He turned his head, his lips working a little, his flushed face very young and bright.
"Oh yes! I can care fast enough," he said. "And I think—I think I could make her happy. And you see, already she worships you. We would pet her, mother, and give her all manner of pretty things, and make a little queen of her—and she would be pleased—she's a child, such a child."
Richard remained awake far into the morning, till the rose had died out of the sky, and the ascending smoke of many kitchen-chimneys began to stain the expanse of heavenly blue. The thought of his possible bride was very sweet to him. But when at last sleep came, dreams came likewise. Helen de Vallorbes' perfect face arose, in reproach, before him, and her azure and purple draperies swept over him, stifling and choking him as the salt waves of an angry sea. Then some one—it was the comely, long-limbed young soldier, Mr. Decies—whom he had seen last night at the Barkings' great party when Morabita sang—and the soprano's matchless voice was mixed up, in the strangest fashion, with all these transactions—lifted Helen and all her magic sea-waves from off him, setting him free. But even as he did so, Dickie perceived that it was not Helen, after all, whom the young soldier carried in his arms, but little Lady Constance Quayle. Whereupon Richard, waking with a start, conceived a wholly unreasoning detestation of Mr. Decies, while, along with that, his purpose of marrying Lady Constance increased notably, waxed strong and grew, putting forth all manner of fair flowers of promise and of hope.
CHAPTER IV
A LESSON UPON THE ELEVENTH COMMANDMENT—"PARENTS OBEY YOUR CHILDREN"
A family council was in course of holding in the lofty, white-and-gold boudoir, overlooking the Park, in Albert Gate. Lady Louisa Barking had summoned it. She had also exercised a measure of selection among intending members. For instance Lady Margaret and Lady Emily,—the former having a disposition, in the opinion of her elder sister, to put herself forward and support the good cause with more zeal than discretion, the latter being but a weak-kneed supporter of the cause at best,—were summarily dismissed.
"It was really perfectly unnecessary to discuss this sort of thing before the younger girls," she said. "It put them out of their place and rather rubbed the freshness off their minds. And then they would chatter among themselves. And it all became a little foolish and missy. They never knew when to stop."
One member of the Quayle family, and that a leading one, had taken his dismissal before it was given and, with a nice mixture of defective moral-courage and good common-sense, had removed himself bodily from the neighbourhood of the scene of action. Lord Shotover was still in London. Along with the payment of his debts had come a remarkable increase of cheerfulness. He made no more allusions to the unpleasant subject of cutting his throat, while the proposed foreign tour had been relegated to a vague future. It seemed a pity not to see the season out. It would be little short of a crime to miss Goodwood. He might go out with Decies to India in the autumn, when that young soldier's leave had expired, and look Guy up a bit. He would rather like a turn at pig-sticking—and there were plenty of pig, he understood, in the neighbourhood of Agra, where his brother was now stationed. On the morning in question, Lord Shotover, in excellent spirits, had walked down Piccadilly with his father, from his rooms in Jermyn Street to Albert Gate. The elder gentleman, arriving from Westchurch by an early train, had solaced himself with a share of the by no means ascetic breakfast of which his eldest son was partaking at a little after half-past ten. It was very much too good a breakfast for a person in Lord Shotover's existing financial position—so indeed were the rooms—so, in respect of locality, was Jermyn Street itself. Lord Fallowfeild knew this, no man better. Yet he was genuinely pleased, impressed even, by the luxury with which his erring son was surrounded, and proceeded to praise his cook, praise his valet's waiting at table, praise some fine old sporting prints upon the wall. He went so far, indeed, as to chuckle discreetly—immaculately faithful husband though he was—over certain photographs of ladies, more fair and kind than wise, which were stuck in the frame of the looking-glass over the chimneypiece. In return for which acts of good-fellowship Lord Shotover accompanied him as far as the steps of the mansion in Albert Gate. There he paused, remarking with the most disarming frankness:—
"I would come in. I want to awfully, I assure you. I quite agree with you about all this affair, you know, and I should uncommonly like to let the others know it. But, between ourselves, Louisa's been so short with me lately, so infernally short—if you'll pardon my saying so—that it's become downright disagreeable to me to run across her. So I'm afraid I might only make matters worse all round, don't you know, if I put in an appearance this morning."