The Vicissitudes of Evangeline 7
It was not well worded, and I had never cared much for Lady Katherine,
but it was fairly kind, and fitted in perfectly with my plans.
She had probably heard of Mr. Carruthers’ arrival, and was scandalized
at my being alone in the house with him.
Both men had their eyes fixed on my face when I looked up, as I
finished reading the note.
“Lady Katherine Montgomerie writes to ask me to Tryland,” I said;
“so if you will excuse me I will answer it, and say I will come this
afternoon,”--and I got up.
Mr. Carruthers rose too, and followed me into the library. He
deliberately shut the door and came over to the writing-table where I
sat down.
“Well, if I let you go, will you tell her then that you are engaged to
me, and I am going to marry you as soon as possible.”
“No, indeed I won’t!” I said, decidedly.
“I am not going to marry you, or any one, Mr. Carruthers. What do
you think of me--! Fancy my consenting to come back here for ever,
and live with you--when I don’t know you a bit--and having to put up
with your--perhaps--kissing me, and, and--things of that sort! It is
perfectly dreadful to think of!”
He laughed as if in spite of himself. “But supposing I promised not to
kiss you----?”
“Even so,” I said, and I couldn’t help biting the end of my pen, “it
could happen that I might get a feeling I wanted to kiss some one
else--and there it is! Once you’re married, everything nice is wrong!”
“Evangeline! I won’t let you go--out of my life--you strange little
witch, you have upset me, disturbed me, I can settle to nothing. I seem
to want you so very much.”
“Pouff!” I said, and I pouted at him.
“You have everything in your life to fill it--position, riches,
friends--you don’t want a green-eyed adventuress.”
I bent down and wrote steadily to Lady Katherine. I would be there
about 6 o’clock, I said, and thanked her in my best style.
“If I let you go, it is only for the time,” Mr. Carruthers said, as I
signed my name. “I _intend_ you to marry me--do you hear!”
“Again I say _qui vivra verra_!” I laughed, and rose with the note in
my hand.
Lord Robert looked almost ready to cry when I told him I was off in the
afternoon.
“I shall see you again,” he said. “Lady Katherine is a relation of my
aunt’s husband, Lord Merrenden. I don’t know her myself, though.”
I do not believe him--how can he see me again--young men do talk a lot
of nonsense.
“I shall come over on Wednesday to see how you are getting on,” Mr.
Carruthers said. “Please do be in.”
I promised I would, and then I came upstairs.
And so it has come to an end, my life at Branches. I am going to start
a new phase of existence, my first beginning as an adventuress!
How completely all one’s ideas can change in a few days. This day
three weeks ago Mrs. Carruthers was alive. This day two weeks ago I
found myself no longer a prospective heiress--and only three days
ago I was contemplating calmly the possibility of marrying Mr.
Carruthers--and now--for heaven--I would not marry any one! And so, for
fresh woods and pastures new. Oh! I want to see the world, and lots of
different human beings--I want to know what it is makes the clock go
round--that great, big, clock of life--I want to dance, and to sing,
and to laugh, and to _live_--and--and--yes--perhaps some day to kiss
some one I love----!
TRYLAND COURT, HEADINGTON,
_Wednesday, November 9th._
GOODNESS gracious! I have been here four whole days, and I continually
ask myself how I shall be able to stand it for the rest of the
fortnight. Before I left Branches I began to have a sinking at the
heart. There were horribly touching farewells with housekeepers and
people I have known since a child, and one hates to have that choky
feeling--especially as just at the end of it--while tears were still in
my eyes, Mr. Carruthers came out into the hall, and saw them--so did
Lord Robert!
I blinked, and blinked, but one would trickle down my nose. It was a
horribly awkward moment.
Mr. Carruthers made profuse inquiries as to my comforts for the drive,
in a tone colder than ever, and insisted upon my drinking some cherry
brandy. Such fussing is quite unlike his usual manner, so I suppose he
too felt it was a tiresome _quart d’heure_. Lord Robert did not hide
his concern, he came up to me and took my hand while Christopher was
speaking to the footman who was going with me.
