possible to all those with whom he had had any former connexion. He was accidentally introduced to Lucy, and she appeared to him precisely the thing of which he was in search. She was decidedly very pretty, and lacked nothing but what a week's tuition would give, to have un air distingué. Her head was small-it was naturally well put on. Her figure was slender, her foot was not large; and though her hands were a little red, they were well-shaped. Some almond-paste, the best shoemaker, and Mademoiselle Hyacinthe would set all quite right. He thought he should not alter the style of her coiffure. The back of her head was so Grecian in its contour, she might venture upon her own simple twist and long ringlets. Having thus made up his mind, he proceeded to ingratiate himself with the family. There was a public ball at the concert-rooms, and thither he went. He never danced: he knew he was too old, and he never affected youth. But when Lucy was dancing, she often found his large, intelligent, expressive eyes fixed on her from beneath the very dark eyebrows which shaded them, without giving them any look of harshness. She felt flattered without being distressed, for the expression was that of kindly pleasure in seeing a lovely young woman innocently gay. The gaze expressed that he did think her lovely, though it contained nothing that could alarm the most shrinking modesty. In the course of the evening he conversed a good deal with Mrs. Heckfield, in whose commonplace remarks he seemed to find much pith and substance. Between the dances, when Lucy returned to her mother, he rose to give her his seat, not as if he were merely doing an act of common courtesy, but as if it afforded him real heartfelt pleasure to be of any possible use to her, and it was with kindliness rather than gallantry, that he flew to fetch her some tea or some lemonade. He handed Mrs. Heckfield to supper, and sat between her and Lucy, who found her partner quite dull and stupid, in comparison with this very agreeable new acquaintance. He did not talk much; he said nothing which she could afterward remember as being either clever or amusing. But he had a manner of listening with a deferential air, his eyes fixed with attention on the speaker, while his countenance seemed to say the remark made was new and luminous, something which had never struck him before, so that people believed themselves delighted with him, while in truth they were delighted with themselves. we shall have quite enough. I don't like a great let-off; it is much best to take matters quietly." "Good heavens, Colonel Heckfield! you cannot be in earnest. What! that old proser, who makes a comma between every word, and a full stop nowhere! and those two misses, one as old as the hills, and the other as giggling a girl as ever I saw. Besides, Lucy and she will get laughing and gossiping together, and Lucy never appears to advantage when Bell Stopford is with her." "Whom had we best have then, my love?" responded the colonel, who began to be weary of the discussion. "Why, first of all, Mrs. Haughtville," answered Mrs. Heckfield, who had long ago prepared her list in her mind, " and Sir James Ashgrove (as you wish), and young Mr. Lyon, Lord Petersfield's nephew, and Sir Alan Byway, the great traveller, and Miss Pennefeather, who wrote those sweet novels; she is quite the lion of these parts, and people of fashion like to meet a genius; and then, my dear, I thought of asking Lord and Lady Bodlington." "Mercy upon us, wife! why, I don't know them by sight." "But I do, Colonel Heckfield, and a sweet woman she is. I was introduced to her at the ball the other night, and it would be but civil to ask them to dinner." " I think it would be much better to have Mr. Denby and his nice daughter. But it is all the same to me; I don't like running after fine folks, who care not a rush for us, that's all." "Well, if Lord and Lady Bodlington cannot come, then we will ask the Denbys. But I really am half-pledged to ask them, for Lady Bodlington said the other night she heard I had the prettiest green-house in the world: and I said I hoped to have the pleasure of showing it to her." "But we do not dine in the green-house?" "I assure you, my love, I understand these little matters better than you do, and it would seem quite marked if we did not ask the Bodlingtons." Colonel Heckfield did not quite understand what would seem marked, but he acquiesced. The distinguished personages mentioned by Mrs. Heckfield proved propitious, with the exception of Sir Alan Byway, whose place was filled, though most inadequately filled, by a young shy lordling, who was at a private tutor's in the neighbourhood. Mrs. Heckfield preferred him on account of his name, to the Indian friend Dolby, whom Colonel Heckfield, on the secession of the loquacious traveller, made another attempt to insert. most approved sort-in Paris at least-whatever it might be in Russia. He told young Lord Slenderdale he ought to look at Captain Charles Heckfield's brown mare, for she was the cleverest hack he had seen for a long time; and the two young men soon found themselves able to speak. He complimented Colonel Heckfield on his wines, and Mrs. Heckfield on the beautiful china of which the dinner-service was composed: and he told her, in a friendly, confidential manner, the only place where such rare china could be matched. By degrees the conversation became general, and then he listened to each, so as to make each person-each lady at least, believe herself an object of interest and attention to him. Mrs. Heckfield felt quite at her ease concerning the fate of her dinner, and perfectly intimate with Lord Montreville, but not quite happy about Lucy; who, since the first awful silence had given way to a comfortable universal clatter, had grown so merry with her brother and Lord Slenderdale, that Mrs. Heckfield felt convinced Lord Montreville would set her down in his mind as a missish hoyden, and entirely dismiss her from his thoughts. In vain were sundry maternal glances levelled at poor Lucy-knittings of the eyebrows (suddenly smoothed and converted into sweet smiles if any one looked her way), all were wasted on the unconscious girl, who, in the gayety of her heart, continued to laugh and to talk till she was on the verge of laughing a little too loud, and, as Mrs. Heckfield thought, of losing a marquisate. But she was mistaken. Lord Montreville knew the sex well, and he saw that it was an innocent, gay, natural laughthat there was neither freedom nor coquetry in her merriment; he knew how quickly women catch the tone of good society, and he still thought she would do. Mrs. Heckfield hastened the signal for the departure of the ladies, in consequence of Lucy's ill-timed mirth, and they all sailed out, Lady Bodlington first, the Honourable Mrs. Haughtville next, Miss Pennefeather followed after, and Mrs. Heckfield was able quietly, but angrily, to whisper to Lucy, "that she giggled just as if Bell Stopford had been with her." |