CHAPTER VI.--IN WHICH LEWIS ARUNDEL SKETCHES A COW, AND THE AUTHOR DRAWS

A YOUNG LADY.

It was about noon on the day following the events narrated in the last chapter. Frere had departed to his office at the scientific institution some two hours since, and Lewis and Faust were looking out of the window, when a well-appointed cab dashed round the corner of a cross street, and a pair of lavender-coloured kid-gloves drew up a splendid bay horse, who arched his proud neck and champed the bit, impatient of delay, till a young male child in livery coat and top-boots rolled off the back of the vehicle and stationed itself before the animal’s nose, which act of self-devotion appeared to mesmerise him into tranquillity, and afforded the occupant of the cab time to spring out and knock at Frere’s door. Five minutes more saw Leicester and Lewis seated side by side and driving rapidly in the direction of Park Crescent.

“I don’t know how you feel this morning, Arundel,” began Leicester; “but positively when I first woke I could scarcely move. I’m black and blue all over, I believe.”

“I must confess to being rather stiff,” was the reply, “and my left hand is unproducible. I cut my knuckles against the nose of that tall fellow when I knocked him down, and shall be forced to wear a glove till it heals.”

“You did that uncommonly well,” returned Leicester; “the man was as strong as Hercules, and vicious into the bargain. He evidently had heard what you said about a black eye, and meant mischief. I was coming to help you when you finished him off.”

“It would have been most provoking to have been disfigured just at this time,” rejoined Lewis. “One could not very well go to propose oneself as a mentor for youth with a black eye obtained in something nearly akin to a street row.”

“No,” said Leicester; “the General would consider our last night’s exploit as dreadfully _infra dig._ He is quite one of the old school, and reckons Sir Charles Grandison a model for gentlemen. You must be careful to avoid the free-and-easy style of the present day with him; but I think you’ll suit him exactly; there’s naturally something of the _preux chevalier, héros de roman_ cut about you that will go down with him amazingly.”

“In plain English, you consider me stiff and affected,” returned Lewis. “Do not scruple to tell me if it is so.”

“Stiff, yes; affected, no,” was the rejoinder. “Indeed, your manner is unusually simple and natural when you thaw a little, but at first you are--well, I hardly know how to describe it; but there is something about you unlike the men one usually meets. You have a sort of half-defiant way of looking at people, a sort of ‘you’d better not insult me, sir’ expression. I don’t know that I should have observed it towards myself, but it was your manner to Grandeville that particularly struck me. I have not annoyed you by my frankness?” he added interrogatively, finding that Lewis did not reply. Regardless of this question, Lewis remained silent for a minute or two, then suddenly turning to his companion, and speaking in a low, hurried voice, he said--

“Can you conceive no reason for such a manner? Is there not enough in my position to account for that, ay, and more? By birth I am any man’s equal. My father was of an old family, a captain in the Austrian service, and in the highest sense of the word a gentleman. I have received a gentleman’s education. Up to the present time I have associated with gentlemen on terms of equality, and now suddenly, through no fault of my own, I am in effect a beggar. The very errand we are upon proves it. Through the kindness of Frere and of yourself,--a stranger,--I am about to receive a favourable recommendation to some proud old man as a hired servant; for though in name it may not be so, in fact I shall be nought but a hireling! Is it strange then that I view men with suspicion? that I am watchful lest they attempt to refuse me the amount of courtesy due to those who, having never forfeited their own self-respect, are entitled to the respect of others?”

He paused, and removing his hat, allowed the cold breeze to blow freely around his heated brow. Leicester, who, despite his foppery, was thoroughly kind-hearted, being equally surprised and distressed at the burst of feeling his words had called forth, hastened to reply.

