Part 5

“You certainly have the oddest memories, my dear,” cried the Canon, with a scornful smile. “Now I remember how frequently she used to say: ‘Miss Sophia, your nose wants blowing.’”

It was a very good hit, and Lady Sophia, bridling, answered coldly: “She was a woman of no education, Theodore.”

“That is precisely what your reminiscence led me to believe,” he replied, with an ironical bow.

“Humph!”

The Canon, elated by this verbal triumph, looked at her mockingly, but before Lady Sophia could find an adequate rejoinder Lord Spratte and Wroxham were shown in together. Somewhat irritated by her defeat she greeted them with relief.

To the unfortunate Wroxham, ill-at-ease and full of misgiving, luncheon seemed endless. He cursed the ingenuity of Theodore’s cook, who prolonged his torture by the diversity and number of her courses. Considering with anxiety the ordeal that was before him, he found it quite impossible to join intelligently in the conversation, and feared that Winnie must think him very stupid. But Canon Spratte, tactfully realizing his condition, was as good as a band; he spoke without pause, and carried on with his brother a very lively exchange of banter. It was rarely that his family was privileged to hear so many sallies of his wit. Later, when Lady Sophia and Winnie, leaving the men to smoke, went into the drawing-room, Wroxham’s nervousness became sheer agony. The affair grew intolerably grotesque when he was set at a pre-arranged hour solemnly to offer his hand and heart. Though his mind was very practical, he could not fail to see that the proceeding was excessively unromantic. He wished heartily that he had waited till he found himself by chance alone with Winnie, and could bring the conversation round by Shakespeare and the Musical Glasses to the hazardous topic of matrimony. But Canon Spratte, asking his brother and Lionel to go upstairs, led Wroxham to the study.

“I feel most awfully nervous,” said the young man, doing his best to smile.

“Nonsense, my dear boy,” cried the Canon, very cheerily. “There’s nothing whatever to be nervous about. You have my complete assurance that Winnie undoubtedly cares for you. Now sit down quietly like a good fellow, and I’ll send my little girl down to you. Bless my soul, it reminds me of the day when I asked my own dear wife to marry me.”

Wroxham began to walk up and down the room, turning over in his mind what he should say. The Canon, with deliberate steps, marched to the drawing-room.

“Has Harry gone?” asked Lady Sophia.

“No, he’s in my study,” answered the Canon, looking down gravely.

This was the moment for which he had waited, and he paused to consider the success of his worldly wisdom.

“Dear me, how stupid I am!” he cried. “I meant to bring the paper up with me. Winnie, my love, will you fetch it for me?”

Winnie got up, but caught her father’s pleased expression, and puzzled, stopped still, looking at him.

“Pray go, my dear,” he added, smiling. “I left it in the study.”

“But Harry is there,” she said.

“I’m under the impression, my love, that he would not be sorry to have a few moments alone with you. I think he has something to say to you.”

“To me, papa?” exclaimed Winnie, a little startled. “What on earth can he want?”

The Canon put his arm affectionately round her waist.

“He will tell you that himself, my love.”

Winnie understood now what her father meant, and a deep blush came over her face. Then a coldness rose in her heart and travelled through every limb of her body. She was afraid and confused.

“But I can’t see him, I don’t want to.”

She shrank away from her father; but he, somewhat amused at this resistance, led her towards the door.

“My dear, you must. I can quite understand that you should feel a certain bashfulness. But he has my full approval.”

“There’s something I must say to you at once, father. I want to explain.”

“There’s nothing to explain, my darling.”

She was growing almost distracted. Her father, good-humoured and affectionate, seemed to hold her in the hollow of his hand, taking from her all strength of will.

“Father, let me speak. You don’t understand.”

“There’s nothing to understand, my dear. I know all about it, and you really need not be nervous. You go with my very best wishes.”

“I can’t go. I must speak to you first,” she cried desperately.

“Come, come, my dear, you must pluck up courage. It’s nothing very terrible. Go downstairs like a good girl, and I daresay you’ll bring Harry up with you.”

He treated her as he would a child, frightened at some imaginary danger, who must be coaxed into boldness. He opened the door, and Winnie, all unwilling, yielded to his stronger mind. With a hearty laugh he came back, rubbing his hands.

