“You don’t mean that he’ll marry a disagreeable wife!”
“Oh, no; not in the least. I only mean to say that like other sons of Adam, he will have to strike his colours. I dare say, if the truth were known, he has done so already.”
“I am sure he has not.”
“I don’t at all ask to know his secrets, and I should look upon you as a very bad sister if you told them.”
“But I am sure he has not got any—of that kind.”
“Would he tell you if he had?”
“Oh, I hope so; any serious secret. I am sure he ought, for I am always thinking about him.”
“And would you tell him your secrets?”
“I have none.”
“But when you have, will you do so?”
“Will I? Well, yes; I think so. But a girl has no such secret,” she continued to say, after pausing for a moment. “None, generally, at least, which she tells, even to herself, till the time comes in which she tells it to all whom she really loves.” And then there was another pause for a moment.
“I am not quite so sure of that,” said Miss Furnival. After which the gentlemen came into the drawing-room.
Augustus Staveley had gone to work in a manner which he conceived to be quite systematic, having before him the praiseworthy object of making a match between Felix Graham and Sophia Furnival. “By George, Graham,” he had said, “the finest girl in London is coming down to Noningsby; upon my word I think she is.”
“And brought there expressly for your delectation, I suppose.”
“Oh no, not at all; indeed, she is not exactly in my style; she is too—too—too—in point of fact, too much of a girl for me. She has lots of money, and is very clever, and all that kind of thing.”
“I never knew you so humble before.”
“I am not joking at all. She is a daughter of old Furnival’s, whom by the by I hate as I do poison. Why my governor has him down at Noningsby I can’t guess. But I tell you what, old fellow, he can give his daughter five-and-twenty thousand pounds. Think of that, Master Brook.” But Felix Graham was a man who could not bring himself to think much of such things on the spur of the moment, and when he was introduced to Sophia, he did not seem to be taken with her in any wonderful way.
Augustus had asked his mother to help him, but she had laughed at him. “It would be a splendid arrangement,” he had said with energy. “Nonsense, Gus,” she had answered. “You should always let those things take their chance. All I will ask of you is that you don’t fall in love with her yourself; I don’t think her family would be nice enough for you.”
But Felix Graham certainly was ungrateful for the friendship spent upon him, and so his friend felt it. Augustus had contrived to whisper into the lady’s ear that Mr. Graham was the cleverest young man now rising at the bar, and as far as she was concerned, some amount of intimacy might at any rate have been produced; but he, Graham himself, would not put himself forward. “I will pique him into it,” said Augustus to himself, and therefore when on this occasion they came into the drawing-room, Staveley immediately took a vacant seat beside Miss Furnival, with the very friendly object which he had proposed to himself.
There was great danger in this, for Miss Furnival was certainly handsome, and Augustus Staveley was very susceptible. But what will not a man go through for his friend? “I hope we are to have the honour of your company as far as Monkton Grange the day we meet there,” he said. The hounds were to meet at Monkton Grange, some seven miles from Noningsby, and all the sportsmen from the house were to be there.
“I shall be delighted,” said Sophia, “that is to say if a seat in the carriage can be spared for me.”
“But we’ll mount you. I know that you are a horsewoman.” In answer to which Miss Furnival confessed that she was a horsewoman, and owned also to having brought a habit and hat with her.
“That will be delightful. Madeline will ride also, and you will meet the Miss Tristrams. They are the famous horsewomen of this part of the country.”
“You don’t mean that they go after the dogs, across the hedges.”
“Indeed they do.”
“And does Miss Staveley do that?”
“Oh, no—Madeline is not good at a five-barred gate, and would make but a very bad hand at a double ditch. If you are inclined to remain among the tame people, she will be true to your side.”
“I shall certainly be one of the tame people, Mr. Staveley.”
“I rather think I shall be with you myself; I have only one horse that will jump well, and Graham will ride him. By the by, Miss Furnival, what do you think of my friend Graham?”
“Think of him! Am I bound to have thought anything about him by this time?”
“Of course you are;—or at any rate of course you have. I have no doubt that you have composed in your own mind an essay on the character of everybody here. People who think at all always do.”
“Do they? My essay upon him then is a very short one.”
“But perhaps not the less correct on that account. You must allow me to read it.”
“Like all my other essays of that kind, Mr. Staveley, it has been composed solely for my own use, and will be kept quite private.”
“I am so sorry for that, for I intended to propose a bargain to you. If you would have shown me some of your essays, I would have been equally liberal with some of mine.” And in this way, before the evening was over, Augustus Staveley and Miss Furnival became very good friends.
“Upon my word she is a very clever girl,” he said afterwards, as young
