The same post which had brought the Viscount’s letter to his mother had also brought one, a much briefer one, to Mrs Bagshot. The Viscount had enjoyed writing it, and had read it aloud to Hero before fixing the wafer to it.
Dear Madam, [it ran] it is my duty to inform you that your cousin, Miss Wantage, has done me the honour to accept my hand in marriage. Should you be wishful of addressing your felicitations to her, a letter to The Viscountess Sheringham, care of Fenton’s Hotel, will find her. Believe me, etc., Sheringham.
Mrs Bagshot, reading with starting eyes this curt note, suffered all the rage and the chagrin the Viscount had desired her to feel when he gleefully penned it. She declared at once that the marriage was illegal, and should be instantly set aside; she said that she had always known Hero to be a minx and a baggage; she said that if Cassy had only made more regular use of the Denmark Lotion she had procured for her to eradicate the spots on her face this would never have happened. Cassy then fell into a fit of hysterics which brought her father into the room to inquire testily what the devil was amiss. Leaving Cassy to her sisters’ ministrations, Mrs Bagshot thrust the Viscount’s note into her husband’s hands, and commanded him to do something about it at once! Mr Bagshot, having calmly affixed his spectacles over his ears, read the note with maddening deliberation, and then desired his wife to inform him what she expected him to do about it.
Mrs Bagshot told him. He heard her out in patient silence, and, when she paused for breath, enunciated one word: “Rubbish!”
She glared at him, quite taken aback. Perceiving that she was momentarily bereft of speech, Mr Bagshot said: “Pray, why should you desire to have so advantageous a marriage set aside? I wish you will put yourself to the trouble of considering a little before flying into these odd humours, my dear. To be sure, I do not understand why young Sheringham must needs elope with Hero, for there can have been not the least reason for him to fear that you would not give your consent to the match.”
“I?” gasped Mrs Bagshot. “I consent to the penniless beggar’s marrying Sheringham? I would die rather!”
Her husband looked her over coolly. “Indeed! Then no doubt Sheringham knew what he was about when he carried her off in this improper fashion.”
“I shall have it put a stop to!”
“You will do no such thing,” he replied. “Unless you wish to appear a greater fool than I take you for, you will accept this highly flattering alliance with the appearance at least of complaisance.” He added dryly: “I imagine you are not desirous of giving the world cause to say that you are jealous because his lordship would not throw his handkerchief in Cassy’s direction. For my part, I am happy to think that Hero, who I have always considered to be a nice little thing, has had the good fortune to become so creditably established.”
These words of calm good sense did not fail of their effect. By the time the Dowager Lady Sheringham’s landaulet was at the door, Mrs Bagshot had had time to think the matter over. Nothing would serve to abate the strong sense of chagrin that possessed her, but she was intelligent enough to realize that to attempt to overset the marriage would only serve to make her look extremely foolish. The dowager, therefore, found Mrs Bagshot unresponsive. Mrs Bagshot was certainly much shocked, but although she was lavish in her expressions of sympathy for her dearest Lady Sheringham, she made it quite plain that she had no intention of interfering in the marriage. When Lady Sheringham said that she had quite counted on having that sweet Isabella for her daughter-in-law, the thought crossed her mind that however infuriating it might be to find one’s despised poor relation suddenly a great way above one in the social scale, it would not have afforded her the smallest gratification to have seen the Viscount married to Miss Milborne.