her heart. But she was sometimes almost angry with herself that she had permitted her heart to be thus easily taken from her, and had rebuked herself for her girlish facility. But the marriage would be at any rate respectable. Mr Grey was a man of high character, of good though moderate means; he was, too, well educated, of good birth, a gentleman, and a man of talent. No one could deny that the marriage would be highly respectable, and her father had been more than satisfied. Why Miss Vavasor herself was not quite satisfied will, I hope, in time make itself appear. In the meanwhile it can be understood that Lady Midlothian’s praise would gall her.
“Alice, don’t be uncharitable,” said Lady Macleod severely. “Whatever may have been Lady Midlothian’s misfortunes no one can say they have resulted from her own fault.”
“Yes they can, aunt, if she married a man whom she knew to be a scapegrace because he was very rich and an earl.”
“She was the daughter of a nobleman herself, and only married in her own degree. But I don’t want to discuss that. She meant to be goodnatured when she mentioned your marriage, and you should take it as it was meant. After all she was only your mother’s second cousin—”
“Dear aunt, I make no claim on her cousinship.”
“But she admits the claim, and is quite anxious that you should know her. She has been at the trouble to find out everything about Mr Grey, and told me that nothing could be more satisfactory.”
“Upon my word I am very much obliged to her.”
Lady Macleod was a woman of much patience, and possessed also of considerable perseverance. For another half-hour she went on expatiating on the advantages which would accrue to Alice as a married woman from an acquaintance with her noble relatives, and endeavouring to persuade her that no better opportunity than the present would present itself. There would be a place in Lady Midlothian’s carriage, as none other of the daughters were going but Lady Jane. Lady Midlothian would take it quite as a compliment, and a concert was not like a ball or any customary party. An unmarried girl might very properly go to a concert under such circumstances as now existed without any special invitation. Lady Macleod ought to have known her adopted niece better. Alice was immoveable. As a matter of course she was immoveable. Lady Macleod had seldom been able to persuade her to anything, and ought to have been well sure that, of all things, she could not have persuaded her to this.
Then, at last, they came to another subject, as to which Lady Macleod declared that she had specially come on this special morning, forgetting, probably, that she had already made the same assertion with reference to the concert. But in truth the last assertion was the correct one, and on that other subject she had been hurried on to say more than she meant by the eagerness of the moment. All the morning she had been full of the matter on which she was now about to speak. She had discussed it quite at length with Lady Midlothian;—though she was by no means prepared to tell Alice Vavasor that any such discussion had taken place. From the concert, and the effect which Lady Midlothian’s countenance might have upon Mr Grey’s future welfare, she got herself by degrees round to a projected Swiss tour which Alice was about to make. Of this Swiss tour she had heard before, but had not heard who were to be Miss Vavasor’s companions until Lady Midlothian had told her. How it had come to pass that Lady Midlothian had interested herself so much in the concerns of a person whom she did not know, and on whom she in her greatness could not be expected to call, I cannot say; but from some quarter she had learned who were the proposed companions of Alice Vavasor’s tour, and she had told Lady Macleod that she did not at all approve of the arrangement.
“And when do you go, Alice?” said Lady Macleod.
“Early in July, I believe. It will be very hot, but Kate must be back by the middle of August.” Kate Vavasor was Alice’s first cousin.
“Oh! Kate is to go with you?”
“Of course she is. I could not go alone, or with no one but George. Indeed it was Kate who made up the party.”
“Of course you could not go alone with George,” said Lady Macleod, very grimly. Now George Vavasor was Kate’s brother, and was therefore also first cousin to Alice. He was heir to the old squire down in Westmoreland, with whom Kate lived, their father being dead. Nothing, it would seem, could be more rational than that Alice should go to Switzerland with her cousins; but Lady Macleod was clearly not of this opinion; she looked very grim as she made this allusion to cousin George, and seemed to be preparing herself for a fight.
“That is exactly what I say,” answered Alice. “But, indeed, he is simply going as an escort to me and Kate, as we don’t like the rôle of unprotected females. It is very goodnatured of him, seeing how much his time is taken up.”
“I thought he never did anything.”
“That’s because you don’t know him, aunt.”
“No; certainly I don’t know him.” She did not add that she had no wish to know Mr George Vavasor, but she looked it. “And has your father been told that he is going?”
“Of course he has.”
“And does—” Lady Macleod hesitated a little before she went on, and then finished her question with a little spasmodic assumption of courage. “And does Mr Grey know that he is going?”
Alice remained silent for a full minute before she answered this question, during which Lady Macleod sat watching her grimly, with her eyes very intent upon her niece’s face. If she supposed such silence to have been in any degree produced by shame in answering the question, she was much mistaken. But it may be doubted whether she understood the character of the girl whom she thought she knew so well, and it is probable that she did make such mistake.
“I might tell you simply that he does,” said Alice at last, “seeing that I wrote to him yesterday, letting him know that such were our arrangements; but I feel that I should not thus answer the question you mean to ask. You want to know whether Mr Grey will approve of it. As I only wrote yesterday of course I have not heard, and therefore cannot say. But I can say this, aunt, that much as I might regret his disapproval, it would make no change in my plans.”
“Would it not? Then I must tell you, you are very wrong. It ought to make a change. What! the disapproval of the man you are going to marry make no change in your plans?”
“Not in that matter. Come, aunt, if we must discuss this matter let us do it at any rate fairly. In an ordinary way, if Mr Grey had asked me to give up for any reason my trip altogether, I should have given it up certainly, as I would give up any other indifferent project at the request of so dear a friend,—a friend with whom I am so—so—so closely connected. But if he asked me not to travel with my cousin George, I should refuse him absolutely, without a word of parley on the subject, simply because of the nature and closeness of my connection with him. I suppose you understand what I mean, aunt?”
“I suppose I do. You mean that you would refuse to obey him on the very subject on which he has a right to claim your obedience.”
“He has no right to claim my obedience on any subject,” said Alice; and as she spoke Aunt Macleod jumped up with a little start at the vehemence of the words, and of the tone in which they were expressed. She had heard that tone before, and might have been used to it; but, nevertheless, the little jump was involuntary. “At present he has no right to my obedience on any subject, but least of all on that,” said Alice. “His advice he may give me, but I am quite sure he will not ask for obedience.”
“And if he advises you you will slight his advice.”
“If
