CHAPTER XXXVII. PROPOSALS.
KATE found Lady Hester, the Prince, and Mr. Jekyl awaiting her as she entered the drawing-room, all looking even more bored and out of sorts than people usually do who have been kept waiting for their dinner.
“Everybody has sworn to be as tiresome and disagreeable as possible to-day,” said Lady Hester. “George said he'd dine here, and is not coming; Lord Norwood promised, and now writes me word that an unavoidable delay detains him; and here comes Miss Dalton, the mirror of punctuality when all else are late, a full half-hour after the time. There, dear, no excuses nor explanations about all you have been doing, the thousand calls you 've made, and shops you 've ransacked. I 'm certain you 've had a miserable day of it.”
Kate blushed deeply, and dreaded to meet Jekyl' s eye; but when she did, that little glassy orb was as blandly meaningless as any that ever rattled in the head of a Dutch doll. Even as he gave his arm to lead her in to dine, nothing in his manner or look betrayed anything like a secret understanding between them. A bystander might have deemed him a new acquaintance.
“Petits diners” have, generally, the prerogative of agreeability; they are the chosen reunions of a few intimates, who would not dilute their pleasantry even by a single bore. They are also the bright occasions for those little culinary triumphs which never can be attempted in a wider sphere. Epigrams, whether of lamb or language, require a select and special jury to try them; but just in the same proportion as the success of such small parties is greater, so is their utter failure, when by any mischance there happens a breakdown in the good spirits or good humor of the company.
We have said enough to show that the ladies, at least, might be excused for not displaying those thousand attractions of conversation which all centre on the one great quality, ease of mind. The Prince was more than usual out of sorts, a number of irritating circumstances having occurred to him during the morning. A great sovereign, on whom he had lavished the most profuse attentions, had written him a letter of thanks, through his private secretary, enclosing a snuff-box, instead of sending him an autograph, and the first class of the national order. His glover, in Paris, had forgotten to make his right hand larger than the left, and a huge packet that had just arrived was consequently useless. His chef had eked out a salmi of ortolans by a thrush; and it was exactly that unlucky morsel the Cardinal had helped himself to at breakfast, and immediately sent his plate away in disappointment. Rubion, too, his ninth secretary, had flatly refused to marry a little danseuse that had just come out in the ballet, a piece of insolence and rebellion on his part not to be tolerated; and when we add to these griefs an uncomfortable neckcloth, and the tidings of an insurrection in a Russian province where he owned immense property in mines, his state of irritability may be leniently considered.
Jekyl, if truth were told, had as many troubles of his own to confront as any of the rest. If the ocean he sailed in was not a great Atlantic, his bark was still but a cockleshell; his course in life required consummate skill and cleverness, and yet never could be safe even with that. Notwithstanding all this, he alone was easy, natural, and agreeable, not as many an inferior artist would have been agreeable, by any over-effort to compensate for the lack of co-operation in others, and thus make their silence and constraint but more palpable, his pleasantry was tinged with the tone of the company, and all his little smartnesses were rather insinuated than spoken. Quite satisfied if the Prince listened, or Lady Hester smiled, more than rewarded when they once both laughed at one of his sallies, he rattled on about the Court and the town talk, the little scandals of daily history, and the petty defections of those dear friends they nightly invited to their houses. While thus, as it were, devoting himself to the amusement of the others, his real occupation was an intense study of their thoughts, what was uppermost in their minds, and in what train their speculations were following. He had long suspected the Prince of being attracted by Kate Dalton; now he was certain of it. Accustomed almost from childhood to be flattered on every hand, and to receive the blandest smiles of beauty everywhere, Midchekoff's native distrust armed him strongly against such seductions; and had Kate followed the path of others, and exerted herself to please him, her failure would have been certain. It was her actual indifference her perfect carelessness on the subject was the charm to his eyes, and he felt it quite a new and agreeable sensation not to be made love to.
Too proud of her own Dalton blood to feel any elevation by the marked notice of the great Russian, she merely accorded him so much of her favor as his personal agreeability seemed to warrant; perhaps no designed flattery could have been so successful. Another feeling, also, enhanced his admiration of her. It was a part of that barbaric instinct which seemed to sway all his actions, to desire the possession of whatever was unique in life. Those forms or fancies of which nature stamps but one, and breaks the die, these were a passion with him. To possess a bluer turquoise than any king or kaiser, to own an arab of some color never seen before, to have a picture by some artist who never painted but one; but whether it were a gem, a vase, a weapon, a diamond, or a dog, its value had but one test, that it had none its exact equal. Now, Kate Dalton realized these conditions more than any one he had ever met. Her very beauty was peculiar; combining, with much of feminine softness and delicacy, a degree of determination and vigor of character that to Midchekoff smacked of queenly domination. There was a species of fierte about her that distinguished her among other women. All that he had seen done by an illustrious title and a diamond tiara, she seemed capable of effecting in the simplest costume and without an effort. All these were wonderful attractions to his eyes; and if he did not fall in love, it was simply because he did not know how. He, however, did what to him served as substitute for the passion; he coveted an object which should form one of the greatest rarities of his collection, and the possession of which would give him another title to that envy, the most delicious tribute the world could render him.
There were some drawbacks to his admiration; her birth was not sufficiently illustrious. His own origin was too recent to make an alliance of this kind desirable, and he wished that she had been a princess; even de la main, gauche of some royal house. Jekyl had done his best, by sundry allusions to Irish greatness, and the blood of various monarchs of Munster and Conuaught, in times past; but the Prince was incredulous as to Hibernian greatness; probably the remembrance of an Irish diamond once offered him for sale had tinged his mind with this sense of disparagement as to all Irish magnificence. Still Kate rose above every detracting influence, and he thought of the pride in which he should parade her through Europe as his own.
Had she been a barb or a bracelet, an antique cup or a Sevres jar, he never would have hesitated about the acquisition. Marriage, however, was a more solemn engagement; and he did not quite fancy any purchase that cost more than mere money. Nothing but the possibility of losing her altogether could have overcome this cautious scruple; and Jekyl had artfully insinuated such a conjuncture. “George Onslow's attentions were,” he said, “quite palpable; and although up to this Miss Dalton did not seem to give encouragement, who could tell what time and daily intercourse might effect? There was Norwood, too, with the rank of peeress in his gift; there was no saying how an ambitious girl might be tainted by that bait.” In fact, the Prince had no time to lose; and, although nothing less accorded with his tastes than what imposed haste, he was obliged to bestir himself on this occasion.