“I can’t see that,” cried Raymond; “not a bit. It doesn’t take much education to spend a great fortune, when a fellow has to make his own way like me; I should think there was nothing so jolly as to have a lot of money, so much that you never could get through it; by Jove! I wonder how it feels,” he said, with a laugh. To this question, if it was a question, Lucy made no reply. It was the subject upon which she could talk best; but she was not a great talker, and Raymond was a kind of being very far off from her, whom she did not understand.
“I don’t think there is much more to see,” he said; “there is not much. I can’t think what my mother meant to show you in the garden. Would you like to go back and try a game? I’ll teach you, if you like. I suppose I may say you will ride to the picnic? Emmie will go (as well as she knows how), and I—”
“If Jock may come, too.”
“Oh,” cried Raymond, “there will be no want of chaperons, you know. My mother is coming, and no doubt some more old ladies. It will be all right, you know,” said the youth with a laugh. This speech made Lucy ponder, but confused her mind rather than enlightened it. She went back to the lawn with him into the midst of the croquet-players, with very little more conversation, and Mrs. Rushton, looking on anxiously, gnashed her teeth behind the tea-urn. “He did not seem to me to find a word to say to her,” she lamented afterward; “what’s the good of spending all that money on a boy’s education, if at the end of it he can’t say a word for himself.” And her husband answered with those comforting words which husbands have the secret of. “You had much better let scheming alone,” he said. “You will put me in a false position if you don’t mind, and you’ll never do any good to yourself.” We are ashamed to say the monosyllable was “Stuff!” which Mrs. Rushton replied.
But the afternoon was very pleasant to Lucy; and Jock enjoyed it too, after awhile, learning the game much more quickly than his sister, and getting into an excitement about it which she did not share. The little fellow remained in the foreground brandishing a mallet long after the party had melted away, and took possession of the lawn altogether, tyrannizing over the little Rushtons, when Lucy was taken in to dinner with the grown-up members of the family. “Mrs. Rushton says you may come with me, Jock,” Lucy said; but Jock resisted strenuously. “It is only when you go we can have a real game; you are all duffers,” said the little boy, with a contempt which he was much in the habit of showing to his sister. Thus they were launched upon life and society in Farafield. Mrs. Rushton proposed the brougham to Lucy when the time came to go home, but, on hearing that she would prefer to walk, declared that she too was dying for a little fresh air, and that the cool of the evening was delightful. Then they sallied forth in a body, Raymond by Lucy’s side. It was all very pleasant. He was not a brilliant talker, indeed, but Lucy did not want anything very brilliant, and what with the little pricks and stimulants provided by his mother, who walked behind, Raymond excelled himself. It was cheerful even to see the little party making its way along the cool twilight ways, with soft interchange of voices and laughter, little Jock again holding his sister’s hand, while Raymond was skillfully poked and bantered into talk. If it was a scheme it was not very deeply laid, and meant nothing cruel. Would not Raymond Rushton be a perfectly good match for her, should it come to pass? and why should not Raymond have the great fortune as well as another? His mother felt all the glow of virtuous consciousness in her breast. He was a good son, and would make a good husband. In every way, even in respect to family and position, old Trevor’s daughter in marrying Raymond would do very well for herself.
CHAPTER XXXV.
POPULARITY.
Lucy found the picnic very amusing. She had never known any of the delights of society; and the gay party in the Abbey ruins, and the ride—though Emmie did not know in the least how to sit her pony, and Raymond rode a tall and gaunt animal of extremely doubtful race, which might have drawn a fly, or a hearse, for anything his appearance said to the contrary—was pleasant all the same. The party was not very large, but it included the best people in Farafield; and among others the rector and his family, who were all very gracious to Lucy. “You must not forget that I am partially your guardian,” the rector said. “If you flirt I have a right to pull you up. If you distinguish one young fellow more than another I shall probably ask what are your intentions? So beware,” he cried, laughing and holding up a finger of warning. And all the rectory girls were as friendly as if they had possessed a brother, which unfortunately was not the case. “If there had been a boy among us, of course he should have tried for the prize,” they all said with cheerful frankness, which Mrs. Rushton did not relish.
