“And she did not speak to you! She did not think it an honour, the greatest honour that could have been done her—”
“Why should she think it an honour? It was her wedding-day. She was the first person to be thought of. And I did not mean to see her, at least, to speak to her. I did not mean that Arthur should find me out. Oh!” cried Lucy, with sudden compunction, “I retract all I said just now. When she came into the church, before she knew that I was there, she did not look bold. She looked beautiful, yes, beautiful! happy and serious, and not thinking who was there. Just, I should think, as a girl who is going to be married ought to look,” said Lucy, with a soft mantling of colour, less than a blush, impersonal, meaning the soft thrill of fellow-feeling, nothing more.
“But afterwards—you thought her bold?—who is she? Did you see her people? Has she any people?” said Bertie, “that is almost as important as herself.”
Lucy gave a slight shudder, which was not thrown away upon her companion. She had scarcely seen the rest of the Bates’ at the time, but now the peculiarities of the other members of the group seemed to come back to her with the retrospective memory which excitement possesses. She could see them now—the shabby father upon whom that beautiful girl leant, the mother in her Paisley shawl, and the flippant Sarah Jane. These were the “people” of her brother’s wife. She made no reply, and her cousin went on.
“What a blessing that so much of the estate is entailed! Radicals may speak as they please about the law of entail, but how many old families would be kept up without? Fortunately, however angry my uncle might be, he has no power to punish Arthur; at least it cannot but be a moderate punishment. So long as he has Oakley—”
“He has not Oakley, Cousin Bertie. I wish you would not always talk of the time when papa will be gone. We may all be gone before him for anything we know;” and once more she put out her two fingers under the folds of her warm jacket to avert the omen. The Rector caught the movement and laughed.
“You are superstitious, Lucy. Why do you make that mystic sign at me?”
“I am not superstitious—it is to avert superstition;” she said quickly, with an idea that she was giving a reason. “But I don’t like a conversation that is all occupied with what will happen when papa is——, or that discusses my brother as if—You may think me fanciful if you please, but I do not like it. I should not talk about Uncle Anthony’s—to you.”
She would not say the words death or dying, but left them to the imagination.
“You may say whatever you please to me,” said the Rector softly, with a smile, and so far as concerned his father’s death anyone might have discussed it. General Curtis had not much to leave, it was not his end that would work any great change one way or other in the world. His sons would receive their pittance, and there would be no more about it. She might talk of it as long as she pleased, and the Rector’s feelings would not be much affected. But this was not the impression that Hubert Curtis wished to produce upon his cousin. He meant to say you may say what you please—you are privileged, there is nothing that I would not accept from you.