He was a good deal smitten with Blanche, and knew better than to run counter to his enslaver's pronounced opinion.
"Then," exclaimed Jim, "like Curtius, I must leap into the gulf single-handed. Stop! hang it, I will exercise my military prerogative; yes, Braybrooke, I shall order you to accompany me, if it is only to witness the sacrifice."
"Stay, Captain Bloxam," said Mrs. Sartoris, laughing. "Such devoted gallantry deserves encouragement; I won't see you fall into the hands of the Philistines without an effort at your preservation. You'll go, Tom, won't you?" she continued, appealing to her husband, "if Lady Mary can only find us transport."
"Yes, I am good to go, if you wish it," replied Sartoris.
"How I should like to shake the life out of that woman!" thought Lady Mary, as she smilingly murmured that "if Mrs. Sartoris had the courage to face the horrors of an Easter ball, there was, of course, the carriage at her disposal."
"Bravo, Mrs. Sartoris!" cried Jim; "and now that you have given them a lead, I have no doubt I shall pick up some more recruits, at all events, young ladies," he continued, appealing to the Misses Evesham, "it's a consolation to think that we have secured a chaperon, even if our mothers remain obdurate on the point."
But Lady Mary was not going to suffer any further discussion concerning the Commonstone ball, if she could possibly prevent it. What she mentally termed the pig-headedness of her son already threatened to upset the seclusion that she had marked out as most conducive to Lionel Beauchamp's subjection. Taking advantage of the decanters having made their appearance on the table, she bent her head to Mrs. Evesham, and the rising of the ladies put an end to the subject, at all events for the present. "If," thought Lady Mary, as she followed her guests to the drawing-room, "I can only stop their talking any more about this wretched ball, there will be no harm done. Jim, Captain Braybrooke, and the Sartorises are welcome to go, so long as the rest stay at home."
Though silent, Pansey Cottrell had been an amused auditor of the previous conversation. Living, as he habitually had done from his boyhood, always in society, he derived no little amusement from watching the foibles and manoeuvres of those around him, and occasionally indulged himself by gently pulling the strings for his own diversion. It was a secret that had been penetrated by only a few of his intimates, but there was lurking in Pansey Cottrell a spirit of mischief that sometimes urged him to contravene the schemes of his associates. It was never from any feeling of malice, but from a sheer sense of fun. The present state of affairs, for instance, tickled him immensely. He knew that poor Lady Mary had resolutely made up her mind that the Grange party should have none of this ball, and equally did he foresee that there was every probability of both herself and all her guests being present at it. Secondly, she had brought Lionel Beauchamp down here, far away from rival beauties, so that Miss Blanche might capture him at her leisure; and such was Lady Mary's malignant star, that an exceedingly pretty and fascinating stranger immediately appeared upon the scene. Now this was just one of the little dramas that it so amused Pansey Cottrell occasionally to exercise his influence in. I do not mean to say that he would interfere to such an extent as to either make or mar the wedding; but to take part with the conspirators and coerce Lady Mary into going to this Commonstone ball was a bit of mischief quite in his way. He could not resist the temptation of teasing his fellow-creatures, and what gave such particular zest to such tormenting was that his victims were always perfectly unconscious that he was at the bottom of their annoyance.
In the drawing-room Lady Mary expressed her disapproval of the ball so strongly that Mrs. Sartoris felt quite guilty, and rather repented her of having volunteered to join Captain Bloxam's party; but when the gentlemen made their appearance, Lady Mary was doomed to be made once more uncomfortable by the proceedings of her first-born.
She listened in somewhat distrait fashion to a flood of anecdote and small-talk that Mr. Cottrell was pouring into her ears; for she felt intuitively that Jim was canvassing the whole party on the subject of this abominable ball with an ardour worthy of a better cause. She had seen him talking and laughing with Mrs. Sartoris, and knew that he had confirmed that lady in her iniquity. Now he was talking with the Misses Evesham, and she felt convinced that those flabby-minded damsels had admitted that they should like to be present, although not half an hour ago they had assured her that they detested all such "omnium gatherums." If she could but have got hold of Jim and told him that there were particular reasons why the Grange party should not attend upon this occasion! but no, Pansey Cottrell was entertaining her with a scandalous and apparently interminable narrative of the doings of one of her friends, and she felt she had been as effectually buttonholed as if she were the victim of the Ancient Mariner.