“My dear fellow, I really am--that is, ’pon my word, I had no idea you looked upon the affair in this light. I can assure you, I think you quite mistake the matter; a tutorship is considered a very gentlemanly occupation. If I had any work in me, I’m not at all sure I might not--that is, it would be a very sensible thing of me to look out for something of the kind myself. Stanhope Jones, who was up at Trinity with me, and about the fastest man of his year, ran through his fortune, got a tutorship in Lord Puzzletête’s family, went abroad with the eldest cub, and picked up a prize widow at Pisa, with tin enough to set the leaning tower straight again, if she’d had a fancy to do so.”

During this well-meant attempt at consolation Lewis had had time to come to the conclusion that he was in the position of that unwise individual who wore “his heart upon his sleeve for daws to peck at;” or, in plain English, that he had been betrayed into a display of feeling before a man incapable of appreciating or understanding it; and a less agreeable conviction at which to arrive we scarcely know. Nothing, however, remained but to make the best of it, which he accordingly did, by admitting the possibility that there might be much truth in Leicester’s view of the case, and changing the subject by saying, “Now I want you to give me a peep at the _carte du pays_ of the unknown region I am about to explore. I think I pretty well comprehend the General from your description. Of what other members does the family consist?”

“Ah! yes, of course you must be curious to know. Well, the _dramatis persono_ is somewhat limited. First and foremost, the General,--you comprehend him, you say?” Lewis made a sign in the affirmative, and Leicester continued: “Then we have an awful personage, who I expect will be a severe trial to you--Miss Livingstone; she is a relation, an aunt I think, of the General’s late wife, who lives with him and keeps his house, and was the terror of my boyhood whenever I was staying down at Broadhurst. She never was over young, I believe; at least I can’t imagine her anything but middle-aged, and she must now be sixty or thereabouts. For the rest, she looks as if she had swallowed a poker, and, by some mysterious process of assimilation, become imbued with its distinguishing characteristics; for she is very stiff, very cold, and as far as I know utterly impenetrable, but of a stirring disposition withal, which leads her to interfere with everybody and everything. Lastly, there is my cousin Annie, the General’s only daughter; she inherits her mother’s beauty, her father’s pride, her great-aunt’s determination to have her own way, and the devil’s own love of teasing. To set against all this, I believe her to be thoroughly good and amiable, and everything of that kind; at all events she is a most bewitching girl, and bids fair, under judicious management, to become a very charming woman! fancy her mission is to reform my brother Bellefield and render him a steady married man, and I wish her joy of it. She comes into her mother’s fortune when she is of age, and the respective governors have set their hearts upon the match.”

“And what says Lord Bellefield?” inquired Lewis listlessly.

“Oh, Bell reckons she won’t be of age, and that the match can’t come off these four years, by which time he expects to be so hard up that he must marry somebody; and as there will be plenty of the needful, she will suit his book as well as any other.”

“The young lady, of course, approves?” continued Lewis dreamily, untying a knot in the thong of Leicester’s whip.

“Catch a woman refusing a coronet,” returned Leicester, as he pulled up at a house in Park Crescent so suddenly as almost to throw the bay on his haunches.

“General Grant begs you will walk upstairs, Mr. Leicester. He is engaged at present, but desired me to say he particularly wishes to see you,” was the reply made by a most aristocratic butler to Leicester’s inquiry whether his master was at home. “Keep the bay moving, Tim. Now, Arundel, turn to the right--that’s it,” and suiting the action to the word, Charley the indolent leisurely descended from the cab, and crossing the “marble hall,” lounged up a wide staircase followed by Lewis.

“Silence and solitude,” he continued, opening the door of a large drawing-room handsomely furnished. “I hope they won’t be long before they introduce us to the luncheon-table. Oysters are popularly supposed to give one an appetite; but the natives we demolished at Frere’s last night must have been sadly degenerate, for I declare to you I could scarcely get through my breakfast this morning. Ah! what have we here?--a water-colour landscape in a semi-chaotic condition. Annie has been sketching, as sure as fate. I’ll introduce a few masterly touches and surprise her.” So saying he seated himself at the table and began dabbling with a brush.

“By Jove, I’ve done it now!” he exclaimed in a tone of consternation, after a minute’s pause. “Just look here; I thought I would insert the trunk of a tree in the foreground, and the confounded brush had got red in it, so I have made a thing like a lobster and spoiled the drawing.”

