Part 3

‘But then,’ said the other sister, ‘these are not people in the village; they’re new people, and there’s a great deal in a first impression--at least, so Emmy thinks.’

‘A first impression--upon whom?’ said Mab, with all the severity of her age. Seventeen, being as yet scarcely in it, is a severe critic of the ages over twenty which are in possession of the field.

There was a pause, which Florence broke by one of her disconcerting laughs.

‘Mab, you are too much of a baby. Don’t you know the Swinfords are going to entertain? Perhaps you don’t know what that means. They are going to give all sorts of parties, and we’ll not be asked if--we don’t please.’

‘Whom?’ said Mab again.

And then there came another laugh from Florence, and an offended ‘What can you mean, Mab? Mrs. Swinford, to be sure. It is only she who could invite girls to make the house pleasant, and,’ said Emily, with a little dignity, ‘it is as much for you as for me.’

‘Oh! I thought it might be Leo Swinford,’ said the audacious Mab, ‘who wants a wife, mother says. But he says himself no, he doesn’t want anything of the kind.’

‘Mab!’ said Lady William, in a warning tone from behind.

‘He didn’t say it in any secret,’ said Mab, ‘not the least. He didn’t tell you “But this is between ourselves,” or “You won’t mention it,” or anything of the kind, as people say when they confide in you. He said it right out.’

‘Who said it right out?’ cried Emily. It was their turn to question now, and they looked at each other after they had looked, in consternation, at Mab--asking each other, with their eyes, awe-stricken, what could this little minx mean, and how did she know?

‘As for Leo Swinford, I don’t think anything at all of him,’ said Mab. ‘He was got up in a fur coat yesterday, when it was not cold at all, only blustering; and he had shiny shoes on and red socks showing, as if he were got up for the evening--to walk about the Watcham roads.’

‘Do you mean to say,’ said Emily severely, crushing these pretensions in the bud, ‘that _you_ have seen Mr. Swinford, Mab? And how did you know it was Mr. Swinford--it might have been some excursionist or other down here by a cheap train.’

‘A Marshall and Snelgrove young man,’ said Florence. ‘Absurd! red socks and evening shoes and a fur coat.’

‘And we have always understood Mr. Swinford was a gentleman,’ Emily said. ‘But it is not at all wonderful at Mab’s age to take up such a foolish idea. For a new person in the village always looks as if there was an adventure behind him, doesn’t he, aunt?--and Mab is such a child still.’

‘However,’ said Lady William, ‘I don’t know how it came about, but it was Leo Swinford, my dear. I knew him very well when he was a child, and he sought me out because, I suppose, he didn’t know any one else here.’

There was another pause of consternation and disappointment: for to think that Mab had seen this new personage before any of them, and that he had seen Mab, was very disconcerting and disagreeable to these young ladies. But then they reflected that Mab did not count--a little fat, roundabout thing, looking even younger than her age, and that if it was ordained that they should be forestalled by any one, better Mab than another. The horrid little thing! But then it was a good sign for future intimacy that he knew Aunt Emily, and had come in this way at once to her house.

‘I am sure,’ said Emmy, ‘he might have come to the Rectory. Papa would have been very glad to see him, and the clergyman is generally the first person--unless when there is a squire. And of course he is the squire himself. But then Aunt Emily is the highest in rank, everybody knows.’

‘My rank had not much to do with it. All that Leo knows of me was as Emily Plowden, the Rector’s daughter, just as you are now, Emmy,’ said Lady William, with a little laugh. She was going out of the room as she spoke, and turned her head to give them one glance from the door. If it occurred to Lady William that the second Emily Plowden was not precisely like the first, she did not give vent to that opinion. But it was a little ludicrous from her point of view to be told, as she was told so often, that Emily was ‘her very image’--‘just what I remember you at her age.’ It was with, perhaps, a little glance of satire in her eyes that she flung this parting word at her niece. But the Emily Plowden of the present generation understood no jest. She blushed a little with conscious pleasure and pride, and threw up her head. Now, Lady William had a throat like a swan, but Emily’s could be described no otherwise than as a long neck, at the top of which her head jerked forward with a motion not unlike the darting movement of a hen.