“A little maidenly modesty! Very charming, very pretty! It’s a lovely sight, my dear Sophia, that of the typical creamy English girl suffused in the blushes of virginal innocence.”

“Fiddlesticks!” said Lady Sophia.

“You’re a cynic, my dear,” laughed the Canon. “It’s a grave fault of which I recommend you to correct yourself.”

“I beg you not to preach to me, Theodore,” she answered, bridling.

“No man is a prophet in his own country,” said he, with a shrug of the shoulders. Then he turned to his brother: “But you will wonder why I sent you that urgent note, asking you to luncheon.”

“Not at all. I can quite understand that the pleasure of my company was worth a special messenger.”

But Canon Spratte interrupted: “I asked you to come in your official capacity, if I may so call it--as the head of the family.”

“My dear Theodore, merely by courtesy: I am unworthy.”

“The fact is sufficiently patent without your recalling it,” retorted the Canon, promptly. “But I should be obliged if at this moment, when the affairs of our house are at stake, you would adopt such sobriety and decorum as you are capable of.”

“I wish I’d got my coronation robes on now,” sighed Lord Spratte.

“Go on, Theodore,” suggested their sister.

“Well, you will all of you be gratified to hear that Lord Wroxham has asked my permission to pay his addresses to Winnie.”

“In my young days when a man wanted to marry he asked the girl before he asked her father,” said Lady Sophia.

“I think it was a very proper proceeding; I am so old-fashioned as to consider a father the best judge of his daughter’s welfare. And I think that in this case I am certainly the first person to be consulted. Wroxham is a young man of the very highest principles, and he naturally chose the correct course.”

“And you fell upon him and said: ‘What ho!’” cried Lord Spratte.

The Canon gave him a cold stare of surprise and of injured dignity.

“I informed him that I had no objection to him as a son-in-law, and I made the usual inquiries into his circumstances.”

“What bloomin’ cheek, when every one knows he has twenty thousand a year!”

“And finally I imparted to him my conviction that Winnie looked upon him with sincere regard.”

“You are a downy old bird, Theodore,” said Lord Spratte, laughing. “There’s many a London matron has set her net to catch that fish.”

“I did not expect that you would treat the matter with decorum, Thomas, and it was only from a strong sense of duty towards you as the head of my house, that I requested your presence.”

But his elder brother was completely unabashed.

“Shut it, Theodore. You know very well that Wroxham can just about wipe his boots with the likes of us.”

“I don’t in the least understand what you mean,” replied the Canon, frigidly. “We are his equals in the best sense; and if you wish to go into details, our rank in the peerage is--higher than his.”

“Rank in the peerage be hanged! There’s a deuce of a difference between the twenty-first Lord Wroxham with half a county to his back and the second Earl Spratte with a nasty pretentious stucco house and about ten acres of sooty land. Earls like us are as thick as flies.”

Lady Sophia’s mind, like her brother’s, turned to the house which the founder of their family, on acquiring wealth, had purchased to gain the standing of a country gentleman. The Chancellor loved to get full value for his money, and its small price as well as its grandeur attracted him. Beachcombe was built by a retired ironmonger in the first years of Queen Victoria, when romance and Gothic architecture were the fashion; and it had all the appearance of a mediæval castle. With parapets, ogival windows, pointed arches, machicolations, a draw-bridge, and the other playthings of that amusing era, the grey stucco of its walls made it seem more artificial than the canvas palace of a drop-scene. The imposing hall was panelled with deal stained to resemble oak; and the walls, emblazoned with armorial bearings, gave it the gaudiness of a German beer cellar. The ceilings were coloured alternately blue and red, and decorated in gold with fleurs-de-lis and with heraldic lions. The furniture was elaborately carved, and there were settles, oak chests, and huge cabinets, on every available space of which might be seen the arms of the family of Spratte. With the best will in the world it was impossible to accept the inferior pictures, bought wholesale at an auction, as family portraits. After sixty years all this magnificence was become somewhat tawdry, and the rooms, little inhabited by their present owner, had the dismal look of a stage-set seen by daylight. The classic statues, the terraces and steps, which strove to give importance to the garden, had withstood the weather so ill that their plaster in spots was worn off and exhibited in shameful nakedness the yellow brick of which they were manufactured. The romantic grottoes were so dilapidated that they resembled kitchens burnt out and abandoned. The whole place put visibly the healthy paradox that the idealism of one age is but the vulgarity of the next.

