This fact, brusquely placed before her by Mrs. Banks, she was unable to deny, and sat dumb and sullen.
“Uncle Pelham is sure to take to Honor,” added Jessie, “and he will probably do something for us all, thinking that we are all as nice as Honor, which is not the case. She will be home in a year, and there will be her letter every week.”
“Yes, and presents,” put in Mrs. Banks, significantly. “She will have plenty of pocket-money, and will be able to send you home no end of nice things.”
Fairy sniffed and sighed, dabbed her eyes with her handkerchief, and finally suffered herself to be coaxed and convinced, and when her sister opened the drawing-room door, with rather a solemn face, she ran to her and put her arms round her and said—
“Honor, darling, I have promised to let you go!”
That very day the important epistle was despatched to Shirani, and Fairy, to show that she did nothing by halves, actually dropped it into the letter-box with her own hand. And during the evening she once more produced the bundles of patterns, and threw herself heart and soul into the selection of her sister’s outfit.
CHAPTER VIII.
DANIEL POLLITT, ESQ., AND FAMILY.
The grand dinner-party at 500, Princes Gate, was over, the last silken train had swept down the steps, the last brougham had bowled away, and a somewhat bored-looking young man indulged in a stretch and a prodigious yawn, and strolled slowly back to the library, where the master of the house, a spruce little person of sixty, with a rosy cheek and active eye, stood before the empty fireplace (the month was June) with his coat-tails under his arms, engaged in chewing a tooth-pick. Wealthy he may be, judging from his surroundings, but he is certainly not distinguished in appearance; his scanty locks are brushed out into two sharp horns over his large ears. In spite of his blazing solitaire stud and faultless claw-hammer coat, he is plebeian; yes, from the points of his patent leather shoes to the crown of his bald head. It is difficult to believe that he is the uncle of the aristocratic young fellow who has just entered and cast himself into a deep armchair. What the French call “the look of race,” is the principal thing that strikes one about Mark Jervis. It is afterwards—possibly some time afterwards—that you realize the fact that he is remarkably handsome, and considerably older than you took him to be at the first glance. His smooth face and sunny hazel eyes are misleading: young Jervis is more than nineteen, he is five and twenty.
“Well, Mark, that’s over, thank God,” exclaimed Mr. Pollitt. “I hate these big dinners; but your aunt will have them. She says we owe them; women are never backward in paying those sort of debts. It was well done, hey? That new chef is a success. Did you taste the Perdreaux aux Chartreuse—or the Bouchée à la financière, or that cold entrée?”
“No, Uncle Dan,” strangling another great yawn.