CHAPTER IV.

Il n’est pas bien honnête, et pour beaucoup de causes, Qu’une femme étudie et sache tant de choses. Former aux bonnes mœurs l’esprit de ses enfans, Faire aller son ménage, avoir l’œil sur ses gens, Et régler la dépense avec économie, Doit être son étude et sa philosophie. Nos pères sur ce point étaient gens bien sensés, Qui disaient qu’une femme en sait toujours assez Quand la capacité de son esprit se hausse A connaître un pourpoint d’avec un haut de chausse. Les leurs ne lisaient point, mais elles vivaient bien, Leurs ménages étaient tout leur docte entretien; Et leurs livres, un dé, du fil, et des aiguilles, Dont elles travaillaient au trousseau de leurs filles. Les femmes d’à present sont bien loin de ces mœurs, Elles veulent écrire, et devenir auteurs.—MOLIERE.

There is no moment more trying to the mistress of a house than that in which the ladies first gather round the fire when they leave the dining-room. If a silence ensues, or if the conversation is begun in too low a tone of voice, that voiceless utterance which denotes and produces shyness, the die is cast—the character of the evening is stamped.

Unfortunately Mrs. Heckfield, in her anxiety to be attentive, just as the ladies were crowding round the fire, asked them if they would not “take a seat,” and was sufficiently wanting in tact to allow them to settle themselves, in something very nearly approaching a circle, and a circle some way removed from the fire.

In vain were the sofas stuffed with cushions, in vain were the ottomans as low as possible, and the arm-chairs so deep that no one under seven feet high could reach the back of them; in vain were all the tables so orthodoxly covered with snuff boxes under glass cases, miniatures in beautiful frames, French souvenirs with liliputian artificial flowers, annuals in every variety of binding, prose albums, poetry albums, drawing albums, china cups and Sevres vases, Dresden inkstands, and mother-of-pearl letter pressers, till it was impossible to find a spot on which a cup could be safely deposited; all these appliances and means to boot will not produce ease if it is wanting in the mind of the hostess. From which, by the by, might be deduced the superiority of mind over matter.

Mrs. Haughtville was a fine lady, and was anxious Lady Bodlington should not labour under the erroneous impression that she was in her element with Miss Pennefeather and the Heckfields. She therefore took an early opportunity of asking Lady Bodlington how many Miss Heckfields there were, and whether this Miss Heckfield was older or younger than Lady Selcourt. Lady Bodlington answered truly and simply, that she did not know, as she had only met them once before at the ball. Mrs. Haughtville did not hear, and Lady Bodlington, who was straightforward and good-humoured, and did not wish to be uncivil, was quite distressed to know how to answer. Mrs. Haughtville continued to ask questions about the people present, forgetting that though she asked in a whisper, she could not hear the whispered answer.

Mrs. Heckfield, who thought if Miss Pennefeather would talk every one must be delighted with her cleverness, was occupied in leading her to subjects on which she fancied she would shine and edify her audience; but Miss Pennefeather, who had found the dandy very unsatisfactory, and was not much pleased with the _insouciance_ of the ladies of fashion, and who thought herself privileged to have the sensitive pride of genius, was not so easily drawn out. Lucy, who had been daunted by her mother’s remark as they left the dining-room, was meek and silent.

It was up-hill work for Mrs. Heckfield. At length she thought of some Italian views which had lately been sent to her by her eldest son, who was on his travels.

“Have you seen these prints, Miss Pennefeather, that Henry has sent me? They are quite in your way, such an Italian scholar as you are.”

Miss Pennefeather revived; she piqued herself on her pronunciation of Italian. She looked at them with interest, read the names of each with great emphasis, scrupulously called Leghorn, Livorno, and Florence, Firenze; and expatiated on the beauties of each place, as if she had lived there all her life.

“I thought you had never been abroad, Miss Pennefeather?” said Lucy, timidly and simply.

“No! I have never been abroad, exactly,” replied Miss Pennefeather, with a slight embarrassment, but, instantly recovering, she added with enthusiasm, “but I have heard and read so much of these hallowed spots, I feel as if I knew them perfectly; as if I had roved with Il Petrarca, through the shady groves and by the purling streams of Valchiusa; as if I had accompanied the great author of the Divina Commedia in his wanderings; and I can almost fancy I had made one of that party of congenial souls in the enchanted skiff with Guido and Lappo,

‘E Monna Vanna, e Monna Bice poi, E quella sotto ’l numer delle trenta!’