‘So you have really seen him, Mab? Think of having a man, a real man, a young man in Watcham! Were you much excited? Had you presence of mind enough to note any particulars as to eyes and hair and height, and so forth--as well as the red socks and the shiny shoes?’

‘Oh, he’s fair, I think,’ said Mab indifferently, ‘a sort of no-coloured hair like mine, and the rest to correspond. He was very talky and jokey with mother, just as if she had been a young lady. But he said little to me.’

‘It was not to be expected,’ said Emily, ‘that a gentleman and a man of the world like Mr. Swinford would find much to say to you; and I wonder that he should have remembered Aunt Emily. I have never heard that men like that cared much for old ladies: but no doubt it was because he knew nobody else, and just to pass the time.’

‘Mother is not an old lady,’ said Mab; ‘if I were a man I should like her better than all of you girls put together. You are, on the whole, rather silly things. You don’t talk out of your own heads, but watch other people’s eyes to see what will please them. I don’t call that talking! You never would have found out what would please that man if you had looked into his eyes for a year. Now mother never minds--she says what comes into her head: and if any one contradicts her she just goes on saying the other thing.’

This somewhat vague description seemed to make a certain impression upon the young ladies, who probably were able to fill up the outlines for themselves. Emily gave a little sigh.

‘Conversation’s quite a gift,’ she said, ‘and it’s always difficult with a new person till you know their tastes. I suppose Mr. Swinford knows about pictures and that sort of thing, and unless you’ve somebody to tell you when you go to the exhibitions it’s so hard to know which are really the good ones. Then books--Mudie never sends us any of the best. He puts all the common novels into the country parcels. At the Hall they will get everything that comes out.’

‘He said nothing about books or pictures either,’ said Mab--‘Yes, by the bye, he’s going to lend mother some--but they’re French ones----’

‘French ones!’ said the cousins; and then there was a pause of consternation. ‘Papa once said if he had his will no French novel should ever come into the parish.’

‘Ah!’ said Mab, ‘but then I suppose Mr. Swinford didn’t write and ask uncle what he should bring.’

Emily remained gazing out of the window with a troubled air.

‘We shall never know what to say if that is the sort of thing; and as for going to their parties, if they are all made up of---- Mamma, too, who never read a French book in her life. We had a little practice in the schoolroom, when we had Fräulein, don’t you remember, Flo---- Who was it we read? It was all long speeches, and one could never make out what they were about.’

‘And they sounded exactly like German when Fräulein read them. I never could tell which was which. But I know where the books are, and perhaps if you learned one of the speeches and said it to Mr. Swinford, he might like it, don’t you know.’

‘I was not, of course, thinking of Mr. Swinford, but of Mrs. Swinford,’ said Emily, frowning.

‘And you think you will get a chance of talking to her with mamma and Aunt Emily there?’

‘Well,’ said Emily, ‘at least I can show her that I know my place, and how an English girl behaves.’

‘I wish you would not wrangle,’ said Mab; ‘it was rather fun listening to mother and him: they said no speeches out of books--I believe after all what they said was chiefly chaff. Mother is a wonderful hand at chaff. She looks so quiet all the time, and goes on till you are nearly jumping. But he liked it, and laughed, and gave her as good. There was one thing he said,’ added Mab demurely, ‘which wasn’t chaff, and which you might like to hear. He said at once he didn’t want----’

‘What! I’m sure I don’t care what he wants or doesn’t want--a gardener perhaps? and papa has just heard of one he wanted to recommend.’

‘A wife!’ cried Mab, her blue eyes quickening a little with mischief. ‘Mother asked if he did, and he said he didn’t. Perhaps she had some one she wanted to recommend.’

‘Perhaps,’ said Florence, coming to her sister’s aid; ‘that is the way in France, the parents arrange it all. I shouldn’t mind at all--that. I give my consent. It would be nice to be the bride’s relations and always about the house. If you’ll promise to ask nice people and always us to meet them--and be kind about sending the carriage for us, and that sort of thing, for papa hates a bill for flys--I shall give my consent.’

