"You will, I suppose, take Miss Vernon up with you for the season, Lady Esmondet?" asked Mrs. Haughton, eager to know if her wish to rid herself of Vaura companionship would be gratified.
"Yes, if her uncle will give her to me; for myself, I have set my heart on having her with me at Park Lane."
"I am glad of that, and the Colonel must agree, for I have not my plans matured; if we are at No. 2 Eaton Square, my house will be full as a box of sardines. You are sure to come for the season, I suppose?"
"Oh, yes! habit, habit; I could not miss my—every thing (I was going to say) that London gives; the crush at the balls, seated comfortably with some pleasant people about me, chatting of the newest flirtations, if those (among the unmarried) of last season ended in matrimony; if so, what then? a pleasant yokedom or no? What divorce or separation is on the tapis; bits of club gossip, &c."
"With some racy scraps, political, which you would take to as for your dinner entrees," cried Vaura gaily.
"True, Vaura, and any new passage at arms between our good Queen
Victoria's prophet, Earl Beaconsfield and that earnest defender of the
Liberal faith, Gladstone; and, this winter, if I mistake not, we shall
have stirring times, we are getting ourselves into a tight place;
England will have to keep one eye on the East, the other on her
Armoury."
"I wish the war party were stronger," said Colonel Haughton, earnestly, "we shall have no soldiers among the rising generation, if Bright's policy be carried out continuously."
"War is too horrid for anything; one has no one to flirt with," cried
Mrs. Haughton.
"You forget our older men and boys, Mrs. Haughton," said Vaura, gaily, "who, when not given a chance for the cold steel of the battle field, are ever ready to bare the breast for the warm dart of Cupid.
"Wouldn't give five cents for 'em," cried Mrs. Haughton, "I want the soldiers; so if this man Bright pleases me in this matter, though I care not a dime for politics, I am with him."