The Canon was outraged but still dignified.

“I should like you to understand once for all, Thomas, that I very much object to the sneering manner which you are pleased to affect with regard to our family. I, for one, am proud of its origin. I am proud to be the son of the late Lord Chancellor and the grandson of a distinguished banker.”

“Fiddlesticks, Theodore!” answered Lady Sophia, scornfully. “You know very well that our grandfather was a bill-broker, and rather a seedy one at that.”

“He was nothing of the sort, my dear; I recollect Josiah Spratte, the elder, very well. He was a most polished and accomplished gentleman.”

“My dear Theodore, you were only seven when he died. I remember only a little shabby old man who used to call my mother mam. He was always invited to dinner the day after a party to eat up the scraps, and I’m sure it never occurred to any one that he was a distinguished banker till he was safely dead and buried.”

“Remember that he was my grandfather, so I should presumably know what profession he followed.”

To Lady Sophia it was one of her brother’s most irritating habits to assume an exclusive right to their common progenitors. Even though she was not overwhelmed by the contemplation of their greatness, she felt it hard to be altogether cut off from them.

“It’s carried for bill-broking,” said Lord Spratte, with a contented air. “And my belief is that the old chap did a bit of usury as well. It’s no good stuffin’ people, Theodore, they don’t believe us.”

“And what about the bill-broker’s papa?” asked Lady Sophia.

“I don’t believe the bill-broker had a parent at all,” put in Lord Spratte. “That’s where the Montmorencys come in.”

“I confess I don’t know what my great-grandfather was,” answered Theodore, hesitating a little, “but I know he was a gentleman.”

“I very much doubt it,” said Lady Sophia, shaking her head. “I can’t help thinking he was a green-grocer.”

“Ah, that beats the Montmorencys, by Jove,” cried Lord Spratte. “The ancestral green-grocer--goin’ out to wait at dinner-parties in Bedford Square, and havin’ a sly drink at the old sherry when no one was lookin’!”

Lady Sophia began to laugh, but the Canon looked his brother up and down, with a contemptuous twirl of his lips.

“Is this your idea of humour, Thomas?” he asked gravely, as though demanding information.

“Oh, you don’t know what a load it is off my mind! Here have I been goin’ about all these years with that ghastly string of Montmorencys hangin’ round my neck just like the albatross and the ancient mariner, tryin’ to hide from the world that I knew the family tree was bogus just as well as they did, tryin’ to pretend I didn’t feel ashamed of sneakin’ somebody else’s coat of arms. Why, I can’t look at Burke without getting as red as the binding. But, by Jove, Theodore, I can live up to the ancestral green-grocer.”

“I hope you will have the good sense to keep these observations from Wroxham,” returned the Canon, shrugging his shoulders. “Remember that he is about to enter into an alliance with our family, and he’s extremely sensitive in these matters.”

“You mean he’s a bit of a prig. Oh, well, he’s only just come down from Oxford. He’ll get over that.”

“I mean nothing of the sort. I look upon him as a very excellent young man, and with his opportunities I’m convinced that he’ll end up as Prime Minister.”

“And suppose Winnie refuses him?” said Lord Spratte.

“What!” cried the Canon, with a jump, for such a possibility had never occurred to him. But he put it aside quickly as beyond the bounds of reason. “Nonsense! Why should she? He’s a very eligible young man, and he has my full approval.”

Lord Spratte shrugged his shoulders.

“Supposin’ she should take it into her head to marry that Socialist Johnny? D’you know, she told me he was the handsomest man she’d ever seen in her life.”

The Canon burst into a shout of laughter.

“Young Railing? Absurd! My daughter knows what is due to herself and to her family. She may be young, but she has a sense of dignity which I should be pleased to see in you, Thomas. Remember our motto: _Malo mori quam fœdari_, I would sooner die than be disgraced.”

“I always think we were overcharged for that,” murmured Lord Spratte.

“Of course a fine sentiment merely excites your ribaldry!”

“My dear Theodore, I have the receipt among the family papers.”

At that moment Winnie, unhappy and pale, came quickly into the room. She gave her father a rapid look of apprehension, then, as if seeking protection, glanced appealingly at the others. But the Canon, full of complacent affection, went towards her and took her in his arms.

