-house that looked on to the river. Liking Gerald's manner and appearance, Mr. Cromer would insist upon his staying to dinner. Presently the ladies came sailing across the lawn--Mrs. Cromer and Lady Dudgeon; Miss Cromer, and Miss Lloyd; and then they all walked down to the edge of the river, where lay moored a pretty little boat, named _Cora_, in honour of Miss Cromer. The weather was warm and sunny for the time of year, and the river looked quite gay, so numerous were the tiny craft which the bright day had coaxed out after their long winter sleep.

"How delightful it would be to go on the river this afternoon!" said Miss Cromer.

"I should like it above all things," replied Miss Lloyd.

"I wish Charley were here to take us for a row," alluding to her brother. "How coquettish my boat looks this afternoon! How she seems to woo us to take her out for a spin!"

Gerald lifted his hat. "I believe that I can handle a pair of oars as awkwardly as most people," he said, with a smile. "If you will trust yourselves to my care, I will promise to bring you back--either alive or dead."

The young ladies vowed that it would be delicious. The elder ladies disapproved faintly, on the ground that there would be a cold breeze on the river, but were overruled. Mr. Cromer waddled back to the house to get some shawls and wraps, and Gerald handed the young ladies into the boat.

In the result, however, Miss Cromer had to be left behind. At the last moment she was seized with her old complaint, palpitation of the heart, and her mother would not let her go. Eleanor would have stayed with her, but both Mr. and Mrs. Cromer insisted upon her going. It did not require much persuasion to make Gerald take them at their word. Eleanor had hardly ceased protesting that she would much rather stay with Cora, when she found herself in the middle of the stream, and all conversation with those on shore at an end.

"Now, Miss Lloyd, will you kindly take charge of the tiller ropes?" said Gerald, decisively. "I presume you know how to use them?"

"I ought to know," said Eleanor. "I had a great deal of practice with them when poor papa and I used to go out boating together."

It would not be high water for half an hour, and the tide was still running up strongly. Gerald put the boat's head up stream, and pulled gently along towards Twickenham. He blessed the happy fortune that, for one delicious hour, had given him Eleanor all to himself. But now that the opportunity was his, what should he talk to her about? He felt that he ought to be at once witty and tender; that now, if ever, he ought to rise above the commonplace level of everyday conversation. He felt all this, and yet he felt, at the same time, that he had nothing to say. If he might only have opened the floodgates of his heart, then, indeed, there would have been no lack of words--no necessity to hunt here and there in his brain for something to talk about. It is true that he might have begun about the weather, or some other equally simple topic; but, then, any nincompoop could have done that, and to-day he wanted so particularly to shine in the eyes of his goddess! But before long it became quite evident that he was not to shine to-day. He must rest contentedly on the level of the nincompoops, and trust to his good fortune that Miss Lloyd would not find out that he was a bigger donkey than the rest of the gentlemen who were in the habit of laying themselves out to fascinate her.

But Miss Lloyd herself seemed to have very little to say this afternoon. It seemed pleasure enough just then to sit quietly in the sweet sunshine and dip her ungloved hand now and again in the cool ripples of the tide.

"Have you ever been as far up the Thames as this before?" asked Gerald at last, in sheer desperation.

"I was never on the Thames in a small boat before to-day," answered Eleanor.

"There are some lovely nooks on it--so thoroughly English, you know: altogether unlike anything of the kind that you can see anywhere else."

"I have been so little abroad lately that I am hardly competent to judge what kind of scenery is thoroughly English, or what is not."

Another awkward silence. "What a goose he must think me! It seems so stupid not to be able to talk except in answer to a question," said Eleanor, to herself. "Why do I feel so different when I am with _him_ from what I do when I'm with anyone else? I never felt like this when I was alone with Captain Dayrell. If Cora had come with us we should have been lively enough." And yet, in her heart, how glad she was that Cora had not come! "Whether this scenery is English or not, it is very beautiful," said Eleanor, at last, with a desperate resolve to break the spell that was weaving itself more strongly around them with every moment. "One can see where spring's delicate brush has been at work here and there among the trees, rubbing-in the first faint tints of green. How lovely it is!"

"If this sunshine would only last, and the tide not tire of running up," said Gerald, "I feel that I could go on like this for a week and not feel weary."

