It was a Lover and His Lass

by Mrs. Oliphant

"I have yet to learn," said Miss Margaret, drawing herself up, "that a title would make any difference to a Murray of Murkley; we are well enough known without that."

"Oh! but, Margaret, you should be my lady," cried Lilias, springing up and making curtseys in pure wantonness all round the room. "Miss is not suitable for you. Mistress would be better, or Madam, but my lady best of all. I think Jean is a wise woman; and if the queen—"

"You are a grand judge of wisdom," said her sister. "Jean and you, you might just go in a show together, the female Solomon and the person that explains the oracle; but you will just go to your bed, and take a good rest, for it will be a fatiguing day to-morrow. You will have plenty to do looking after your dress, and remembering your manners, without taking it upon you to give your advice to Her Majesty, who has been longer at the trade than you."

"To-morrow!—is it really to-morrow? Oh!" cried Lilias, "when I come before her I will forget everything: and what will she say to me?" This made the elder sister look a little confused, but she had herself but little idea what the royal lady would do in the circumstances; and the safest plan was to send Lilias to bed.

Next morning it was a sight to see the two débutantes. Miss Margaret had a train of velvet sweeping from her shoulders that made her look, Lilias declared, like Margaret of Anjou, though why this special resemblance was hit upon, the young lady declined to say. As for herself, in clouds of virgin white, it seemed to her sisters that nothing had ever been seen so lovely as this little lily, who would, however, have been more aptly termed a rose, with the colour of excitement coming and going upon her cheeks, her eyes like dew with the sun on it, her dazzling sweetness of complexion. Perhaps her features were not irreproachable, perhaps her little figure wanted filling out; but at seventeen these are faults that lean to virtue's side. She was dazzling to behold in that first exquisite youthful bloom, which is like nothing else in the world. When she came into the room where they were awaiting her, she made them a curtsey to show her perfection, her face running over with smiles. And then Lilias grew grave, a flutter came to her child's heart. Her eyes grew serious with the awe of a neophyte on the edge of the mysteries of life.

"When I come back I will be a woman," she said, with a little catch of her breath.

"No, no, not till you are one-and-twenty, my darling," cried Jean, who did not always know when to hold her peace.

"I shall be a woman," Lilias repeated. "I shall be introduced to the world—I shall be able to go where I please——"

"There may be two words about that," said Margaret, interfering; "but this is not a time for discoursing. So just you gather up your train, Lilias, and let us go away."

Miss Jean went downstairs after them; she watched them drive away, waving her hand. She thought Margaret was just beautiful notwithstanding her age. "But, after all, forty is not such an extraordinary age," Jean said to herself; and, as for Lilias, words could not express what her sister felt. The Court must be splendid indeed, and a great deal of beauty in it, if two ladies like that were not observed. She took out her table-cover, which had been much neglected, and sat down at the window and arranged her silks as of old. There was no carnation now for a pattern, but indeed she was done with that flower. When a woman has seen her best-beloved go forth in full panoply to conquer, and feels the domestic silence close down upon herself, there is, if she is the kind of woman, an exquisite repose and pleasure in it. The mother who comes out to the door to watch her gay party go away, and, closing it again with all their pleasure in her mind, goes back to the quiet, either to work for them or to wait for them, has her share both real and vicarious, and doubles the pleasure. She goes with them along the way, she broods over their happiness at home. Miss Jean, who was this kind of woman, had thus a double share, and worked into her flowers the serene and delicious calm, the soft expectation, the flutter of an excitement out of which everything harsh was gone. She could not help thinking that it would be a real pleasure to Her Majesty, who had girls of her own and a kind heart, to see such a creature as Lilias just in the opening of her flower. The Queen would be glad to know that General Murray had left such representatives, though, no doubt, she would be sorry there was no son. Jean felt too, modestly, that it was always possible, seeing Margaret and Lilias, and admiring them as she must, that Her Majesty might graciously ask whether there was no more of a family, and command that "next time" the other sister should be brought to see her. "But, oh, she would be disappointed in me!" Miss Jean said to herself. All these thoughts kept her amused and happy, so that she wanted no other entertainment. She even forgot Lewis and the confidence which had so touched her heart. She thought it so likely that some young duke, some glorious lord in waiting, would clasp his hands together and say, in the very presence chamber, "Here, by God's word, is the one maid for me." Lewis had floated from her mind, which was beguiled by higher things.