"It is said that he did not want to come to town; hates it. Only, her heart was set upon it, and he can't deny her anything."
"Oh, that's it, is it," returned Lord Winchester.
That was it. Selina Dalrymple, the bride of a month or two, had made Oscar promise that they should spend part of the season in town. Vain, giddy, and thoughtless, Selina's heart was revelling in the pleasures of this London life, her head turned with the admiration she received. Alas! she had all too speedily forgotten the tragical end of her once-loved brother, though it came but a year ago. Amidst all this whirl of gaiety there was no time to remember that.
Mrs. Dalrymple's carriage had continued its course. It was now on its way to her dressmaker's, Madame Damereau. Dead now, and the once large business dispersed, Madame Damereau, a Frenchwoman, was famous in that gone-by day. An enormous custom—clientèle she used to call it—had she. Her house was handsome, and, so far as its appearance went, strictly private. It was in a private street, amidst other handsome houses, and there was nothing to betray its business except the brass-plate on the wide mahogany door—"Madame Damereau." It was as handsome inside as out; its rooms were a mixture of Parisian taste and English comfort, with their velvet carpets, rich crimson furniture, brilliant mirrors, and ornamental objects of porcelain, all delicate landscape painting and burnished gold. Surely, rooms so elaborately fitted up were not needed to carry on the business of a milliner and dressmaker, great though that business was! Needed or not, there they were. Madame Damereau had taste, and liked them. There was a hall and a reception-room; and a painted glass-door at the end of a passage, as the clientèle turned to ascend a handsome staircase that led to the show-rooms; through which glass-door might be caught glimpses of a paved court with green shrubs and plants. Above the stairs came an anteroom, and a trying-on room—and I know not how much more. Madame Damereau was as fascinating, in her line, as Mrs. Dalrymple in hers. Ask the ladies who were for ever paying her visits, and they would tell you that, once within reach of the fascinations of herself and her show-rooms, there they were contentedly fixed; there was no getting away, and there was no trying to get away. Madame's expenses were very great, and she had feathered her nest pretty well: somebody paid for it. When madame's nest should be sufficiently well feathered—or what she would consider so—it was her intention to return to La Belle France—pays chéri!—and quit England and its natives—les barbares!—for ever. Every thought of madame had reference to this enchanting finale: not a dress did she make, a bonnet sell, a mantle improvise, but the charges for them (very high generally) were elaborated with this one desirable end in view. Apart from this propensity to gain, madame was not bad at heart. Very good, in fact; and many a little kindness did she enact in private, especially to her poor countrymen and women domiciled here. What though she did stick on ruinous prices for those who could pay?—a person must live. Que voulez-vous?
There had been a Monsieur Damereau once upon a time. He had something to do with the theatres, though not in the way of acting. But he grew too fond of English porter and of fingering madame's profits. Madame inveigled him into a journey to Paris with her; let him have his fling a little while, and one fatal morning the poor deluded man woke to find that he and his wife were two; she had obtained a separation from him "de corps et de biens." Madame returned to England the same day, and what became of him she neither knew nor cared; except that he regularly drew the annuity she allowed to him, and which was to cease if he ever reset his foot in the British Isles.
At the period of which we are writing, a great mania had seized upon the gay London world. That other mania, admiration for Oscar Dalrymple's wife, which chiefly concerned the men, was but a small and private one; this was public and universal, and pertained to the women. It was a love for dress. A wild, rampant love for extravagant dress, not to be controlled within any limit. No fever yet known was like unto it; and Madame Damereau blessed it heartily, and petted it, and nursed it, and prayed—good Catholic that she was!—that it might never abate. We who have come to a certain age (than which nothing was ever more uncertain) can remember this, and the commotion it wrought. It was not the ordinary passion for finery that obtains in the beau monde, more or less, at all times, that is prevailing now, but something worse—different. In truth it was a very madness; and it ruined thousands. Few had fallen into this insidious snare as completely as Mrs. Oscar Dalrymple. Bred up in the country, in simplicity and comparative seclusion, London and its attractions had burst upon her with irresistible power, dazzling her judgment, and taking captive her senses. The passion for dress had been born with Selina. No wonder, therefore—example is so contagious, rivalry so rife in the human heart—that it had, with its means of gratification, seized frantic hold of her; just as another passion had formerly seized upon and destroyed her unfortunate brother. Not caring particularly for her husband, the world's homage had become as second life to her vain (and somewhat empty) mind; and of course she must dress accordingly and go out at all times and seasons armed for conquest. At breakfast gatherings; in afternoon visits; at teas, I was going to say, but kettledrums had not then come into vogue; in the parks, at dinners, at the play, and in the ball-room, she would be conspicuous for the freshness and beauty of her toilette.
Does the reader remember a remark made by Miss Upton, of Court Netherleigh? "Selina Dalrymple is more fond of dress than a Frenchwoman. Want of sense and love of finery often go together."
Poor Oscar Dalrymple, knowing nothing of the mysteries of a lady's toilette, or its cost, was content to admire his wife's as did other men. And, it may be, that no thought ever intruded itself into Selina's mind of the day of reckoning that must inevitably come.