Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/732

722 Why was the man not had over yesterday?"

"I really do not know. How can you be so disagreeable?" cries poor Bee, her patience on the wane. "Speak about it yourself. How can I know about pipes and things?"

"Mamma ought to look after it," the rumbling undertone goes on. "Mamma never makes Macky do anything now. Do, for any sake, let us have a decent luncheon! hotchpot, and proper things. Blount is accustomed to having everything in the best style."

She dutifully acquiesces, and hopes he has now run himself out.

But no.

She is by no means so smart as on the evening before, and in this he finds a fresh grievance.

"That gown of yours is too light for this time of year. Velveteen is the thing. Why don't you have velveteen?"

"I have not got my winter things yet."

"And when do you mean to get them, pray?"

"Oh, by-and-by I shall send for some. It is so difficult down here, and after Christmas we shall have nobody."

"And you mean to wear that all the winter?"

"No, of course — I told you I thought it would do for just now; the weather is still so fine — you know it never is very cold here; and mamma thinks we shall go in to Edinburgh in February. I was waiting till then."

"Do go to a decent dressmaker, then. That woman of mamma's can't make anything fit to be seen. You should have seen those girls at the duke's; they had on the jolliest gowns every day."

"They were able to afford them, I daresay."

"Oh, that's all nonsense! A good gown is just as cheap to make up as a bad one ——"

"But a good dressmaker is not as cheap to go to as having them made up at home."

"They never turn you out the same."

"I know they don't." She is too generous to tell him how she smarts under this knowledge — nay, more, how she had almost written that order to Madame Vallotin, when her father's complaints of his extravagance made her stop.

Accordingly Arthur feels he has the best of it, and proceeds to deliver a homily to the purpose that economy consists in having the best of everything — things that last, you know, and always look well, and you are never ashamed of them, even if they get a little bit old-fashioned.

All very well, but when the young man of the family is of this opinion, it happens not infrequently that he puts it out of the power of the other members to act in accordance with it.

Bee would not hint this to Arthur for the world, but in her heart she rebels.

As for him, he is already in a better humour.

"You should have seen those girls at the duke's," he repeats. "Some of them were awfully nice."

"Oh, tell me about your visit there; you never wrote a word to us, and I wanted so much to hear. Now, begin; who were there?" cries Bee, brightening up.

So he begins — she is all attention; he is mollified, soothed: she questions, he rejoins with complacency, and by the time that breakfast is over, the sky is quite serene.

But one pair of loving eyes have cast more than one anxious glance towards her full-fledged nestlings, and a simple wile has been devised whereby Arthur and Bee may not be too often undisturbed in each other's company.

"My poor boy, he means no harm; but they are both so young, and she is so easily led. I had far rather see her romping with Jack and Charlie, as she did a year ago, than drinking in Arthur's foolish notions, and trying to be like the giddy girls he tells her about."

Bee has already begun to resume something of the Beatrix manner.

Arthur has been relating to her his adventures with one young lady in a dogcart, and showing the purse another has worked for him, while he declares he must not forget the gloves he owes to a third; each of the three is declared to be "awfully jolly and friendly," and she is given to understand that this is quite the approved thing.

So by way of being friendly, she is writing at the davenport when the young men come in, and looks up with a little simper, wondering why they are not yet gone? What can they mean by dawdling about in that way the whole morning; the day is half over!

This to Arthur — at Blount.

Harry replies in good faith. "The beaters are only assembling now, Miss Graeme; we are not to start for a quarter of an hour. Are you coming to see us off?"