Maugre her sorrow, there were few happier maidens in England than Mary May, even though her service was distracted by the claims of three slave-owners at once, bound as she was, to Ethel, by habitual fidelity, to Harry, by eager adoration, to Blanche, by willing submission. Luckily, their requisitions (for the most part unconscious) seldom clashed, or, if they did, the two elders gave way, and the bride asserted her supremacy in the plenitude of her youthful importance and prosperity.
Thus she carried off Mary in her barouche to support her in the return of bridal calls, while the others were organizing a walk to visit Flora and the rifle target. Gertrude’s enthusiasm was not equal to walking with a weapon that might be loaded, nor to being ordered out to admire the practice, so she accompanied the sisters; Tom was reading hard; and Ethel found herself, Aubrey, and the sailor, the only ones ready to start.
This was a decided treat, for Aubrey and she were so nearly one, that it was almost a tete-a-tete with Harry, though it was not his way to enter by daylight, and without strong impulse, on what regarded himself, and there were no such confidences as those to Mary on the previous night; but in talking over home details, it was easier to speak without Tom’s ironical ears and caustic tongue.
Among other details, the story of the summer that Ethel and Aubrey had spent at Coombe was narrated, and Aubrey indulged himself by describing what he called Ethel’s conquest.
‘It is more a conquest of Norman’s, and of Melanesia,’ said Ethel. ‘If it were not nonsense to build upon people’s generous visions at seventeen, I should sometimes hope a spark had been lit that would shine some day in your islands, Harry.’
Going up that hill was not the place for Etheldred May to talk of the futility of youthful aspirations, but it did not so strike either of the brothers, to whom Cocksmoor had long been a familiar fact. Harry laughed to hear the old Ethel so like herself; and Aubrey said, ‘By the bye, what did you do, the day you walked him to Cocksmoor? he was fuller of those islands than ever after it.’
‘I did not mean it,’ said Ethel; ‘but the first day of the holidays I came on him disconsolate in the street, with nothing to do, and very sore about Henry’s refusal to let him volunteer; he walked on with me till we found ourselves close to Cocksmoor, and I found he had never seen the church, and would like to stay for evening service, so I put him into the parsonage while I was busy, and told him to take a book.’
‘I know,’ said Aubrey; ‘the liveliest literature you can get in Richard’s parlour are the Missionary Reports.’
‘Exactly so; and he got quite saturated with them; and when we walked home, I was so thankful that the rifle grievance should be a little displaced, that I led him on to talk and build castles rather more than according to my resolutions.’
‘Hollo, Ethel!’ said Harry.
‘Yes, I think spontaneous castles are admirable, but I mistrust all timber from other people’s woods.’
‘But isn’t this a horrid shame of Henry?’ said Aubrey. ‘Such a little prig as he is, to take the place of such a fellow as Leonard, a capital shot already.’
‘I wish Henry had been magnanimous,’ said Ethel.
‘I’d as soon talk of a magnanimous weasel, from what I recollect,’ said Harry.
‘And he is worse now, Harry,’ continued Aubrey. ‘So spruce and silky out of doors, and such a regular old tyrannical bachelor indoors. He is jealous of Leonard, any one can see, and that’s the reason he won’t give him his due.’
‘You observe,’ said Ethel, ‘that this boy thinks the youngest brother’s due is always to come first.’
‘So it is, in this family,’ said Harry. ‘No one comes so last as old Ritchie.’
‘But of course,’ said Aubrey, rather taken aback, ‘if I were not youngest, I should have to knock under to some one.’
Ethel and Harry both laughed heartily; one congratulating him on not having carried the principle into the cockpit, the other adding, ‘Don’t indoctrinate Leonard with it; there is enough already to breed bitterness between those brothers! Leonard ought to be kept in mind that Henry has so much to harass him, that his temper should be borne patiently with.’
‘He!’
‘I don’t think papa’s best endeavours have kept all his father’s practice for him, and I am sure their rate of living must make him feel pinched this Christmas.’
‘Whew! He will be in a sweeter humour than ever!’
‘I have been trying to show Leonard that there’s room for magnanimity on his side at least; and don’t you go and upset it all by commonplace abuse of tutors and governors.’
‘I upset it!’ cried Aubrey: ‘I might as well try to upset the Minster as a word from you to Leonard.’
‘Nonsense! What’s that?’ For they were hailed from behind, and looking round saw two tall figures, weapon in hand, in pursuit. They proved to be Hector Ernescliffe and Leonard Ward, each bearing one of what Dr. May called the H. E. rifles; but Leonard looked half shy, half grim, and so decidedly growled off all Aubrey’s attempts at inquiry or congratulation, that Ethel hazarded none, and Aubrey looked discomfited, wearing an expression which Harry took to mean that the weight of his rifle fatigued him, and insisted on carrying it for him, in, spite of his rather insulted protests and declarations that the sailor was an invalid; Ethel had walked forwards, and found Leonard at her side, with a darkening brow as he glanced back at the friendly contest.
‘Harry spoils Aubrey as much as all the others do,’ said Ethel lightly, deeming it best to draw out the sting of the rankling thought.
‘Ay! None of them would leave him to be pitied and offered favours by some chance person,’ said Leonard.
‘You don’t call my brother Hector a chance person?’
‘Did you say anything to him, Miss May?’ said Leonard, turning on her a flushed face, as if he could almost have been angered with her.
‘I said not one word.’
