Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

not particularly fond of a formal garden; I like our shrubberies and the wild, broken ground at the Chase better.'

'Do you?' said Sir Harry, wondering how he could express his perfect readiness to turn the garden, which was the pride of his mother's heart, into a wilderness if only he might find favour in Thomasina's eyes.

'It is all in keeping with the place, however. It is natural that I should like the Chase better,' said Thomasina, and Sir Harry, in deep discouragement, walked by her side almost in silence, and only betrayed his sentiments by picking with ruthless hands every flower for which she expressed the slightest admiration.

The two elder ladies in the drawing-room had come to a better understanding. Lady Camden remarked on Thomasina's brilliant beauty, and Mrs. Grey replied, without enthusiasm, that pretty girls of her age were

apt to receive more admiration than they deserved, although Sir Richard would not like to hear her say so. Then Lady Camden deplored the lonely life a girl must lead at the Chase, and said that her daughters would be so delighted to see more of her, and, since Mrs. Grey admitted that it would be a good thing for Thomasina, Lady Camden hoped that she might be allowed to spend a few days with them next week, when they would have a large party staying in the house. Mrs. Grey thought that, if Lady Camden would entrust her with a note to Sir Richard, the matter might be arranged, but she would not advise her to say anything first to Thomasina. Throughout the dialogue there was not the most distant allusion to Sir Harry, yet Lady Camden knew that Mrs. Grey had pledged herself to favour his suit as fully as if she had signed and sealed a contract to that effect.

When they drove off, with Lady Camden's note to Sir Richard in Mrs. Grey's pocket,

she thought it well to pave the way for its

[ocr errors]

reception. Lady Camden wants you to go

and stay there next week, Thomasina; I believe that she has written to Sir Richard about it.'

'She asked me once before, but I certainly shall not go,' said Thomasina.

'At all events I suppose you will hear what Sir Richard has to say in the matter?'

He will hear what I have to say. I cannot imagine why you should force me into an intimacy with people whom I do not like. I did not want to call on the Camdens to-day, and I am determined not to go again.'

[ocr errors]

In my younger days, Thomasina, young ladies did not think it necessary to refuse

offers of marriage before they were made.'

[ocr errors]

It is most unfair to say such things,' said

Thomasina with flaming cheeks.

• If people

talk, it is the fault of those who try to throw us together, and Sir Harry ought to know that I would not marry him if there was not another man in the world.'

Then surely you need not be afraid of going to stay with his mother and sisters. To hear you talk, one might suppose that poor Sir Harry was a second Lovelace.'

Is not Lovelace the hero of "Clarissa Harlowe"?' said Thomasina, glad to turn the conversation. 'I began the book once, and Sir Richard took it away from me, as he thought it would not quite do. Of course I have wanted to read it ever since.'

'You want some one besides Sir Richard to keep you in order, though this does credit to his discretion. But, to return to the invitation, you must not make yourself absurd by refusing it. I told Lady Camden that you had no engagement.'

'She knows that Sir Richard never goes out now, and that I do not leave him.'

'That excuse can scarcely be valid now that I am here to look after him,' said Mrs. Grey. Thomasina felt that her aunt's society could not supply the void created by her absence, but she reserved her opposition until it should be necessary to reply to the invitation. Mrs. Grey, however, outwitted her by a grand stroke of diplomacy; she asked Thomasina if she would like to be dropped at the cottage, to walk home, while she herself returned in the carriage in time to lay the matter before Sir Richard before the post-bag was closed. She extorted from him an unwilling consent and wrote herself to Lady Camden, so that she had the satisfaction of informing Thomasina, on her return, that the invitation was accepted.

'Your aunt told me that you wanted to

« AnteriorContinuar »