“Excellent, Miss Taverner!” murmured Mr. Brummell. “You are so apt a pupil that if I were only ten years younger I believe I should propose for your hand.”
She laughed. “I cannot suppose it possible. Did you ever propose to any lady, sir?”
“Yes, once,” replied Mr. Brummell in a voice of gentle melancholy. “But it came to nothing. I discovered that she actually ate cabbage, so what could I do but cut the connection?”
If Miss Taverner’s phaeton did not succeed in putting an end to all criticism of her drive from town it did silence a good many tongues. Her habit of driving herself all over Brighton was soon looked on as an idiosyncrasy allowable in a lady with a fortune of eighty thousand pounds. But although the dowagers, with one or two exceptions, might agree to look indulgently on her oddities there was one person who gave no sign of having forgiven her. Lord Worth continued to hold aloof, and when they met conducted himself towards her with a cold civility that showed her how fresh in his mind were the events at Cuckfield. Having frequently assured herself and him that nothing could exceed her dislike of him, there was no other course open to her than to treat him with similar coldness, and to flirt with Captain Audley. The Captain was all readiness to oblige her, and by the time they had twice danced half the evening together, and twice been seen driving along the parade in the perch-phaeton it began to be pretty freely circulated that the Captain was to be the lucky man.
Even Mrs. Scattergood began to take a serious view of the affair, and having watched in silence for a week at last ventured to broach the subject one evening after dinner. “Judith, my love,” she said, very busy with the yards of fringe she was making, “did I tell you that I met Lady Downshire in East Street this morning? You must know that I walked back to Westfield Lodge with her.”
“No, you did not tell me,” replied Miss Taverner, laying down her book. “Was there any reason why you should?”
“Oh, none in the world! But I must own I was rather taken aback by her asking me when your engagement to Charles Audley was to be made known. I did not know what to say.”
Judith laughed: “Dear ma’am, I hope you told her that you did not know?”
Mrs. Scattergood shot her a quick look. “To be sure, I told her that I had no apprehension of any such engagement taking place. But the case is, you see, that people are beginning to wonder at the preference you show for Charles. You must not be offended with me for speaking plain.”
“Offended! How should I be?”
Mrs. Scattergood began to look a little alarmed. “But Judith, is it possible that you can be contemplating marriage with Charles?”
Miss Taverner smiled saucily, and said: “I am persuaded you can no longer see to make your fringe, ma’am. Let me ring for some working-candles to be brought you!”
“Pray do not be so teasing!” besought her chaperon. “I have nothing in the world to say against Charles. Indeed I have the highest value for him; but a younger son, my dear, and without the least prospect of enlargement! for it is not to be supposed that Worth will stay single to oblige him, you know. I could tell you of any number of young ladies who have set their caps at him. He will certainly be thinking of getting married one day soon.”
“I shall be happy to wish him joy whenever that may be!” said Miss Taverner sharply. She picked up her book, read a few lines, lowered it again, and inquired hopefully: “Was it he who told you to discover whether I mean to marry Captain Audley or not?”
“Worth? No, my dear, upon my word it was not. He has not spoken to me of it at all.”
Miss Taverner resumed her book with an expression so forbidding that Mrs. Scattergood judged it wisest to say no more.
She was at a loss to know what to think. A natural shrewdness had induced her to suppose from the outset that Judith stood in very little danger of falling in love with the Captain. A hint that people were beginning to couple their names should have been enough, if she did not mean to marry him, to make her behave with more circumspection; but it had no effect on her at all. She continued to flirt with the Captain, and her brother in high good-humour, remarked to Mr. Taverner that he believed the pair would make a match of it yet.
“Audley and your sister!” said his cousin, turning a little pale. “Surely it is not possible!”
“Not possible! Why not?” asked Peregrine. “He is a capital fellow, I can tell you; not at all like Worth. I thought the instant I clapped eyes on him that he would do very well for Judith. It’s my belief that they have some sort of an understanding. I taxed Ju with it, but she only coloured up and laughed, and would not give me an answer.”
Peregrine’s own affairs soon took a turn for the better. He had lately fallen into the habit of driving over to Worthing twice a week, and spending the night with the Fairfords; and he was able to inform Judith on his return from one of these expeditions that Sir Geoffrey, being dissatisfied with the uncertainty of his daughter’s engagement, was coming to Brighton to seek an interview with Lord Worth.
