Emily herself solved the problem, producing her commonplace with a friendly tentative smile.
“Isn’t it a lovely country?” she said.
“It’s perfect,” answered the mother. “I’ve never visited Europe before, and the English country seems to me just exquisite. We have a summer place in America, but the country is quite different.”
She was goodnatured and disposed to talk, and, with Emily Fox-Seton’s genial assistance, conversation flowed. Before they were halfway to Mallowe, it had revealed itself that they were from Cincinnati, and after a winter spent in Paris, largely devoted to visits to Paquin, Doucet, and Virot, they had taken a house in Mayfair for the season. Their name was Brooke. Emily thought she remembered hearing of them as people who spent a great deal of money and went incessantly to parties, always in new and lovely clothes. The girl had been presented by the American minister, and had had a sort of success because she dressed and danced exquisitely. She was the kind of American girl who ended by marrying a title. She had sparkling eyes and a delicate tip-tilted nose. But even Emily guessed that she was an astute little person.
“Have you ever been to Mallowe Court before?” she inquired.
“No; and I am so looking forward to it. It is so beautiful.”
“Do you know Lady Maria very well?”
“I’ve known her about three years. She has been very kind to me.”
“Well, I shouldn’t have taken her for a particularly kind person. She’s too sharp.”
Emily amiably smiled. “She’s so clever,” she replied.
“Do you know the Marquis of Walderhurst?” asked Mrs. Brooke.
“No,” answered Miss Fox-Seton. She had no part in that portion of Lady Maria’s life which was illumined by cousins who were marquises. Lord Walderhurst did not drop in to afternoon tea. He kept himself for special dinner-parties.
“Did you see the man who drove away in the high cart?” Mrs. Brooke continued, with a touch of fevered interest. “Cora thought it must be the marquis. The servant who met him wore the same livery as the man up there”—with a nod toward the box.
“It was one of Lady Maria’s servants,” said Emily; “I have seen him in South Audley Street. And Lord Walderhurst was to be at Mallowe. Lady Maria mentioned it.”
“There, mother!” exclaimed Cora.
“Well, of course if he is to be there, it will make it interesting,” returned her mother, in a tone in which lurked an admission of relief. Emily wondered if she had wanted to go somewhere else and had been firmly directed toward Mallowe by her daughter.
“We heard a great deal of him in London this season,” Mrs. Brooks went on.
Miss Cora Brooke laughed.
“We heard that at least half a dozen people were determined to marry him,” she remarked with pretty scorn. “I should think that to meet a girl who was indifferent might be good for him.”
“Don’t be too indifferent, Cora,” said her mother, with ingenuous ineptness.
It was a very stupid bit of revelation, and Miss Brooke’s eyes flashed. If Emily Fox-Seton had been a sharp woman, she would have observed that, if the _rôle_ of indifferent and piquant young person could be made dangerous to Lord Walderhurst, it would be made so during this visit. The man was in peril from this beauty from Cincinnati and her rather indiscreet mother, though upon the whole, the indiscreet maternal parent might unconsciously form his protection.
But Emily only laughed amiably, as at a humorous remark. She was ready to accept almost anything as humour.
“Well, he would be a great match for any girl,” she said. “He is so rich, you know. He is very rich.”
When they reached Mallowe, and were led out upon the lawn, where the tea was being served under embowering trees, they found a group of guests eating little hot cakes and holding teacups in their hands. There were several young women, and one of them—a very tall, very fair girl, with large eyes as blue as forget-me-nots, and with a lovely, limp, and long blue frock of the same shade—had been one of the beauties of the past season. She was a Lady Agatha Slade, and Emily began to admire her at once. She felt her to be a sort of added boon bestowed by kind Fate upon herself. It was so delightful that she should be of this particular house-party—this lovely creature, whom she had only known previously through pictures in ladies’ illustrated papers. If it should occur to her to wish to become the Marchioness of Walderhurst, what could possibly prevent the consummation of her desire? Surely not Lord Walderhurst himself, if he was human. She was standing, leaning lightly against the trunk of an ilex-tree, and a snow-white Borzoi was standing close to her, resting his long, delicate head against her gown, encouraging the caresses of her fair, stroking hand. She was in this attractive pose when Lady Maria turned in her seat and said:
“There’s Walderhurst.”
The man who had driven himself over from the station in the cart was coming towards them across the grass. He was past middle life and plain, but was of good height and had an air. It was perhaps, on the whole, rather an air of knowing what he wanted.
Emily Fox-Seton, who by that time was comfortably seated in a cushioned basket-chair, sipping her own cup of tea, gave him the benefit of the doubt when she wondered if he was not really distinguished and aristocratic-looking. He was really neither, but was well-built and well-dressed, and had good grayish-brown eyes, about the colour of his grayish-brown hair. Among these amiably worldly people, who were not in the least moved by an altruistic prompting, Emily’s greatest capital consisted in the fact that she did not expect to be taken the least notice of. She was not aware that it was her capital, because the fact was so wholly a part of the simple contentedness of her nature that she had not thought about it at all. The truth was that she found all her entertainment and occupation in being an audience or a spectator. It did not occur to her to notice that, when the guests were presented to him, Lord Walderhurst barely glanced at her surface as he bowed, and could scarcely be said to forget her existence the next second, because he had hardly gone to the length of recognising it. As she enjoyed her extremely nice cup of tea and little buttered scone, she also enjoyed looking at his Lordship discreetly, and trying to make an innocent summing up of his mental attitudes.
Lady Maria seemed to like him and to be pleased to see him. He himself seemed, in an undemonstrative way, to like Lady Maria. He also was evidently glad to get his tea, and enjoyed it as he sat at his cousin’s side. He did not pay very much attention to any one else. Emily was slightly disappointed to see that he did not glance at the beauty and the Borzoi more than twice, and then that his examination seemed as much for the Borzoi as for the beauty. She could not help also observing that since he had joined the circle it had become more animated, so far at least as the female members were concerned. She could not help remembering Lady Maria’s remark about the effect he produced on women when he entered a room. Several interesting or sparkling speeches had already been made. There was a little more laughter and chattiness, which somehow it seemed to be quite open to Lord Walderhurst to enjoy, though it was not exactly addressed to him. Miss Cora Brooke, however, devoted herself to a young man in white flannels with an air of tennis about him. She sat a little apart and talked to him in a voice soft enough to even exclude Lord Walderhurst. Presently she and her companion got up and sauntered away. They went down the broad flight of ancient stone steps which led to the tennis-court, lying in full view below the lawn. There they began to play tennis. Miss