"You are an Englishman, Mr. Pomeroy, and I am afraid that you would soon begin to cry out for your dinner."

"Would not the gods feed us and have a care of us? To-day we are their children. I feel that I have but to summon Hebe, and she would come and wait upon us."

"For my part, Minerva is the only one of the divinities whom I should care to summon."

"So much wisdom would surely overweight our little boat."

"But are we not rather short of ballast just at present?" asked Eleanor, slily.

"Possibly so; but Minerva would certainly swamp us. I should greatly prefer the company of a certain juvenile, called by Schiller _der lächelnde Knabe_: he would make the proper ballast for such a voyage as ours."

"Where I was at school in Germany they never would let us read Schiller," said Eleanor, demurely. "How happy those swans look!" she added, a moment afterwards, as if to change the subject.

"Yes," said Gerald, "they find their happiness as certain people one sometimes meets with find theirs--in groping about amongst the mud--seeking what they can devour."

"And yet how graceful they are!"

"They are graceful enough as long as they are in their proper element. Out of it, they are as ungraceful as a scullion-maid in a drawing-room. And yet, I daresay that if they can think at all, they think that they look far more graceful during their perambulations ashore than ever they do in the water. But, then, how many of us think in the same way!"

"Why, you are quite a cynic, Mr. Pomeroy. But it is considered fashionable nowadays for young men to be cynical, and one must be in the fashion, you know."

Gerald laughed a little dismally. "I tasted the bitters of life at so early an age that I suppose the flavour of them still clings to my palate."

"Pardon me if I have hurt your feelings!" said Eleanor, earnestly. "I certainly did not intend to do so. But see, the tide is on the turn, and we must turn with it."

"Have we not time to go a little further? The afternoon is still young."

"Yes, you shall row me round yonder tiny island, that looks so pretty from here, and then we must really go back."

When they had rounded the islet, said Eleanor: "I am sure you must be tired, Mr. Pomeroy. Suppose you ship your oars and let the tide float us gently down."

"I am not in the least tired; but, being a good boy, I like to do as I am bidden."

Cunning Gerald knew that by floating down with the stream he should have half an hour more of Eleanor's society than if he had used his oars ever so gently.

"Going back is not nearly so nice as going up stream," he remarked.

"What makes you think so?"

"Because our voyage will so soon be at an end."

"But, when you have landed me, there will be no objection to your having the boat out for as many hours as you like."

"And make a water hermit of myself. I scarcely think that I am sufficiently fond of my own company to care for that. I like solitude, but I must have some one to share it with me. The sweetest solitude is that where two people, whose tastes and sympathies are in accord, shut themselves out from the rest of the world (as you and I are shut out on this silent highway) to find in the society of each other a truer and more complete satisfaction than in aught else this earth can afford."

"Is not that a rather selfish view to take of life and its duties?" asked Eleanor.

"Is it not possible to live in the world and yet be not of it?" he returned--"to do our daily tasks there, and yet have an inner sanctuary to flee to, of which no one but ourselves shall possess the key, and against whose walls the noise and turmoil of the world shall dash themselves in vain?"

"You would have to be very particular in your choice of a companion to share such a solitude with you, otherwise the demon of Ennui would soon make a third in your company."

"Ennui can never intrude itself between two people whose tastes and sympathies thoroughly agree. Four times out of six ennui means neither more nor less than vacuity of brain."

Eleanor laughed. "Next time I am troubled with it I shall know how to call it by its proper name.--I declare if there isn't dear Lady Dudgeon looking out for us with a shawl over her head!"

Her ladyship received them very graciously; but then Mr. Pomeroy was a special favourite with her. "I am glad you have had the good sense to get back early," she said. "The river-damps are said to be very dangerous after sunset."

Not the slightest suspicion of any possible danger to her protégée ever entered her mind. Had anyone even hinted at such a thing, she would have replied indignantly that Miss Lloyd, who had refused the addresses of Captain Dayrell, was not at all likely to fall in love with Sir Thomas Dudgeon's secretary. She judged Eleanor, in fact, by what she herself had been at the same age. She had been brought up to believe that for any young lady to throw herself away simply for love was next door to a crime. As it was totally out of the question that she herself could have ever fallen in love with any man who was without wealth or position, or both, so would it have been utterly inconceivable to her that her darling Miss Lloyd could ever sink to a level which would render possible any such act of social degradation.