Lady Grange noticed the tired looks of Jenny, and kindly ordered the maid whom she had summoned to receive the dress, to take the girl to the kitchen, that she might have a little rest and refreshment. As Jenny, after dropping a courtesy, turned to follow the servant, her attention was arrested by the sudden clatter of horses’ feet; and three young men, laughing and racing each other up the slope, dashed along to the entrance of the Hall, the hoofs tearing up the well-rolled gravel, and the loud merry voices strangely breaking the peaceful silence which had prevailed a few minutes before. Two of the horsemen reined up at a little distance from the lady; while the third, who was mounted on a splendid white horse, approached the spot where she stood.
“Mother,” said he, stroking the neck of his steed, which champed its bit and pawed on the ground, as if impatient to bound onward again; “mother, I’ve asked Jones and Wildrake to stop dinner to-day.”
Jenny happened to glance at Lady Grange. There was an anxious frown on the gentle face, a flush on the lately pale cheek, which gave an impression of keen suffering not unmixed with anger. What Lady Grange replied to her son, or whether she replied at all, Jenny did not know; for the lady’s-maid led her towards the kitchen.
The delicious, savoury odour of that place; the ranges of tin pans on the shelves glittering like silver; the rows of innumerable plates and dishes—above all, the enormous joint, slowly revolving before a fire larger than any that Jenny had ever dreamed of, for the moment put everything out of her head but the thought that it must be delightful to be very rich! “How proud one would be, too, to have so many servants, some of them looking themselves so very grand!” thought Jenny, as she saw various members of the household, some engaged in different occupations, some appearing as though they had nothing to do but to loiter about and gossip. An aged woman, in black bonnet and shawl, was seated at the long deal table on which the stout cook was rolling out some tempting-looking pastry. She, as Jenny soon found from the conversation going on around her, was Mrs. Dale, a nurse who had attended Lady Grange in her childhood, and who had now come from some distance on a visit to that lady, whom she had not seen since her marriage.
“Well, only think!” cried the lady’s-maid who had conducted Jenny into the kitchen; “only think! here’s Master Philip has brought down those two companions of his whom missus cannot abide the sight of; and they’re to stay dinner, and sleep here too, I’ll warrant you! I wonder what master will say to it when he comes home.”
“Mighty little peace there’ll be in the house,” observed the cook.
“Oh! as for peace, no one looks for it in this place!” observed the butler, who, with his hands behind him, was warming himself at the fire. “If you’d heard all I’ve heard, and seen all I’ve seen!” and he shook his head with an air of much meaning.
“I’m afraid my poor lady has not much comfort in her son?” said the nurse, in a tone of inquiry.
“Comfort! well, I can only say that high tempers and high words—one pulling one way, and another another—the father trying to bridle the son, the son kicking against the authority of the father—debts to be paid, bills to be discharged—Sir Gilbert choosing to do neither, yet having at last to do both—are not my notion of comfort!”
“Master Philip will break his mother’s heart,” said the lady’s-maid;—“you should see how she cries her eyes out when she’s in her own room!”