'Here? Not imminent? Lady Hammond always sends notice.'
'Imminent? They are prancing up the drive! Only I cut across in "Miss Ullin" to give warning. Shall I administer any orders to the dinner, Cherry, before I make myself scarce?'
'No, thank you, there is quite enough. Just take my painting-apron, that's all,' said Cherry, as coolly as Lady de la Poer would have heard tidings of such an inroad; but when Amelia announced, 'Sir Vesey and Lady Hammond in the drawing-room—and two more ladies, Ma'am—shall I lay the table for them?' she quietly answered, 'Yes, I suppose so.—Stella my dear, will you see if there is fruit enough in?' And Stella stayed behind, while Cherry descended, aided by Robina's arm.
Felix was already in presence, and the moment the two sisters appeared, a slight, brown, hazel-eyed girl in mourning exclaimed, 'O Miss Underwood, this is just what I hoped!' and eagerly kissed her, while Lady Hammond introduced 'Lady Caergwent' and 'Mrs. Umfraville,' the latter a peculiarly sweet-looking elderly lady in widow's dress. There were apologies for this sudden descent, telling that, on hearing how near Vale Leston was, Lady Caergwent had been so eager to see the Priory, that she had wrought with Sir Vesey, and prevailed.
Yet she did not seem to be profiting by the opportunity, for she merely sat by Robina, looking, thought Cherry, neither like a Countess nor a woman of twenty-three, but much more like a girl of eighteen—petrified, all save her great eyes, by shyness; and Felix regarded her precedence as not only unnatural but unlucky, with so unconversible a subject, when he had to give her his arm, and seat her at his right hand for the mid-day meal. Be it observed, that the veal stewed with asparagus, and the pie that was to be cold for the morrow, as fully justified Cherry's calmness, as did the pile of strawberries and glasses of preserves her trust in Stella's handiwork.
Clement came in late and astonished, and with a very hazy idea who the strangers were, just as Sir Vesey was saying, 'Now, Lady Caergwent, Mr. Underwood will be able to answer your question.'
She coloured a little, and rather hastily asked whether there were any tradition of French architects having been employed in the church, for she had been struck with the foreign air of the tracery of the south window. Not a little surprised, Felix soon found himself in the midst of an architectural discussion, which taxed all his knowledge on the matter, and stirred Clement on the other side into the ecclesiastical aspect of the question; and all three fell into an eager talk, when suddenly there was a general lull, and the young lady's voice was heard saying, 'There is no heart or beauty in what is not symboli—' and there she came to a full stop, and looked at Mrs. Umfraville with a start of embarrassment, requited.
Appreciation of their church was no slight merit with any of the Underwoods; and in the lionizing that ensued, the guest had eyes and tongue full of architecture, romance, and history, even spying and identifying a heraldic badge that supplied a missing link in the history of the building. Angela thought it flagrant pedantry; but Clement was so struck with her keen interest in all his arrangements, and her real reverence, that he unlocked the grille of the chancel, offered her to try the tone of his organ, and in spite of her total ignorance on that head, he asked if 'Miss Umfraville' would not like to see the choice needlework from St. Faith's in the chest in his vestry. There she had no lack of ideas; she examined and asked questions evidently with practical views, and could be hardly got away to continue the tour, when she again satisfied him (and more) by indignation on behalf of the monks—not sentimental, but evidently straight out of Dean Hook's version of the dissolution of the abbeys; and yet there was a quaintness and originality in the way she put it, that amused Felix greatly.
In the painting-room an entreaty was preferred to see Miss Underwood's drawings, which were indeed more worth looking at than when Lord de Vigny had stirred her up. She always had at least one real work in hand, and a good many studies. She was finishing a water-colour of the scene in The Lord of the Isles, when Ronald's betrothal ring falls at the feet of Isabel Bruce in the convent.
Lady Caergwent stood before this as if it touched some responsive chord; but her aunt was busy with the portraits. Geraldine's emulation had been fired by the cluster of miniatures in the drawing-room, and she had undertaken to commemorate the present family in the same style. She had produced very fair likenesses of Felix and of Wilmet, besides her half-finished crayon of Robina, and a still better one of Mr. Froggatt, which she was copying for his widow. Mrs. Umfraville was delighted with these, and wished she could get anything as good of her Kate, whom photography always represented as a fury, and portraiture as a doll; but by this time Lady Caergwent had got Robina in the recess of a window, asking, 'Are you still at Repworth?'