“I think, if you wish, I could turn it into a cow, and so get you out of the scrape,” suggested Lewis, smiling at his companion’s guilty countenance.

“My dear fellow, the very thing,” exclaimed Leicester, hastily rising and thrusting Lewis into his seat; “let’s have a cow, by all means. That’s famous,” he continued, as with a few graphic strokes Lewis converted the red daub into the semblance of an animal. “Bravo! make her an eye--now the horns--what a fascinating quadruped! Where’s the tail to come?”

“You would not see the tail in the position in which the cow is supposed to be lying,” remonstrated Lewis.

“Still, it would make it more natural,” urged Leicester. “As a personal favour, just to oblige me, stretch a point and give her a tail.”

“There, then, I’ve twisted it under her leg,” said Lewis, making the desired addition; “but depend upon it, there never was a cow’s tail so situated.”

“All the greater proof of your talent,” was the reply. “The ideal is what you artists (for I see you are one) are always raving about, and this is a specimen of it.”

So engrossed had the two young men been with their occupation that they had not observed the entrance of a third person. The newcomer was that most charming of all created beings, a very lovely girl of seventeen.

As every poet since Homer has done his utmost to clothe in fitting language a description of the best specimen of the class which it may have been his hap to meet with, and as no man in his senses would exchange half-an-hour of the society of one of the originals for all the fanciful descriptions of women that ever were written, we would fain be excused from adding one more to the number; and were all our readers of what grammarians most ungallantly term “the worthier gender,” we should cut the matter short by begging each man to imagine the damsel in question exactly like the “unexpressive she” who is, for the time being, queen of his soul. But as we flatter ourselves certain bright eyes will sparkle and coral lips smile over this “o’er true tale,” and as we have already been asked by “oceans” of young ladies, “What is the heroine to be like?” we will e’en make a virtue of necessity and give a _catalogue raisonné_ of her many perfections.

Annie Grant, then (for we’ll have no disguise about the matter, but own at once that she it _was_ who entered the drawing-room unperceived, and that she it _is_ who is destined to play the heroine in this our drama of the Railroad of Life; and be it observed interparenthetically that we use the theatrical metaphor advisedly, for Shakespeare has told us that “all the world’s a stage,” and it is a matter of common notoriety that in the present day all stages have become railroads)--Annie Grant, then, we say, was rather above the middle height, though no one would have thought of pronouncing her tall; her gown of _mousseline--poil de_--psha! what are we thinking of?--she had not a gown on at all; how should she, when she was going to ride directly after luncheon? No, her habit, which fitted to perfection, was well calculated to set off her slight but singularly graceful figure to the best advantage. Her hair, which was braided in broad plaits for the greater convenience (seeing that ringlets under a riding-hat are an anomaly, not to say an abomination), was _really_ auburn,--by which definition we intend to guard against the pale red, or warm, sand-coloured locks which usually pass current for the very rare but very beautiful tint we would particularise,--and if a poet had speculated as to the probability of some wandering sunbeam being imprisoned in its golden meshes, the metaphor, though fanciful, would not have been unapt. Delicate, regular features, large blue eyes, now dancing and sparkling with mischievous glee, now flashing with pride, a mouth like an expressive rosebud, a clear skin, with a warm glow of health painting each velvet cheek, but retreating from the snowy forehead, combined to form a whole on which to gaze was to admire.

This young lady, being such as we have described her, tripped lightly across the apartment till she had stationed herself behind her cousin Charles, and perceiving that both gentlemen were so preoccupied as not to have observed her approach, contrived, by standing on tiptoe and peeping over Leicester’s shoulder, to witness the introduction of the cow of which we have already made honourable mention.

During the animated discussion on the tail question she nearly betrayed her presence by laughing outright; repressing the inclination, however, she retraced her steps, and had nearly succeeded in reaching the side door by which she had entered, when her habit, catching against a table, caused the overthrow of a piece of ornamental china and revealed her presence.

