Cecil Forrester heard every word of this dialogue. At its commencement he had started to his feet, and if any one could have witnessed his gestures and contortions he would have been deemed a madman. His face flushed and paled, his eyes dilated with anger and flashed with contempt, his lip curled in bitter scorn, and narrowly escaped being bitten through as he gnashed his teeth in impotent rage; he clenched his hands, he tore off the turquoise ring which he had hitherto worn on his little finger as a gage d’amitié from the false beauty, and finally, after exhausting his angry emotions, he flung himself into a seat, with a calm and determined expression of countenance which augured ill for some of the schemes of Miss Laura Oriel.
——
THE DINING-ROOM.
Is there any thing more musical to the ear of the time-sick lounger at a fashionable watering-place than the dinner-bell? Talk of the melody of running streams, the sighing of summer winds, the carol of forest birds! they may be all very pleasant sounds in certain moods of the mind, but for a music which never fails to please, a sound which never falls wearily upon the senses, a voice which is never uttered to a listless ear, commend me to that dinner-bell. The dullest face brightens into something like intelligence, the most confirmed valetudinarian forgets all elegant debility, the most intellectual remember the pressing claims of the physical man, and the most refined of women venture to look somewhat interested in the vulgar duty of dining. The saloon was crowded with company all eager for the summons which was to transform them into eating animals.
“Pray why,” said a gentleman who was somewhat famous for puns, conundrums and such little witticisms, preferring as it seemed to shoot the “rats and mice and such small deer” of literature, because he could draw a long rather than a strong bow; “Pray,” said he in that half suppressed voice which, like a theatrical aside, is sure to be distinctly heard in a crowd, “why is this saloon like the President’s levee? do ye give it up? why it is filled with a crowd of hungry expectants! ha! ha! ha!”
The joke would have been excellent as an after dinner speech, but the audacity of uttering an idle jest while so many persons were keenly alive to one of the sufferings of frail humanity, was very properly punished. No body laughed, and, to his infinite regret, the great Mr. —— saw that he had wasted his wit. The first stroke of the second bell brought all to their feet, as suddenly as if they had been subjected to the power of a galvanic battery. Cecil Forrester, attired with unusual care, all the lurking dandyism of his character fully but not offensively displayed, had been one of the first in the saloon, determined to give Miss Oriel a lesson in indifference. But she did not appear, and, as the band struck up a march, the usual signal for deploying into the dining-room, he took the hand of his neighbor, who happened to be a very pretty woman, and followed the somewhat rapid pace of the procession.
The important business of the dinner-table was half finished: the soup, the fish, even the joints had disappeared, and the voracity of the élégants had given place to fastidiousness as they amused themselves with a bit of ris de veau glacé or a petit pâte de Périgord, when a slight bustle at the door attracted universal attention. A dumpy, over-dressed old lady, leaning on the arm of a delicate, fair-haired girl, entered with that fussy manner so characteristic of an out-of-place feeling, while, immediately following her, with a complexion as cool and fresh as marble, if one could only imagine marble tinged with the rose-tint of youth and health—a complexion such as nothing but a morning bath can give—came the elegant Miss Oriel. There was the very perfection of art in her whole appearance. She had chosen for her entrance the moment when the fierce appetites of those who eat to kill time (and sometimes end by killing themselves) were sufficiently appeased to enable them to admire something else beside the reeking dishes. Among the heated and flushed beauties who sat around the table, with relaxed ringlets and moistened brows, she appeared like some fairy of the fountain, some water nymph fresh from her sub-marine grotto, diffusing about her a cool and refreshing atmosphere as she moved gracefully onward. Her dress was white transparent muslin, which displayed rather than veiled the fine form of her arms, while her neck and shoulders, actually dazzling in their snowy hue and polish, were only shadowed by a single jet-black ringlet, which seemed to have accidentally fallen from the clustering mass gathered at the back of her head. A pale, pearl-like japonica was her only ornament. As she slowly paced the length of the hall to a seat near the head of the table, reserved for her by a well-bribed waiter, a murmur of admiration ran through the apartment. All eyes were fixed upon her, and she knew better than to break the spell of her fascinations by condescending to the vulgar taste for eating; (a brace of woodcock had been sent to her room only an hour previous.) Mrs. Oriel, who seemed determined to make amends for past delay by present haste, sent her plate to be filled and re-filled; but her daughter only trifled with some delicate French combination of odor and tastelessness, and finished the meal by a morsel of Charlotte au russe and Vanilla cream. A glass of iced eau sacré was her only beverage, and she was thus enabled to retain her cool fresh tint even in the heated atmosphere so redolent of spices, and gravies, and vinous distillations.
