The Nonesuch

“Well, I haven’t. Is she an heiress?”

“So I’m given to understand. I rather think she told me so herself.”

“Sort of thing she would do,” said Laurie. He thought it over for a moment, and then added, “I don’t want to be leg-shackled: wouldn’t suit me at all! Not but what I may be forced into it.”

“I’m reluctant to blight your hopes, Laurie, but I think it only right to warn you that I have reason to suppose that your suit won’t prosper. Miss Wield is determined to marry into the Peerage.”

“Exactly so!” exclaimed Laurence. “I saw at a glance! She means to catch Lindeth, of course. I imagine you wouldn’t like that above half!”

“Not as much,” said Sir Waldo, in a voice of affable agreement.

“No, and my aunt wouldn’t like it either!” said Laurence. “What’s more, I wouldn’t blame her! No reason why he should make a cream-pot marriage: he ain’t under the hatches!”

“I don’t think he has any such intention.”

“I know that! The silly chub was bowled out by her face. Well, you won’t cozen me into thinking that young Julian is not your cosset-lamb! You’d give something to see him come safe off, wouldn’t you?”

Sir Waldo, who had drawn his snuff-box from his pocket, opened it with an expert flick of one finger, and took a pinch. He looked meditatively at Laurence, amused understanding in his eyes. “Alas, you’ve missed your tip!” he said.

Laurence stared at him. “If you’re trying to bamboozle me into believing that Julian ain’t dangling after that girl it’s you who have missed your tip, Waldo! You won’t tell me that he—”

“The only thing I shall tell you,” interposed Sir Waldo, “is that you’re after the fair! Oh, don’t look so affronted! Console yourself with the reflection that as little as I discuss Julian’s business with you do I discuss yours with him!”

He said no more, leaving Laurence puzzled and aggrieved. He had his own reasons for believing that Julian had been cured of his passing infatuation; but if Laurie, bent on detaching Tiffany, had not discovered that his young cousin now had his eyes turned towards a very different quarry so much the better, he thought, profoundly mistrusting Laurie’s mischief-making tongue. If Julian’s interest in Miss Chartley became fixed, nothing could more surely prejudice his mother against the match than to learn of it from Laurie. The first news of it must come from Julian himself; after which, he reflected wryly, it would be his task to reconcile the widow. She would be bitterly disappointed, but she was no fool, and must already have begun to doubt whether her cherished son would gratify her ambition by offering for any one of the damsels of rank, fortune, and fashion in whose way she had thrown him. She was also a most devoted parent; and once she had recovered from her initial chagrin Sir Waldo believed that she would very soon take the gentle Patience to her bosom. A pungent description of the beautiful Miss Wield would go a long way towards settling her mind.

For himself, he was much inclined to think that after his various tentative excursions Julian had found exactly the wife to suit him. Just as Patience differed from Tiffany, so did Julian’s courtship of her differ from his eager pursuit of Tiffany. He had begun with liking; his admiration had been kindled by the Leeds episode; and he was now, in Sir Waldo’s judgment, quietly and deeply in love. From such references to Patience as he from time to time let fall, his cousin gathered that she had every amiable quality, a well-informed mind, and a remarkable readiness to meet Julian’s ideas, and to share his every sentiment. Sir Waldo guessed that he was a frequent visitor at the Rectory, but there were none of the rides, picnics, and evening parties which had attended his transitory passion for Tiffany. Probably that was why Laurence seemed not to have realized that he had suffered a change of heart; no doubt Laurie supposed him to be in his elder cousin’s company when he found him missing from Broom Hall; and was misled by the innate civility which made him continue to call at Staples into thinking, him still Tiffany’s worshipper.

It was during one of these morning visits that Julian learned that the al fresco ridotto which Tiffany had coaxed her aunt to hold in the gardens was to be postponed. Charlotte still continued to be languid and out of spirits; the doctor recommended a change of air and sea-bathing; so Mrs Underhill was going to take her to Bridlington, where she had a cousin living with his wife in retirement. She explained apologetically to Lindeth, and to Arthur Mickleby, whom Lindeth had found kicking his heels in the Green Saloon, that she hoped they wouldn’t be vexed, but she didn’t feel able for a ridotto when Charlotte was so poorly. Both young men expressed their regrets, and said everything that was polite; and Arthur reminded Mrs Underhill, in a heartening way, of how he had been taken to Bridlington after the measles, and how quickly he had plucked up there.