‘It is vain to try to collect them again,’ sighed Mr. Prendergast; ‘we must shut up. Good night, Miss Murrell;’ and therewith he turned back to his garden, where the freakish sprite, feigning flight, took refuge in the boat, cowering down, and playfully hiding her face in deprecation of rebuke, but all she received was a meekly melancholy, ‘O Cilla! prayers.’
‘One day’s less loathing of compulsory devotion,’ was her answer in saucy defiance. ‘I owed it to them for the weariness of listening for ten minutes to the “Three Fishers’ Wives,” which they appreciated as little as their pastor did!’
‘I know nothing about songs, but when one wants them—poor things—to look to something better than sleep.’
‘Oh, hush! Here are Miss Charlecote and Mr. Fulmort on your side, and I can’t be crushed with united morality in revenge for the tears Edna caused you all to shed. There, help Miss Charlecote in; where can Owen be dawdling? You can’t pull, Phœbe, or we would put off without him. Ah, there!’ as he came bounding down, ‘you intolerable loiterer, I was just going to leave you behind.’
‘The train starting without the engine,’ he said, getting into his place; ‘yes, take an oar if you like, little gnat, and fancy yourself helping.’
The gay warfare, accompanied by a few perilous tricks on Lucilla’s part, lasted through the further voyage. Honora guessed at a purpose of staving off graver remonstrance, but Phœbe looked on in astonishment. Seventeen is often a more serious time of life than two-and twenty, and the damsel could not comprehend the possibility of thoughtlessness when there was anything to think about. The ass’s bridge was nothing compared with Lucy! Moreover the habits of persiflage of a lively family often are confusing to one not used to the tone of jest and repartee, and Phœbe had as little power as will to take part in what was passing between the brother and sister; she
sat like the spectator of a farce in a foreign tongue, till the boat had arrived at the broad open extent of park gently sweeping down towards the river, the masses of trees kept on either side so as to leave the space open where the castle towered in pretentious grandeur, with a flag slowly swaying in the summer wind on the top of the tallest turret.
The trees made cool reaches of shade, varied by intervals of hot sunshine, and much longer did the way appear, creeping onward in the heat, than it had looked when the eye only took in the simple expanse of turf, from river to castle. Phœbe looked to her arrival there, and to bedroom conferences, as the moment of recovering a reasonable Lucy, but as they neared the house, there was a shout from the wire fence enclosing the shrubbery on the eastern side, and Horatia was seen standing at the gate calling them to come into the cloisters and have some sustenance.
Passing the screen of shrubs, a scene lay before them almost fit for the gardens of Seville. Three sides of an extensive square were enclosed by the semi-gothic buildings, floridly decorated with stone carving; one consisted of the main edifice, the lower windows tented with striped projecting blinds; a second of the wing containing the reception rooms, fronted by the imitative cloister, which was continued and faced with glass on the third side—each supporting column covered with climbing plants, the passion-flower, the tropæolum, the trumpet honeysuckle, or even the pomegranate, opening their gay blooms on every side. The close-shaven turf was broken by small patches of gorgeously-tinted flower-beds, diversified by vases filled with trailing plants, and lines of orange trees and fuchsias, with here and there a deep-belled datura, all converging towards the central marble fountain, where the water played high, and tinkled coolly in sparkling jets. Between it and the house, there were placed in the shade some brightly-tinted cushions and draperies, lounging chairs, and a low table, bearing an oriental-looking service of tiny cups, of all kinds of bright and fantastic hues, no two alike. Near it reclined on her cushions a figure in perfect keeping with the scene, her jetty hair contrasting with her gold and coral net, her scarlet gold-embroidered slipper peeping out from her pale buff-coloured dress, deeply edged with rich purple, and partly concealed by a mantle of the unapproachable pink which suggests Persia, all as gorgeous in apparel as the blue and yellow macaw on his pole, and the green and scarlet lories in their cage. Owen made a motion of smoking with Honor’s parasol, whispering, ‘Fair Fatima! what more is wanting?’
‘There! I’ve got Lolly out!’ cried Horatia, advancing with her vehement cordiality, and grasping their hands with all her might; ‘I would have come and pulled you up the river, Miss Charlecote, but for imperative claims. Here’s some tea for you; I know you must be parched.’