“My dear child!” He looked round, and with sportive tenderness gazed into his daughter’s eyes. “But where is the young man? Why haven’t you brought him upstairs with you, darling?”

Winnie, an expression of pain settling about her mouth, disengaged herself from the parental embrace.

“Papa, Harry has asked me to marry him.”

“I know, I know. He did it with my full approval.”

“I hope you won’t be angry,” she said, taking her father’s hand, with a look of entreaty. “You wouldn’t want me to do anything I didn’t like, father.”

“What on earth d’you mean?” he cried, surprised and uncertain.

“I had to say--that I couldn’t.”

The Canon started as though he were shot. “What! You’re joking. Oh, it’s a mistake! I won’t have it. Where is he?”

He went rapidly to the door as if he meant to call back the rejected lover.

“Papa, what are you doing?” cried Winnie, distracted. “He’s gone!”

The Canon stopped and came back grimly.

“I suppose you’re joking, Winnie? I’m quite bewildered with all this humour.”

“I don’t love him, father,” she said, with tearful eyes.

Canon Spratte, quite unable to comprehend, stared at her helplessly.

“The girl’s mad,” he cried, looking at Lady Sophia.

But Winnie felt it was no longer possible to hold back the truth. She braced herself for the contest and looked firmly into her father’s eyes.

“I’m already engaged to be married, papa.”

“You? And to whom, pray?”

“I’m engaged to Bertram Railing.”

“Good God!”

Lady Sophia also uttered a cry of dismay, and even her uncle, though he had maliciously suggested the possibility, was no less dumfounded. In his heart he had been convinced that Winnie was far too worldly-wise to commit herself to a doubtful marriage, and he would have sworn she was incapable of a daring act. Then, against his will, the humour of the situation occurred to him, and he smothered a little laugh. But Canon Spratte, infuriated, with all his senses on the alert, divined rather than noticed this offensive merriment. He turned upon his brother angrily.

“I think we shall proceed in this matter better without your presence, Thomas,” he said roughly, putting aside in his uncontrollable anger the studied urbanity upon which he prided himself. “I regret that I cannot expect from you either assistance or sympathy, or any of the feelings to be awaited in a nobleman and a gentleman. I shall be grateful if you will take your departure.”

Lord Spratte smiled very good-humouredly.

“My dear Theodore, I don’t want you to wash your dirty linen before me. Good-bye, Sophia.”

He kissed his sister, and held out his hand to the Canon, who turned away ill-temperedly, muttering indignant things. Lord Spratte, by no means disconcerted, smiled and went up to Winnie. She was looking down, listlessly turning over the pages of a book. He put his hand kindly on her shoulder.

“Never mind, Winnie, old girl,” he said, in his flippant, careless way, “you marry the man you want to, and don’t be jockeyed into takin’ any one else. I’ll always back you up in anything unreasonable.”

Winnie neither moved nor answered, but heavy tears rolled down her cheeks on to the open book.

“Well, I hope you’ll all have a very nice time,” said Lord Spratte. “I have the honour to wish you good-afternoon.”

No one stirred till he had gone. Canon Spratte waited till the door was closed; waited, looking at his daughter, till the silence seemed intolerable.

“Now, what does all this mean, Winnie?” he asked at last.

She did not speak, and Canon Spratte tightened his lips as he watched her. You saw now for the first time the square strength of his jaw. When angry he was not a man to be trifled with, and Lady Sophia thought there was more in him at this moment of the ruthless Chancellor than she had ever known.

“Am I to understand that you are serious?”

Winnie, still looking down, nodded. The Canon stared at her for one instant, then burst out angrily with harsh tones. None would have imagined that the sonorous, sweet voice was capable of such biting inflections. But Lady Sophia could not help thinking him rather fine in his wrath.

“Oh, but you must be mad,” he cried. “The child’s stark, staring mad, Sophia. The whole thing is preposterous. I never heard anything like it. Do you mean seriously to tell me that you’re engaged to that penniless, unknown scribbler--a man whom no one knows anything about, a rogue and a vagabond?”

But Winnie could not suffer to hear Railing ill-spoken of. The contemptuous words roused her as would have done no violence towards herself, and throwing back her head, she looked fearlessly at her father.

“You said he was a man of great intellect, papa. You said you greatly admired him.”

