“Well, when we were at Baden in September last, and E. and I wrote those letters in common to you, I dare say you can fancy what my feelings might have been towards such a beautiful young creature, who has a hundred faults, for which I love her just as much as for the good that is in her. I became dreadfully smitten indeed, and knowing that she was engaged to Lord Kew, I did as you told me you did once when the enemy was too strong for you—I ran away. I had a bad time of it for two or three months. At Rome, however, I began to take matters more easily, my naturally fine appetite returned, and at the end of the season I found myself uncommonly happy in the society of the Miss Baliols and the Miss Freemans; but when Kew told me at Naples of what had happened, there was straightway a fresh eruption in my heart, and I was fool enough to come almost without sleep to London in order to catch a glimpse of the bright eyes of E. N.
“She is now in this very house upstairs with one aunt, whilst the other lets lodgings to her. I have seen her but very seldom indeed since I came to London, where Sir Brian and Lady Anne do not pass the season, and Ethel goes about to a dozen parties every week with old Lady Kew, who neither loves you nor me. Hearing E. say she was coming down to her parents at Brighton, I made so bold as to waylay her at the train (though I didn’t tell her that I passed three hours in the waiting-room); and we made the journey together, and she was very kind and beautiful; and though I suppose I might just as well ask the Royal Princess to have me, I can’t help hoping and longing and hankering after her. And Aunt Honeyman must have found out that I am fond of her, for the old lady has received me with a scolding. Uncle Charles seems to be in very good condition again. I saw him in full clerical feather—at Madame de Moncontour’s, a good-natured body who drops her h’s, though Florac is not aware of their absence. Pendennis and Warrington, I know, would send you their regards. Pen is conceited, but much kinder in reality than he has the air of being. Fred Bayham is doing well, and prospering in his mysterious way.
“Mr. Binnie is not looking at all well: and Mrs. Mack—well, as I know you never attack a lady behind her lovely back, I won’t say a word of Mrs. Mack—but she has taken possession of Uncle James, and seems to me to weigh upon him somehow. Rosey is as pretty and good-natured as ever, and has learned two new songs; but you see, with my sentiments in another quarter, I feel as it were guilty and awkward in company of Rosey and her mamma. They have become the very greatest friends with Bryanstone Square, and Mrs. Mack is always citing Aunt Hobson as the most superior of women, in which opinion, I daresay, Aunt Hobson concurs.
“Good-bye, my dearest father; my sheet is full; I wish I could put my arm in yours and pace up and down the pier with you, and tell you more and more. But you know enough now, and that I am your affectionate son always, C. N.”
In fact, when Mr. Clive appeared at Steyne Gardens stepping out of the fly, and handing Miss Ethel thence, Miss Honeyman of course was very glad to see her nephew, and saluted him with a little embrace to show her sense of pleasure at his visit. But the next day, being Sunday, when Clive, with a most engaging smile on his countenance, walked over to breakfast from his hotel, Miss Honeyman would scarcely speak to him during the meal, looked out at him very haughtily from under her Sunday cap, and received his stories about Italy with “Oh! ah! indeed!” in a very unkind manner. And when breakfast was over, and she had done washing her china, she fluttered up to Clive with such an agitation of plumage, redness of craw, and anger of manner, as a maternal hen shows if she has reason to think you menace her chickens. She fluttered up to Clive, I say, and cried out, “Not in this house, Clive,—not in this house, I beg you to understand that!”
Clive, looking amazed, said, “Certainly not, ma’am; I never did do it in the house, as I know you don’t like it. I was going into the Square.” The young man meaning that he was about to smoke, and conjecturing that his aunt’s anger applied to that practice.
“You know very well what I mean, sir! Don’t try to turn me off in that highty-tighty way. My dinner to-day is at half-past one. You can dine or not as you like,” and the old lady flounced out of the room.
Poor Clive stood rolling his cigar in sad perplexity of spirit, until Mrs. Honeyman’s servant Hannah entered, who, for her part, grinned and looked particularly sly. “In the name of goodness, Hannah, what is the row about?” cries Mr. Clive. “What is my aunt scolding at? What are you grinning at, you old Cheshire cat?”
“Git long, Master Clive,” says Hannah, patting the cloth.
“Get along! why get along, and where am I to get along to?”