In this mood she rang the bell, and ordered her horses; not however till she had reason to believe the dog-cart on the way down the avenue. As she came down in her habit, she was met by Frank, returning from his tutor.
"Have I made a mistake, Cecil! I thought we were to go out together this afternoon!"
"Yes; but Raymond was wanted at Willansborough, and I am going to lunch at Sirenwood. I want to borrow a book."
"Oh, very well, I'll come, if you don't mind. Sir Harry asked me to drop in and look at his dogs."
This was irresistible; and Frank decided on riding the groom's horse, and leaving him to conduct Anne to the rendezvous in the afternoon-for Charlie had been at Sandhurst for the last week- running in first to impart the change of scheme to her, as she was performing her daily task of reading to his mother.
He did so thus: "I say, Anne, Cecil wants to go to Sirenwood first to get a book, so Lee will bring you to meet us at the Beeches at 2.30."
"Are you going to luncheon at Sirenwood?" asked Mrs. Poynsett.
"Yes; Cecil wants to go," said the dutiful younger brother.
"I wish you would ask Cecil to come in. Raymond put himself into such a state of mind at finding me reading Madame de Sevigne, that I am afraid he carried off her books summarily, though I told him I was glad of a little space for my old favourites."
Cecil was, however, mounted by the time Frank came out, and they cantered away together, reaching the portico of Sirenwood in about twenty minutes.
Cecil had never been in the house before, having only left her card, though she had often met the sisters. She found herself in a carpeted hall, like a supplementary sitting-room, where two gentlemen had been leaning over the wide hearth. One, a handsome benignant-looking old man, with a ruddy face and abundant white whiskers, came forward with a hearty greeting. "Ah! young Mrs. Poynsett! Delighted to see you!-Frank Charnock, you're come in good time; we are just going down to see the puppies before luncheon. Only I'll take Mrs. Poynsett to the ladies first. Duncombe, you don't know Mrs. Raymond Poynsett-one must not say senior bride, but the senior's bride. Is that right?"
"No papa," said a bright voice from the stairs, "you haven't it at all right; Mrs. Charnock Poynsett, if you please-isn't it?"
"I believe so," replied Cecil. "Charnock always seems my right name."
"And you have all the right to retain it that Mrs. Poynsett had to keep hers," said Lady Tyrrell, as they went up-stairs to her bedroom. "How is she?"
"As usual, thank you; always on the sofa."
"But managing everything from it?"
"Oh, yes."
"Never was there such a set of devoted sons, models for the neighbourhood."
Cecil felt a sense of something chiming in with her sources of vexation, but she only answered, "They are passionately fond of her."
"Talk of despotism! Commend me to an invalid! Ah! how delightfully you contrive to keep your hair in order! I am always scolding Lenore for coming in dishevelled, and you look so fresh and compact! Here is my sanctum. You'll find Mrs. Duncombe there. She drove over in the drag with her husband on their way to Backsworth. I am so glad you came, there is so much to talk over."
"If our gentlemen will give us time," said Mrs. Duncombe; "but I am afraid your senator will not be as much absorbed in the dogs as my captain."
"I did not come with my husband," said Cecil; "he is gone to Willansborough to meet the architect."
"Ah, about the new buildings. I do hope and trust the opportunity will not be wasted, and that the drainage will be provided for."
"You are longing to have a voice there," said Lady Tyrrell, laughing.
"I am. It is pre-eminently a woman's question, and this is a great opportunity. I shall talk to every one. Little Pettitt, the hair-dresser, has some ground there, and he is the most intelligent of the tradesmen. I gave him one of those excellent little hand-bills, put forth by the Social Science Committee, on sanitary arrangements. I thought of asking you to join us in ordering some down, and never letting a woman leave our work-room without one."
"You couldn't do better, I am sure," said Lady Tyrrell; "only, what's the use of preaching to the poor creatures to live in good houses, when their landlords won't build them, and they must live somewhere?"
"Make them coerce the landlords," said Mrs. Duncombe; "that's the only way. Upheave the masses from beneath."
"But that's an earthquake," said Cecil.
"Earthquakes are sometimes wholesome."
"But the process is not so agreeable that we had not rather avert it," said Lady Tyrrell.
"All ours at Dunstone are model cottages," said Cecil; "it is my father's great hobby."
"Squires' hobbies are generally like the silver trough the lady gave her sow," said Mrs. Duncombe; "they come before the poor are prepared, and with a spice of the autocrat."
"Come, I won't have you shock Mrs. Charnock Poynsett," said Lady Tyrrell. "You illogical woman! The poor are to demand better houses, and the squires are not to build them!"
"The poor are to be fitly housed, as a matter of right, and from their own sense of self-respect," returned Mrs. Duncombe; "not a few favourites, who will endure dictation, picked out for the model cottage. It is the hobby system against which I protest."
"Without quite knowing what was conveyed by it in this instance?" said Lady Tyrrell. "I am sure there is nothing I wish more than that we had any power of improvement of the cottages here; but influence is our only weapon."
"By the bye, Mrs. Poynsett," continued Mrs. Duncombe, "will you give a hint to Mrs. Miles Charnock that it will never do to preach to the women at the working-room? I don't mean holding forth," she added, seeing Cecil's look of amazement; "but improving the occasion, talking piously, giving tracts, and so forth."
"I thought you gave sanitary tracts!" said Lady Tyrrell.
"That is quite different."
"I doubt whether the women would see the distinction. A little book is a tract to them."
"I would abstain rather than let our work get a goody reputation for indoctrinating sectarianism. It would be all up with us; we might as well keep a charity school."
"I don't think the women dislike it," said Cecil.
"Most likely they think it the correct thing, the grain which they must swallow with our benefits; but for that very reason it injures the whole tone, and prevents them learning independence. Put it in that light; I know you can."
"I don't think Anne would understand," said Cecil, somewhat flattered.
"I doubt whether there are three women in the neighbourhood who would," said Lady Tyrrell.
"People always think charity-how I hate the word!-a means of forcing their own tenets down the throats of the poor," said Mrs. Duncombe. "And certainly this neighbourhood is as narrow as any I ever saw. Nobody but you and-shall I say the present company?-has any ideas. I wonder how they will receive Clio Tallboys and her husband?"
"Ah! you have not heard about them," said Lady Tyrrell. "Most delightful people, whom Mrs. Duncombe met on the Righi. He is a Cambridge professor."
"Taillebois-I don't remember the name," said Cecil, "and we know a great many Cambridge men. We went to a Commencement there."
"Oh, not Cambridge on the Cam! the American Cambridge," said Mrs. Duncombe. "He is a quiet, inoffensive man, great on political economy; but his wife is the character. Wonderfully brilliant and original, and such a lecturer!"
"Ladies' lectures would startle the natives," said Lady Tyrrell.