Lady Caroline and her husband received this party in the great drawing-room which was used on state occasions: everything had been thrown open professedly that Lord Millefleurs should see, but really that Lord Millefleurs should be dazzled by, the splendour which Torrance devoutly believed to be unrivalled. It was in order that he might see the effect of all the velvet and brocade, all the gilding and carving, upon the stranger, that he had waited to receive the party from Lindores with his wife, a thing quite unusual to him; and he was in high expectation and good-humour, fully expecting to be flattered and gratified. There was a short pause of mutual civilities to begin with, during which Torrance was somewhat chilled and affronted to see that the little Marquis remained composed, and displayed no awe, though he looked about him with his quick little round eyes.
“You will have heard, Lady Caroline, how I have lost any little scrap of reputation I ever had,” Millefleurs said, clasping his plump hands. “I am no shot: it is true, though I ought to be ashamed to acknowledge it. And I don’t care to follow flying things on foot. If there was a balloon indeed! I am an impostor at this season. I am occupying the place of some happy person who might make a large bag every day.”
“But there is room for all those happy persons without disturbing you—who have other qualities,” said Carry, with her soft pathetic smile. There was a little tremor about her, and catching of her breath, for she did not know at what moment might occur that name which always agitated her, however she might fortify herself against it.
“If not at Lindores, there’s always plenty of room at Tinto,” said Torrance, with ostentatious openness. “There’s room for a regiment here. I have a few fellows coming for the partridges, but not half enough to fill the house. Whenever you like, you and your belongings, as many as you please, whether it’s servants—or guardians,” Torrance said, with his usual rude laugh.
Something like an electric shock ran round the company. Millefleurs was the only one who received it without the smallest evidence of understanding what it was. He looked up in Torrance’s face with an unmoved aspect. “I don’t travel with a suite,” he said, “though I am much obliged to you all the same. It is my father who carries all sorts of people about with him. And I love my present quarters,” said the little Marquis, directing a look towards Lady Lindores of absolute devotion. “I will not go away unless I am sent away. A man who has knocked about the world knows when he is well off. I will go to Erskine, and be out of the way during the hours when I am de trop.”
“Erskine is filling his house too, I suppose,” Torrance said. And then having got all that was practicable in the shape of offence out of this subject, he proposed that they should make the tour of what had been always called the state apartments at Tinto. “There’s a few things to show,” he said, affecting humility; “not much to you who have been about the world as you say, but still a few things that we think something of in this out-of-the-way place.” Then he added, “Lady Car had better be the showman, for she knows more about them than I do—though I was born among them.” This was the highest possible pleasure to Pat Torrance. To show off his possessions, to which he professed to be indifferent, with an intended superiority in his rude manliness to anything so finicking, by means of his wife—his proudest and finest possession of all—was delightful to him. He lounged after them, keeping close to the party, ready with all his being to enjoy Lady Car’s description of the things that merited admiration. He was in high good-humour, elated with the sense of his position as her husband and the owner of all this grandeur. He felt that the little English lord would now see what a Scotch country gentleman could be, what a noble distinguished wife he could get for himself, and what a house he could bring her to. Unfortunately, Lord Millefleurs, whose delight was to talk about Californian miners and their habitudes, was familiar with greater houses than Tinto, and had been born in the purple, and slept on rose-leaves all his life. He admired politely what he was evidently expected to admire, but he gave vent to no enthusiasm. When they came to the great dining-room, with its huge vases and marble pillars, he looked round upon it with a countenance of complete seriousness, not lightened by any gratification. “Yes—I see: everything is admirably in keeping,” he said; “an excellent example of the period. It is so seldom one sees this sort of thing nowadays. Everybody has begun to try to improve, don’t you know; and the mieux is always the ennemi du bien. This is all of a piece, don’t you know. It is quite perfect of its kind.”
“What does the little beggar mean?” it was now Torrance’s turn to say to himself. It sounded, no doubt, like praise, but his watchful suspicion and jealousy were roused. He tried his usual expedient of announcing how much it had cost; but Millefleurs—confound the little beggar!—received the intimation with perfect equanimity. He was not impressed. He made Torrance a little bow, and said with his lisp, “Yeth, very cothtly alwayth—the materials are all so expensive, don’t you know.” But he
