Page:Once a Week Jun to Dec 1864.pdf/30

25, 1864.]

Earl of Oakburn was in a bustle. The earl was one of those people who always are in a bustle when starting upon a journey, be it ever so short a one. He was going on a visit to Sir James Marden at Chesney Oaks, and he was putting himself in a commotion over it.

To Jane’s surprise he had announced an intention not to take Pompey. Jane wondered how he would get on without that faithful and brow-beaten follower, if only in the light of an object to roar at; and when she asked the earl the reason for not taking him, he had civilly replied that it was no business of hers. Jane felt sorry for the decision, for she believed Pompey to be essential to her father’s comforts; and she knew the earl, with all his temper, liked the old servant, and was glad to have him about him; but otherwise Jane attached no importance to the matter. So the earl was driven to the Paddington station, and Pompey, after seeing his master and his carpet-bag safely in an express train, returned with the carriage to Portland Place.

Jane Chesney was a little busy on her own score just now, for she was seeking a governess to replace Miss Lethwait; one who should prove to be a more desirable inmate than that lady had been. Jane blamed herself greatly for not having inquired more minutely into Miss Lethwait’s antecedents; she had been, as she thought now, too much prepossessed in her favour at first sight, had taken her too entirely upon trust. That Jane would not err again on that score, her present occupation was proving—that of searching out the smallest details in connection with the lady now recommended to her, a Miss Snow. Not many days yet had Miss Lethwait quitted the house, but Jane had forcibly put her out of remembrance. Never, willingly, would she think again upon one, whose conduct in that one particular, the episode to which Jane had been a witness the night of the party, had been so entirely obnoxious.

Lord Oakburn was whirled along that desirable line for travellers, the Great Western. In the opposite corner of the comfortable carriage there happened to be another old naval commander sitting, and the terms that the two got upon were so good, that his lordship could not believe his eyes when he saw the well-known station at Pembury, or believe that they had already reached it.

He had, however, to part with his new acquaintance, for Pembury station was his alighting point. He found Sir James Marden’s carriage waiting for him, a sort of mail phaeton, Sir James himself, a little man with a yellow face, seated in the box seat. The earl and his carpet-bag were duly installed in it, and Sir James drove out of the station.

As they were proceeding up the street to take the avenue for Chesney Oaks,—the pleasant avenue, less green now than it had been in spring, which wound through the park to the house,—a small carriage, drawn by a pair of beautiful ponies, came rapidly down upon them. Not more beautiful in their way, those ponies, than were the ladies seated in the carriage. Two gay, lovely ladies, laughing and talking with each other, their veils and their streamers and their other furbelows, flying behind them in the wind. The one, driving, was Colonel Marden’s wife, and she was about to rein in and greet Sir James, when her companion, with a half-smothered cry and a sudden paleness displacing the rich bloom on her cheeks, seized the reins and sent the ponies onward at a gallop. It was Lady Laura Carlton.

“Holloa!” exclaimed Sir James, “what was that for?”

Lord Oakburn, in his surprise, had started up in the phaeton. About the last person he had been thinking of was Laura, and Pembury was about the last place he would have expected to see her in. The fact was, Laura had recently met Mrs. Marden at a friend’s house near Great Wennock; the two ladies had struck up a sudden friendship, and Laura had come back with her for a few days’ visit.

“She was evidently scared at the sight of one of us, and I’m sure I never met her before to my knowledge,” cried Sir James, alluding to the lady seated with Mrs. Marden. “Do you know her, Lord Oakburn?”

“Know her!” repeated the earl, rather explosively. “I’m sorry to say I do know her, sir. She is an ungrateful daughter of mine, who ran away from her home to be married to a fellow, and never asked my leave.”

“It must be Lady Laura Carlton!” quickly exclaimed Sir James Marden.

“It is,” said the earl. “And I assure you