“It is a delightful discovery,” said young Brotherton. “How fortunate that I mentioned it now; my father charged me to find out—but I confess I had forgotten till this moment. How lucky I thought of it! I am afraid I must go home to-night with these good people who have been so kind to me; but I will come back in the morning. It is delightful to fall among kindred,” the young man said, looking at Lydia, whose face reflected all manner of pleasant sensations, surprises, a delightful sense of novelty and exhilaration. She had but few relatives, and a new cousin was delightful—especially a cousin so completely creditable, a gentleman, one about whom there could not be two opinions. The Pilgrims, who had been so proud of this “strange young man,” had altogether disappeared now, and Raaf was left entirely out of the little group of three, all so pleased with themselves and each other. Joan forgot even those duties which usually she performed with such devotion, leaving the round game and its players to themselves, and no longer thinking either of the duet of the Pilgrim girls, or Raaf’s song.
“I took the greatest notice of you from the moment you came in,” she said. “I cannot tell you how it was. It’s not that there is any family likeness, for I can’t see any. Liddy favours mother, and there’s not a feature alike in her and you; but all the same I took notice of you from the first. I didn’t catch your name, or it might have made me think—but there was something. I was more vexed than pleased with those Pilgrims; but all the same, when I caught sight of you——”
“It was kindred at first sight,” said the young man.
“That’s a new way of putting it,” said Joan, laughing; and it glanced through her mind that she had already thought, if he had not been with the Pilgrims, that this might be the right sort of man; and now it was clear that he did not belong to the Pilgrims. She gave a rapid glance from him to Lydia, and back again. As yet she had not the least idea who he was. She had never seen any of the Brotherton connections, and knew nothing about them. Mrs. Joscelyn had often told her children that she had no relations nearer than cousins, and with them even she had kept up no acquaintance. Her children were entirely in the dark about the family. They knew that there was a Sir John who gave dignity to it; but that was all. Joan was very straightforward, but she did not like to plunge at once into details, and ask him who he was. But when she had talked a great deal to the new relative, and arranged the expedition to the White House to-morrow, she went back to Mrs. Pilgrim, who sat somewhat deserted in her corner, a little humiliated by the desertion of her “gentleman,” with the most cheerful cordiality. “I did not catch the gentleman’s name,” she said, “when you brought him in; but what a good thing you brought him! He’s a cousin of ours, and came here looking for mother; for her own friends live far away, and we’ve long lost sight of them. Of course,” said Joan, with a little artifice, “he had no notion whose house he was coming to. There’s always a great confusion in a family about your married name.”
“Came here—looking for——? I thought he came looking for a place for the shooting,” Mrs. Pilgrim said, confounded. She could scarcely allow herself to believe it. It had been a distinction to bring a new “gentleman,” a person of such distinguished appearance, in her train; and to have him taken from her bodily, nay, carried off soul and body, so to speak, not indeed to her enemy’s side, but at all events into another family, was hard to bear.
CHAPTER III.
CONFIDENCES.
THEY were still at breakfast at Heatonshaw next morning when the new cousin came to the door. He was on a good horse, which was a thing they all remarked at once, being learned in such matters—and looked handsomer in daylight than he had done at night. The household had been late on the previous evening—a party being a matter of such rare occurrence that it was considered only right to make the best of it, both in kitchen and parlour, and to bustle half the night “putting away.” The whole company had dispersed at a little after eleven; but next morning there was as much license as if it had been the morning after a ball. And the household felt equally dissipated; everything is comparative; eleven o’clock at night was in Heatonshaw as bad as three or four in the morning at another place. So they were still around the breakfast table when young Brotherton rode up.
“That’s not Pilgrim’s horse,” Mr. Selby said. “It must be out of his own stables; and he did not get that for nothing.” Even Liddy got up from where she was sitting, a little out of the way, to peep at the new arrival. He came in a few minutes after whip in hand.
“You are not so early, Mrs. Selby, as I feared. I made a very early start lest you should be gone before I could get here.”
“We are not so early as all that,” said Joan, “and we’re not used to have our home disturbed, and the house turned upside-down, as it was last night. I’m one that thinks it a duty, where people have a nice house and plenty to do with, to have your friends from time to time. But it’s a great trouble both before and after. Not a servant in this house was in their bed till long past twelve o’clock at night; and, poor things, we could not be exacting this morning,” Joan added, apologetically. “Liddy, if Mr. Brotherton will not take anything, we will, maybe, better get ready to go.”