“Amelia, my love,” said Mrs. Beaumont, who drew up also to give assistance at this critical juncture, “go, this moment, and write a note to your friend Miss Walsingham, to say that we shall all be with them early to-morrow: I will send a servant directly, that we may be sure to meet with them at home this time; you’ll find pen, ink, and paper in my dressing-room, love.”
Mrs. Beaumont drew Amelia’s arm within hers, and, dictating kindest messages for the Walsinghams, led her out of the room. Having thus successfully covered her daughter’s retreat, our skilful manoeuvrer returned, all self-complacent, to the company. And next, to please the warm-hearted Mr. Palmer, she seemed to sympathize in his patriotic enthusiasm for the British navy: she pronounced a panegyric on the young hero, Captain Walsingham, which made the good old man rub his hands with exultation, and which irradiated with joy the countenance of her son. But, alas! Mrs. Beaumont’s endeavours to please, or rather to dupe all parties, could not, even with her consummate address, always succeed: though she had an excellent memory, and great presence of mind, with peculiar quickness both of eye and ear, yet she could not always register, arrange, and recollect all that was necessary for the various parts she undertook to act. Scarcely had she finished her eulogium on Captain Walsingham, when, to her dismay, she saw close behind her Sir John Hunter, who had entered the room without her perceiving it. He said not one word; but his clouded brow showed his suspicions, and his extreme displeasure.
“Mrs. Beaumont,” said he, after some minutes’ silence, “I find I must have the honour of wishing you a good morning, for I have an indispensable engagement at home to dinner to-day.”
“I thought, Sir John, you and Amelia were going to ride?”
“Ma’am, Miss Beaumont does not choose to ride—she told me, so this instant as I passed her on the stairs. Oh! don’t disturb her, I beg—she is writing to Miss Walsingham—I have the honour to wish you a good morning, ma’am.”
“Well, if you are determined to go, let me say three words to you in the music-room, Sir John: though,” added she, in a whisper intended to be heard by Mr. Palmer, “I know you do not look upon me as your friend, yet depend upon it I shall treat you and all the world with perfect candour.”
Sir John, though sulky, could not avoid following the lady; and as soon as she had shut all the doors and double-doors of the music-room, she exclaimed, “It is always best to speak openly to one’s friends. Now, my dear Sir John Hunter, how can you be so childish as to take ill of me what I really was forced to say, for your interest, about Captain Walsingham, to Mr. Palmer? You know old Palmer is the oddest, most self-willed man imaginable! humour and please him I must, the few days he is with me. You know he goes on Tuesday—that’s decided—Dr. Wheeler has seen him, has talked to him about his health, and it is absolutely necessary that he should return to the West Indies. Then he is perfectly determined to leave all he has to Amelia.”
“Yes, ma’am; but how am I sure of being the better for that?” interrupted Sir John, whose decided selfishness was a match for Mrs. Beaumont’s address, because it went without scruple or ceremony straight to his object; “for, ma’am, you can’t think I’m such a fool as not to see that Mr. Palmer wishes me at the devil. Miss Beaumont gives me no encouragement; and you, ma’am, I know, are too good a politician to offend Mr. Palmer: so, if he declares in favour of this young hero, Captain Walsingham, I may quit the field.”
“But you don’t consider that Mr. Palmer’s young hero has never made any proposal for Amelia.”
“Pshaw! ma’am—but I know, as well as you do, that he likes her, and propose he will for her now that he has money.”