His wife was a vivacious, lively, cheerful person, pleasantly patronizing to all youthful people. She liked young society, and she liked to take such as suited her under her wing, and bring them forward, and encourage them by all kindly means. She was chatting in her own cheerful, sprightly way, with Robert Insches, who held a high place in her favour. She was bent at present on providing him with that indispensable equipment for all young ministers—a wife—and had plans of her own on the subject, of which Robert had a considerable guess; but Robert conquered himself, had full confidence in the fascination of Helen, and felt sure of the ultimate approval of Mrs Whyte.
The first arrival was a sister of Mrs Whyte’s, a widow lady resident at Fendie. She was a querulous person, constitutionally inclined to look at the dark side of everything, a perfect contrast to the happier temper of her sister, but withal not destitute of a kindred kindliness. Only the youthful people patronized by Mrs Gray, were sedulously tutored into a melancholy certainty of the inevitable miseries of the world. She tried, good gloomy woman, to charge the natural atmosphere of hope with the vapoury fears in which she herself found a certain sombre satisfaction, and now and then she was temporarily successful.
The drawing-room was not very much crowded. Besides these, there were only Lilias, Halbert, Helen, and the banker Oswald and his wife.
The last two were invited by Mr Insches for some unexplained reason. They were certainly his very good friends, but that was not the cause; he had many good friends in Fendie quite as eligible; but the Reverend Robert had once or twice encountered William in the immediate vicinity of Mrs Buchanan’s house, and had an idea that his rival, like himself, was kept back by scruples of pride, or by consideration of what “the world” would say. Consequently, William’s parents were invited to-night to show them that the step was taken, that the dignified youthful minister had made up his mind, and that Helen was about to be elevated to the lofty position of Mistress of the Manse.
Helen herself, who had come with some reluctance, felt already uncomfortably hampered by her host’s attentions; there was a slight ostentation in them—a certain consciousness of derogation on his own part, and fear for her, lest the exaltation should dazzle her. Helen kept closely by the side of Lilias, amused, afraid, and suspecting some design upon her.
Mrs Oswald seated herself beside the young friends. The banker kept apart, struggling very vainly against the curiosity which turned his eyes towards this group; he began to feel an interest in watching the colour fluctuate and change on Helen’s cheek, and to understand the half-suppressed, impatient motion and altered attitude, which testified some annoyance under those elaborate courtesies of Robert Insches. Mr Oswald was sadly inconsistent; he had a certain satisfaction in perceiving that these courtesies did not seem particularly acceptable to Helen.
“My dear,” said the plaintive Mrs Gray, addressing Lilias, “I am glad to see you looking so much stronger: but perhaps you are flushed—just a little flushed to-night; you must be very careful as you go home that you don’t take cold.”
“I heard Mrs Mense making a great provision of cloaks for my home-going,” said Lilias, smiling; “they are too careful of me, Mrs Gray. I shall not take cold if my good friends can guard me from it.”
“Well,” said Mrs Gray, “this is a strange world; you will see trouble coming often to those who are most carefully guarded, while others who can use no precautions escape it altogether. Ay, Miss Insches, you may well shake your head; I have seen such things myself.”
Miss Insches had indeed shaken her head sympathetically, because the good-humoured little woman thought some assent was necessary; but on being thus involved as an interlocutor, she looked very guilty and confused, and was by no means sure whether she should have done it or no.