was one of bright sunshine. It encouraged Miss Charing to wear a Villager-hat of satin straw, with flowers at one side, and an apple-green ribbon passed beneath her chin, and tied in a skittish bow under her ear; and to carry a frivolous parasol, bestowed upon her by Meg. Mr. Westruther found himself thinking, as he handed her into his curricle, that her appearance was such as must satisfy the most exacting of men.
It was his custom to drive abroad with a diminutive Tiger perched up behind him, but on this occasion he had dispensed with the services of this youth. He told Kitty, with the flicker of a smile, that such chaperonage could not be thought necessary for such near relations (by affection) as themselves. She agreed to it, but warily. Yet not the most querulous critic could have called in question Mr. Westruther’s conduct from start to finish of this expedition. He was the big cousin who had enchanted her childish fancy; he might laugh at her, but he refrained from laughing at Freddy; if he never once referred to her engagement, at least he gave no sign of disbelieving it. Only at the end of an afternoon for which Kitty thanked him with real gratitude did he lower the mask for an instant. The laugh sprang to his eyes; he looked down into her face for a moment, lightly pinched her chin, and said, the words a caress: “Foolish, doubting, little Kitty! There, in with you, my child! I cannot leave my horses to go with you!”
The colour rushed up under his careless fingers; she glanced fleetingly into his face, lowered her eyes again, and with a stammered: “Th-thank you! It was very agreeable!” ran up the steps, and into the house. He drove away, very well satisfied; thinking, too, that the country cousin was unfurling new and charming petals.
He let two days pass, and then called one morning in Berkeley Square to invite both ladies to go with him to Sadler’s Wells on the following evening, so that Kitty might see the great Grimaldi in a revival of his very successful pantomime, Mother Goose. Though Meg might cry out against so unsophisticated an entertainment, Mr. Westruther knew Kitty well enough to be sure that she would revel in it. Had it been possible, he would unhesitatingly have taken her to Astley’s Amphitheatre, and would himself have derived a good deal of amusement, he thought, from watching her awe and delight at Grand Spectacles, and Equestrian Displays. But the Amphitheatre, like its rival, the Royal Circus, never opened until Easter Monday, by which time, Mr.
Westruther trusted, Kitty would have returned to Arnside.
Meg’s butler, admitting him into the house, informed him that her ladyship had driven out, but that Miss Charing, though about to take the air with a friend, was in the Small Saloon. He then escorted Mr. Westruther to this apartment, and, all unwitting, subjected him to a severe shock. “Mr. Westruther!” he announced, and went away, leaving Mr. Westruther on the threshold, a little rigid, the lazy smile frozen on his lips.
There were three people in the room. There was Kitty, in a mulberry bonnet and pelisse, engaged in working her fingers into a pair of new gloves; there was Freddy, standing with his back to the fire; and there was Miss Broughty, radiant in pale blue merino, with swansdown trimming, and a swansdown muff.
It was only for an instant that Mr. Westruther was shocked into immobility. Before Kitty, turning to greet him, had time to observe his stupefaction, he had recovered himself, and had moved forward, saying with perfect sangfroid: “I collect that I have not chosen my moment well: you are going out! Never mind! my errand is soon discharged.”
“Yes, Miss Broughty is so kind as to give me her company,” she replied, shaking hands with him. “We mean to walk in the Park, and see how the daffodils and the crocuses come on. Olivia, pray allow me to introduce Mr. Westruther to you!”
“Unnecessary,” he said coolly, advancing towards Olivia, and holding out his hand. “I already have the honour of being acquainted with Miss Broughty. How do you do?”
This announcement was productive of only the mildest surprise in Miss Charing; but when she glanced towards her friend she was astonished to see her face suffused with blushes. Miss Broughty looked up, and looked down, stammered something inaudible, and barely permitted Mr. Westruther to touch her hand before tucking it away again in her muff. Such conduct, even in a girl unused to society, seemed strange. Kitty wondered if Jack could in some way have offended Olivia. She knew him to be occasionally arrogant; and had just decided that he must have wounded Olivia’s susceptibilities with some slighting look or remark, when she chanced to catch sight of Freddy. The elegant Mr. Stand en bore all the appearance of one who had been stuffed, his gaze being so glassy, and his face so totally devoid of expression, that one glance in his direction was enough to convince Kitty that she had stumbled upon a mystery he would have been very glad to have kept hidden from her. Only a short time earlier she would certainly have demanded an explanation, but her little stay in London had already taught her to command her tongue. Seeming not to notice Olivia’s confusion, she said: “And what is your errand, Jack?”
