“Then you do go to parties?” she asked. “I am very ignorant about society, and what you call the ton, and when you said you were a social outcast I thought perhaps it meant you didn’t go into polite circles at all.”
“Oh, it isn’t as bad as that!” he assured her. “I’m certainly not invited to run tame in houses where the daughters are of marriageable age, and I can think of nothing more unlikely than of being permitted to cross the sacred threshold of Almack’s—unless, of course, I reformed my way of life, married Miss Ubley, and was sponsored by my Aunt Augusta into that holy of holies—but only the very highest sticklers go to the length of cutting my acquaintance! If anything were wanting to make me flee from Miss Ubley’s vicinity it would be the dread of being dragged into precisely those circles from which I am most happy to be excluded!”
“I must say, from all Lady Denny has told me I should suppose the Assemblies at Almack’s to be amazingly dull,” she observed. “When I was a girl it was used to be the top of my ambition to attend them, but I think now that I should find them insipid.”
But this he would not allow. He scolded her for speaking of her girlhood as a thing of the past, and said: “When your brother comes home you’ll go on a visit to that aunt of yours, and you will enjoy yourself very much. You will be gay to dissipation, my dear delight, going to all the fashionable squeezes, breaking a great many hearts, and finding every day too short for all the pleasuring you wish to cram into it.”
“Oh, when that day dawns I shall very likely be in my dotage!” she retorted.
VIII
Edward Yardley, secure in the knowledge of his own worth, might rate Damerel cheap, but young Mr. Denny, by no means so self-confident as he tried to appear, recognized in him both amodel and a menace. Like Edward, he rode over to the Priory to enquire how Aubrey did; unlike Edward, he no sooner clapped eyes on Damerel than he became possessed of a deep and envious hatred.
Imber ushered him into the library, where Damerel and Aubrey were playing chess, with Venetia seated on a stool by the sofa, watching the game. This cosy scene afforded him no pleasure at all; and when Damerel rose, and he saw how tall he was, with what careless grace he moved, and how much lazy mockery lurked in his eyes, he knew that his sisters had grossly misled him: they had thought his lordship dull and middle-aged; Oswald perceived at one glance that he was a dangerous marauder.
His visit was not of long duration, but it lasted for quite long enough to enable him to see on what easy terms of intimacy the Lanyons were with their host. They were not only perfectly at home in his house, but they behaved as though they had known him all their lives. Aubrey even called him Jasper; and although Venetia did not go to such outrageous lengths as that she used no formality when she spoke to him. As for Damerel, Nurse might think his attitude avuncular, but Oswald, his perception sharpened by jealousy, was not deceived. When his eyes rested on Venetia there was an expression in them very far from avuncular, and when he addressed her there was a caress in his voice. Oswald glared at him, and tried in vain to think of some adroit way of getting himself and Venetia out of the room. None occurred to him, so he was forced to employ direct tactics, saying rather throatily, and with reddening cheeks, as he shook hands in farewelclass="underline" “May I speak to you for a moment?”
“Yes, of course you may!” Venetia replied kindly. “What is it?”
“Don’t be gooseish, m’dear!” recommended Aubrey, inspiring Oswald with a longing to wring his neck.
“You have a message for her from Lady Denny, which you would prefer to deliver in private, haven’t you?” suggested Damerel helpfully, but with an unholy twinkle.
In a nobler age one could have answered such impertinence by jostling his lordship as he stood holding open the door, so that he would have been obliged to demand a meeting. Or did one, even in that age, refrain from jostling people in doorways when a lady was present?
Before he had decided this point he had followed Venetia into the hall, and Damerel had shut the door on them. He uttered tensely: “If I know myself, there will be a reckoning between us one day!”
Venetia was accustomed to his dramatic outbursts, but she found this one surprising. “Between us?” she asked. “Now, what in the world have I done to put you in a miff, Oswald?”
“You! Never!” he declared. “It’s no matter—I should not have spoken, but there are times when a man’s feelings may not be suppressed!” He eyed her hungrily. “Only give me the right to call you mine!” he invited.
“What, is that why you wanted to talk to me alone?” she exclaimed. “Of all the ridiculous starts—! I wish you will believe that when I say No, No is precisely what I mean! How can you be so absurd? I am more than six years older than you! Besides, you don’t really wish to marry me in the least!”
“N-not w-wish to marry you?” he stammered, thunderstruck.
Her eyes danced. “Of course you don’t! Only think what a bore it would be to be obliged to settle down as a respectably married man before you have had a great many adventures!”
He had never before looked at the matter in this light, and he could not help feeling secretly rather struck. However, he was too earnest in the pursuit of his calf-love to acknowledge the good sense of her observation. “I ask no greater felicity than to win you!” he assured her.
Her lips quivered irresistibly, but she managed to keep from laughing. Only if one was very cruel did one laugh at a boy in the throes of his first love. She said: “Well, it is excessively kind of you, Oswald, and indeed I am flattered, even if I can’t return your sentiments. Pray don’t talk about it any more! Tell me, is Lady Denny well? And your sisters?”
He ignored this, but said in a gloomy tone: “I shall say no more, except to beg you to believe that my devotion is unalterable. I didn’t come for that purpose, but to tell you that you may count upon me. I am not a consequential prig, like Yardley! I am not afraid of going against etiquette—in fact I don’t care a straw for such stuff, but then, I have seen more of the world than—”
“Oswald, what are you talking about?” Venetia interrupted. “If it is Edward who has put you in this passion—”
“That skirter!” he ejaculated, with awful contempt. “Let him busy himself with his roots, and his cattle: it is all he is fit for!”
“Well, you must own that he is very fit for that!” said Venetia reasonably. “I daresay his land is in better heart than any you would find in half a day’s journey. Even Powick, you know, doesn’t disdain his advice when it is a matter of farming.”
“I didn’t come to talk about Yardley!” said Oswald. “I merely mentioned—well, it’s no odds! Venetia, if that fellow should offer you an insult, send me word!”
“Edward offer me— Oh, good God, do you mean Damerel? You absurd creature, go home, and try if you can be interested in roots, or cattle, or anything you please as long as it is not me! Lord Damerel is our very good friend, and it vexes me very much to hear you talk in that foolish style about him.”
“You are too innocent, too divinely pure, to be able to read the mind of a man of his stamp,” he told her, his brow darkling. “He may deceive Yardley, but I knew him for what he is the instant I clapped eyes on him! A Man of the Town! It is a—a desecration to think of his so much as touching your hand! When I saw how he looked at you—By God, I was within ames-ace of planting him a facer!”