“You might try the girl’s voice after supper, Stephen.”
My lord was very ready. He had a bass of rich compass, like the voice of a popish priest chanting in some glorious choir.
“Herrick should be the man for Barbara. Soft, delicate lyrics, with an amorous droop of the eyelids. Poor Lionel was too fond of the old Cavalier ditties.”
Barbara looked at him with sombre, widely opened eyes. It was not often of late that she had heard him speak her father’s name. And that night it woke a flare of exultant anger in her, because of the touch of patronage, as though the dead could always be safely pitied.
“Well, then, let us go to the music-room,” said her mother. “I will ring to have candles lit.”
My lord wiped his mouth daintily and laughed.
“Next month there will be no lights needed, but chaste Diana peeping through the casements and wishing she was not cursed with so prudish a reputation.”
They wandered out into the garden, where a great slant of golden light came over the trees and made the grass vivid, even to violet in the shadows. Barbara walked a little apart, like one whose thoughts went silently to meet the night. Now and again she glanced at my lord, when his eyes were off her, with an earnestness that might have puzzled him had he noticed it.
It was Mrs. Jael who came out with a tinder-box and lit the candles in the music-room. Barbara watched her through the window, noticing, almost unconsciously, the woman’s double chin, and loose, lying, voluble mouth. She was watching Mrs. Jael when my lord took her by the elbow playfully and turned her toward the portico.
“Come, Mistress Jet and Ivory, we must see how you fancy Parson Herrick.”