“And who is the tall man with red hair?”
“He’s a political link between the Duke and Mr. Palliser. His name is Bott, and he’s a Member of Parliament.”
“But why should he interfere?”
“I suppose it’s his business. I don’t quite understand all the ins and outs of it. I believe he’s to be one of Mr. Palliser’s private secretaries if he becomes Chancellor of the Exchequer. Perhaps he doesn’t tell;—only I think he does all the same. He always calls me Lady Glen-cowrer. He comes out of Lancashire, and made calico as long as he could get any cotton.” But this happened in the bedroom, and we must go back for a while to the drawing-room.
The Duchess had made no answer to Mrs. Sparkes, and so nothing further was said about the warmth. Nor, indeed, was there any conversation that was comfortably general. The number of ladies in the room was too great for that, and ladies do not divide themselves nicely into small parties, as men and women do when they are mixed. Lady Glencora behaved pretty by telling the Duchess all about her pet pheasants; Mrs. Conway Sparkes told ill-natured tales of someone to Miss Euphemia Palliser; one of the Duchess’s daughters walked off to a distant piano with an admiring friend and touched a few notes; while Iphigenia Palliser boldly took up a book, and placed herself at a table. Alice, who was sitting opposite to Lady Glencora, began to speculate whether she might do the same; but her courage failed her, and she sat on, telling herself that she was out of her element. “Alice Vavasor,” said Lady Glencora after a while, suddenly, and in a somewhat loud voice, “can you play billiards?”
“No,” said Alice, rather startled.
“Then you shall learn tonight, and if nobody else will teach you, you shall be my pupil.” Whereupon Lady Glencora rang the bell and ordered that the billiard-table might be got ready. “You’ll play, Duchess, of course,” said Lady Glencora.
“It is so nice and warm, that I think I will,” said the Duchess; but as she spoke she looked suspiciously to that part of the room where Mrs. Conway Sparkes was sitting.
“Let us all play,” said Mrs. Conway Sparkes, “and then it will be nicer—and perhaps warmer, too.”
The gentlemen joined them just as they were settling themselves round the table, and as many of them stayed there, the billiard-room became full. Alice had first a cue put into her hand, and making nothing of that was permitted to play with a mace. The duty of instructing her devolved on Jeffrey Palliser, and the next hour passed pleasantly;—not so pleasantly, she thought afterwards, as did some of those hours in Switzerland when her cousins were with her. After all, she could get more out of her life with such associates as them, than she could with any of these people at Matching. She felt quite sure of that;—though Jeffrey Palliser did take great trouble to teach her the game, and once or twice made her laugh heartily by quizzing the Duchess’s attitude as she stood up to make her stroke.
“I wish I could play billiards,” said Mrs. Sparkes, on one of these occasions; “I do indeed.”
“I thought you said you were coming to play,” said the Duchess, almost majestically, and with a tone of triumph evidently produced by her own successes.
“Only to see your Grace,” said Mrs. Sparkes.
“I don’t know that there is anything more to see in me than in anybody else,” said the Duchess. “Mr. Palliser, that was a cannon. Will you mark that for our side?”
“Oh no, Duchess, you hit the same ball twice.”
“Very well;—then I suppose Miss Vavasor plays now. That was a miss. Will you mark that, if you please?” This latter demand was made with great stress, as though she had been defrauded in the matter of the cannon, and was obeyed. Before long, the Duchess, with her partner, Lady Glencora, won the game—which fact, however, was, I think, owing rather to Alice’s ignorance than to her Grace’s skill. The Duchess, however, was very triumphant, and made her way back into the drawing-room with a step which seemed to declare loudly that she had trumped Mrs. Sparkes at last.
Not long after this the ladies went upstairs on their way to bed. Many of them, perhaps, did not go to their pillows at once, as it was as yet not eleven o’clock, and it was past ten when they all came down to breakfast. At any rate, Alice, who had been up at seven, did not go to bed then, nor for the next two hours. “I’ll come into your room just for one minute,” Lady Glencora said as she passed on from the door to her own room; and in about five minutes she was back with her cousin. “Would you mind going into my room—it’s just there, and sitting with Ellen for a minute?” This Lady Glencora said in the sweetest possible tone to the girl who was waiting on Alice; and then, when they were alone together, she got into a little chair by the fireside and prepared herself for conversation.
“I must keep you up for a quarter of an hour while I tell you something. But first of all, how do you like the people? Will you be able to be comfortable with them?” Alice of course said that she thought she would; and then there came that little discussion in which the duties of Mr. Bott, the man with the red hair, were described.
“But I’ve got something to tell you,” said Lady Glencora, when they had already been there some twenty minutes. “Sit down opposite to me, and look at the
