CHAPTER X
THE INCARNATION OF LADY AGATHA
“She’s such a dear good girl, Mr. Wentworth,” said Lady Merceron. “She’s the greatest comfort I have.”
It was after luncheon at Langbury Court. Lady Merceron and Calder sat on the lawn: Mrs. Marland and Millie Bushell were walking up and down; Charlie was lying in a hammock. A week had passed since the two young men had startled Lady Merceron by their unexpected arrival, and since then the good lady had been doing her best to entertain them; for, as she could not help noticing, they seemed a little dull. It was a great change from the whirl of London to the deep placidity of the Court, and Lady Merceron could not quite understand why Charlie had tired so soon of his excursion, or why his friend persisted with so much fervor that anything was better than London, and the Court was the most charming place he had ever seen. Of the two Charlie seemed to feel the ennui much the more severely. Yet, while Mr. Wentworth spoke of returning to town in a few weeks, Charlie asseverated that he had paid his last visit to that revolting and disappointing place. Lady Merceron wished she had Uncle Van by her side to explain these puzzling inconsistencies. However, there was a bright side to the affair: the presence of the young men was a godsend to poor Millie, who, by reason of the depressed state of agriculture, had been obliged this year to go without her usual six weeks of London in the season.
“And she never grumbles about it,” said Lady Merceron admiringly. “She looks after her district, and takes a ride, and plays tennis, when she can get a game, poor girl, and is always cheerful and happy. She’d be a treasure of a wife to any man.”
“You’d better persuade Charlie of that, Lady Merceron.”
“Oh, Charlie never thinks of such a thing as marrying. He thinks of nothing but his antiquities.”
“Doesn’t he?” asked Calder, with apparent sympathy and a covert sad amusement.
“Mr. Wentworth,” said Mrs. Marland, approaching, “I believe it’s actually a fact that you’ve been here a week and have never yet been to the Pool.”
At this fateful word, Calder looked embarrassed, Charlie raised his head from the hammock, and Millie glanced involuntarily towards him.
“We must take you,” pursued Mrs. Marland, “this very evening. You’ll come, Miss Bushell?”
“I don’t think I care very much about the Pool,” said Millie.
“We won’t let Mr. Merceron take you in his canoe this time.”
Charlie rolled out of the hammock and came up to them.
“You must take us to the Pool. I don’t believe you’ve been there since you came back. Poor Agatha will quite”
“Agatha?” exclaimed Calder.
“Agatha Merceron, you know. Why, haven’t you heard?”
“Oh, ah! Yes, of course. I beg your pardon.”
“I hate that beastly Pool,” said Charlie.
“How can you?” smiled Mrs. Marland. “You used to spend hours there every evening.”
Charlie glanced uneasily at Calder, who turned very red.
“Times have changed, have they?” Mrs. Marland asked archly. “You’ve got tired of looking in vain for Agatha?”
“Oh, all right,” said Charlie crossly, “we’ll go after tea.”
Anything seemed better than this rallying mood of Mrs. Marland’s.
Presently the two young men went off together to play a game at billiards; but after half a dozen strokes Charlie plumped down in a chair.
“I say, Calder, old chap, how do you feel?” he asked.
Calder licked his cigar meditatively.
“Better,” said he at last.
“Oh!”
“And you?”
“Worse—worse every day. I can’t stand it, old chap. I shall go back.”
“What, to her?”
“Yes.”
“That’s hardly sticking to our bargain, you know.”
“But, hang it, what’s the good of our both cutting her?”
“Oh, I thought you did it because you were disgusted with her. That was my reason.”
“So it was mine, but”
“Probably she’s got some other fellow by now,” observed Calder calmly.
“The devil!” cried Charlie. “What makes you think so?”
“Oh, nothing. I know her way, you see.”
“You think she’s that sort of girl? Good heavens!”
“Well, if she wasn’t, I’d like to know where you’d be, my friend. I shouldn’t have the honor of your acquaintance.”
Charlie ignored this point.
“And yet you wanted to marry her?”
“I dare say I was an ass—like better men before me and—er—since me.”
“Hang it!” cried Charlie. “I’m sick of the whole thing. I’m sick of life. I’m sick of all the nonsense of it. For two straws I’d have done with it, and marry Millie Bushell.”
“What! Look here, Charlie”
Calder left his sentence unfinished.
“Well?” said Charlie.
