“And I shall send Mr. Beaumaris a card, because it would be such a splendid thing for you, my love, if it were known that he came to your debut—for such we may call it! Why, if he were to come, and perhaps talk to you for a few minutes, and seem pleased with you, you would be made, my dear! Everyone follows his lead! And perhaps, as there are so few parties yet, he might come! I am sure I have been acquainted with him for years, and I knew his mother quite well! She was Lady Mary Caldicot, you know: a daughter of the late Duke of Wigan, and such a beautiful creature! And it is not as though Mr. Beaumaris has never been to my house, for he once came to an Assembly here, and stayed for quite half-an-hour! Mind, we must not build upon his accepting, but we need not despair!”
She paused for breath, and Arabella, colouring in spite of herself, was able at last to say: “I—I am myself a little acquainted with Mr. Beaumaris, ma’am.”
Lady Bridlington was so much astonished that she dropped her pencil. “Acquainted with Mr. Beaumaris?” she repeated. “My love, what can you be thinking about? When can you possibly have met him?”
“I—I quite forgot to tell you, ma’am,” faltered Arabella unhappily, “that when the pole broke—I told you that!— Miss Blackburn and I sought shelter in his hunting-box, and—and he had Lord Fleetwood with him, and we stayed to dine!”
Lady Bridlington gasped. “Good God, Arabella, and you never told me! Mr. Beaumaris’s house! He actually asked you to dine, and you never breathed a word of it to me!”
Arabella found herself quite incapable of explaining why she had been shy of mentioning this episode. She stammered that it had slipped out of her mind in all the excitement of coming to London.
“Slipped out of your mind?” exclaimed Lady Bridlington. “You dine with Mr. Beaumaris, and at his hunting-box, too, and then talk to me about the excitement of coming to London? Good gracious, child—But, there, you are such a country-mouse, my love, I daresay you did not know all it might mean to you! Did he seem pleased? Did he like you?”
This was a little too much, even for a young lady determined to be on her best behaviour. “I daresay he disliked me excessively, ma’am, for I thought him very proud and disagreeable, and I hope you won’t ask him to your party on my account!”
“Not ask him to my party, when, if he came to it, everyone would say it was a success! You must be mad, Arabella, to talk so! And do let me beg of you, my dear, never to say such a thing of Mr. Beaumaris in public! I daresay he may be a little stiff, but what is that to the purpose, pray? There is no one who counts for more in society, for setting aside his fortune, which is immense, my love, he is related to half the houses in England! The Beaumarises are one of the oldest of our families, while on his mother’s side he is a grandson of the Duchess of Wigan—the Dowager Duchess, I mean, which of course makes him cousin to the present Duke, besides the Wainfleets, and—But you would not know!” she ended despairingly.
“I thought Lord Fleetwood most amiable, and gentlemanlike,” offered Arabella, by way of palliative.