“You are a dear,” he said, “and a brick, and don’t you forget I shall
come and stay with Lady Katherine before you leave, so you won’t feel
you are all among strangers.”
I thanked him, and he squeezed my hand so kindly--I do like Lord Robert.
Very soon I was gay again, and _insouciante_, and the last they saw of
me was smiling out of the brougham window as I drove off in the dusk.
They both stood upon the steps and waved to me.
Tea was over at Tryland when I arrived, such a long, damp drive! And
I explained to Lady Katherine how sorry I was to have had to come so
late, and that I could not think of troubling her to have up fresh for
me--but she insisted, and after a while a whole new lot came, made in
a hurry with the water not boiling, and I had to gulp down a nasty
cup--Ceylon tea, too--I hate Ceylon tea! Mr. Montgomerie warmed himself
before the fire, quite shielding it from us, who shivered on a row of
high-backed chairs beyond the radius of the hearth rug.
He has a way of puffing out his cheeks and making a noise like
“Bur-r-r-r”--which sounds very bluff and hearty, until you find he has
said a mean thing about some one directly after. And while red hair
looks very well on me, I do think a man with it is the ugliest thing in
creation. His face is red, and his nose and cheeks almost purple, and
fiery whiskers, fierce enough to frighten a cat in a dark lane.
He was a rich Scotch manufacturer, and poor Lady Katherine had to marry
him, I suppose, though, as she is Scotch herself, I daresay she does
not notice that he is rather coarse.
There are two sons and six daughters, one married, four grown-up, and
one at school in Brussels, and all with red hair!--but straight and
coarse, and with freckles and white eyelashes. So really it is very
kind of Lady Katherine to have asked me here.
They are all as good as gold on top, and one does poker work, and
another binds books and a third embroiders altar-cloths, and the fourth
knits ties--all for charities, and they ask everyone to subscribe to
them directly they come to the house. The tie and the altar-cloth one
were sitting working hard in the drawing-room--Kirstie and Jean are
their names--Jessie and Maggie, the poker worker and the bookbinder
have a sitting-room to themselves, their workshop they call it. They
were there still, I suppose, for I did not see them until dinner. We
used to meet once a year at Mrs. Carruthers’ Christmas parties ever
since ages and ages, and I remember I hated their tartan sashes, and
they generally had colds in their heads, and one year they gave every
one mumps, so they were not asked the next. The altar-cloth one, Jean,
is my age, the other three are older.
It was really very difficult to find something to say, and I can
quite understand common people fidgeting when they feel worried like
this. I have never fidgeted since eight years ago, the last time
Mrs. Carruthers boxed my ears for it. Just before going up to dress
for dinner Mr. Montgomerie asked blank out if it was true that Mr.
Carruthers had arrived. Lady Katherine had been skirting round this
subject for a quarter of an hour.
I only said yes, but that was not enough, and once started, he asked a
string of questions, with “Bur-r-r-r” several times in between. Was Mr.
Carruthers going to shoot the pheasants in November? Had he decided to
keep on the _chef_? Had he given up diplomacy? I said I really did not
know any of these things, I had seen so little of him.
Lady Katherine nodded her head, while she measured a comforter she was
knitting to see if it was long enough.
“I am sure it must have been most awkward for you, his arriving at all;
it was not very good taste on his part, I am afraid, but I suppose he
wished to see his inheritance as soon as possible,” she said.
I nearly laughed, thinking what she would say if she knew which part of
his inheritance he had really come to see. I do wonder if she has ever
heard that Mrs. Carruthers left me to him, more or less, in her will!
“I hope you had your old governess with you, at least,” she
continued, as we went up the stairs, “so that you could feel less
uncomfortable--really a most shocking situation for a girl alone in the house with an unmarried man.”
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