Lucy, however, had a guardian who was more alarming than the rector. Out of civility to her, Philip had been asked, and Philip conducted himself in a way which called forth the dire displeasure of all who had any intentions upon Lucy’s peace. He was always appearing wherever she went, stalking continually across the scene, like a villain in a theater, appearing suddenly when least expected. “What was the fellow afraid of?” the rector said; “he had no chance; he was not even in the running.” But he was Lucy’s cousin, and in this capacity he was privileged to push forward, to make his way through a group, to call to her familiarly to “come and see” something, or even to persuade her that the thing she was invited to do on the other hand was impossible. “You can’t go there, Lucy, the mud would be up to your knees; come this way and I’ll show you all you want;” or, “You never will be able for that climb, I will show you an easier way.” Thus Philip, who had been so irreproachable and popular, made himself disagreeable in society for the first time. Perhaps the chief cause of it was that Katie was there. He had taken himself sharply to task after that, one evening of enchantment, which was so new and so unusual that he had given way to it without an effort. The more delicious it was, the more Philip had taken himself to task. He tried to analyze it, and make out how it was that he had been so deeply affected. A reasonable man, he said to himself, must be able to give an account of all the mental processes he passed through; but here was a mental process which was inexplicable. Every interest, every argument, pointed to Lucy as the object of his thoughts. And now that he saw Lucy among other people, and observed the court that was paid to her, it became intolerable to Philip to think of a stranger who had had nothing to do with the family, carrying her off and her fortune, which belonged to the Rainys. He could not think of such a thing with composure. For himself he liked Lucy well enough, and probably the most suitable arrangement in the circumstances for both of them would have been the mariage de convénance, which is not allowed as a natural expedient in England, in name at least. But when he remembered the evening at the Terrace, when he had been so foolish, Philip could not understand himself. On various occasions he had attempted to analyze it—what, was it? Lucy had blue eyes as well as Katie Russell, she was about the same height. To be sure her hair did not curl, and during the course of his analysis he recollected with dangerous distinctness the blowing out of the curls in the soft evening breeze. But who could analyze a curl, or understand how such an insignificant detail could give softness to the air, and melody to the wind, and make the very stars in heaven look their best? One of the rector’s daughters had a great many curls, far more complete articles than the curls of Katie, but they did not produce the same effect.
After this unsuccessful attempt at analysis, Philip kept himself away from Katie, and kept watch upon his cousin. He was determined to appropriate the one, and if he could help, not so much as to see the other. It was the easiest way. But these two objects together made the picnic a very harassing and painful pleasure to the young school-master. When Raymond Rushton was pushed by his mother’s exertions to Lucy’s side, Philip did not fail to do his best to hustle him politely away. He was constantly at hand with an appeal to Lucy. At least he was determined that everybody should see he had a claim upon her, and a prior claim to all the rest of the world. But still he could not but remain conscious of the presence of the other girl. In all the guarded and careful intercourse which he had previously had with society in Farafield, as a man on his promotion, and anxiously attentive to rules, Philip had never asserted himself, never put himself into undue prominence, never presumed upon the kindness of the friends who were at the same time his patrons, before. But it could not be denied that he made himself disagreeable about Lucy that afternoon; her name was continually on his lips. He would let her have no rest. He stepped in front of everybody, broke up all the groups of which she formed a part, and followed her with vigilant watch everywhere. Had his relationship to the heiress turned his head, or was it possible that he thought himself worthy of all that fortune, that he thought she would choose him for the partner of her splendor, the company asked each other? “I am sure it is a thing to which Mr. Rushton for one would never give his consent,” said the giver of the feast. The rector was not quite so certain. “After all it would be no mésalliance, for they are exactly in the same position,” he said; but then it was well known the rector looked upon his association with Lucy’s other guardians as more a joke than a serious duty. Talks were going on about her in almost every group, everybody was interested in the great heiress; people wished to be introduced to her, as if the poor little girl had been a notability, and so to be sure she was.
The riding party went off rather earlier than the others, and before the whole party was got under way a considerable time elapsed. Philip had insisted upon putting his cousin into her saddle himself; he was not clever at so unusual an office, and he could not help feeling, when she was gone, that he had not done himself any good by his assiduities. He was as sensitive as a thermometer to the fluctuation of public opinion, and he perceived at once that he had done himself harm. The company in general were not unwilling to let him see that nobody particularly wanted him, and that though they were kind and invited him, they did not expect any very great advantage from his presence. Thus Philip spent the interval in wandering about in a somewhat vague manner, not sought by any one. He could never tell how it was that, at last he found himself in one of the carriages by Katie Russell’s side. He had not done it, nor had she done it, for Katie was greatly piqued by the persistent way in which he had avoided her, and her pride was up in arms; but when he turned his head and saw, in the gathering dusk, the little twist of the curl which he had been so utterly unable to analyze, a sudden change of sentiment, still farther beyond the reach of analysis, came over Philip. How was it? nothing more illogical, more unreasonable, ever happened to a philosophical school-master. Instead of the uncomfortable state of effort in which he had spent the day, the young man’s soul glided back in a moment into that curious lull of enchantment which had come over him at the Terrace. Once more the very air grew balmy and caressing, the earth smelled sweet, the night wind blew in his face like a caress, and all the individual sounds about ran into one hum of happiness, and satisfaction, and peace. No cause for it! only the fact, that it was that girl, and not another who sat, next him in the break, among all the chattering and the laughter. Was there ever any cause so inadequate? but this was how it was. The carriage stopped opposite the Terrace to put down Katie. She had only a little way to walk from that point to the White House, which shone faintly through the darkness with a few lights in the windows. Philip did not quite know how, but somehow he had made his peace with Katie, and he it was who jumped down to help her out, and constituted himself her escort. They walked again side by side down the same enchanted road.