“If,” said Calder slowly, “there are any girls, either down here or in London, whom you’re quite sure you’ll never want to marry, I should like to be introduced to one of ’em, Charlie, if you’ve no objections.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, in fact, during this last week, Charlie, I have come to have a great esteem for Miss Bushell. There’s about her a something—a solidity”
“She can’t help that, poor girl.”
“A solidity of mind,” said Calder, a little stiffly.
“Oh, I beg pardon. But I say, Calder, what are you driving at?”
“Charlie! Charlie!” sounded from outside. “Tea’s ready.”
Calder rose and took Charlie by the arm.
“Should I be safe,” he asked solemnly, “in allowing myself to fall in love with Miss Bushell, or are you likely to step in again?”
“You mean it? Honor bright, Calder?”
“Yes.”
“Where’s Bradshaw? By Jove, where’s Bradshaw?”
“Bradshaw? What the devil has Bradshaw?”
“Why, a train, man—a train to town.”
“I don’t want to go to town, bless the man”
“You! No, but I do. To town, Calder—to Agatha, you old fool.”
“Oh, that’s your lay?”
“Yes, of course. I couldn’t go back on you, but if you’re off”
“Charlie, old fellow, think again.”
“Go to the deuce! Where’s that?”
“Charlie, Charlie! Tea!”
“Hang tea!” he cried; but Calder dragged him off, telling him that to-morrow would do for Bradshaw.
At tea Charlie’s spirits were very much better, and it was observed that Calder Wentworth paid marked attention to Millie Bushell, so that, when they started for the Pool, Millie was prevailed upon to be one of the party, on the understanding that Mr. Wentworth would take care of her. This time the expedition went off more quietly than it had previously, but at the last moment the ladies declared that they would, be late for dinner if they waited till it was time for Agatha Merceron to come.
“Oh, nonsense!” said Calder. “Come over to the temple, Miss Bushell. I won’t upset the canoe.”
“Well, if you insist,” said Millie.
Then Mrs. Marland remarked in the quietest voice in the world—
“There’s some one in the temple.”
“What?” cried Millie.
“Eh?” exclaimed Calder.
“Nonsense!” said Charlie.
“I saw a face at the window,” insisted Mrs. Marland.
“Oh, Mrs. Marland! Was it very awful?”
“Not at all, Millie—very pretty,” and she gave Charlie a look full of meaning.
“Look, look!” cried Millie in strong agitation.
And, as they looked, a slim figure in white came quietly out of the temple, a smile—and, alas! no vestige of a blush—on her face, walked composedly down the steps, and, standing on the lowest one, thence—did not throw herself into the water—but called, in the most natural voice in the world,
“Which of you is coming to fetch me?”
Charlie looked at Calder. Calder said,
“I think you’d better put her across, old man. And—er—we might as well walk on.”
They turned away, Millie’s eyes wide in surprise, Mrs. Marland smiling the smile of triumphant sagacity.
“I was coming to you to-morrow,” cried Charlie the moment his canoe bumped against the stops.
“What do you mean, sir, by staying away a whole week? How could you?”
“I don’t know,” said Charlie. “You see, I couldn’t come till Calder
“Oh, what about Calder?”
“He’s all right.”
“What? Miss—the girl you upset out of the canoe?”
“I think so,” said Charlie.
“Ah, well!” said Agatha. “But how very curious!” Then she smiled at Charlie, and asked,
“But what love can there be, Mr. Merceron, where there is deceit?”
Charlie took no notice at all of this question.
“Do you mind Calder going?” he whispered.
“Well, not much,” said Miss Glyn.
Thus it was that the barony of Warmley returned to the house of Merceron, and the portrait of the wicked lord came to hang once more in the dining-room. So the curtain falls on the comedy; and what happened afterwards behind the scenes, whether another comedy, or a tragedy, or a mixed half-and-half sort of entertainment, now grave, now gay, sometimes perhaps delightful, and again of tempered charm—why, as to all this, what reck the spectators who are crowding out of the theatre and home to bed?
But it seems as if, in spite of certain drawbacks in Agatha Merceron’s character, nothing very dreadful can have happened, because Mr. and Mrs. Wentworth, who are very particular folk, went to stay at the Court the other day, and their only complaint was that Charlie and his bride were always at the Pool!
And, for his own part, if he may be allowed a word (which some people say he ought not to be) here, just at the end, the writer begs to say that he once knew Agatha, and—he would have taken the risks. However, a lady to whom he has shown this history differs entirely from him, and thinks that no sensible man would have married her. But, then, that is not the question.