“She treats me as if I were the dirt under her feet,” he muttered, sullenly, “just the dirt under her feet! And I like her all the better for it, confound her! But it’s a dangerous game to play with Bartley Bradstone, Miss Olivia, if you only knew it! Perhaps the day will come when you will lower your pride a little. It will be my turn then. By Heaven! I’d give—I don’t know what I wouldn’t give, to see you at my feet! And it shall come to that, too, or I’m not the clever fellow people think me. It is very hard if Bartley Bradstone isn’t a match for a dozen Lord Granvilles, though he is the son of an earl.”
He rode up the long, newly planted avenue to The Maples, and a couple of grooms came out to take his horse; but, as they had kept him waiting half a moment, he snarled at them as he flung himself from the saddle and mounted the stone steps—painfully white and new—which led to the front entrance. A footman was waiting to take his hat and stick, and his valet stood at the top of the stairs.
The squire and Lord Carfield were capable of hanging up their hats for themselves; but that would not have been “good enough” for Mr. Bartley Bradstone, who liked to see his gorgeous footmen whenever he could, and insisted upon being waited upon, literally, hand and foot.
He passed through the hall—which, notwithstanding its painted windows, and men in armor, and brown oak, looked as new as the rest of the place—and, going into the dining-room, rang for a glass of sherry; the squire would have got it for himself from the sideboard, but Mr. Bradstone flung himself into a chair while the butler and footman “served” the glass of wine on a heavy silver salver. The master of The Maples drank it, and looked round with a restless sigh.
“I was a fool not to stay, after all,” he muttered. “It was cutting off my nose to spite my face. It’s deuced dreary here by one’s self, but it shan’t be for long. Before long she’ll be begging me to stay at the Grange—yes, begging me.”
Then he got up, and, with his hands thrust in his pockets, wandered about the room. Presently he cast a glance at the many pictures, all in heavy gilt frames, and stood before one representing a girl reading a book. It was a recent purchase, and he had bought it because he fancied that it somewhat resembled Olivia; and twenty times a day he would stand before it and gaze at it.
“I’ll have her own portrait here presently,” he murmured, moodily. “I’ll give Millais the commission to paint it the day we’re engaged.”
This resolution seemed to afford some satisfaction, for with something less of his recent sullenness, he rang the bell for his valet to dress him for dinner.
As he did so the footman entered with a note on the salver.
Bartley Bradstone opened and eyed it with an expression of displeased surprise.