The latter was 'a thundering bore' to Sir Harry, who was provoked to see 'a parcel of louts in half bullet hats' gaping about the Hall. However, the matter was soon over, permission was given for the interment, and, after unlimited brandies-and-sodas in the butler's premises, they all departed in high good-humour with themselves.
Lord Aberfeldie came to attend the funeral, and brought with him Olive to remain with Eveline. Lady Aberfeldie did not think the Hurdells 'good form,' so she remained, as yet, at Southsea.
Eveline's father and cousin were shocked by the expression of her face. Intense mental pain seemed written on her brow; and her eyes, if sunk and inflamed, seemed to have gathered much of intensity.
The stipulated number of days allowed by custom to elapse between the day of death and that of interment were over, and the funeral too; Lord Aberfeldie, Sir Harry, Mr. Pyke Poole, and many others in scarfs and hatbands of wonderful length had departed with the remains for Slough-cum-Sloggit by train, and some of their carriages were now returning through the sunshiny park, where the soft rain was falling, and, as the clouds were breaking up, bright gleams of radiance danced along the sward.
Unused to death and unsympathetic, Lucretia Hurdell felt intense relief.
The great Tudor hall, with all its window blinds down and shrouded in silence and gloom, had seemed to her for all these days like one large sepulchre, though an odour of hothouse flowers was everywhere as the gardener brought all his treasures—hyacinths, waxen camelias, gardenia, faint Dijon roses, and so forth—to decorate the corridor, the death-chamber, and the coffin, while, unconscious of all the mischief he had wrought, the bay hunter enjoyed his corn and beans as usual.
So the coffin was laid in 'the family vault,' where lay the first baronet of the House of Puddicombe and the first wife of Sir Paget.
'I shall never lie there,' thought Eveline, with a shudder, when her father, before returning to Southsea, gave her the final details.
Poor Sir Paget was gone, but no one seemed sad about it, and everyone seemed to grow bright now that he was gone finally. Sunshine and air came freely into the house through the open windows now, and the nameless hush that for days had pervaded the vicinity of the dead was no longer necessary. The decorous sadness that was acted, even in the servants' hall, imposed by the presence of death—especially the death of a very rich man—was no longer required. The butler might whistle as he cleaned the plate, the housemaids might laugh freely now, and Mademoiselle Clairette indulge in a merry little French chauson unchecked by that rigid matron in black moire, the housekeeper.