“The culprit is Mr. Jervis!” she proclaimed with an air of calm conviction.
At this announcement there was a shout of ribald laughter, even Mrs. Paul and Mrs. Sladen smiled. Jervis the impecunious, the unassuming, the unpaid travelling companion, why, he went by the name of “the poor relation!” Miss Valpy’s shots generally hit some portion of her target, but this one was widely astray. And now conversation turned upon the ensuing ball. Decorations were eagerly discussed. Was the dancing-room to be done in pink, or would men wear mess jackets? Had bachelors any distinctive colours, or would the colours of the Shirani gymkana be suitable? Should they select the colours of the most popular bachelor—this was Mr. Brande’s suggestion—or let each of the fifty hosts do a small bit of the room to his own fancy? Above this babel of tongues Jervis’s clear voice was heard saying—
“Take notice, Mr. Brande, that I am going to make a clean sweep of your sofas and armchairs. I have also made a note of your new standard lamp. We shall want a cheval glass——”
Mrs. Brande beamed. She liked people to borrow her belongings. She would have lent her boy Mark her best pink satin dress, and feather head-dress, if they would have been of the smallest use to him.
Presently the party broke up, the visitors going away, as usual, en masse.
Miss Valpy was helped on her pony by Mr. Jervis, and as he carefully arranged her foot in the stirrup and gave her the reins, he looked up and their eyes met.
“Thank you very much,” was all she said to him. To herself, “Aha! my good young man, I know two of your secrets!”
CHAPTER XXVIII.
THE CLUB IS DECORATED.
The bachelors’ ball was to be the dance of the season, and to be done in a style that would set all future competition at defiance, for young Jervis—who was quite a leading light on the committee—had developed unexpectedly magnificent ideas, and ordered things right and left as if the hosts were so many millionaires. Half the supper—at least anything delectable or rare, that could venture to undertake a journey—was to be despatched from Pelitis. It appeared to the flattered community that the Indian Empire was being ransacked from Calcutta to Bombay, in order to entertain them suitably. Groups of coolies were toiling up with palms from the hot low country, a dozen paharis were seeking orchids among the hills, there would be game from the Terai, pâtés and French sweets from the city of palaces, and fish that had executed their last splash in the Bay of Bengal.
Dr. Loyd nodded his head over his newspaper in the club smoking-room, and remarked that “He supposed it was all as it should be, and truly fin-de-siècle!”