“Are you sure we shall not bore you?”
“I am sure you will cheer me. My sister-in-law is very good—but Lady Jane is the only person in this house of whom I do not get desperately tired, including myself,” she added, with a sigh. “Please say you will come, and I will order your rooms.”
“We will come then. Good night, Juanita.”
The shadows were falling as he drove away, after refusing tea in the drawing-room and a further acquaintance with the wonderful children.
He looked forward to that evening at the Priory with an eager expectancy that he knew to be supreme foolishness, and when the evening came, it brought some measure of disappointment with it. Juanita was not so well as she had been upon Christmas Eve. She was not able to dine downstairs, and the family dinner, at which the Etonian Tom, Johnnie, and Lucy were allowed to take their places in virtue of Christmas time, was a dull business for Theodore. His only pleasure was in the fact that he sat on Lady Jane’s right hand, and was able to talk with her of Juanita. Even that pleasure was alloyed with keenest pain; for Lady Jane’s talk was of that dead love which cast its shadow over Juanita’s youth, or of that dim and dawning hope which might brighten the coming days—and neither in the love of the past nor in the love of the future had Theodore any part. Juanita was on her sofa by the drawing-room fire when he and Mr. Grenville left the dining-room, after a single glass of claret, and a brief review of the political situation. Theodore’s sisters were established on each side of her. There was no chance for him while they were absorbing her attention, and he retired disconsolately to the group in the middle of the room, where Mrs. Grenville and Lady Jane were seated on a capacious ottoman with the children about them.
Johnnie and Lucy, who had over-eaten themselves, were disposed to be quiet, the little girl leaning her fair curls and fat shining cheek against her grandmother’s shoulder with an air that looked touching, but which really indicated repletion; Johnnie sprawling on the carpet at his mother’s feet, and wishing he had not eaten that mince-pie, telling himself that, on the whole, he hated mince-pie, and envying his brother Tom, who had stolen off to the saddle-room to talk to the grooms. Godolphin and Mabel having dined early, were full of exuberance, waiting to be “jumped,” which entertainment Theodore had to provide without intermission for nearly half an hour, upheaving first one and then another towards the ceiling, first a rosy bundle in ruby velvet, and then a rosy bundle in white muslin, laughing, screaming, enraptured, to be caught in his arms, and set carefully on the ground, there to await the next turn. Theodore slaved at this recreation until his arms ached, casting a furtive glance every now and then at the corner by the fireplace where his sisters were treating Juanita to the result of their latest heavy reading.
At last, to his delight, Lucy recovered from her comatose condition, and began to thirst for amusement.
“Let’s have magic music,” she said; “we can all play at that, Granny and all. You know you love magic music, Granny. Who’ll play the piano? Not mother, she plays so badly,” added the darling, with childlike candour.
“Sophy shall play for you,” cried Theodore; “she’s a capital hand at it.”
He went over to his sister.