‘Ave! Ave!’ cried the children, who had been trying to attract her attention, ‘if you will let us go to Laburnum Grove by twelve o’clock tomorrow, Mis. Pugh will show us her book of the pretty devices of letters, and teach us to make one.’
‘You will have not finished lessons by twelve.’
‘But if we have?’
‘No, certainly not, I can’t have you bothering every one about that nonsensical fashion.’
‘You shall go, my dears,’ said Henry. ‘I can’t think why your sister should be so ill-natured.’
Averil felt that this was the way to destroy her authority, and though she kept silence, the tears were in her eyes, and her champion broke forth, ‘How can you be such a brute, Henry?’
‘Come away, my dears,’ said Averil, rising, and holding out her hands to her sisters, as she recollected how bad the scene was for them, but it was only Minna who obeyed the call, Ella hung about Henry, declaring that Leonard was naughty, and Ave was cross.
‘Well,’ shouted Leonard, ‘I shan’t stay to see that child set against her sister! I wonder what you mean her to come to, Henry!’
It was no wonder that Minna and Ella squabbled together as to which was cross, Henry or Averil, and the spirit of party took up its fatal abode in the house of Bankside.
CHAPTER IX
Too oft my anxious eye has spied That secret grief thou fain wouldst hide— The passing pang of humbled pride.—SCOTT
The winter was gay, between musical evenings, children’s parties, clerical feastings of district visitors, soirees for Sunday-school teachers, and Christmas-trees for their scholars. Such a universal favourite as Harry, with so keen a relish for amusement, was sure to fall an easy prey to invitations; but the rest of the family stood amazed to see him accompanied everywhere by Tom, to whom the secular and the religious dissipations of Stoneborough had always hitherto been equally distasteful. Yet be submitted to a Christmas course of music, carpet-dances, and jeux de societe on the one hand, and on the other conferred inestimable obligations on the ecclesiastical staff by exhibitions of his microscope and of some of the ornamental sports of chemistry.
‘The truth is,’ was the explanation privately dropped out to Ethel, ‘that some one really must see that those two don’t make fools of themselves.’
Ethel stared; then, coming to the perception who ‘those two’ meant, burst out laughing, and said, ‘My dear Tom, I beg your pardon, but, on the whole, I think that is more likely to befall some one else.’
Tom held his head loftily, and would not condescend to understand anything so foolish.
He considered Bankside as the most dangerous quarter, for Harry was enraptured with Miss Ward’s music, extolled her dark eyes, and openly avowed her attraction; but there were far more subtle perils at Laburnum Grove. The fair widow was really pretty, almost elegant, her weeds becoming; and her disposition so good, so religious, so charitable, that, with her activity, intelligence, and curate-worship, she was a dangerous snare to such of mankind as were not sensible of her touch of pretension. As to womankind, it needed a great deal of submissiveness to endure her at all; and this was not Averil Ward’s leading characteristic.
In fact, the ubiquity of Mrs. Pugh was a sore trial to that young lady, just so superior herself as to detect the flimsiness of the widow’s attainments. It was vexatious to find that by means of age, assumption, and position, these shallow accomplishments made a prodigious show in the world, while her own were entirely overlooked. She thought she despised the admiration of the second-rate world of Stoneborough, but it nettled her to see it thus misplaced; and there was something provoking in the species of semi-homage paid in that quarter by the youths of the May family.
As to the sailor, Averil frankly liked him very much; he was the pleasantest young man, of the most open and agreeable manners, who had ever fallen in her way. He was worthy to be Mary’s brother, for he was friendly to Leonard, and to herself had a truthfully flattering way that was delightful. Without any sentiment in the case, she always felt disappointed and defrauded if she were prevented from having a conversation with him; and when this happened, it was generally either from his being seized upon by Mrs. Pugh, or from her being baited by his brother Tom.
Averil was hard to please, for she was as much annoyed by seeing Tom May sitting courteous and deferential by the side of Mrs. Pugh, as by his attentions to herself. She knew that he was playing the widow off, and that, when most smooth and bland in look and tone, he was inwardly chuckling; and to find the identical politeness transferred to herself, made her feel not only affronted but insulted by being placed on the same level. Thus, when, at a ‘reunion’ at Laburnum Grove, she had been looking on with intense disgust while Tom was admiring Mrs. Pugh’s famous book of devices from letters, translating the mottoes, and promising contributions, the offence was greatly increased by his coming up to her (and that too just as Harry was released by the button-holding Mr. Grey) and saying,
‘Of course you are a collector too, Miss Ward; I can secure some duplicates for you.’
She hoard such fooleries? She have Mrs. Pugh’s duplicates? No wonder she coldly answered, ‘My little sister has been slightly infected, thank you, but I do not care for such things.’
‘Indeed! Well, I always preserve as many as I can, as passports to a lady’s favour.’
‘That depends on how much sense the lady has,’ said Averil, trusting that this was a spirited set down.
‘You do not consider. Philosophically treated, they become a perfect school in historical heraldry, nay, in languages, in mathematical drawing, in illumination, said Tom, looking across to the album in which Mrs. Pugh’s collection was enshrined, each device appropriately framed in bright colours. His gravity was intolerable. Was this mockery or not? However, as answer she must, she said,
‘A very poor purpose for which to learn such things, and a poor way of learning them.’
‘True,’ said Tom, ‘one pastime is as good as another; and the less it pretends to, the better. On the whole, it may be a beneficial outlet for the revival of illumination.’
Did this intolerable person know that there was an ‘illuminator’s guide’ at home, and a great deal of red, blue, and gold paint, with grand designs for the ornamentation of Bankside chapel? Whether he knew it or not, she could not help answering, ‘Illumination is desecrated by being used on such subjects.’