Sylvester, or The Wicked Uncle

“Go on!” the Duchess said encouragingly. “Don’t be afraid to tell me! I might imagine worse than the truth, you know, if you are not open with me.”

“It—it seemed to me, ma’am, that he was polite not to honour others but himself!” Phoebe blurted out. “And that the flattery he receives he—he doesn’t notice because he takes it for granted—his consequence being so large. I don’t know why it should have vexed me so. If he had seemed to hold others cheap I should only have been diverted, and that would have been a much worse fault in him. I think—it is his indifference that makes me so often want to hit him!”

The Duchess laughed. “Ah, yes, I understand that! Tell me: he’s not above being pleased?”

“No, ma’am, never!” Phoebe assured her. “He is always affable in company: not a bit stiff! Only—I don’t know how to express it—aloof, I think. Oh, I didn’t mean to distress you! Pray, pray, forgive me!”

The Duchess’s smile went a little awry. “You haven’t distressed me. It distressed me only to know that Sylvester was still living in some desolate Polar region—but it was only for a moment! I don’t think he is living there any longer.”

“His brother, ma’am?” Phoebe ventured to ask, looking shyly up into her face.

The Duchess nodded. “His twin-brother. They were not alike, but the bond between them was so strong that nothing ever loosened it, not even Harry’s marriage. When Harry died—Sylvester went away. I don’t mean bodily— ah, you understand, don’t you? I might have been sure you would, for I know you to have a very discerning eye. Sylvester has a deep reserve. He will not have his wounds touched, and that wound—” She broke off, and then said, after a little pause: “Well, he kept everyone at a distance for so long that I believe it became, as it were, an engrained habit, and is why he gave you the feeling that he was aloof—which exactly describes him, I must tell you!”

She smiled at Phoebe, and took her hand. “As for his indifferent air, my dear, I know it well—I have been acquainted with it for many years, and not only in Sylvester! It springs, as you so correctly suppose, from pride. That is an inherited vice! All the Raynes have it, and Sylvester to a marked degree. It is inborn, and it wasn’t diminished by his succeeding, when he was much too young, to his father’s dignities. I always did think that the worst thing that could have befallen him, but comforted myself with the thought that Lord William Rayne—he is Sylvester’s uncle, and was guardian to both my sons for the two years that were left of their minority—that William would quickly depress any top-loftiness in Sylvester. But unfortunately William, though the kindest man alive, not only holds himself very much up, but is also convinced that the Head of the House of Rayne is a far more august personage than the Head of the House of Hanover! I have the greatest affection for him, but he is what I expect you would call gothic! He tells me, for instance, that society has become a mingle-mangle, and that too many men of birth nowadays don’t keep a proper distance. He would have given Sylvester a thundering scold for showing incivility to the humblest of his dependants, but I am very sure that he taught him that meticulous politeness was what he owed to his own consequence: noblesse oblige, in fact. So, what with William telling him never to forget how exalted he was, and far too many people looking up to him as their liege-lord, I am afraid Sylvester became imbued with some very improper notions, my dear! And, to be candid with you, I don’t think he will ever lose them. His wife, if he loved her, could do much to improve him, but she won’t alter his whole character.”

“No, of course not, ma’am. I mean—”

“Which, in some ways, is admirable,” continued the Duchess, smiling a little at this embarrassed interjection, but paying no other heed to it. “And the odd thing is that some of his best qualities spring directly from his pride! It would never occur to Sylvester that anyone could dispute his hereditary right of lordship, but I can assure you that it would never occur to him either to neglect the least one of the duties, however irksome, that attach to his position.” She paused, and then said: “The flaw is that his care for his people doesn’t come from his heart. It was bred into him, he accepts it as his inescapable duty, but he hasn’t the love of humanity that inspires philanthropists, you know. Towards all but the very few people he loves I fear he will always be largely indifferent. However, for those few there’s nothing he won’t do, from the high heroical to such tedious things as giving up far too much of his time to the entertainment of an invalid mother!”

