In the concluding scene the deputy lieutenant’s uniform made a great figure, with the addition of the long-breasted waistcoat, a white scarf, and the white cockade, adorning Alex, who, with a boot-jack under his arm, looked as tall and as rigid as he possibly could, with a very low bow, which was gracefully returned by a royal personage in a Scottish bonnet, also bearing the white cockade, a tartan scarf, and the blue ribbon. Altogether, Prince Charles Edward and the Baron of Bradwardine stood confessed; the character was solemnly read, and the shoe pulled off, or supposed to be, as the lower screen still remained to cut off the view; and then the Baron indulged in a lengthy yawn and stretch, while Prince Charlie, skipping into the midst of the audience, danced round Mr. Langford, asking if he had guessed it.
CHAPTER X.
Beatrice had not judged amiss when she thought charade-acting an amusement likely to take the fancy of her cousins. The great success of her boot-jack inspired both Frederick and Henrietta with eagerness to imitate it; and nothing was talked of but what was practicable in the way of scenes, words, and decorations. The Sutton Leigh party were to dine at the Hall again on Thursday, and it was resolved that there should be a grand charade, with all the splendour that due preparation could bestow upon it. “It was such an amusement to grandpapa,” as Beatrice told Henrietta, “and it occupied Fred so nicely,” as she said to her father; both which observations being perfectly true, Mr. Geoffrey Langford was very willing to promote the sport, and to tranquillise his mother respecting the disarrangement of her furniture.
But what should the word be? Every one had predilections of their own—some for comedy, others for tragedy; some for extemporary acting, others for Shakespeare. Beatrice, with her eye for drawing, already grouped her dramatis personae, so as to display Henrietta’s picturesque face and figure to the greatest advantage, and had designs of making her and Fred represent Catherine and Henry Seyton, whom, as she said, she had always believed to be exactly like them. Fred was inclined for “another touch at Prince Hal,” and devised numerous ways of acting Anonymous, for the sake of “Anon, anon, sir.” Henrietta wanted to contrive something in which Queen Bee might appear as an actual fairy bee, and had very pretty visions of making her a beneficent spirit in a little fanciful opera, for which she had written three or four verses, when Fred put an end to it be pronouncing it “nonsense and humbug.”
So passed Tuesday, without coming to any decision, and Henrietta was beginning to fear that they would never fix at all, when on Wednesday morning Beatrice came down in an ecstasy with the news, that by some chance a wig of her papa’s was in the house, and a charade they must and would have which would bring in the wig. “Come and see it,” said she, drawing her two cousins into the study after breakfast: the study being the safest place for holding counsel on these secret subjects. “There now, is it not charming? O, a law charade we must have, that is certain!”
Fred and Henrietta, who had never chanced to see a barrister’s wig before, were greatly diverted with its little tails, and tried it on in turn. While Henrietta was in the midst of her laugh at the sight of her own fair ringlets hanging out below the tight grey rolls, the door suddenly opened, and gave entrance to its owner, fiercely exclaiming, “What! nothing safe from you, you impertinent kittens?”
“O, Uncle Geoffrey, I beg your pardon!” cried Henrietta, blushing crimson.
“Don’t take it off till I have looked at you,” said Uncle Geoffrey. “Why, you would make a capital Portia!”
“Yes, yes!” cried Queen Bee, “that is it: Portia she shall be, and I’ll be Nerissa.”