Nothing more. In fact, the whole group were less remarkable and tragical-looking than I thought they would have been. I was disappointed until I came to Lord Ascot, and then I could not take my eyes off him.
There was tragedy enough there. There was coarse brutality and passion enough, in all conscience. And yet that man had done what he had done. Here was a puzzle with a vengeance.
Lord Ascot, as I saw him now, for the first time, was simply a low-bred and repulsive-looking man. In stature he was gigantic, in every respect save height. He was about five feet nine, very deep about the chest. His hair was rather dark, cut close. His face was very florid, and perfectly hairless. His forehead was low. His eyes were small, and close together. His eyebrows were heavy, and met over his nose, which was short and square. His mouth was large; and when you came to his mouth, you came to the first tolerable feature in his face. When he was speaking to no one in particular, the under lip was set, and the whole face, I am sorry to say, was the sort of face which is quite as often seen in the dock, as in the witness-box (unless some gentleman has turned Queen's evidence). And this was the man who had risked a duke's fortune, because "There were some things a fellow couldn't do, you know."
It was very puzzling till he began to speak about his grandmother, and then his lower lip pouted out, his eyebrows raised, his eyes were apart, and he looked a different man. Is it possible that if he had not been brought up to cock-fighting and horse-racing, among prize-fighters and jockeys, that he might have been a different man? I can't say, I am sure.
Lord and Lady Hainault were simply a very high-bred, very handsome, and very charming pair of people. I never had the slightest personal acquaintance with either of them. My cousin knows them both very intimately, and he says there are not two better people in the world.
Charles Ravenshoe rose to reply to General Mainwaring's speech, proposing the brides and bridegrooms, and I looked at him very curiously. He was pale, from his recent illness, and he never was handsome. But his face was the face of a man whom I should fancy most people would get very fond of. When we were schoolfellows at Shrewsbury, he was a tall dark-haired boy, who was always laughing, and kicking up a row, and giving his things away to other fellows. Now he was a tall, dark, melancholy-looking man, with great eyes and lofty eyebrows. His vivacity, and that carriage which comes from the possession of great physical strength, were gone; and while I looked at him, I felt ten years older. Why should I try to describe him further? He is not so remarkable a man as either Lord Ascot or William. But he was the best man I ever knew.
He said a few kind hearty words, and sat down, and then Lord Ascot got up. And I took hold of Lizzie's hand with my left; and I put my right elbow on the table and watched him intensely, with my hand shading my face. He had a coat buttoned over his great chest, and as he spoke he kept on buttoning and unbuttoning it with his great coarse hand. He said—
"I ain't much hand at this sort of thing. I suppose those two Marstons, confound them, are saying to themselves that I ought to be, because I am in the House of Lords. That John Marston is a most impudent beggar, and I shall expect to see his friend to-morrow morning. He always was, you know. He has thwarted me all through my life. I wanted Charles Ravenshoe to go to the deuce, and I'll be hanged if he'd let him. And it is not to be borne."
There was a general laugh at this, and Lord Ascot stretched his hand across General Mainwaring, and shook hands with my cousin.