So, after all, Erica had a maid in attendance, for Elspeth insisted on seeing her to bed, and, since they talked all the time about the old Scotch days, she was well content to renounce her independence for a little while.
But, whether because of the flickering fire light, or because of the strangeness of the great brass bedstead, with its silken hangings and many-colored Indian rezai, Erica slept very little that night. Perhaps the long talk about her father's early days had taken too great a hold of her. At any rate, she tossed about very restlessly in her luxurious quarters, and when, for brief intervals, she slept, it was only to dream of her father taking leave of his Scottish home, and always he bore that flint-like face, that look of strong endurance and repressed passion which Elspeth had described, and which, in times of trouble and injustice, Erica had learned to know so well.
CHAPTER XXV. Lady Caroline's Dinner
The blank of amaze of your haughty gaze,
The cold surprise of patrician eyes. Lewis Morris
But the paucity of Christians is astonishing, considering
the number of them. Leigh Hunt.
The irritation, or, at any rate, the novelty of the luxury in the Fane-Smith's household wore off after Erica had spent a few days at Greyshot. She became accustomed to the great rooms, and being artistic by nature and the reverse by education, she began very much to enjoy the pictures, the charming variety of foreign treasures, and particularly all the lovely things of Indian workmanship with which the drawing room was crowded. The long, formal meals she learned to endure. The absurdly large retinue of servants ceased to oppress her; she used to amuse herself by speculating as to the political views of the men-servants! while the luxury of a daily drive with her aunt she very much appreciated.
But, though the mere externals were soon familiar enough, she found that every day increased the difficulty she felt in becoming accustomed to the atmosphere of this family. She had lived all her life with people who were overwhelmed with work, and in a home where recreation was only the rare concession to actual health. Here recreation seemed to be the business of life, while work for the public was merely tacked on as a sort of ornamental fringe.
Mr. Fane-Smith had, indeed, a few committee meetings to attend; Mrs. Fane-Smith visited her district once a fortnight, and distributed tracts, and kind words, and soup tickets, and blanket tickets, besides the most lavish gifts from her own purse. Rose, to please her mother, taught a class of little girls on Sunday afternoon that is to say, she did NOT teach them, but she sat in a chair and heard them say collects, and enforced orderly behavior upon them, and read them a good little story book. But these were merely rather tiresome duties which came in very often as provoking interruptions to the great business of life, namely eating, drinking, dining out, giving dinners, or attending the endless succession of at-homes, dances, musical evenings, amateur theatricals, by which Greyshot people tried to kill time.
As to taking any intelligent interest in the political world, no one seemed to dream of such a thing, except Mr. Fane-Smith, who read the paper at breakfast, and hurled anathemas at all the statesmen whom Erica had learned to love and revere. It taxed her patience to the utmost to sit through the daily diatribe against Sir Michael Cunningham, her hero of heroes. But even the violent opposition seemed preferable to the want of interest shown by the others. Mrs. Fane-Smith had time to fritter away at least half an hour after breakfast in the most desultory conversation, the most fruitless discussions with Rose as to some detail of dress; but she always made the excuse that she “had no time” to read the papers, and amused Erica not a little by asking her husband if “anything particular had been happening lately,” when they were just starting for a dinner party. Out of his little rechauffe of the week's news she probably extracted enough information to enable her to display that well-bred interest, that vague and superficial acquaintance with the subject which will pass muster in society, and which probably explains alike the very vapid talk and the wildly false accusations which form the staple of ordinary conversation.
Rose was even more perplexing. She was not only ignorant, but she boasted of her ignorance. Again and again Erica heard her deprecate the introduction of any public question.