CHAPTER XVII.

EVELYN VISITS THE DUCHESS.

THE reader (who is blessed with a good memory) will remember that at the end of our first chapter Miss Sarah Strong had made an appointment to take the newly-arrived Miss Manwaring to call upon the Duchess of Ribblesdale, and punctually at the hour fixed, she arrived to fulfil her promise.

The entrance to her Grace’s apartments was situated in the first quadrangle, and after ascending a somewhat narrow flight of stairs, and passing through a long corridor, the two ladies were ceremoniously introduced into the presence of the “Vice-reine” of Hampton Court. The Duchess rose as they entered. She was a little, upright woman, dressed in plain black silk. A single diamond of great size glistened on her left hand, and, depending from a plain gold chain which hung around her neck, she wore a locket or pendant containing a huge emerald. She wore no cap, but about her hair, which was of a beautiful silver tint, was disposed, Spanish-fashion, some fine old black lace, beneath which shone magnificent dark eyes, which lighted up a face beaming with benevolence, and still retaining some portion of the singular beauty for which it had formerly been celebrated.

“This is indeed kind,” said the Duchess, shaking Miss Strong’s masculine-looking hand warmly, “and it is kind of you, Miss Manwaring,” she added, turning to Evelyn, “to waive ceremony and come to see an old woman whose doctor would not allow her to come and see you. Ah! I see,” she continued, holding Evelyn’s hand in hers, and gently kissing her fair forehead; “you have your mother’s beautiful eyes and hair. Poor little Honoria! Your mother and I were friends when we were girls, you know, and I mean that you and I should be friends now. I am most happy to welcome a _lady_ to the Palace; we have not quite always been so fortunate of late, have we, Miss Strong? and I venture to promise that it will not be my fault if Miss Manwaring’s new home is not a happy one.”

Evelyn was thoroughly set at her ease by this kind address, and the conversation was becoming general, when Mr. Gilray, the groom of the chambers, throwing open the door, announced Lady Lavinia Gathercole, whom Evelyn at once concluded to be the mistress of the Mrs. Papfaddle who had hospitably entertained her own maid with “the cup that cheers but not inebriates” the previous evening.

Truth to tell, Lady Lavinia had been bursting with curiosity the whole morning to see the new-comer--although, till she knew more about her, she did not like to hazard a call--and being warned by the faithful Papfaddle that Evelyn was on her way with Miss Strong to visit the Duchess, she had hastily thrown on her best company bonnet and shawl, and arrived, as she afterwards told her friend and ally Lady M’Adam, in the nick of time to see the pert minx currying favour with her betters.

The Duchess looked somewhat annoyed by the interruption, but she received Lady Lavinia very civilly.

Lady Lavinia (eighth daughter of the late Earl of Beccles), after fidgeting her quiet little husband, Mr. John Gathercole of the Board of Trade, into a premature grave, took to writing novels of a mildly naughty description, and set up as a Blue. The _Morning Post_ (then in its threepenny days) kept constantly printing, in its literary column and clearest type, announcements like the following:--

“‘_The Debutante and the Debauchee._’ We are charmed to announce that another Tale of Fashionable Life has just issued from the facile pen of that well-known and much-appreciated delineator of the Doings of the Upper Ten, Lady Lavinia Gathercole. We need not say that in her new Work the talented Authoress will abundantly sustain her reputation amongst the _Beau Monde_, of which she is herself a brilliant and accomplished member,” &c., &c. The descent in the price of the _Morning Post_ having destroyed its reputation with the old ladies, who were its principal subscribers, and who could not bear seeing it descend to the level of a “Penny Dreadful,” the sale of Lady Lavinia’s novels became small by degrees, and alarmingly less, until it ceased altogether. Upon this, Lady Lavinia, who, at the instance of Lord Bungay, the then premier, had been given apartments at Hampton Court, thought it high time that she should be “converted,” in the evangelical sense of that much-abused word, and the operation was accordingly performed by Mr. Moodle, the eminent apostle of the lower grades of the female aristocratic world. This gentleman, who had been a somewhat fast “Somerset House young man,” had somehow been pitchforked into the position of Commissioner of Taxes, and having noticed the commercial success of the trash which Dr. Cumming and other “religious” quacks annually threw off, he determined to set up in the same line himself. So well, indeed, did he find this scheme pay, that he was on the point of marrying the Dowager Marchioness of Scampingham, when unluckily the young Marquis caught the self-sent apostle in the act of chucking his lady-mother’s French maid under the chin on the grand staircase of Scampingham House, and thereupon incontinently kicked him down stairs, and out into the Square--an operation which Mr. Moodle bore with much pseudo-Christian meekness. Strange to say, this little episode did not destroy his popularity amongst his female devotees. In the first place, he promptly gave out that he had discovered that Lady Scampingham was of too worldly a disposition to merit a union with a saint like himself, and that therefore he had felt it his duty to draw back, as from the pit of Tophet; by which judicious course he came to be regarded in the light of a martyr and injured saint, and turned his kicking to his own advantage. In the next place, Moodle was a good-looking fellow enough, and his admirers, each of them, felt that, as he had _not_ married the Dowager, he might, and very likely _would_, marry her own sweet self; and so they petted him, and believed in him more than ever.

