Page:Once a Week, Series 1, Volume II Dec 1859 to June 1860.pdf/366

21, 1860.]

three youths were standing in the portico when the Countess appeared among them. She singled out him who was specially obnoxious to her, and sweetly inquired the direction to the village post. With the renowned gallantry of his nation, he offered to accompany her, but presently, with a different exhibition of the same, proposed that they should spare themselves the trouble by dropping the letter she held prominently, in the bag.

“Thanks!” murmured the Countess, “I will go.” Upon which his eager air subsided, and he fell into an awkward silent march at her side, looking so like the victim he was to be, that the Countess could have emulated his power of laughter.

“And you are Mr. Harry Jocelyn, the very famous cricketer?”

He answered, glancing back at his friends, that he was, but did not know about the “famous.”

“Oh! but I saw you—I saw you hit the ball most beautifully, and dearly wished my brother had an equal ability. Brought up in the Court of Portugal, he is barely English. There they have no manly sports. You saw him pass you?”

“Him! Whom?” asked Harry.

“My brother, on the lawn, this moment. Your sweet sister’s friend. Your Uncle Melville’s secretary.”

“What’s his name?” said Harry, in blunt perplexity.

The Countess repeated his name, which in her pronunciation was “Hawington,” adding, “That was my brother. I am his sister. Have you heard of the Countess de Saldar?”

“Countess!” muttered Harry. “Dash it! here’s a mistake.”

She continued, with elegant fan-like motion of her gloved fingers: “They say there is a likeness between us. The dear Queen of Portugal often remarked it, and in her it was a compliment to me, for she thought my brother a model! You should have known from your extreme resemblance to your lovely young sister.”

Coarse food, but then Harry was a youthful Englishman; and the Countess dieted the vanity according to the nationality. With good wine to wash it down, one can swallow anything. The Countess lent him her eyes for that purpose; eyes that had a liquid glow under the dove-like drooping lids. It was a principle of hers, pampering our poor sex with swinish solids or the lightest ambrosia, never to let the accompanying cordial be other than of the finest quality. She knew