On hearing the sound, Lewis, recalled to a sense of his situation, and for the first time struck by the idea that, in touching the drawing, he had been guilty of an unwarrantable liberty, rose hastily from his seat, colouring crimson as he did so, from an agreeable mixture of shyness, mortification, and proud self-reproach. Leicester, on the other hand, with the _à-plomb_ and presence of mind of a man of the world, turned leisurely, and whispering, “Keep your own counsel, there’s no harm done,” he advanced towards his cousin, saying with a nonchalant air, “You have stolen a march upon us, Annie. This gentleman and I called to see the General upon business, and as he seems resolved to afford us a practical lesson on the virtue of patience. I ventured to while away the time by showing my friend some of your sketches. By the way, let me introduce you. My cousin, Miss Grant--Mr. Arundel.” Thus invoked, Lewis, who in order to atone to his wounded self-respect, had wrapped himself in his very coldest and haughtiest manner, and resembled a banished prince rather than an every-day Christian, advanced a few steps and acknowledged the introduction by a most Grandisonian inclination of the head.

The lady performed her part of the ceremony with an easy courtesy, into which perhaps an equal degree of hauteur was infused, although not the slightest effort was visible.

“Mr. Arundel is doubtless a judge of painting, and my poor sketches are by no means calculated to bear severe criticism,” remarked Miss Grant demurely.

As Lewis remained silent, Leicester hastened to reply: “A judge! of course he is; he’s just returned from Germany, the happy land where smoking, singing, and painting all come by nature.”

“Indeed!” returned Miss Grant. “Then, if it is not too troublesome, perhaps I might ask Mr. Arundel’s advice as to a sketch of Broadhurst I was attempting before your arrival; I left off in despair, because I could not manage anything for the foreground.”

“Try an elephant,” suggested Leicester; “it would have a grand effect, besides possessing the advantage of novelty, and filling up lots of space.”

“Would you bring me the drawing, Charles?” returned his cousin.

“I know too well the style of assistance I may expect from you in such matters. Who embellished my poor head of Minerva with a pair of _moustaches?_”

“I did,” rejoined Leicester complacently, “and I am proud of it. Minerva was the goddess of war, and sported _moustaches_ in virtue of her profession.”

“Are you never going to give me the drawing, Charles?” asked Annie impatiently. “Positively, cousins are most uncourteous beings. Mr. Arundel, might I trouble you to hand me that sketch?”

Thus appealed to, Lewis had nothing for it but to comply, which he did accordingly, biting his lip with vexation at the _dénouement_ which now appeared inevitable. But Leicester’s resources were not yet exhausted; stretching out his hand before his cousin had received the drawing, he coolly took possession of it, saying, “I know you meant this drawing as a little surprise for me. You have heard me say how much I coveted a sketch of dear old Broadhurst, and so you have kindly made one for me. You have really done it extremely well! Who was it--Fielding--you have been learning of? Positively, you have caught his style!”

“Don’t flatter yourself that I did you the honour of recollecting any such wish, even supposing you really uttered it in my hearing, of which I entertain grave doubts,” returned Annie; “but if you particularly desire it I will make you a present of it when it is finished--if I could only manage that tiresome foreground!”

“I like it better without,” was the reply. “There’s nothing to interfere with the outline of the building, which stands forth in bold relief--and--eh!--well, what’s the matter?”

During his speech his cousin had risen from her seat, and approaching him, caught sight of the drawing, which she had no sooner done than, raising a little white hand, she pointed to the intrusive cow and asked quietly, “Where did that come from?”

The comic perplexity of Leicester’s face was irresistible to behold, as, with a glance at Lewis to secure his sympathy and co-operation, he was evidently about to adopt the cow at all hazards, when the door opened, and a tall, stately old man, with a military port and erect bearing, entered, and surveying the group with evident surprise, drew himself up still more stiffly, ere, with slow and measured steps, he advanced towards them.

_It was General Grant!_