CHAPTER XVIII.
THE PARTY IN THE DINING-ROOM.
ND now, all being seated, began the talk and business of dinner.
"I believe," said Mr. Longcluse, with a laugh, "I am growing metaphysical."
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"Well, shall I confess, Mr. Longcluse, you do sometimes say things that are, I fear, a little too wise for my poor comprehension?"
"I don't express them; it is my fault," he answered, in a very low tone. "You have mind, Miss Arden, for anything. There is no one it
is so delightful to converse with, owing in part to that very faculty--I mean quick apprehension. But I know my own defects. I know how imperfectly I often express myself. By-the-way, you seemed to wish to have that curious little wild Bohemian air I sang the other night, 'The Wanderer's Bride'--the song about the white lily, you know. I ventured to get a friend, who really is a very good musician, to make a setting of it, which I so very much hope you will like. I brought it with me. You will think me very presumptuous, but I hoped so much you might be tempted to try it."
When Mr. Longcluse spoke to Alice, it was always in a tone so very deferential, that it was next to impossible that a very young girl should not be flattered by it--considering, especially, that the man was reputed clever, had seen the world, and had met with a certain success, and that by no means of a kind often obtained, or ever quite despised. There was also a directness in his eulogy which was unusual, and which spoken with a different manner would have been embarrassing, if not offensive. But in Mr. Longcluse's manner, when he spoke such phrases, there appeared a real humility, and even sadness, that the boldness of the sentiment was lost in the sincerity and dejection of the speaker, which seemed to place him on a sudden at the immeasurable distance of a melancholy worship.
"I am so much obliged!" said Alice. "I did wish so much to have it when you sang it. It may not do for my voice at all, but I longed to try it. When a song is sung so as to move one, it is sure to be looked out and learned, without any thought wasted on voice, or
skill, or natural fitness. It is, I suppose, like the vanity that makes one person dress after another. Still, I do wish to sing that song, and
I am so much obliged!"
From the other side her uncle said very softly--"What do you think of my ward, Grace Maubray?" "Oughtn't I to ask, rather, what you think of her?" she laughed archly.
"Oh! I see," he answered, with a pleasant and honest smile; "you have the gift of seeing as far as other clever people into a millstone. But, no--though perhaps I ought to thank you for giving me credit for so much romance and good taste--I don't think I shall ever introduce you to an aunt. You must guess again, if you will have a matrimonial explanation; though I don't say there is any such design. And perhaps, if there were, the best way to promote it would be to leave the intended hero and heroine very much to themselves. They are both very good-looking."
"Who?" asked Alice, although she knew very well whom he meant.
"I mean that pretty creature over there, Grace Maubray, and Vivian Darnley," said he quietly.
She smiled, looking very much pleased and very arch.
With how Spartan a completeness women can hide the shootings and quiverings of mental pain, and of bodily pain too, when the motive is sufficient! Under this latter they are often clamorous, to be sure; but the demonstration expresses not want of patience, but the feminine yearning for compassion.
"I fancy nothing would please the young rogue Vivian better. I wish I were half so sure of her. You girls are so unaccountable, so fanciful, and--don't be angry--so uncertain."
"Well, I suppose, as you say, we must only have patience, and leave the matter in the hands of Time, who settles most things pretty well."
She raised her eyes, and fancied she saw Grace Maubray at the same moment withdraw hers from her face. Lady May was talking from the end of the table with Mr. Longcluse.
"Your neighbour who is talking to Lady May is a Mr. Longcluse?" "Yes."
"He is a City notability; but oddly, I never happened to see him till this evening. Do you think there is something curious in his appearance?"
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"Yes, a little, perhaps. Don't you?"
"So odd that he makes my blood run cold," said Uncle David, with a shrug and a little laugh. "Seriously, I mean unpleasantly odd. What is Lady May talking about? Yes--I thought so--that horrid murder at the 'Saloon Tavern.' For so good-natured a person, she has the most bloodthirsty tastes I know of; she's always deep in some horror."
"My brother Dick told me that Mr. Longcluse made a speech there."
"Yes, so I heard; and I think he said what is true enough. London is growing more and more insecure; and that certainly was a most audacious murder. People make money a little faster, that is true; but what is the good of money, if their lives are not their own? It
is quite true that there are streets in London, which I remember as safe as this room, through which no one suspected of having five
pounds in his pocket could now walk without a likelihood of being garotted." "How dreadful!" said Alice, and Uncle David laughed a little at her horror.
"It is too true, my dear. But, to pass to pleasanter subjects, when do you mean to choose among the young fellows, and present me
to a new nephew?" said Uncle David.
"Do you fancy I would tell anyone if I knew?" she answered, laughing. "How is it that you men, who are always accusing us weak women of thinking of nothing else, can never get the subject of matrimony out of your heads? Now, uncle, as you and I may talk confidentially, and at our ease, I'll tell you two things. I like my present spinster life very well--I should like it better, I think, if it were in the country; but town or country, I don't think I should ever like a married life. I don't think I'm fit for command."
"Command! I thought the prayer-book said something about obeying, on the contrary," said Uncle David.
"You know what I mean. I'm not fit to rule a household; and I am afraid I am a little idle, and I should not like to have it to do--and
so I could never do it well."
"Nevertheless, when the right man comes, he need but beckon with his finger, and away you go, Miss Alice, and undertake it all."
"So we are whistled away, like poodles for a walk, and that kind of thing! Well, I suppose, uncle, you are right, though I can't see that I'm quite so docile a creature. But if my poor sex is so willing to be won, I don't know how you are to excuse your solitary state, considering how very little trouble it would have taken to make some poor creature happy."
"A very fair retort!" laughed Uncle David. And he added, in a changed tone, for a sudden recollection of his own early fortunes crossed him--"But even when the right man does come, it does not always follow, Miss Alice, that he dares make the sign; fate often interposes years, and in them death may come, and so the whole card-castle falls."
"I've had a long talk," he resumed, "with Richard; he has made me promises, and I hope he will be a better boy for the future. He has been getting himself into money troubles, and acquiring--I'm afraid I should say cultivating--a taste for play. I know you have heard something of this before; I told you myself. But he has made me promises, and I hope, for your sake, he'll keep them; because, you know, I and your father can't last for ever, and he ought to take care of you; and how can he do that, if he's not fit to take care
of himself ? But I believe there is no use in thinking too much about what is to come. One has enough to do in the present. I think poor Lady May has been disappointed," he said, with a very cautious smile, his eye having glanced for a moment on her; "she looks a little forlorn, I think."
"Does she? And why?"
"Well, they say she would not object to be a little more nearly related to you than she is."
"You can't mean papa--or yourself !"