In mediæval times there were oubliettes in all castles, and inconvenient persons were let fall down them to disappear for ever. Did they break their necks in falling? Or did they linger on, fed on bread and water, and languish for years? What did it matter?
They were practically dead when the trap-door closed over their heads.
Every aristocratic, every gentle family has now what was anciently the prerogative of the mightiest barons only. Every family is encumbered with its awkward and troublesome members who must be dropped somewhere.
The Honourable Arminell Inglett had gone down an oubliette, but whether it were the family vault or a social limbo mattered nothing. We are too wise to ask about her. We never do anything inconsistent with good taste. We let sleeping dogs lie, and don’t push inquiries about dropped relatives.
When we are invited to dine at my lord’s, we do not peep to see if the broken meats and half-finished bottles be tumbled down under the feet to be mumbled and drained by the forgotten ones beneath. When we dance at my lady’s Christmas ball, in the state ballroom, we know very well that below it is the family oubliette, but we scuffle with our feet to drown the moans of those mauvais sujets who lie below, and the orchestra sounds its loudest strain to disguise the rattle of their chains.
“My dear husband,” said Arminell, “take Lamerton to see your models. They will interest him, and I will go in with mamma. Besides, you can clear his mind of delusions with respect to the Druids, which is really important. You know that there is a circle of stones on Orleigh Common, and in an unguarded moment the boy might attribute them to the ancient Britons.”
“The matter is not one to joke upon,” said Jingles with a flicker of annoyance in his face.
Then he retreated to the pavilion with his old pupil, to show him the work on which he was engaged.
Arminell, quick in perception, saw that Lady Lamerton had noticed the transient cloud, so she said, with a smile, “Do you remember my husband when he was Giles’s tutor? I mean, do you remember how sensitive he then was, how he winced when you came near him? I have heard of nervous disorders that make men thus susceptible. If you put a finger on them, they scream and writhe; if near them, they quiver with apprehension. He was in like manner touchy. Now, however, he is quite recovered. There is but one single point on which he is sensitive, and where a feather will make him wince.”