The letter reached Greville at the stately house of her Grace the Duchess of Argyll and was delivered into his hand as he sat with two ladies so beautiful at their different ages that Paris might sooner have devoured his apple, gold though it was, than run the risk of mistake in awarding it to one or the other.
And lest it be believed that the romancer dresses all his ladies in rainbow glories, I point out that the elder was the famous Elizabeth Gunning—the double Duchess, as they called her—who had risen from direst poverty by the victorious attack of her loveliness on the embattled world, to be successively Duchess of Hamilton and Duchess of Argyll, and the younger was Mrs. Crewe, that most fashionable of all beauties, of whom it was said (in a world which knew not Emma!) that she alone equalled or excelled the perfections of Elizabeth Gunning in the days when she took the town by storm; a sweet, sleepy-eyed beauty, gentle persuasion in every look, and a little delicate malice to season the honey with ginger.
The ladies were dressed for a Court and were splendid in satins and jewels. Greville, very much at home in that house, was festooning a chain of diamonds to better advantage about Mrs. Crewe’s shoulders when the letter made its appearance, the Duchess commenting on his fine taste.
“There’s no man I know like you for taste, Greville,” says her gracious Grace. “The Hamiltons are like that. How is it you pick up all these notions? No wonder you’re fastidious.”
He put the letter carefully in his pocket with a spasm of anger that she should dare pursue him there, and stood back to view his work.
“Mrs. Crewe sets it off even better than she did the other fashion. As to my taste, ’tis formed on the antique, and what I’ve done is by no means original. Thus the Roman Empress Faustina disposed her jewels to catch the eyes of her gladiator lovers when she wearied of her philosophic husband! Ah, madam, are not women the same in all ages?”
“They suit themselves to the men, who also don’t change, for all I see. And if the Emperor was as dull as our philosophers to-day, I excuse her Majesty.” Thus the Duchess.
“One may be dull without the excuse of philosophy to advertise it,” replied Mrs. Crewe at the mirror, looking at her long swan’s throat, glorious with diamonds. “Do but think of the Duke of Devonshire. It gives me an indigestion to look at him. It runs in families. ’Tis because Mr. Greville is half Hamilton that he’s such highly instructive company.”
She shot a little ironic glance at him from under long lashes. The lady knew very well that here was one who “could gaze without madness on Amoret’s eyes”—eyes which had settled the fate of not lovers only but of more than one contested election, for she had but to smile upon the happy voters and they were won. Greville hated political women, and she knew it. Hence the little scratch, a pat with velvet paw. But he was stirred to discomfort nevertheless, for Mrs. Crewe was a thermometer for measuring the liking of society, and had a smile graduated to its exact temperature. Could it be possible the great world began to find him a little tedious, a little arrièré? He was born older than any of them to begin with and had relished a fossil when others were gambling, tripping and soaking, and it was not always easy to conceal that their amusements palled on him. And for the last three years he had permitted himself to drop rather more into obscurity with his delightful pupil than his reason could approve. She was troublesome sometimes, but yet her amazing progress in the graces and accomplishments she owed him and the masters he provided was a daily amusement and interest. And the little house in Edgware Row was absolute comfort. The dish, chosen by himself, and cooked perfectly to his taste, suited his liking and health better than the sumptuous banquets of the great houses, and Emma’s company, which required no tip-toe courtesy or courting, allowed him to stand at ease in a way impossible with the fashionable ladies who welcomed him, perhaps a shade more coldly than formerly. But—if he were dropping out? To be forgotten is a much less easy process than forgetting, and Mr. Greville must be received with acclaim wherever he deigned to show himself. Was his season slipping by? He winced. She was not worth it. No! not a day, not an hour should she stand in his light if he were once persuaded of that. And economize as she would, still his taste for the antique led him into irretrievable expense. That matter, too, was becoming urgent.
He must control his tendency to pontificate. Sir William had warned him of it once half jesting—Sir William, who was twenty years younger for all the remorseless parish register.