“Yes, I saw she had got judiciously out of hearing,” said young Selby, with another laugh. “That’s the first duty of a chaperon.”
In this he meant no particular offence, but spoke with the rough bantering which was not disliked by ordinary country girls, just sharpened with jealousy and envy, and the sting of seeing how thoroughly harmonious and sympathetic Liddy and her new companion looked. As for Brotherton he kept apart as far as he could. Good manners in another generation would have suggested a use of his whip. Good manners now restrained him from taking any notice, though his blood boiled.
“I don’t know about a chaperon’s duties,” Liddy said; “I think we must go on. Good morning, Mr. Selby,” and they went on, leaving him in the middle of the road, staring. He could not help looking after them, though he did not like the sight. Two handsome young people, in complete accord and harmony, moving along together as if to music, with no noise nor boisterous gaiety, as would have been the case had Selby himself ridden home with Liddy after the party, but in perfect friendliness and union, as he thought.
“Good morning,” he called after them, “and my congratulations to Joan upon her success last night.”
He was so bitter that he could not forbear from sending this last shaft after them. Who was this fellow, that he should come in and spoil other people’s chances? Selby recalled furiously to his recollection, incidents of a similar kind that he had known. A swell comes down, he pokes himself between a foolish lass and some honest man that likes her; and when he has turned her head he rides away! The country gallant was aware that he had acted this fine part himself in a lower class, when he had merely laughed at the lass’s credulity and the fury of the clown who was her true lover, but whom she could not endure after being courted by a gentleman; but he did not laugh when the case was his own. This swell, of course, would go away; but Liddy’s head would be turned; and she was a girl who would have a good bit of money, besides being the prettiest girl in the county. Joscelyn had been making money of late, everybody said, and there was her Uncle Henry’s money, which must be divided sooner or later; and all this to be put out of an honest suitor’s reach by a young fellow who would not even take it himself, but only spoil the lass for a better man. This was what was rankling in Selby’s heart as he rode away.
“Is Mr. Selby a relation of yours?” Brotherton asked.
“Only of Joan’s—my sister’s—husband. It is not bragging,” said Lydia, with a little blush, yet a slight elevation of her head as well, “but we are very different from the Selbys, Mr. Brotherton. Many people thought Joan made a very poor marriage. I don’t think so, for she is fond of Philip, and he is so good; but the Joscelyns are the oldest family—I don’t speak out of vanity—the oldest family in the county. We used to be great people,” said Liddy, laughing, but very serious all the same, “in the old days.”
“I always knew,” said Brotherton, “that it was an old name.”
“Oh, there are all sorts of people who have old names; but we are the real people; if you stay long we will show you the old tower. There have been Joscelyns in it ever since there was any history at all.”
She gave her head a slight fling backwards, and laughed again, half at herself—but yet Lydia meant every word she said. Young Brotherton, for his part, had been brought up in more enlightened circles, and would have thought of himself that he failed in that “sense of humour” which is the modern preservation from all absurdities, had he spoken of his family in this way. He held his tongue on the subject, and thought that he esteemed one name as much as another, and was no respector of persons; and he laughed in his heart at Lydia’s brag, and admired, with an indulgent sense of superiority, to see how this sentiment of family pride kindled her eyes and elevated her head. But all the same he was impressed by it. It produced its effect upon him, as it does upon every Englishman. He liked the boast, of which he did not fail to see the ludicrous side, and which his more cultivated taste would have entirely prevented him from putting forth in his own person—but in Liddy he liked it, and laughed, yet was more pleased with her and his connection with her. She carried it in her face, he thought, and in every movement of her untutored, yet graceful, carriage. It did not occur to him to think that homely Joan, soberly speeding along the road in her phaeton, had all the same advantages of blood.