But Venetia only said that she would believe that Conway had sold out when she saw him walk in at the door; and Aubrey, after giving the matter frowning consideration, added, on a regrettably optimistic note, that there was no need to despair, since Conway would probably find another excuse for remaining in the Army.
“I should!” said Oswald. He then realized that this was decidedly uncomplimentary to his hostess, fell into an agony, and stammered: “That is, I don’t mean—that is, I mean I should if I were Sir Conway! He’ll find it so devilish slow here. One does, when one has seen the world.”
“You find it slow after a trip to the West Indies, don’t you?” said Aubrey.
That drew a laugh from Edward, and Oswald, who had meant to ignore Aubrey’s malice, said with unnecessary emphasis: “I’ve seen more of the world than you have, at all events! You’ve no notion—you’d be amazed if I told you how different it all is in Jamaica!”
“Yes, we were,” agreed Aubrey, beginning to pull himself up from his chair.
Edward, with the solicitude so little appreciated, at once went to his assistance. Unable to shake off the sustaining grip on his elbow Aubrey submitted to it, but his thank you was icily uttered, and he made no attempt to stir from where he was standing until Edward removed his hand. He then smoothed his sleeve, and said, addressing himself to his sister: “I’ll be off to collect that package, m’dear. I wish you will write to Taplow, when you have a moment to yourself, and desire him to send us one of the London daily journals in future. I think we ought to have one, don’t you?”
“No need for that,” said Edward. “I promise you I am only too happy to share mine with you.”
Aubrey paused in the doorway to look back, and to say, with dulcet softness: “But if we had our own you wouldn’t be obliged to ride over to us so often, would you?”
“If I had known you wished for it I would have ridden over every day, with my father’s copy!” said Oswald earnestly.
“Nonsense!” said Edward, annoyed by this as he had not been by Aubrey’s overt ill-will. “I fancy Sir John might have something to say to that scheme! Venetia knows she can depend on me.”
This snubbing remark goaded Oswald into saying that Venetia could depend on him for the performance of far more dangerous services than the delivery of a newspaper. At least, that was the gist of what he meant to say, but the speech, which had sounded well enough in imagination, underwent an unhappy transformation when uttered. It became hopelessly involved, sounded lame even to its author, and petered out under the tolerant scorn in Edward’s eye.
A diversion was just then created by the Lanyons’ old nurse, who came into the room looking for Venetia. Finding that Mr. Yardley, of whom she approved, was with her young mistress she at once begged pardon, said that her business could wait, and withdrew again. But Venetia, preferring a domestic interlude, even if she were obliged to inspect worn sheets or listen to complaints of the younger servants’ idleness, to the company of her ill-assorted admirers, rose to her feet, and in the kindest possible way dismissed them, saying that she would find herself in disgrace with Nurse if she kept her waiting.
“I have been neglecting my duties, and if I don’t take care shall be subjected to a dreadful scold,” she said, smiling, and holding out her hand to Oswald. “So I must send you both away. Don’t be vexed! you are such old friends that I don’t stand on ceremony with you.”
Not even Edward’s presence could deter Oswald from raising her hand to his lips, and pressing a fervent kiss upon it. She received this with unruffled equanimity, and upon recovering her hand held it out to Edward. But he only smiled, and said: “In a moment!” and held open the door for her. She went past him into the hall, and he followed her, firmly shutting his rival into the breakfast-parlour.
“You should not encourage that stupid boy to dangle after you,” he remarked.
“Do I encourage him?” she said, looking surprised. “I thought I behaved to him as I do to Aubrey. That’s how I regard him—except,” she added thoughtfully, “that Aubrey doesn’t want for sense, and seems much older than poor Oswald.”
“My dear Venetia, I do not accuse you of flirting with him!” he replied, with an indulgent smile. “Nor am I jealous, if that’s what you are thinking!”
“Well, it isn’t,” she said. “You have no reason to be jealous and no right either, you know.”
“Certainly no reason. As for right, we are agreed, are we not? that it would be improper to say more on that head until Conway comes home. You may guess with what interest I perused that column in the newspaper!”
This was said with an arch look which provoked her to exclaim: “Edward! Pray don’t refine too much upon Conway’s homecoming! You’ve fallen into a way of speaking of it as if that would make me ready to fall into your arms, and I wish you will not!”
“I hope—indeed, I am quite sure—that I have never expressed myself in such terms,” he responded gravely.
“No, never!” she agreed, a mischievous smile hovering round her lips. “Edward, do—do ask yourself, before I become so bored with Conway that I shall be ready to snap at any offer, if you really wish to marry me! For I don’t think you do!”
He looked taken aback, even rather shocked, but after a moment he smiled, and said: “I know your love of funning! You are always diverting, and if your sportiveness leads you now and then to say some odd things I fancy I am too well-acquainted with you to believe you mean them.”
“Edward, pray—pray make at least a push to disabuse your mind of illusion!” begged Venetia earnestly. “You can’t know me in the least, if that’s what you think, and what a dreadful shock it will be to you when you discover that I do mean the odd things I say!”
He replied playfully, yet with no diminution of his confidence: “Perhaps I know you better than you know yourself! It is a trick you’ve caught from Aubrey. You do not in general go beyond the line of what is pleasing, but when you talk of Conway it is as if you did not hold him in affection.”
“No, I don’t,” she said frankly.
“Venetia! Think what you are saying!”
“But it is perfectly true!” she insisted. “Oh, don’t look so shocked! I don’t dislike him—though I daresay I may, if I am obliged to be with him a great deal, for besides not caring a straw for anyone’s comfort but his own he is quite dismally commonplace!”
“You should not say so,” he replied repressively. “If you talk of your brother with so little moderation it is not to be wondered at that Aubrey shouldn’t scruple to speak of his homecoming as he did just now.”
“My dear Edward, a moment since you said that I had caught the trick from him!” she rallied him. His countenance did not relax, and she added, in some amusement: “The truth is—if you would but realize it!—that we haven’t any tricks, we only say what we think. And I must own that it is astonishing how often we have the same thoughts, for we are not, I believe, much alike—certainly not in our tastes!”
He was silent for a minute, and then said: “It is allowable for you to feel a little resentment, perhaps. I have felt it for you. Your situation here, since your father’s death, has been uncomfortable, and Conway has not scrupled to lay his burdens—indeed, his duties!—upon your shoulders. But with Aubrey it is otherwise. I was tempted to give him a sharp set-down when I heard him speak as he did of his brother. Whatever Conway’s faults may be he is very good-natured, and has always been kind to Aubrey.”