Moodle’s _modus operandi_ was as follows. It was his habit to give addresses on religious subjects, or, in other words, to preach self-sent to as many ladies as could be crammed at afternoon tea time into the drawing-room of one of his devotees; and as he was a strong, lusty fellow, with a rich, oily voice, and a great gift of the gab, he drew, you may be sure, large audiences. When the London Season was over, he would visit one watering-place after another, and then his addresses were delivered at ten o’clock in the morning, after which the audience would disperse to write letters, bathe, read French novels on the sly, and flirt on the beach. Moodle generally contrived on these occasions to be the guest of a spinster lady of competent fortune, or of a widow with a comfortable jointure; but he had a particular _penchant_ for ladies of rank, and it is but fair to say that they returned his predilection with interest. Moodle took good care never to give out that he was not a Member of the Church of England, although his doctrine and practice were utterly at variance with its teaching; in spite of which fact, however, he was able to boast of having once had a low-church Bishop amongst his audience at Swimingley-super-Mare. His doctrine, if such it could be called, was, it is needless to relate, of a Calvinistic description, but it was entirely without a tinge of Calvin’s asceticism and sternness, or indeed of anything which goes to lend respectability to that gloomy and Christless creed. It was, in fact, a combination of Calvinism and sugarstick, and his religion was quite consistent with a vast amount of lawn tennis (with serious young men), flirting, gossip, and tittle-tattle. Moodle descanted chiefly on the “filthiness” of good works, and as he was careful to assert the undoubted salvation of all those who believed in his pretensions, his lady admirers felt remarkably comfortable under his ministrations, and agreed with him that those who questioned them were “very dark indeed.” In fact, the ladies, who were so unhesitatingly assured of their own final acceptance, found a pleasing zest in contemplating the equally certain damnation of those who rejected this protestant pontiff. Mr. Moodle had recently established a footing in Hampton Court Palace, through his intimacy with a certain Lady M’Adam, of whom more anon; but his only “converts” at present were Lady Lavinia, her friend Miss Scheimes, and old Admiral Grogrum; but the Admiral, alas! showed from time to time unmistakable signs of back-sliding, and an unregenerate desire to kick over the traces.

During her novel-writing days, Lady Lavinia Gathercole had rather prided herself on exhibiting just a slight spice of naughtiness in her conversation and behaviour, and she was rather tolerant of naughtiness in others; but now, since her “conversion,” as was the case with the Athenians of old, her main occupation in life was to hear (or invent) some new things. Unluckily, however, these new things were generally to the disparagement of her neighbours. Her main object was to appear young, innocent, and lamb-like. Lady Lavinia dressed like a girl, entered a room with a juvenile skip, spite of a slight lameness in one leg, and she had a way of moving her shoulders up and down, and backwards and forwards, which she fondly believed to be alluring. It certainly caused a responsive shudder to vibrate through the frames of all beholders, and it irresistibly reminded strangers of calves’ foot jelly. One of Lady Lavinia’s adulators remarking one day that she was “fawn-like,” Lord Frederic Fitzfoodles, who had apartments in the Palace, drily remarked--“Yes, like a fawn, very; but she reminds me rather of an old nanny-goat with a game leg.” Evelyn was, of course, presented to Lady Lavinia, who, with an infinite amount of undulatory movements in her shoulders, expressed herself delighted to make her acquaintance.

“Really,” she cried, “I am so charmed and delighted to find my new neighbour is Young. With my poor spirits, I feel I could scarcely put up with the presence of another Old person on my staircase, paralytic, perhaps, or with a wooden leg like Admiral Grogrum, and quite--what is it the poet says?--oh! quite in the queer and mellow leaf; no, not mellow either, I think, but something like it. Do you know, Miss Manwaring,” she continued--elevating her shoulders to such an extent that Miss Strong feared she would emerge from her clothes altogether, and appear _in puris naturalibus_ in the Duchess’s drawing-room, which, if Gilray should come in, would, to say the least, be scarcely proper--“do you know that some of the dear people here are so Old that, living amongst them, I sometimes think I must be as old as Methoosalem myself!” (It is a curious question, by the way, why it is that High Church folks always say “Meth_u_sel_ah_,” and Low Church people “Meth_oo_sal_em_.”)

Evelyn could only reply that she was happy to make acquaintance with a lady whose appearance was so remarkably unsuggestive of the patriarchal personage mentioned, and then the conversation, such as it was, turned upon general topics. After a short time, the Duchess, begging her other visitors to excuse her, expressed a wish to speak to Evelyn in private, and conducted her to her own particular room, which was through that in which they had been sitting. “I have brought you in here,” said her Grace, as soon as they were seated, “because I wish to speak to you a few words without interruption. I want to tell you, my dear Miss Manwaring, that I wish to be your friend, not only on account of the excellent qualities which I am sure you possess, and for your dear mother’s sake, but because I feel I owe a debt of gratitude to one of your family who now, alas! is no more--I mean your brother Wilfred, who was my son’s intimate friend when they were together at a private tutor’s, that Dr. Massenger who behaved so ill. My son has often told me what a noble lad that brother of yours was, and that his steadfast friendship and good example were of the utmost value to himself at a critical point of his life: some day, before long, I trust you will see my boy yourself.”

Evelyn was inexpressibly gratified at hearing her darling brother thus lauded by the gracious lady who sat beside her, and, with her eyes filled with grateful tears, said she had often heard of the young Duke of Ribblesdale from her brother. She added that she had still in her possession the letter he had written to Wilfred with the too-late intention of informing him of his acquittal of the charges brought against him, and that she felt deeply thankful to him for having written it.

The Duchess then expressed a hope that Evelyn would not too much seclude herself. “Take us all round,” said her Grace, smiling, “we are not a bad sort of people in the Palace, and I am sure you will meet many kind friends among us. To-morrow I shall insist on your dining quietly with me, for I am bent on introducing you to the Miss Hazelhursts, who are the dearest old ladies in the world. And, now I have said what I wanted, we will go back to Lady Lavinia and Miss Strong; and remember this, that the Duchess of Ribblesdale only brings into this little sanctum those who are, or those who she wishes to be, her intimate personal friends.”