“That proves only that I have good manners,” he retorted, with a disdainful toss of his head. “When a mother shows me her baby, I say it’s a beautiful child. I don’t think it’s a beautiful child, I think it’s a very ugly child. I can’t tell one baby from another, but I assure her it’s the very image of its father. That’s just common politeness.... How long has this absurd business been going on?”

“I became engaged to him yesterday.”

Winnie, though her heart beat almost painfully, was regaining courage. The thought of Bertram strengthened her, and she was glad to fight the first battle on his behalf.

“You perceive, Sophia, that I was not consulted in this.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Theodore.”

Winnie took her father’s hand, trying to persuade him. She felt that if it was only possible to make him comprehend how enormously the whole thing mattered to her, he would surely withdraw his opposition. He was angry because he could not see that to her it was an affair of life and death.

“Oh, don’t you understand, father? You can’t imagine what he’s done for me. He’s taught me everything I know, he’s made me what I am.”

“How long have you enjoyed the privilege of his acquaintance?” asked the Canon, satirically. “Six weeks?”

“I was a fool,” said Winnie, speaking very quickly, with flushed cheeks. “I was just the same as any other girl, vain and empty-headed. I was happy for a week if I got a hat that became me. And then I met him and everything was changed. He found me a foolish doll, and he’s made me into a woman. I’m ashamed of what I was. I’m proud now, and so grateful to him. He’s the first real man I’ve ever known.”

Canon Spratte shook his head contemptuously.

“I should like to know what you find in him that you cannot find in Wroxham or in--or in your father.”

“I don’t love Harry Wroxham.”

“Fiddlededee! A girl of your age doesn’t know what love is.”

“Harry doesn’t know me. He talks nonsense to me. He thinks I’m too stupid to be spoken to of serious things. To him I’m just the same as any other girl he meets at parties. For wife he wants a slave, a plaything when he’s tired or bored. I want to be a man’s companion. I want to work with my husband.”

“I’m surprised and shocked to hear you have such ideas,” answered the Canon, emphatically. “I thought you were more modest.”

“You don’t understand, father,” cried Winnie, with despair in her voice. “Don’t you see that I have a life of my own, and I must live it in my own way?”

“Rubbish! The new woman business was exploded ten years ago; you’re hopelessly behind the times, my poor girl. A woman’s place is in her own house. You’re full of ideas which are not only silly but middle-class. They fill me with disgust. You’re ridiculous, Winnie.”

Canon Spratte, who only spoke the truth when he said the whole matter appeared to him suburban and vulgar, walked up and down impatiently. He sought for acid expressions of his disdain.

“You’re making me dreadfully unhappy, papa,” said Winnie. “You’ve never been unkind to me before. Think that all my happiness depends on this. You don’t wish to ruin my whole life.”

“Don’t be absurd,” cried Canon Spratte, unmoved by this entreaty. “I refuse to hear anything about it. I cannot make you marry Lord Wroxham. Far be it from me to attempt to force your affections. I confess it’s a great disappointment; however, I accept it as the will of Providence and I shall do my best to bear it. But I’m quite sure it’s not the will of Providence that you should marry Mr. Bertram Railing, and I utterly refuse my consent to his shameful, grotesque proposal. The man’s a scoundrel; he’s nothing better than a fortune-hunter.”

“That’s not true, father,” said Winnie, flushing with anger.

“Winnie, how dare you say that!”

“You’ve got no right to abuse the man I love better than the whole world. Nothing you can say will make me change my mind.”

“You’re talking nonsense, and I think you’re a very disobedient and unaffectionate girl.”

“After all, it’s my business alone. It’s my happiness that is concerned.”

“How selfish you are! You don’t consider my happiness.”

“I’ve made up my mind to marry Bertram Railing. I’ve given him my solemn promise.”

“Women’s promises are made of pie-crust,” cried Canon Spratte, contemptuously.

Lady Sophia raised her eyebrows, but did not speak.

“I’m over twenty-one,” retorted Winnie defiantly, for she was not without some temper of her own. “And I’m my own mistress.”

“What do you mean by that, Winnie?”

“If you won’t give me your consent, I shall marry without.”

Canon Spratte was thunderstruck. This was rebellion, and instinctively he felt that nothing could be done with Winnie by direct contradiction. But he was too angry to devise any better way. He walked up and down indignantly.