They were not a formidable couple: he, a tall, bent, grey old man, with courteous manners; she, a pretty, impulsive little woman, enchanted that Lumley had chosen a wife at last, thankful for anyone, as long as she was not black, and prepared to be delighted with her daughter-in-law.
Rata for her part was much touched by their kind welcome, and all now went merrily as a marriage bell. Miss Loftus was handsome, healthy, ladylike; she had £25,000—quite ample, as Lumley had no occasion to marry a great fortune. Her mother was a refined and amiable woman, passionately devoted to her only child, and the attachment was most warmly returned. Rata was a girl of strong feelings, and it was patent to all that she was deeply in love with her fiancé. Mrs. Loftus, who was evidently a woman of wealth, was soon established in a fashionable house at Lowndes Square, with a smart carriage and an adequate staff, and all Lumley Grantham’s relatives and connections, male and female, crowded to call upon the lady of his choice.
They found her as handsome, graceful, and agreeable as they were led to expect, but perhaps a little unconventional and colonial. With respect to her voice, there could be but one opinion. She was a serious loss to the musical world, and could have made a fortune as a great prima donna. Invitations were showered upon 225, Lowndes Square. Miss Loftus was in continual request, and soon became a social favourite. She was a magnificent horsewoman, and rode every morning in the Row, accompanied by Captain Grantham.
Among the chorus of praise were a few discordant notes; the loudest and shrillest of these issued from the Hon. Mrs. Custance, Lord Nesfield’s only sister, a lady in somewhat narrow circumstances, with two tall, talkative daughters. Her view’s were not rigid respecting the marrying of first cousins, and Lumley’s engagement had been a shock to her, for she had always hoped that he would one day settle down, and marry either Maudie or Mag, instead of which he presented as fiancée a Colonial nobody, whom he had, so to speak, picked up at sea! Who was she? This was a question continually on her lips.
The Loftus family were undoubtedly respectable, but how was anyone to know she was one of them? And the uncle, a General, was possibly a myth. These people had no friends in London, and did not seem to know a soul.
But for all these objections Lady Nesfield found satisfactory replies. She was delighted at her son’s capture—now he would be chained fast, and kept at home. General Broome had written his congratulations, and was sending a present. Two of the Custance girls were to be bridesmaids; the wedding would take place in July, as the bride’s mother was in precarious health, and anxious to see her daughter happily married, as she believed—so she told Lady Nesfield in confidence—that her own days were numbered, and she could not bear the idea of leaving Rata alone in the world.
At the present moment she had rallied sufficiently to be able to accompany her girl to the park, the play, and elsewhere.
The questions of Mrs. Custance were also on the lips and in the mind of Lady Foxrock, Lumley Grantham’s only sister. She was undeniably one of the smart set. The childless wife of a wealthy old peer, ambition was her fetish, and, in spite of her passion for bridge, motoring, and racing, she still contrived to find time for the casting of social nets, and for bringing important intimacies into the family circle. She had always resolved that Lumley, “the wild hunter,” as she playfully called him, should marry—when he did take the step—to the advantage of his family, and she had mentally selected one of her exclusive friends, the rather passée daughter of a noble duke, with a splendid connection, and a considerable dower. She never dreamt, for one moment, that Lumley would find anything more attractive abroad than his usual horns, tusks, and skins; but home he came with a bride, so to speak, in his hand—a mere colonial nobody. Lady Foxrock took an invincible dislike to her on the spot—the dislike was mutual. Rata felt herself an antagonist to this tall, sour-looking lady, with a thin, high nose, pale, arrogant eyes, and slow, disdainful airs. Lady Foxrock could not understand why men admired the colonial; in her opinion, she was frightfully second-rate. And who was she? How, she asked her mother, did they know she was related to the Gloucestershire people? The uncle in India was probably a fiction! The girl had no friends in London and, for all that they could tell, might be an adventuress. Lumley’s interests must be watched—he was an idiot, where that girl was concerned.
Naturally Lady Foxrock had been indefatigable in her endeavours to discover something about the Loftuses, but, unfortunately, New Zealand was remote, and her acquaintances in the Colonies were limited, and she had a confused idea that people who lived in Melbourne or Sydney must, as a matter of course, be intimate with those in Christchurch and Wellington!
One sleepy afternoon, at Hurlingham, kind fate placed a clue in her hand. She was sitting in one of the little tents on the lawn, enjoying tea and strawberries; her near neighbours were a large merry party of acquaintances, and they gradually intermixed. Among the group was a grey-haired, square-built gentleman, who was presented to her as Mr. Dexter, spending a few months in England after an absence of thirty years. Lady Foxrock surveyed him critically; his clothes were ill-fitting, his gloves preposterous, but his carriage, square chin, and keen eyes, gave indication of a man of character, and importance.