I never see a print of La bella Firenze, without thinking of her exiled poet, and,” she added with a sigh, and an upward glance, which was intended to speak volumes, “feeling with him—

‘Come sa di sale Lo pan altrui, com’ è duro calle, Lo scender, e ’l salir per l’altrui scale.’”

Miss Pennefeather was poor, and her friends were extremely kind in frequently inviting her to stay at their houses, where she appeared to enjoy herself exceedingly, and gave no signs of sympathising with Dante.

“What did she say?” asked Mrs. Haughtville.

“Something about salt bread, and its being very hard to go up and down stairs,” answered the good-humoured Lady Bodlington.

“Oh!” said Mrs. Haughtville.

Miss Pennefeather cast a glance of contempt at the high-born pair, and relapsed into a dignified silence. Coffee came: that was a real blessing. Tea succeeded, which was some comfort. Mrs. Heckfield’s eyes turned frequently and more frequently towards the door; still the gentlemen came not. In her despair she bade Lucy give them a little music.

“You are fond of music, I believe, Lady Bodlington?”

“Oh, yes! passionately fond of music!” answered Lady Bodlington, with a suppressed yawn, and poor Lucy seated herself at the pianoforte.

She had a pretty voice, but she was very much frightened. Miss Pennefeather was a critic, and Mrs. Haughtville looked so cold. Lady Bodlington she did not mind—she seemed good-natured, and the circumstance of her being a viscountess, had not the same effect on Lucy’s nerves as on her mother’s.

She did her best, and Lady Bodlington, with a sweet smile, thanked her for that pretty Spanish air.

“It is German!” said Lucy, with the _naïveté_ of youth; and both felt uncomfortable. Lady Bodlington, at having made a wrong hit, Lucy, at not having pronounced her words more distinctly. Lady Bodlington should have known better than to utter any phrase of commendation which committed her, as to the language in which a young lady’s song is couched. Lucy should have known better than to set her right, when she had made the mistake.

“If Miss Pennefeather would favour us!” humbly suggested Mrs. Heckfield: “One of your own unique compositions, my dear Miss Pennefeather. Miss Pennefeather composes words, and music, and all, Mrs. Haughtville, and they are the sweetest things!”

This account of Miss Pennefeather’s multifarious talents excited a slight emotion of curiosity in Mrs. Haughtville’s mind, and she accordingly begged Miss Pennefeather to grant their request. Lady Bodlington was very anxious indeed; and the poetess, whose pride, though easily wounded, was, through the medium of her vanity, as easily soothed, found the two fine ladies were more intellectual, and consequently more worthy of the efforts of her genius, than she had at first imagined.

After a little bashful reluctance, she seated herself upon the round stool. She was short and thick, with a very small waist and a very full gown, and she sat extremely stiff and upright. Her arms were short, and when she meant to play _staccato_, she caught up her hands as high as her shoulders, and then she pounced down again on the affrighted notes as a kite upon a brood of chickens. The “sweet thing” she selected for the occasion was in a German style. A love-lorn damsel who sold herself to the spirit of darkness, that she might rejoin her murdered lover’s ghost in another, but not a better, world. Miss Pennefeather’s nose was small, and somewhat _retroussé_; her eyes were large, black, and round (they were her beauty); her mouth would not have been ugly, but that it was difficult to decide where her chin ended and her throat began, so that, during the vehement and energetic passages which the nature of the subject called forth, when the head was thrown back, and the black eyes were darting their beams towards the ceiling, the double chin protruded rather beyond the natural and original one.

The gentlemen entered just as the maiden was torn away to the realms below by the infernal crew, and, having repented her of her unholy compact, was invoking beings of the upper air to her rescue. The poor pianoforte reeled under the astounding accompaniment, in its lowest bass to the deep-toned exultation of the demons, and to the shrieks of the maiden in its highest treble; the Sappho’s cheeks were suffused with the excitement of the moment, the feathers in her yellow toque were waving as rapidly as the plume of a hero in the thickest of the fight. The sight, the sounds, were awful!

The dandy reached the door—he saw—he heard—and, he fled. He retreated to the hall, and hastily seizing a hat (which, by the by, happened to be Lord Montreville’s instead of his own,) and throwing around him his military cloak, he boldly sallied forth in a drizzling wet night to walk two miles to his lodgings.

