However; Theo's wedding was public enough. We had the house full of guests, and among them two whom I had no wish to see, and beheld with dread as birds of ill omen, and so indeed they were. These were no other than my cousin Betty and her husband. They had come to the neighborhood to visit a cousin of Mr. Lovel's, and my lady meeting them and learning who they were, thought she could do no less than invite them to the wedding. My lord did not look too well pleased when he heard of it, for he had taken a great dislike to Betty upon their first meeting, but he could not treat her otherwise than courteously in his own house. As to Mr. Lovel, he never seemed to me to have any character, but to be a mere lay figure for the display of whatever mode in clothes or manners happened to be uppermost.
Betty had not been one evening in the house before she began exercising her powers. My lord was praising lip the institution of marriage, of which he was a great promoter, and my lady, smiling, called him a match-maker.
"Well, I am a match-maker, I don't deny it," said he. "Would you be ashamed of it if you were me, cousin Lovel?"
Betty had been sitting rather silent, and I suppose he meant to include her in the conversation. She answered at once—
"No, indeed, my lord. It is a good vocation. I am sure I have always thanked Vevette for betraying me to my brother, and so bringing my marriage to pass sooner than I could have done."
She spoke in those clear silver tones of hers, which always commanded attention, and several people turned to look at us. As may be guessed, I was covered with confusion, but I made shift to answer.
"You certainly owe me no thanks, Betty, for what I never did. I knew nothing of your affairs, and therefore could not betray them, had I been so inclined."
"Oh, I beg your pardon!" said she, with her mocking, superior smile. And then presently to me in a kind of stage aside which every one about us could hear—
"What is the use of keeping up that stale pretence? I suppose you did what you thought right, and I don't blame you; but why deny what you and I know to be true?"
To this I made no answer whatever, and my lady presently called upon me to sing. I by and by saw Betty in close conference with Mrs. Bernard, and I had no doubt from the looks Martha cast at me that I was the subject of their conference.