It was no time for sentiment; so Ethel suggested getting half into one glove, and carrying the other.
‘You’ll be quite irresistible enough, Harry! And if all the beauty is engaged, I’ll dance with you myself.’
‘Will you?’ cried the lieutenant, with sparkling eyes, ‘then you are a jolly old Ethel! Come along, then;’ and he took her on his arm, ran down-stairs with her, and before she well knew where she was, or what was going on, she found herself in his great grasp passive as a doll, dragged off into the midst of a vehement polka that took her breath away. She trusted to him, and remained in a passive, half-frightened state, glad he was so happy; but in the first pause heartily wishing he would let her go, instead of which she only heard, ‘Well done, old Ethel, you’ll be a prime dancer yet! you’re as light as a feather;’ and before she had recovered her breath, off he led her with ‘Go it again!’
When at length, panting and bewildered, she was safely placed on a seat, with ‘You’ve had enough, have you? mind, I shan’t let you off another time,’ she found that her aberration had excited a good deal of sensation in her own family. Blanche and Gertrude could not repress their amusement; and Dr. May, with merry eyes, declared that she was coming out in a new light. She had only time to confide to him the reason that she had let Harry do what he pleased with her, before two volunteers were at her side.
‘Miss May, I did not think you ever danced!’
‘Nor I,’ said Ethel; ‘but you see what sailors can do with one.’
‘Now, Ethel’ said the other over his shoulder, ‘now you have danced with Harry, you must have this waltz with me.’
‘A dangerous precedent, Ethel,’ said the Doctor, laughing.
‘I couldn’t waltz to save my life, Aubrey,’ said Ethel; ‘but if you can bear me through a polka as well as Harry did, you may try the next.’
‘And won’t you—will you—for once dance with me? said his companion imploringly.
‘Very well, Leonard, if I can get through a quadrille;’ and therewith Ethel was seized upon by both boys to hear the story of every hit and miss, and of each of the difficulties that their unpractised corps had encountered in getting round the corners between Stoneborough and the Grange. Then came Leonard’s quadrille, which it might be hoped was gratifying to him; but which he executed with as much solemn deference as if he had been treading a minuet with a princess, plainly regarding it as the great event of the day. In due time, he resigned her to Aubrey; but poor Aubrey had been deluded by the facility with which the strong and practised sailor had swept his victim along; and Ethel grew terrified at the danger of collisions, and released herself and pulled him aside by force, just in time to avoid being borne down by the ponderous weight of Miss Boulder and her partner.
‘You did not come to grief with Harry!’ muttered the discomfited boy.
‘No more did the lamb damage the eagle; but remember the fate of the jackdaw, Mr. Gray-coat! I deserve some ice for my exertions, so come into the hall and get some, and tell me if you have had better luck elsewhere.’
‘I have had no partner but Minna Ward, and she trips as if one was a dancing-master.’
‘And how has Tom been managing?’
‘Stunningly civil! He began with Ave Ward, in the Lancers, and it was such fun—he chaffed her in his solemn way, about music I believe it was, and her harmonium. I could not quite hear, but I could see she was in a tremendous taking, and she won’t recover it all the evening.’
‘What a shame it is of Tom!’
‘Oh! but it is such fun! And since that he has been parading with Pug.’
‘She has not danced!’
‘Oh no! She got an audience into Meta’s little sitting-room—Henry Ward, Harvey Anderson, and some of the curates; they shut the door, and had some music on their own hook.’
‘Was Richard there!’
‘At first; but either he could not bear to see Meta’s piano profaned, or he thought it too strong when they got to the sacred line, for he bolted, and is gone home.’
‘There’s Harry dancing with Fanny Anderson. He has not got Miss Ward all this time.’
‘Nor will,’ said Aubrey. ‘Tom had put her in such a rage that she did not choose to dance with that cousin of hers, Sam Axworthy, so she was obliged to refuse every one else; and I had to put up with that child!’
‘Sam Axworthy! He does not belong to our corps. How does he come here?’
‘Oh! the old man has some houses in the borough, and an omnium gatherum like this was a good time to do the civil thing to him. There he is; peep into the card-room, and you’ll see his great porpoise back, the same old man that Harry in his benevolence assisted to a chair. He shook hands with Leonard, and told him there was a snug desk at the Vintry Mill for him.’
‘I dare say!’
‘And when Leonard thanked him, and said he hoped to get off to Cambridge, he laughed that horrid fat laugh, and told him learning would never put him in good case. Where shall I find you a place to sit down? Pug and her tail have taken up all the room,’ whispered Aubrey, as by the chief of the glittering tables in the hall, he saw Mrs. Pugh, drinking tea, surrounded by her attendant gentlemen, and with her aunt and Ella Ward, like satellites, a little way from her.
‘Here is a coign of vantage,’ said Ethel, seating herself on a step a little way up the staircase. ‘How those people have taken possession of that child all day!’
‘I fancy Leonard is come to reclaim her,’ said Aubrey, ‘don’t you see him trying to work through and get at her! and Miss Ward told me she was going home early, to put the children to bed. Ha! what’s the row? There’s Leonard flaring up in a regular rage! Only look at his eyes—and Henry just like Gertrude’s Java sparrow in a taking—’
‘It must not be,’ cried Ethel, starting up to attempt she knew not what, as she heard Leonard’s words, ‘Say it was a mistake, Henry! You cannot be so base as to persist!’
There it became evident that Ethel and Aubrey were seen over the balusters; Leonard’s colour deepened, but his eye did not flinch; though Henry quailed and backed, and the widow gave a disconcerted laugh; then Leonard pounced on his little sister and carried her off to the cloak-room. ‘What treason could it have been?’ muttered Aubrey; ‘we shall get it all from Ward;’ but when Leonard reappeared it was with his sister cloaked and bonneted on his arm, each leading a little one; he took them to the entrance and was seen no more.
Nor was the true history of that explosion ever revealed in the May family, though it had grave consequences at Bankside.
Rumour had long declared at Stoneborough that the member’s little daughter was carefully secluded on account of some deformity, and Mrs. Pugh had been one of many ladies who had hoped to satisfy their curiosity on this head upon the present occasion. She had asked Henry Ward whether it were so, and he had replied with pique that he had no means of judging, he had never been called in at the Grange. By way of salve to his feelings, the sympathizing lady had suggested that the preference for London advice might be from the desire of secrecy, and improbable as he knew this to be, his vanity had forbidden him to argue against it. When no little Miss Rivers appeared, the notion of her affliction gained ground, and Leonard, whose gray back was undistinguishable from other gray backs, heard Mrs. Pugh citing his brother as an authority for the misfortune which Mr. and Mrs. Rivers so carefully concealed as to employ no surgeon from their own neighbourhood.
Falsehood, slander, cruelty, ingratitude, breach of hospitality, were the imputations that fired the hot brain of Leonard, and writhed his lips, as he started round, confronted the lady, and assured her it was a—a—a gross mistake. His father had always attended the child, and she must have misunderstood his brother. Then, seeing Henry at a little distance, Leonard summoned him to contradict the allegation; but at that moment the sudden appearance of the two Mays put the whole conclave to silence.