“We have many confidences to make each other,” said Mrs. Sewell, with a sigh so full of sorrow that Lucy instinctively pressed her hand with warmth, as though to imply her trustfulness would, not be ill deposited.
At last came the hour of leave-taking, and the Judge accompanied his guests to the door, and even bareheaded handed Lady Lendrick to her carriage. To each, as they said “Good-night,” he had some little appropriate speech,—a word or two of gracious compliment, uttered with all his courtesy.
“I call this little dinner a success, Lucy,” said he, as he stood to say “Good-night” on the stairs. “Lady Lendrick was unusually amiable, and her daughter-in-law is beyond praise.”
“She is indeed charming,” said Lucy, fervently.
“I found the Colonel also agreeable,—less dictatorial than men of his class generally are. I suspect we shall get on well together with further acquaintance; but, as Haire said, I was myself to-night, and would have struck sparks out of the dullest rock, so that I must not impute to him what may only have been the reflex of myself. Ah, dear! there was a time when these exertions were the healthful stimulants of my life; now they only weary and excite,—good-night, dear child, good-night.”
As Lady Lendrick and her party drove homeward, not a word was uttered for some minutes after they had taken their seats. It was not till after they had passed out of the grounds, and gained the high-road, that she herself broke silence. “Well, Dudley,” said she at last, “is he like my description? Was my portrait too highly colored?”
“Quite the reverse. It was a faint weak sketch of the great original. In all my life I never met such inordinate vanity and such overweening pretension. I give him the palm as the most conceited man and the greatest bore in Christendom.”
“Do you wonder now if I could n't live with him?” asked she, half triumphantly.
“I 'll not go that far. I think I could live with him if I saw my way to any advantage by it.”
“I'm certain you could not! The very things you now reprobate are the few endurable traits about him. It is in the resources of his intense conceit he finds whatever renders him pleasant and agreeable. I wish you saw his other humor.”