“We shall see how that may answer,” said Peregrine in a tone of strong satisfaction. “However little Worth may attend to my entreaties, he cannot fail to pay heed to a man of Sir Geoffrey’s age and consequence. I fancy the wedding-bell will be soon fixed.”
“I do not depend upon it, though I am sure I wish it may,” Judith replied. “I shall own myself surprised if Sir Geoffrey finds his lordship any more persuadable than we have done.”
Peregrine, however, continued sanguine, and in a very few days events proved him to have been justified. They were sitting down to dinner in Marine Parade one evening when the butler brought in Sir Geoffrey’s card. Peregrine ran out to welcome him and learn his news, while Mrs. Scatter good cast an anxious eye over the dish of buttered lobster, and sent down a message to the cook to serve up the raised giblet-pie as well as the fricando of veal. She was still wondering whether the cheese-cakes would go round and lamenting that a particularly good open tart syllabub should have been all ate up at luncheon when Peregrine brought their visitor into the dining-parlour. Peregrine’s countenance conveyed the intelligence of good news to his sister immediately; his eyes sparkled, and as Judith rose to shake hands with Sir Geoffrey, he burst out with: “You were wrong, Ju! It is all in a way to be done! I knew how it would be! I am to be married at the end of June. Now wish me joy!”
She turned her eyes towards him with a look of amazement in them. She had not thought it to be possible. “Indeed, indeed, I do wish you joy! But how is this? Lord Worth agrees?”
“Ay, to be sure he does. Why should he not? But Sir Geoffrey will tell it all to us later. For my part I am satisfied with the mere fact.”
She was obliged to control her impatience to know how it had all come about, what arguments had been used to prevail with Worth, and to beg Sir Geoffrey to be seated. The impropriety of discussing his interview with Worth before the servants was generally felt, and it was not until they were all gathered in the drawing-room later that their curiosity could be satisfied.
It was not in Sir Geoffrey’s power to remain long with them; he had made no provision for spending the night in Brighton, and wished to be back in Worthing before it grew dark. There was very little to tell them, after all; he had guessed that Lord Worth’s refusal to consent to the marriage taking place arose from scruples natural in a man standing in his position. It had been so, his lordship had felt all the evils of a marriage entered into too young, but upon Sir Geoffrey’s representation to him of the proved durability of Peregrine’s affections (for six months, at the age of nineteen, was certainly a period) he had been induced to relent.
“There was no difficulty, then?” Judith inquired, fixing her eyes on his face. “Yet when I spoke of it to him he answered me in such a way that I believed nothing could win him over! This is wonderful indeed I There is no accounting for it.”
“There was a little difficulty,” acknowledged Sir Geoffrey. “His lordship felt a good deal of reluctance, which I was able, however, to overcome, I am not acquainted with him, do not think I have exchanged two words with him before to-day, so that I cannot conjecture what may have been in his mind. He is a reserved man; I do not pretend to read his thoughts. I own that it seemed to me that something more than a doubt of the young people being of an age to contemplate matrimony weighed with him.”
“What made you think so?” Miss Taverner asked quickly. “He can have had no other reason!”
Sir Geoffrey set the tips of his fingers together. “Well, well, I might be mistaken. His manners, which are inclined to be abrupt, may easily have misled me. But upon my making known to him the object of my call his first words were of refusal. That he had no objection to my daughter’s character or her situation in life he at once made clear to me, however.”
“Objection!” cried Peregrine, with strong indignation. “What objection could he have, sir?”
“None, I trust,” replied Sir Geoffrey placidly. “But his countenance led me to suppose that my application was very unwelcome. He said positively that you were too young. I ventured to remind him that a six-months’ engagement was his own suggestion, whereupon he exclaimed with a degree of annoyance that surprised me that he had been guilty of a piece of the most unconscionable folly in consenting to any engagement at all.”
“Well, and so I thought at the time,” remarked Mrs. Scattergood. “It seemed to me highly nonsensical, as I daresay it did to you, sir. For I quite depended on it being no more than a passing fancy with them both, you know.”
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