‘Me!’ cried Mab, indignant, ‘I would not marry Leo Swinford, not if---- I’d rather marry the silliest of the curates. I’d rather----’ She stopped short breathless, unable to find a stronger alternative.

‘Then what a good thing for you,’ said Florry, ‘that he doesn’t want a wife!’

‘If you think it is nice,’ said Emily, ‘for young girls to talk about gentlemen, and whether they want wives or not, as if wives were sold at the shop at so much a pound--I am not of that kind of mind: and Aunt Emily would not like it any more than mamma. Good-bye, you two. I have got to go home and get ready, whatever you may have to do.’

And thus Emily retired with the honours of war. If there was any one who had formed plans on the subject of Leo Swinford it was she; not plans, indeed, which are dreadful foreign things, but just a floating idea such as an English girl might entertain, that if a young man and a young woman are thrown much together, why, then certain consequences might follow. One never could tell what might happen, as Mrs. Plowden herself, who was the very essence of propriety, did not hesitate to say.

IV

The road was a little muddy, but not much; and it was quite possible by taking a little trouble in walking to keep your boots quite clean. Under the trees in the avenue this was not so easy, for it was more sheltered, and the wind could not get in to sweep through and through every opening. There is a pond, or lake, in the grounds, as everybody knows, which had been the delight of the neighbourhood for the skating in winter, all the long time the Swinfords had been absent.

‘I wonder if they will still let us skate now they are at home,’ said Emily, as they walked round the bank over the crisped and extremely living water, which did not look under the breeze as if it had ever been bound by chains of frost.

‘Winter is a long way off,’ said Mrs. Plowden, who was a little blown by her walk. She desired her companions to pause a little and look at the view. ‘I don’t want,’ she said, panting, ‘to go in out of breath. These sort of people have quite advantage enough over one in their fine houses without going in panting like a washer-woman.’ She added, ‘Winter’s a long way off, and, as we never knew whether they gave permission at all, or if it was only Howell at the gate, I wouldn’t say anything about it, Emmy, if I were you.’

Mrs. Plowden’s loss of breath partly proceeded from the fact that she had been talking all the way. She had no want of subjects: the past history of Mrs. Swinford, whom they were going to visit, which she did not know; but that made little difference; and the character of her son, which nobody in Watcham knew; and the precautions to be taken in arranging their intercourse with the family so as to get all that might be advantageous out of that intercourse without in any way compromising themselves in respect to that which might be unsatisfactory. ‘If there should be any matrimonial entanglement,’ said Mrs. Plowden, ‘or that sort of thing, of course it would be for the girl’s family to make every inquiry. But I daresay as he’s half a Frenchman, and not at all one of our sort, nothing of that kind will happen: and it is time enough to take it into consideration when it does.’

‘Quite time enough,’ said Lady William, very decidedly, ‘especially as nothing can be more unlikely.’

‘That is just what I say. Of course when young people are thrown together one never knows what may happen: and it is to be hoped that Mr. Swinford may see how much better it would be to settle down with a nice English wife than to bring over a French mademoiselle, who never would understand English ways. But it will be time enough, don’t you think so, Emily? for I always acknowledge you know better than me when it is anything French that is in question--with your languages, you know, and all that.’

‘My languages won’t help me much with Leo Swinford, who is just as English as I am--nor with his mother, who is cosmopolitan, and of no country at all.’

‘That’s just one of your sayings, Emily, for how could a woman be of no country at all? What I’m most concerned for is whether they will come to church: and I can see it’s much on James’s mind, though he never says anything; for a great house like that, almost the only great house in the parish, sets such a dreadful example if they don’t go to church. One hears of it all through the place. If the people at the Hall don’t go, why should we? I tell them it’s quite different--that the people at the Hall have many opportunities, and are deeply interested all the same, and all that; whereas if poor people don’t pay attention to their religious duties, what is to become of them? But often they don’t seem to see it.’

‘I shouldn’t see it if I was in their place. I thought that in Christianity there was no respect of persons.’

