CHAPTER XII

“Upon my word, Elizabeth,” said Margaret, as they entered the parlour, “I should like to know what Emma has done to get such fine friends. She has such amazing luck. I suppose I have been to twenty assemblies and never was a bit the nearer knowing Lord Osborne or any of his set, and not for want of a hint, but you know how obstinate Tom can be. How Emma managed it I cannot think.”

Emma, who knew herself innocent of any manœuvre, and who feared that the conversation might tend in a direction whither she had hardly allowed her own thoughts to stray, did not remain to hear more, but went upstairs to her father. As she closed the door, she heard just enough of Elizabeth’s kind reply to feel thankful for her intervention.

“It is simply that Emma is good-natured and pretty,” said Elizabeth, laying down her needlework.

“Emma is not the first pretty girl who has been seen in those rooms, I believe, and I should like to know what good-nature has to do with it.”

“It made her offer to dance with little Charles Blake, and so please his mother and uncle. That was her kindness and good-nature.”

“No, it was not, it was because she was so lucky as to sit next the boy; if she had been at the other end of the room, all the good-nature in the world would have been of no use. It was all her good luck.”

“And if you had sat next to him the whole evening, should you have thought of offering to be his partner?” enquired Elizabeth.

“Very likely not. I hate dancing with boys, but Emma likes children, which just proves what I was saying, that she has all the good fortune. But I do not understand how Emma became so well acquainted with Lord Osborne.”

“And I cannot at all comprehend what makes your head so full of the Osbornes this morning,” replied Elizabeth.

“Why, we met them all this morning, and first there was Lord Osborne walking and talking with Emma, and then Mr Howard. There never was anything like it. He came right up to the garden gate before he left us.”

“Do you mean Lord Osborne?” cried Elizabeth in astonishment.

Margaret explained, but with such ill-humour that Elizabeth, curious and unsatisfied, ran up after Emma to ascertain the truth from her.

Emma had quitted her father’s room, and was standing by the window in the room she shared with Elizabeth. Despite the pleasure of Mr Howard’s attentions, her spirits were not good. Margaret was not such a walking companion as she had been used to. She had been much with her uncle, a well-read man of broad views, and she had been accustomed to the enjoyment of sharing the experiences of a cultivated mind. She had been happy, too, in many hours of solitude, and family life at Stanton with its incessant calls on her attention and good-humour was too great a change to be as yet agreeable. She had, however, a real regard for Elizabeth, and her entrance, while it necessitated the rousing of her spirits, did not irk them. Elizabeth was soon in possession of all that had passed, and of as much as she could comprehend of Emma’s reasons for declining the introduction to Miss Osborne. This was more than she could have understood a month earlier. Her intimacy with Emma had shown her that there were people whose imagination was not bounded by the Castle, and whose hopes were not centred in D----

“Well, I am less proud than you, Emma. I should think it very fine to be introduced to Miss Osborne. After all, you mean to let Mrs Blake visit you. Where is the difference?”

“Surely, Elizabeth, you must yourself see the difference. Mr Howard and his sister are in our own rank of life, though their intimacy at the Castle gives them more consequence. There would be no condescension on their part, and no obligation incurred by me which a return visit will not repay.”

“Well, I wish I knew what day they would come,” said Miss Watson; “for we could sit in the drawing-room, and not cover the sofa and carpet.”

“But, my dearest sister, I hope it will not be the only visit they pay, and we cannot always be sitting in state to receive them. Let us choose to begin as perforce we must continue.”

“You are very odd, Emma. I do not understand you at all,” was all Elizabeth could say.

A combination of gratitude in Mrs Blake, enthusiasm in Charles, a something in Mr Howard, a fair morning and an old pony-chaise brought the party from Wickstead to call on the Miss Watsons at Stanton on the following Monday.

Elizabeth and Margaret were sitting together when they were announced. Greetings were exchanged, and Emma was named. Elizabeth looked an enquiry at Margaret, but Margaret was too well satisfied with her position to notice, and Elizabeth, after lengthy apologies, was obliged herself to go in search of Emma.

There is a certain freedom in being alone with strangers, and Margaret took full advantage of it. Old wit is new, or may be, and will almost certainly be accepted as new. Margaret, gentle and drawling, was by turns the admired of the town of D---- for Mr Howard, the would-be confidante for Mrs Blake, and could doubtless have been something appropriate for Master Blake if he had not checkmated her by asking for Emma. He stood by his mother’s side, earnestly regarding the top of his hat, and drawing figures on the beaver with his fingers, until the entrance of the two other young ladies, when he looked up all animation as Emma greeted him as her “partner at the ball.”

Why Emma, without being in any way striking, and without the wish of appearing so, should become the centre of the circle of interest is a question that admits of many answers. To Mr Howard she was fast becoming the centre of many things. For Mrs Blake there could be only one centre, her children, but Emma had allied herself to Charles by word and look. Charles’s thoughts had revolved round her since she first took his hand; while Elizabeth was pleased to see that she had on her spotted muslin, and Margaret, noting afresh her brown skin, thought with complaisance of her own fairness.

A moment afterwards Mr Watson entered the room, to the surprise of his daughters, who should have realised that even much-pampered gout might be relieved by the sound of Mr Howard’s voice.

It was Emma who rolled her father’s chair into position, Emma who arranged his footstool, who drew the curtain, placed the screen and laid his spectacles and snuff-box within his reach, and nothing of this escaped Mr Howard’s notice.

When Mr Watson had put on his spectacles, he surveyed the company and, turning to Mr Howard, asked who was that nice young woman talking to Elizabeth. Mr Howard replied that she was his sister. Mr Watson apologised for not recognising a lady whom he had never seen before. It seemed a strange thing to him, he said, that he should not be presented to ladies in his own house, and Elizabeth well knew the difficulty he would now experience in rising and crossing the room to pay his respects.

Elizabeth had tried to do what was proper, but at quite the most impossible moment, and it must be in doubt whether the apology, which she was now trying to make, would have attracted any more attention, had not Mrs Blake rendered apology unnecessary and annoyance ridiculous by crossing the room and taking her brother’s seat by Mr Watson. In the general rearrangement, Mr Howard was soon addressing himself to Emma, Elizabeth sat looking on in happy hospitality, while for Margaret a welcome diversion was caused by the entry of Tom Musgrave.

Tom, admired by at least three-fourths of the young ladies of the neighbourhood, was mildly disliked by Mr Watson, and caused him a more than mild annoyance, but this is the less surprising when we remember that the young ladies would have disliked three-fourths of everything that Mr Watson found tolerable. Mr Watson was reasonably uncivil, and Tom quickly found that the only person anxious to hear how he had won a wager off Lord Osborne that morning was the one to whom he did not care to tell it; and soon Margaret had the disappointment of hearing him say:

“Well, I must be going, Mr Watson, for I have an engagement. I promised to meet Fred Simpson and Beauclere and another fellow, so I must be on my way. There are not many men within reach of my curricle who will buy or sell a dog without getting the advantage of my opinion. These are monstrous good fellows, and must not be kept waiting. Great friends of Osborne’s, I assure you.”

Nobody but Margaret opposed his intention, and he took himself off. As the sound of the curricle wheels lessened, Mr Watson observed:

“A foolish young man! Did he say some word of sense, I should never know it. I have long withheld my attention.”