Lord Fleetwood stared hard at the Tallants for a minute or two, but could perceive no likeness, which, indeed, existed more in an occasional expression than in their lineaments. “No, dash it!” he said. “The little Tallant ain’t got a beak of a nose!”
Mr. Warkworth acknowledged it, and excused his lapse by explaining that it was only a sudden notion he had taken into his head.
Mr. Beaumaris did not arrive until after midnight, and consequently failed to secure a waltz with Arabella. He seemed to be in one of his more inaccessible moods, and, having exerted himself to say a few civil things to his hostess, to dance once with a lady to whom she presented him,. and once with his cousin, Lady Wainfleet, occupied himself in strolling through the various saloons, talking languidly to acquaintances, and surveying the company through his quizzing-glass with a faintly bored air. After about half-an-hour, when two sets were forming for a country-dance, he went in search of Arabella, who had disappeared from the ballroom in the direction of the conservatory, at the end of the last dance, accompanied by Mr. Epworth, who protested that there had never been such a jam in the history of London balls, and offered to procure her a cooling glass of lemonade. Whether he redeemed this promise or not, Mr. Beaumaris never knew, but when he walked into the conservatory a few minutes later, it was to find Arabella shrinking back in a chair in a state of the greatest discomfort, and trying to disengage her hands from the fervent clasp of Mr. Epworth, romantically on his knees before her. Everyone else having left the conservatory to take their places in the new sets, the enterprising Mr. Epworth, fortified by liberal doses of Lord Bridlington’s champagne, had seized the opportunity once more to press his suit upon the heiress. Mr. Beaumaris entered in time to hear her utter in a tone of distress: “Oh, pray do not! Mr. Epworth, I implore you, get up! I am very much obliged to you, but I shall never, never change my mind! It is ungentlemanly of you to tease me like this!”
“Do not try to be such a dead bore, Epworth!” said Mr. Beaumaris, with all his usual sangfroid. “I came to ask you if you would stand up with me for the next dance, Miss Tallant.”
She was blushing furiously, and returned rather an incoherent answer. Mr. Epworth, considerably mortified at having been found in such a posture by one whose contempt he dreaded, got to his feet, muttered something about taking his leave, and left the conservatory. Mr. Beaumaris, taking her fan from Arabella’s hand, unfurled it, and began gently to wave it beside her heated countenance. “How many times has he proposed to you?” he enquired conversably. “How very ridiculous he looked, to be sure!”
She was obliged to laugh, but said warmly: “He is the most odious little man, and seems to think he has only to persevere to make me receive his advances with complaisance!”
“You must make allowances for him,” said Mr. Beaumaris. “If he did not believe you to be a wealthy woman he would cease to trouble you.”
Her bosom swelled; she said in a low, shaking voice: “Had it not been for you, sir, he would never have known it!”
He was silent, as much from disappointment as from the rueful knowledge that although Fleetwood’s had been the tongue which had spread the rumour, it had been his own idly malicious words which had convinced Fleetwood of the truth of Arabella’s claim.
After a moment, she said in a subdued tone: “Shall we take our places in the set?”