‘Oh! my dear Emily, you ought to know better than to bring up that common argument against us, and your brother the Rector of the parish. Of course there’s no respect of persons! But if Mrs. Swinford comes to church she will be shown into the Hall pew, and old Mrs. Lloyd will just find a place for herself, if she is early enough, in the free seats. How could anybody do otherwise? We must be practical. Old Mary Lloyd would be very uncomfortable if she were to sit down with you or me. She is much more at home in the free seats. And with the poor people it is only their individual selves that are in question, whereas the great lady sets such an example: and there are all the servants and the servants’ families, and one doesn’t know how many----’

‘I think you may set your mind at ease, Jane. Mrs. Swinford will come to church.’

‘You take a load off my mind, Emily; but it is many, many years since you have seen her, and people change a great deal. I sometimes feel even myself, you know, an inclination to stay in bed on Sunday mornings. It is a thing to be crushed in the bud. If you give in to a headache once, there is no telling where it may land you in the end.’

‘But, mamma dear,’ said the sympathetic Emmy, ‘your headaches are so bad!’

‘Hum!’ said Mrs. Plowden doubtfully. ‘Yes, my headaches are bad sometimes: but it is a thing that one should set one’s face against. It ought to be crushed in the bud--on Sundays, I mean; it does not matter so much on other days. And Mr. Swinford, Emily. I hear that you have seen him already. Now, I wonder what made him go to see you----’

‘Why shouldn’t he?’ said Lady William, with a laugh.

‘Oh, well, you know! I should have thought a gentleman would have looked up the Rector, or the Archdeacon, or the General, instead of a lady just living in a small way by herself, like you.’

‘Mamma, you forget Aunt Emily’s rank,’ Emmy said in dismay.

‘Oh, I never forget her rank!’ cried Mrs. Plowden, with a little irritation. ‘I hear enough of it, I am sure.’

‘The Rector and the Archdeacon and the General are all very important persons. The only thing is that Leo Swinford did not know them, and he knew me.’

‘I have always observed that people in that sort of position know everybody,’ said Mrs. Plowden, ‘and, my dear Emily, I don’t want to seem censorious, but do you think it is quite _nice_ to talk of a young man like that by his Christian name? _I_ don’t even know his Christian name. It may be Leonard or it may be Lionel, or it may be----’

‘Oh! Leopold, mamma!’

‘I don’t see what you have got to do with it, Emmy. If your aunt knows him so well as that, _you_ don’t know him--and perhaps never will if he is that kind of man!’

‘Don’t you think,’ said Lady William, with that perfect composure of which she was mistress, ‘that we might stop for a moment again and look at the view----’

‘Oh, if you feel the hill, Emily--it is a little steep--I don’t mind sitting down for a moment, if you feel you want it. It is very pretty here,’ said Mrs. Plowden, panting; ‘the water--through the trees--and the lodge--in the distance--with the wisteria just beginning to shoot.’

The pause made here was a few minutes in duration, for Mrs. Plowden had heated herself much by her argument and by clambering up the ascent--which was, indeed, only a very gentle ascent. At last, however, the party reached the door. As they came up sounds were audible inside, which disclosed themselves, when the door was hastily opened, as produced by a game of billiards, played by Mr. Leo Swinford, and--oh! terrible sight--his butler: though for the first moment Mrs. Plowden’s eager intelligence had not taken in this fact. She said, politely, that she was afraid they had driven the gentleman away----

‘Oh!’ said Leo with a laugh, ‘it’s only Morris--let me fulfil his functions and take you to my mother.’ He offered the Rector’s wife his arm, but she drew modestly back.

‘My sister-in-law, Mr. Swinford. Oh, I hope I know what is _comme-il-faut_. I could not go before Lady William.’ Mrs. Plowden had a flash of exultation in thinking of that word--_comme-il-faut_. It was something like an inspiration that brought it to her lips in the very nick of time.