“He’d brave the raging of the skies, But not”—Miss Pennefeather.

The other gentlemen were less easily intimidated, and made good their entrance. Lord Montreville seated himself by the side of Lucy, and, without speaking enough to be uncivil towards the performer, he contrived to make Lucy perfectly understand that he preferred her conversation to Miss Pennefeather’s singing, although he was passionately fond of music, and should like of all things to hear her sing.

When the performance was concluded, he assured the Corinne of the evening that her composition was one which could be heard with indifference by no one. Miss Pennefeather was charmed, and asked if his Lordship was an admirer of the new style of English music, which had been introduced since the Captive Knight and the Treasures of the Deep had made such a sensation.

“Of course you know the Treasures of the Deep? They tell me I have caught something of the inspired authoress’s expression.” Lord Montreville really trembled. He had heard it sung by the inspired authoress, and he hastened to avert the sacrilegious attempt, by begging for another of her own composition.

Charmed and flattered, Miss Pennefeather again burst forth in a perfectly original piece, under cover of which Lord Montreville entered into a most agreeable conversation with Lucy. His dark, lively, expressive eyes, looked at her with so much consciousness of being understood, that she immediately felt quite intimate, and perfectly satisfied that he was as much amused as she was, by Miss Pennefeather’s exhibition. These looks of mutual intelligence and amusement prevented her feeling any awe of his age or his rank, while his very age made her feel perfectly safe and innocent in immediately giving in to the intimacy which so suddenly sprang up between them. Their communication did not confine itself to a little good-humoured ridicule of the self-constituted Corinne; he had the happy knack of leading the conversation to topics interesting to the individuals with whom he conversed; and Mrs. Heckfield overheard Lucy, in the fullness of her heart, giving a detailed account of the death of a Newfoundland puppy, which was supposed to have been bit by a mad dog!

Mrs. Heckfield was in agonies: she looked unutterable things; but her looks were utterly thrown away. Lucy’s heart and soul were in her subject, and her eyes were sufficiently tearful to look very bright and melting. Lord Montreville thought this extremely countrified simplicity, charming, though he did not intend it should last for ever. He was himself a professed lover of animals, and he gave her, in return, an account of a horse who neighed when he came into the stable, and would put his nose into his pocket to find the bread he was in the habit of feeding him with.

Lucy thought him the nicest, best-natured creature she had ever met with; and Mrs. Heckfield saw her, in the midst of his story, draw her chair nearer to him, her whole mind intent upon the sensible horse. Mrs. Heckfield thought, “How improper! how forward! how vulgar! What can ail Lucy to-night?”

When the company dispersed, what was her horror to see Lucy put out her hand towards Lord Montreville, and shake hands with him cordially, heartily, and frankly; but her horror was mixed with astonishment, when Lord Montreville begged permission to call the next morning, as Miss Heckfield had promised to show him some beautiful puppies, and to allow him to select one, as he was a great dog-fancier.

“What can be the meaning of this?” thought she, “he must be disgusted with Lucy’s manners to-day! They could not have been worse if Bell Stopford had been here!”

When the last carriage had driven from the door, Mrs. Heckfield threw herself into a chair.

“Well, Lucy! I think you have done it to-day! When you knew I wished you to behave like a girl of fashion. When we had all the best company within ten miles round assembled here, just this one day, to giggle and laugh all dinner-time, and then to entertain a man of Lord Montreville’s refinement and taste with your dog’s death, and your puppies’ birth! He must think you have been brought up in the stables, rather than in the drawing-room.”

“Oh, dear mamma! I assure you he asked me all about poor dear Hector’s death!”

“Asked you about Hector’s death! How could he have known such a dog as Hector ever existed, if you had not begun about your own dog and your own affairs? Don’t you know that egotism should be avoided in every way, and that it is the most ill-bred thing in the world to talk of yourself and your concerns?”

“So it is, mamma;—very true. I did not mean to talk of myself, and I am sure I do not know how I fell into it: but you don’t know how interested he seemed. I do not think he was bored, really: he says he is so fond of animals—just like me.”

“Pooh, child!—he is a very well-bred man, and was too polite to let you feel you bored him. You must learn not to be led into pouring your own histories into people’s ears.”

Mrs. Heckfield forgot that at dinner she had given Lord Montreville a very long account of the manner in which she had become possessed of the china he had admired.