“Then it really wasn’t you who made him go to Egypt?” Mrs. Carpenter persisted.
“No. I am very much flattered at being mistaken for the War Office, but it wasn’t me. I should like to take the credit for ridding the country of the dullest regiment in England, but I am afraid I can’t truthfully.”
“That is very sarcastic of you, dear Amy, but I know you don’t like soldiers,” said Mrs. Carpenter affectionately. “You have never mixed with them enough to know how honest and simple they are. What do you think of General Fulton, though, really and truly? He is an odd sort of man, isn’t he? I get on with him very well because I love his humour and we have great arguments together, but I know he is not popular as a rule. He is very naughty in the things he says to her sometimes, and she never seems to see. Emmie Trotter doesn’t like her at all; she thinks she is not genuine, but I don’t think that. I think she is perfectly sincere in the work she does but I don’t think she is business-like. Someone told me that Evan Hatton is coming back and going into business. Had you heard of it?”
“Yes, I had heard that,” said Mrs. Vachell. “And Teresa has given up her work with Emma and is going to study unemployment from the most favourable standpoint, by having nothing to do. She is very lucky, I think, though I couldn’t do it myself.”
“You mean you don’t care for the Varens’?”
“I know nothing about them one way or the other. He used to be in and out of the University, I don’t know what for; learning to make chemical manures perhaps; but I never saw much of him. He belongs to what Mrs. Harding calls the ‘polo set’ and they don’t interest me.”
“Oh, now, some of them are very charming and delightful. All the Brackenbury set are dears. Bobo, as they call him, is a splendid player and a real dear boy. However, the Duke says he can’t afford to let him play next year and he must do something. You have heard about the girls setting up an inn, haven’t you? It is a pity, I think, but as Bobo says, what are you to do? He pretends he is going to run a circus, but seriously, I’m sure I don’t know. They can’t keep themselves in the army now, not even in the Guards. But David Varens—how did we get off the track——? He is all right, apparently. His father seems to have left him plenty of money, and of course he is not extravagant like Bobo and that terrible elder brother. Wasn’t it dreadful about him! Did you say Teresa is going to give up all her work as soon as she marries? Now I do think that is a great mistake, don’t you? All the more reason she should go on with it now that she will have money. Of course I can see that she couldn’t come in every day in the same way, but there is no reason why she shouldn’t visit and take an interest in it all. A few meetings would be good for her and prevent her from getting self-centred.”
The door opened and Mr. Vachell was heard to say, “Come in. I think my wife is in here,” and Teresa walked into the room, followed by the little man with a pile of books. “I was bringing these back,” she said to Mrs. Vachell. “They are some that you lent to Evangeline and she had forgotten about them. I am so sorry. I met Mr. Vachell on the step and he brought me up, but I am afraid I mustn’t stay.”
“Yes, you must,” said Mrs. Vachell. “I haven’t seen any of you for so long and Mrs. Carpenter was saying just now that I am given credit for all sorts of things in your family—for Captain Hatton’s regiment being sent to Egypt and—what else was it, Mrs. Carpenter? I have just told her that I never see you, but she is still suspicious.”
Teresa frowned and blushed and had nothing to say for a minute. Then she turned on Mrs. Carpenter in sudden wrath. “I do wish women wouldn’t be sweet when they want to make mischief,” she said. “I never knew anything like this place. It is like a lot of flies walking in muck and then settling on the jam.” The expression on Mrs. Carpenter’s face moved her to compunction, and she stopped. After all, the woman had had children and battled with pain and death and denied herself for her fellow-creatures in more ways than Teresa, for she had no love of them to carry her over the discomforts of bearing other people’s burdens. If she did gossip and preach and plume herself by the way, she was entitled to that relaxation, knowing no other. So long as Britons never shall be slaves let us allow the Potters their public-house, the Carpenters their tea-table, the Fisks their blood and the passionate philanthropists their feast of reason and flow of soul. The Emma Gainsboroughs will go on patiently and methodically clearing up, taking no notice of themselves, and by-and-bye, as Susie so often justly remarked, “Anything that is really good is sure to make the rest seem so small in comparison.”