"Temporarily it would appear that she has declined the proposal."
"He was at liberty?… he could honourably?…"
"His best friend and nearest relative is your guarantee."
"I know it; I hear so; I am informed of that: I have heard of the proposal, and that he could honourably make it. Still, I am helpless, I cannot move, until I am assured that my daughter's reasons are such as a father need not underline."
"Does the lady, perchance, equivocate?"
"I have not seen her this morning; I rise late. I hear an astounding account of the cause for her departure from Patterne, and I find her door locked to me — no answer."
"It is that she had no reasons to give, and she feared the demand for them."
"Ladies!" dolorously exclaimed Mr. Dale.
"We guess the secret, we guess it!" they exclaimed in reply; and they looked smilingly, as Dr. Middleton looked.
"She had no reasons to give?" Mr. Dale spelled these words to his understanding. "Then, sir, she knew you not adverse?"
"Undoubtedly, by my high esteem for the gentleman, she must have known me not adverse. But she would not consider me a principal. She could hardly have conceived me an obstacle. I am simply the gentleman's friend. A zealous friend, let me add."
Mr. Dale put out an imploring hand; it was too much for him.
"Pardon me; I have a poor head. And your daughter the same, sir?"
"We will not measure it too closely, but I may say, my daughter the same, sir. And likewise — may I not add — these ladies."
Mr. Dale made sign that he was overfilled. "Where am I! And Lætitia refused him?"
"Temporarily, let us assume. Will it not partly depend on you, Mr. Dale?"
"But what strange things have been happening during my daughter's absence from the cottage!" cried Mr. Dale, betraying an elixir in his veins. "I feel that I could laugh if I did not dread to be thought insane. She refused his hand, and he was at liberty to offer it? My girl! We are all on our heads. The fairy-tales were right and the lesson-books were wrong. But it is really, it is really very demoralizing. An invalid — and I am one, and no momentary exhilaration will be taken for the contrary — clings to the idea of stability, order. The slightest disturbance of the wonted course of things unsettles him. Why, for years I have been prophesying it! and for years I have had everything against me, and now when it is confirmed, I am wondering that I must not call myself a fool!"
"And for years, dear Mr. Dale, this union, in spite of counter-currents and human arrangements, has been our Willoughby's constant preoccupation," said Miss Eleanor.
"His most cherished aim," said Miss Isabel.
"The name was not spoken by me," said Dr. Middleton.
"But it is out, and perhaps better out, if we would avoid the chance of mystifications. I do not suppose we are seriously committing a breach of confidence, though he might have wished to mention it to you first himself. I have it from Willoughby that last night he appealed to your daughter, Mr. Dale — not for the first time, if I apprehend him correctly; and unsuccessfully. He despairs. I do not: supposing, that is, your assistance vouchsafed to us. And I do not despair, because the gentleman is a gentleman of worth, of acknowledged worth. You know him well enough to grant me that. I will bring you my daughter to help me in sounding his praises."
Dr Middleton stepped through the window to the lawn on an elastic foot, beaming with the happiness he felt charged to confer on his friend Mr. Whitford.
"Ladies! it passes all wonders," Mr. Dale gasped.
"Willoughby's generosity does pass all wonders," they said in chorus.
The door opened; Lady Busshe and Lady Culmer were announced.
Chapter XLV
The Patterne Ladies: Mr. Dale: Lady Busshe And Lady Culmer: With Mrs. Mountstuart Jankinson
Lady Busshe and Lady Culmer entered spying to right and left. At the sight of Mr. Dale in the room Lady Busshe murmured to her friend: "Confirmation!"
Lady Culmer murmured: "Corney is quite reliable."
"The man is his own best tonic."
"He is invaluable for the country."
Miss Eleanor and Miss Isabel greeted them.
The amiability of the Patterne ladies combined with their total eclipse behind their illustrious nephew invited enterprising women of the world to take liberties, and they were not backward.
Lady Busshe said: "Well? the news! we have the outlines. Don't be astonished: we know the points: we have heard the gun. I could have told you as much yesterday. I saw it. And I guessed it the day before. Oh, I do believe in fatalities now. Lady Culmer and I agree to take that view: it is the simplest. Well, and are you satisfied, my dears?"
The ladies grimaced interrogatively: "With what?"
"With it? with all! with her! with him!"
"Our Willoughby?"
"Can it be possible that they require a dose of Corney?" Lady Busshe remarked to Lady Culmer.
"They play discretion to perfection," said Lady Culmer. "But, my dears, we are in the secret."
"How did she behave?" whispered Lady Busshe. "No high flights and flutters, I do hope. She was well-connected, they say; though I don't comprehend what they mean by a line of scholars — one thinks of a row of pinafores: and she was pretty."
"That is well enough at the start. It never will stand against brains. He had the two in the house to contrast them, and… the result! A young woman with brains — in a house — beats all your beauties. Lady Culmer and I have determined on that view. He thought her a delightful partner for a dance, and found her rather tiresome at the end of the gallopade. I saw it yesterday, clear as daylight. She did not understand him, and he did understand her. That will be our report."
"She is young: she will learn," said the ladies uneasily, but in total ignorance of her meaning.
"And you are charitable, and always were. I remember you had a good word for that girl Durham."
Lady Busshe crossed the room to Mr. Dale, who was turning over leaves of a grand book of the heraldic devices of our great Families.
"Study it," she said, "study it, my dear Mr. Dale; you are in it, by right of possessing a clever and accomplished daughter. At page 300 you will find the Patterne crest. And mark me, she will drag you into the peerage before she has done — relatively, you know. Sir Willoughby and wife will not be contented to sit down and manage the estates. Has not Lætitia immense ambition? And very creditable, I say."
Mr. Dale tried to protest something. He shut the book, examining the binding, flapped the cover with a finger, hoped her ladyship was in good health, alluded to his own and the strangeness of the bird out of the cage.
"You will probably take up your residence here, in a larger and handsomer cage. Mr. Dale."
He shook his head. "Do I apprehend…" he said.
"I know," said she.
"Dear me, can it be?"
Mr. Dale gazed upward, with the feelings of one awakened late to see a world alive in broad daylight.
Lady Busshe dropped her voice. She took the liberty permitted to her with an inferior in station, while treating him to a tone of familiarity in acknowledgment of his expected rise; which is high breeding, or the exact measurement of social dues.
"Lætitia will be happy, you may be sure. I love to see a long and faithful attachment rewarded — love it! Her tale is the triumph of patience. Far above Grizzel! No woman will be ashamed of pointing to Lady Patterne. You are uncertain? You are in doubt? Let me hear — as low as you like. But there is no doubt of the new shifting of the scene? — no doubt of the proposal? Dear Mr. Dale! a very little louder. You are here because —? of course you wish to see Sir Willoughby. She? I did not catch you quite. She?… it seems, you say…?"
Lady Culmer said to the Patterne ladies: —