Indeed Lady Peacock, with whom we exchanged calls, made no secret of her compassion when she found how many parties the ladies were not going to; and Ellen’s own relations, the Lesters, would have taken her out almost every night if she had not staunchly held to her promise to her mother not to go out more than three evenings in the week, for Mrs. Fordyce knew her to be delicate, and feared late hours for her. The vexation her cousins manifested made her feel the more bound to give them what time she could, at hours when Griffith was not at liberty. She did not like them to be hurt, and jealous of us, or to feel forsaken, and she tried to put her affection for us on a different footing by averring that ‘it was not the same kind of thing—Emily was her sister.’
One day she had gone to luncheon with the Lesters in Cavendish Square, and was to be called for in the carriage by me, on the way to take up the other two ladies, who were shopping in Regent Street.
Ellen came running downstairs, with her cheeks in a glow under the pink satin lining of her pretty bonnet, and her eyes sparkling with indignation, which could not but break forth.
‘I don’t know how I shall ever go there again!’ she exclaimed; ‘they have no right to say such things!’ Then she explained. Mary and Louisa had been saying horrid things about Griffith—her Griff! It was always their way. Think how Horace had made her treat Clarence! It was their way and habit to tease, and call it fun, and she had never minded it before; but this was too bad. Would not I put it in her power to give a flat contradiction, such as would make them ashamed of themselves?
Contradict what?
Then it appeared that the Misses Lester had laughed at her, who was so very particular and scrupulous, for having taken up with a regular young man about town. Oh no, they did not think much of it—no doubt he was only just like other people; only the funny thing was that it should be Ellen, for whom it was always supposed that no saint in the calendar, no knight in all the Waverley novels, would be good enough! And then, on her hot desire to know what they meant, they quoted John, the brother in the Guards, as having been so droll about poor Ellen’s perfect hero, and especially at his straight-laced Aunt Fordyce having been taken in,—but of course it was the convenience of joining the estates, and it was agreeable to see that your very good folk could wink at things like other people in such a case. Then, when Ellen fairly drove her inquiries home, in her absolute trust of confuting all slanders, she was told that Griffith did, what she called ‘all sorts of things—billiards and all that.’ And even that he was always running after a horrid Lady Peacock, a gay widow.
‘They went on in fun,’ said Ellen, ‘and laughed the more when—yes, I am afraid I did—I lost my temper. No, don’t say I well might, I know I ought not; but I told them I knew all about Lady Peacock, and that you were all old friends, even before he rescued her from the Bristol riots and brought her home to Chantry House; and that only made Mary merrier than ever, and say, “What, another distressed damsel? Take care, Ellen; I would not trust such a squire of dames.” And then Louisa chimed in, “Oh no, you see this Peacock dame was only conducted, like Princess Micomicona and all the rest of them, to the feet of his peerless Dulcinea!” And then I heard the knock, and I was never so glad in my life!’
‘Well!’ I could not help remarking, ‘I have heard of women’s spitefulness, but I never believed it till now.’
‘I really don’t think it was altogether what you call malice, so much as the Lester idea of fun,’ said Ellen, recovering herself after her outpouring. ‘A very odd notion I always thought it was; and Mary and Louisa are not really ill-natured, and cannot wish to do the harm they might have done, if I did not know Griff too well.’
Then, after considering a little, she said, blushing, ‘I believe I have told you more than I ought, Edward—I couldn’t help having it out; but please don’t tell any one, especially that shocking way of speaking of mamma, which they could not really mean.’