It was soon disclosed; she could not answer for Meg’s willingness to go to Sadler’s Wells, but she said that for herself she would be all happiness to accept. She then shook hands with both gentlemen, unmistakeably dismissing them, and swept Olivia off for their proposed walk in the Park.
Alone with Mr. Standen, Mr. Westruther said sweetly: “Would you care to explain to me, my very dear coz, how I come to find that charming ladybird on terms of intimacy with Kitty?”
“Yes, I didn’t fancy you’d like it overmuch,” replied Freddy. “Nothing to do with me. Don’t imagine I introduced her to Kit, do you?”
“The notion, I own, had presented itself to me,” said Mr. Westruther.
“Well, I didn’t,” said Freddy. “Dashed bacon-brained notion to take into your cockloft! For one thing, not acquainted with the girl myself; for another, not the sort of girl I would introduce to Kit.” He thought this over for a moment, and then said scrupulously: “What I mean is, won’t be, if she pays any heed to the lures you’ve been throwing out to her this age past! Looked to me as though she well might. Pretty little bit of muslin, but hen- witted.”
“I thank you!” Mr. Westruther said sardonically. “If not to you, Freddy, to whom are my thanks due for this clever touch?” He perceived that he had bewildered his cousin, and added impatiently: “Well? Who made Kitty known to the girl her perfidious cousin Jack has made the object of his attentions?”
“Don’t think anyone did,” replied Freddy. “Met her by chance. Know what I think? Good thing if you was to take a damper! Not engaged to Kit, coz!”
Those very blue eyes glinted at him. “I might make the obvious retort, Freddy, but I won’t!”
The two ladies in question, meanwhile, were treading briskly down one of the paths in the Park, their hands tucked in their muffs, and their pelisses fastened tightly up to their throats, for although the sun shone, encouraging daffodils to burst from their sheaths, an east wind blew strongly.
“Dear Miss Charing, if you knew the solace it is to me to be in your company!” Olivia said. “I should not repine—I know that Mama has made many, many sacrifices to make this visit to the Metropolis p(^sible, but, oh, I was happier by far at home, with my sisters!”
Kitty was already aware of the existence of Amelia, and Jane, and Selina, and she uttered a murmur of sympathy. She was not of an age fully to comprehend the anxieties of a mother indifferently blessed with four daughters, but she understood from Olivia that these were acute. Dear Papa, it seemed, had not left his family in affluent circumstances; but he had certainly endowed them with good looks, a commodity in which they had been bred from earliest youth to trade to the best advantage. Only Jane, they feared, was bookish; and Amelia showed a dreadful tendency to freckles. Olivia, the loveliest as well as the eldest of the sisters, did not question that it was her duty to make a good match. She had come to London with that object; but whenever her maiden fancy had speculated on the good match it had always corne to her in the guise of a young and handsome suitor, and never in that of an elderly roue. She had supposed too that Dear Papa’s grand relations in Brook Street would welcome her and Mama to their house; but here again reality had fallen sadly short of expectation. Repulsed by the Batterstowns, Mama had been obliged to accept the hospitality of her sister, living in Hans Crescent; and however good-natured Mrs. Scorton might be, she had no entrde into the world of fashion, and was undeniably vulgar. Not for Miss Broughty the select gatherings at Almack’s, the
It seemed to Kitty a pity that her new friend’s mind was set so irrevocably upon marriage, but her suggestion that Olivia might seek an eligible situation as a governess met with no favour at all. Olivia stared at her with dismay in her big eyes, and unequivocally stated her preference for death. Upon reflection, Kitty was obliged to own that she was scarcely fitted for such a post. Her intellect was not superior, and her education was scanty. She had great sweetness of temper, a biddable disposition, and sufficient refinement to shrink from the machinations of her Mama