It was not until just before quitting the table that Miss Oriel allowed herself to see any one in the room. She raised her large soft eyes languidly and beheld, what she had for some time known, that her young friend Ellen was familiarly chatting with Cecil Forrester. A graceful bend of her fair neck and a most lovely smile marked her consciousness of his presence, while Cecil, with a polite but rather careless bow continued his conversation with Miss Grey; being incited to show her peculiar attention by his consciousness that she, as well as himself, was designed to be the tool of the selfish beauty. Miss Oriel was too well schooled to exhibit any surprise at his cool manner, and as her principal object was to attract the attention of Mr. Beauchamp, she gave herself no further thought about the matter at that time.
Mr. Fitzroy Beauchamp, by a kind of “gramerye” which some ignorant people might call impudence, had early established himself at the head of the table, and assumed the manners of a host upon all occasions. He was in fact that most admired, and courted, and flattered of men—the Beau (par excellence) of a watering-place. Reader, if you have ever seen such a person in such circumstances you will be able to imagine his appearance, for he was only one of a rather numerous tribe of ephemera, who appear every summer and waste their little lives in some fashionable resort, whence they vanish with the first northeast wind, and if they do not die, at least evaporate in something like empty air. Mr. Fitzroy Beauchamp (he was very proud of his name, and was known to have refused to dance in the same cotillion with Miss Phebe Pipkin, until his refined taste was soothed by the intelligence that she was the heiress of half a million) was rather diminutive in size, with a remarkably trim figure, and very small feet. He had flaxen hair, elaborately curled, which no one would have suspected to be a wig; and he wore the softest and silkiest of whiskers, which nobody dreamed were an appendage of the self same wig, ingeniously contrived to clasp with springs beneath his chin. His cheek had that delicate peach bloom which rarely outlasts extreme youth, and, in this case, certainly owed much of its richness to a judicious touch of the hare’s foot. His hands were very white and loaded with rings, the gifts, as he asserted, of various fair ladies; so that he might be said to have the history of his conquests at his fingers’ ends. He wore a black dress coat lined with white silk, snow-white inexpressibles, embroidered silk stockings, and pumps diminutive enough to have served for a lady’s slippers. Mr. Fitzroy Beauchamp was what ladies call “a love of a man,” and he was duly grateful for their partiality. To conceal the ravages of time (alas! he had already numbered half a century) and to decorate himself in the most pleasing manner he considered a compliment due to the fair sex, while the proper display of his wealth and luxury was a duty he owed to himself.
He had been wonderfully attracted by the grace and beauty of Miss Oriel. Absorbed in admiration of her easy and modest self-possession, he forgot to ask his former favorite, the pretty and spirituelle Mrs. Dale, to take wine with him, and the lady was quick-sighted enough to discover, and wise enough to smile at the discovery that henceforth her reign over the tilbury was at an end. She was quite right. Soon after dinner Mr. Beauchamp solicited from Cecil Forrester the honor of an introduction to Miss Oriel, and though Cecil would have been ready to fight a duel with a fellow who should thus have presumed after a three days’ acquaintance, had the lady been one whom he really respected, yet he now cordially acquiesced in the wishes of both parties, and with a degree of magnanimity quite surprising to Laura, afforded her exactly the opportunity she had desired. About twenty minutes before sunset—the hour Mr. Beauchamp usually selected for his daily drive—Miss Oriel was handed into the elegant vehicle, and they drove off, leaving several gentlemen in ecstasies at her beauty as she playfully kissed her hand to her dear old fat Mamma, who had bustled out with “my sweet Laura’s cashmere, lest the evening air should injure her delicate health.” Her fears were quite unnecessary. Mr. Beauchamp never drove his horses more than three miles at a time, and had no fancy for hardening his white hands by curbing their impetuosity. He was seldom absent more than half an hour, as his ambition was fully gratified by being envied as he drove off, or dashed up to the door with the best horses before his carriage and the most admired woman at his side.