Phoebe said, with a glowing look: “He could never think that tedious, I am persuaded, ma’am!”

“Good gracious, of all the boring things to be obliged to do it must surely be the worst! I made up my mind not to permit him to trouble about me, too, but—you may have noticed it!—Sylvester is determined to have his own way, and never more so than when he is convinced he is acting for one’s good.”

“I have frequently thought him—a trifle high-handed, ma’am,” said Phoebe, her eye kindling at certain memories

“Yes, I’m sure you have. Harry used to call him The Dook, mocking his overbearing ways! The worst of it is that it’s so hard to get the better of him! He doesn’t order one to do things: he merely makes it impossible for one to do anything else. Some idiotish doctor once convinced him it would cure me to take the hot bath, and he got me to Bath entirely against my will, and without ever mentioning the name of the horrid place. The shifts he was put to! I forgave him only because he had taken so much trouble over the iniquitous affair! His wife will have much to bear, I daresay, but she will never find him thoughtless where her well-being is concerned.”

Phoebe said, flushing: “Ma’am—you mistake! I—he—”

“Has he put himself beyond forgiveness?” inquired the Duchess quizzically. “He certainly told me he had, but I hoped he was exaggerating.”

“He doesn’t wish to marry me, ma’am. Not in his heart!” Phoebe said. “He only wished to make me sorry I had run away from him, and fall in love with him when it was too late. He couldn’t bear to be beaten, and proposed to me quite against his will—he told me so himself!—and then, I think, he was too proud to draw back.”

“Really, I am quite ashamed of him!” exclaimed the Duchess. “He told me he had made a mull of it, and that, I see, is much less than the truth! I don’t wonder you gave him a set-down, but I am delighted to learn that all his famous address deserted him when he proposed to you! In my experience a man rarely makes graceful speeches when he is very much in earnest, be he never so accomplished a flirt!”

“But he doesn’t want to marry me, ma’am!” averred Phoebe, sniffing into a damp handkerchief. “He told me he did, but when I said I didn’t believe him—he said he saw it was useless to argue with me!”

“Good heavens, what a simpleton!”

“And then I said he was w-worse than Ugolino, and he didn’t s-say anything at all!” disclosed Phoebe tragically.

“That settles it!” the Duchess declared, only the faintest of tremors in her voice. “I wash my hands of such a ninny! After having been given all this encouragement, what does he do but come home in flat despair, saying you won’t listen to him? He even asked me what he should do! I am sure it was for the first time in his life!”

“F-flat despair?” echoed Phoebe, between hope and disbelief. “Oh, no!”

“I assure you! And very disagreeable it made him, too. He brought Mr. Orde up to take tea with me after dinner, and even the tale of Sir Nugent and the button failed to drag more than a faint smile from him!”

“He—he is mortified, perhaps—oh, I know he is! But he doesn’t even like me, ma’am! If you had heard the things he said to me! And then—the very next instant—proposed to me!”

“He is clearly unhinged. I daresay you had no intention of reducing him to this sad state, but I feel you ought, in common charity, to allow him at least to explain himself. Very likely it would settle his mind, and it won’t do for Salford to become addle-brained, you know! Do but consider the consternation of the Family, my dear!”

“Oh, ma’am—!” protested Phoebe, half laughing.

“As for his not liking you,” continued the Duchess, “I don’t know how that may be, but I can’t recall that he ever before described any girl to me as a darling!”

Phoebe stared at her incredulously. She tried to speak, but only succeeded in uttering a choking sound.

“By this time,” said the Duchess, stretching out her hand to the embroidered bell-pull, “he has probably gnawed his nails down to the quick, or murdered poor Mr. Orde. I think you had better see him, my dear, and say something soothing to him!”

Phoebe, tying the strings of her hat in a lamentably lopsided bow, said in great agitation: “Oh, no! Oh, pray —!”