The drawing-room at the Hall was a large room in three divisions, divided with pillars of sham marble with gilded capitals. It was too bright, notwithstanding the heaviness of the decorations. Large windows almost from the roof to the floor poured in floods of afternoon light, and shone pitiless upon the lady who rose languidly to meet her visitors, keeping her back to the light. She was a tall woman, exceedingly worn and thin, but with a great deal of grace in her movements, though she was old. Her age was the first thing which the eager rural visitors noted, for it was a sort of age which had never come under their observation before. She was dressed picturesquely in dark velvet with such folds and cunning lines as they had never dreamed of, and which plunged them into anxious questioning whether that might be the latest fashion. If so, it was unlike anything that Miss Singer had in her books and papers, or even Madame Mantz, who was Miss Singer’s great example in town; and her hair, which had not a white thread in it, was uncovered. No cap on her head! and approaching seventy, Mrs. Plowden thought, making a rapid calculation upon the facts she knew. Mrs. Swinford stepped forward a little with a faint cry of ‘Emily’ when Lady William appeared, and took her, with every appearance of cordiality, into her arms, and they kissed, or at least Mrs. Swinford touched Lady William’s cheeks one after the other, while the Plowdens made a respectful circle round and looked on. ‘This is indeed kind,’ Mrs. Swinford said. The ladies were so bent upon the aspect of the mistress of the Hall that they did not observe how pale Lady William was, or how little part she took in the embrace. ‘And though, of course, she could not take us into her arms,’ Mrs. Plowden said after, ‘never having set eyes on us before, she was quite as cordial, and hoped she would see a great deal of us, and that it was so nice to feel that one was coming among people who felt like old friends.’ ‘I have heard so much of you through Emily,’ was what Mrs. Swinford really did say; to which Emily was so disagreeable as to make no reply. And then they all sat down, and Mrs. Plowden began to make conversation, as in duty bound.

‘We are so glad to see you in your own house, Mrs. Swinford. The Rector has always said it was so cold like to feel that there was no one in the Hall. A squire’s house makes such a difference. The poor people think so much of it, and the middle people are always looking out for an example; and of course the higher class, it is yourself--so you being here is, if I may say so, of the greatest consequence to everybody, and I do hope it will be agreeable to you.’

‘You are very good,’ said Mrs. Swinford, with a motion of her head. ‘It never occurred to me that it could be of any importance except to ourselves.’

‘Oh, I assure you it is of the greatest consequence. What we want in England is the higher classes to set a good example, to keep back those horrid democratic ways, and show us how we ought to behave. We are very loyal to a good example in England, Mrs. Swinford. You have been so long away, perhaps you may not remember how in a well-ordered parish the people are taught to look up to those who are above them----’

‘But suppose we do not set a good example?’ said the lady, with a languid smile. She was looking at Lady William, who sat by, saying little, and who was in the full flood of the light, which she was quite able to bear. The elder woman, who was not, bestowed an interested attention upon the friend whom she had greeted so warmly--not even a look or movement, nor even a fold of the very plain black dress, which showed how little means of adornment the other possessed, yet how little it mattered to her whether she was adorned or not, escaped her. Mrs. Swinford was very deeply learned in all these arts, in all that tended to preserve beauty and enhance it. She had been a beauty herself in her day, and was very reluctant to part with it. She looked at her old friend with an eager, yet veiled attention, observing all that was in her favour, and the few things against her. Poorly dressed, but looking none the worse, the black being in its way a kind of veil even of its own imperfections: the charm of the face enhanced by sorrow and trouble and many experiences, the outlines uninjured, the cheek almost as purely oval as in youth, the eyes as sweet, the hair--it had a touch of gray, perhaps, but that is no harm to such a woman, a woman not standing upon her appearance, perhaps not thinking much of it--at least, giving herself the air of not thinking of it at all. Mrs. Swinford did not believe that any woman was ever indifferent to her appearance, or not thinking of it. It did not matter much to herself at the present moment, when there was no one she cared to affect or charm, no one worth the lifting of a finger; and yet she was not indifferent to her own aspect, and why should Lady William be? Lady William? A strange smile crossed the elder lady’s face as she remembered what was now Emily Plowden’s name. She said to her in the middle of Mrs. Plowden’s speech, to which she paid no attention, with a way that women of the world have, ‘How strange it is to think of you, Emily, by that name!’