There had never been any question of her success with the men, so little, indeed, that it was curious to see how well she stood with the women. Her early years, it has been hinted, did not want of experience: she proved her femininity before she was sixteen. And betwixt the cubs of the village and the young lions of politics is no difference in kind. You vary the allure; but brown eyes are still brown, and ginger is always hot in the mouth. Of these splendid youths Palmer Lovell must perhaps be reckoned with first, he who, for her sake (or so it is said), forsook a young and handsome Viscountess. After a stormy sowing in one field he was now complacently reaping in another. Mr. Germain’s party owned him an acquisition, and the same feeling was to be expected of Mr. Germain’s wife. Lovell constituted himself her Mentor, waited about great stairways for her, attached himself to her side, and sat out all and sundry. He explained himself unaffectedly as a Hope of the Party, and she was very willing to believe him. But somehow the information did not thrill her as it had when she received it from Tristram Duplessis; with the rising of whose light above the firmament sank the orb of Mr. Lovell.
Horace Wing—romantic to the waist, thence downwards dancing master, approved himself in her eyes. He was handsome, affable, an artist in his way. She had an instinct for style; and he had that. He knew where to depart from the tailor’s ideal, which is tightness; he knew where to be loose. He could unbutton a coat to better purpose than any man living—or a phrase, when he saw his way. He always coloured his phrases. You were thought to hear birds in the brake, to see cowslips adrift in a pasture—happy country things—when he discoursed. Some considered his flowers forced, things of the hot-bed. But he was discreet, because really he was timid. The Byron of the Boudoir, Lovell called him, scorning Mr. Wing. But Mrs. Germain, who knew little to Byron’s discredit, and understood boudoirs to be made for two, was much taken with this fine gentleman. On his part, he found her attractive because his world did. He was acutely sensitive to opinion, with the feelers of a woman for it. I don’t mean that he knew what was in fashion—of course he did; but that he could detect what was going to be. There he was almost infallible.
There were others about her—it was quite a little triumph in its way,—whom to name would be tedious. But one was a very great man indeed. Robert John Bernard, Marquis and Earl of Kesteven, a Knight of the Garter, and an Ambassador. Lord Kesteven was no less than sixty-odd years old, had a Marchioness somewhere and three mature children, and a reputation for incisive gallantry second to no man’s. He managed his affairs of the kind deliberately; he had method. When he died it was said that not one single note in a woman’s hand was to be found among his papers. That was not for want of hunting for them: and yet—well, if old Kesteven looked at you twice you were worth looking at. That was said. Now, he looked at Mrs. Germain more than twice.
With these tributes at her feet, with such heady incense in her nostrils, it isn’t wonderful if she attended the coming of Duplessis with assurance of amusement, wondering what offerings he would bring. Real goddesses, we may suppose, take their worship as of right, but a make-believe goddess discovers an appetite for it the more she gets. She felt perfectly ready for Tristram, and more than ready by the time she had him. It seems that he had thought her out—she might have inferred it had she not been piqued by delay—and decided that he must give himself value. At any rate, he did not present himself at Hill-street until the card for her first evening party made it a matter of duty. Then he came, and was received with airy smiles—as if he had been an old crony! He found her to be extremely at ease in his company, was disconcerted, and showed it. He had come as one prepared to be fatigued; he departed with frowns as one who fears that he has been fatiguing. “Good God!” he said to himself, “she’ll be calling me Tristram in a day or two.” He reflected that, if she did that, he was done for; that would show that he had ceased to strike her imagination, had become so much furniture, a sort of house-dog. Deeply mortified, brooding over it, he began to need her. His self-esteem sickened; she only could restore its tone. He became really alarmed about himself, couldn’t work, failed of audacity, missed his spring. He saw her again—he was in a black mood. She rallied him upon it, and sent him away to entertain Lady Barbara, whose rights no man dared dispute.
Lady Barbara accepted him as a target for some of her archery. “I saw that young lady married to our friend”—and she nodded towards their hostess. “You, I fancy, did not. A most hopeless business I thought. I remember a sister with fluffy hair. Hopeless it would have been if she had been clever—but, thank goodness, she’s not. She has just sense enough to be herself; no airs, no smirks nothing to hide. She told old Kesteven all about herself, I hear, at a dinner-party; father, mother, sister Jinny. Kesteven was charmed. That’s a sensible girl, you know, not a clever one, who’d spend herself in scheming how to let bygones be bygones. On the contrary, this girl hoards them, for a relish.”
Tristram looked very glum. Was she hoarding him? For a relish? The old archer went on with her practice.
“Look at her now with Horace Wing. Horace is weaving his gossamers; he thinks she’s enmeshed. She’s not, you know; she’s only pleased. I tell you, she’s exactly what she always was. Once upon a time Tom Styles ‘took notice’ of her, as she would say, hung about the church-door, Sundays. That was a triumph in its way. Now it’s Lovell, or Jocelyn Gunner, or old Kesteven. I don’t suppose she has ever been in love in her life—but I fancy that you can correct me if I am wrong.”
Duplessis faced about. “I? I’m afraid I can’t help you. She knew my people in the country. We were rather friendly; we liked her. I’m glad to think that you do, too.”
“She amuses me,” said Lady Barbara, “and I certainly admire her honesty. Horace Wing won’t, I think. She’ll puzzle him with her gratitude. Horace wants dearer tributes. All you young men do.”
Mr. Germain came up to bow over his friend’s hand. “I’m talking of your speech, Germain,” she told him.