Amethyst: The Story of a Beauty

Liberally supplied with flowers, and filled with graceful inhabitants, the effect of the shabby, elegant drawing-room, with its open windows and fearless daylight, was not amiss.

Indeed, there was a touch of genius in the way Lady Haredale faced the situation, and, spite of the ineffaceable memories behind her, Amethyst was sometimes almost bewitched into believing her mother to be the most ingenuous of women. Lady Haredale often bought trifles for herself or for her daughters, which took her fancy, and which were always tasteful and becoming, quite regardless of the cost; but she never bought anything, or chose anything, to conceal the fact that they had less than the usual amount to spend on their clothes. She forestalled the comments of acquaintances by the simplest confession.

“You see,” she would sometimes say, with her wide-open eyes and her sweet smile, “we have scraped every farthing we can get together, and joined with Miss Haredale’s nice little heiress to give our girls a chance. We think Amethyst is so pretty, that it is quite a duty to make a great effort. Of course we shall have to pay for it afterwards, or perhaps we shan’t – Dear me! – one can’t always, you know. We can no more afford, properly, to have a London season, than we can fly, but I can’t sacrifice such a beauty as I think my girl is, and I’ve brought all her sisters to town, that they may get a little pleasure when they can. Perhaps we shall never be able to come up again. But here we are – and so enjoying it. We have to do it all simply, but we don’t mind that the least little bit.”

Simplicity is comparative, but it was quite true that Lady Haredale wasted far less regret than most women would have done, on the defects of the turn-out in which she drove in the park with her beautiful daughter.

“What does it matter?” she would say. “My lord has had good horses more than once, and every one knows that he has always had to sell them.”

She did not mind wearing her dresses several times over; she knew that they always suited her. She appeared to be the least scheming of mothers, would throw over an invitation, for which many women would have plotted in vain, for another that seemed to her more amusing. She let Amethyst dance and talk with whom she would, cared little apparently where the young beauty was seen, or where she was not seen; and when Miss Haredale would have anxiously guarded Amethyst’s footsteps, chosen her acquaintances, and guided her smallest actions, as she would have said “for the best,” Lady Haredale observed —

“My dear Anna, you are much more worldly than I am. Let the child alone. She is getting on well enough. Let her enjoy herself, she looks much prettier when she is happy. She is getting quite enough talked about, and written about too in the Society papers. And that is the great point, you know, in getting her started.”

“I should be very sorry,” said Miss Haredale, “if anything came of the attentions of that Italian Prince.”

“What, Prince Pontresina? – Very old family. But, for my part, I’ve learned prudence, and I should be very well content if she chose Sir Richard Grattan. No – I don’t think Lord Broadstairs would do; he is nearly as badly off as we are – and a very bad character into the bargain. Amethyst wouldn’t like that.”

Miss Haredale sighed, and felt that she would have to swallow a great deal of old-fashioned prejudice before she could willingly see her niece marry a man in business, whose father had got a baronetcy through being mayor on the occasion of a royal visit to his borough; while to see her given to an old roué nobleman would nearly break her heart. It vexed her that Amethyst should be allowed to give up an eligible partner because Una was tired and wanted to go home, and she would much rather have taken her to a morning concert at a duchesss, than to look at pictures in an artist’s studio, farther west than Miss Haredale had ever paid a visit in her life, where she saw celebrities, and was seen by them.

“They will write about her and criticise her picture, and besides, it will be more amusing,” said Lady Haredale. “Take Carrie to the duchess’s. – Quite the best thing for her. And as for Una, it’s very pretty to see Amethyst taken up with her.”

By the sunshiny afternoon on which we lift the curtain, Lady Haredale’s method, or no method, had had time to work, and Amethyst’s name as a beauty was being rapidly made. She had danced with princes, and been praised by painters; her help at a coming fancy-fair, where princesses and actresses held the stalls, had been asked as a special favour, her presence and her costume was mentioned in accounts of fashionable gatherings; all was going well, and Lady Haredale, as she said, was enjoying herself immensely.

Her endorsement of the old proverb that honesty is the best policy, though illustrated by Amethyst’s career, had not, however, been intended to apply to it.

The party had come in from their various afternoon engagements. Amethyst, looking bright and fresh, and Carrie Carisbrooke, with much improved costume and manner, were touching up some flowers at a side table, while the elder ladies rested and talked before dressing for dinner.

“You know,” said Lady Haredale, “there’s not the least use in making pretences about Charles. Every one knows that he has been quite a trial. Now he is going to turn over a new leaf, and I think it is quite my duty to help him, now his debts are paid.”

“It’s very clever of him to have got his debts paid. I can’t think how he has done it,” said a slow, high voice from the end of the long room.

“Tory!” exclaimed Lady Haredale, “what are you doing there?”

“I’m learning a German verb, mother,” said Tory, standing up. “Don’t you think that, as our brother is coming home for the first time, Kat and I might dine down-stairs? We won’t speak unless we’re spoken to.”

“You had much better go up-stairs and finish your lessons,” said Amethyst, who preferred Tory’s absence at critical moments.

“Now don’t try to suppress us, Amethyst. It isn’t worthy of you. It isn’t, indeed,” said Tory, holding the end of her long tail of hair, and arranging the ribbon on it, with an absurdly childish look.

“Well,” said Lady Haredale, “as there are only the Grattans and Mr Carisbrooke coming, I don’t see why you should not come in. – But, as I was saying, we must try to make it pleasant and home-like for Charles. He has not been all he should have been, but we must forget that.”

“Yes, we know all about it, mother, all of us,” said Tory, – “except Carrie.”

“Carrie is one of us now,” said Lady Haredale, “so we won’t make a stranger of her.”

Carrie, who adored Lady Haredale, smiled and coloured as she ran away to dress for dinner; while Amethyst, as she too went up-stairs, remembered the conversation they had held at Silverfold, and thought it strange that Mr Oliver Carisbrooke and Charles Haredale should both make their first visit on the same day.

Amethyst, like her mother, was “enjoying herself very much.” She did inherit the same liking for life, and for the pleasant things of life, and, in spite of the occasional pressure of the past and of the future, it was not wonderful that the present was enchanting to her. A cup, rare, sweet, and intoxicating, was held to her lips, it was something to taste so fine a flavour.

She was so full of life, that she would have enjoyed all the elements of a London season heartily, if she had been but an insignificant figure in it, and to feel herself to be one of its chief attractions, naturally enhanced the charm. While the leaves in the Park were still young and green, the air cool, and all the fine clothes fresh, the end of the season seemed far away, and the result of it needed not to be forestalled.

Neither success nor amusement ever made her forget Una, who played a much more passive part in the great Masque of Pleasure in which they were all engaged. It was for her, at any rate for the time being, an outward show. Her real life was elsewhere. This was partly, of course, because fatigue took off the edge of the pleasure, but quite as much because nothing really interested her but her emotions. She did not pass unnoticed even by Amethyst’s side, being an uncommon and interesting creature, with her extreme fragility and delicacy of appearance, and absolute self-possession and indifference of manner.

She recollected, and probably knew more about, the prodigal brother than Amethyst did, and she shrank nervously from his return. Amethyst had learned to shrug her shoulders, and “make the best of a bad business.” She encouraged Una, and would not let her dwell on what Tory called “the family crisis,” but she was a little surprised that the two younger ones also were evidently uncomfortable, and made a point of going down-stairs under her protection.

Probably they were none of them nearly so uncomfortable as the man who had lived for years under a cloud, whose reputation was tarnished, not only in the eyes of innocent girls, but in those of the men of the world with whom he ought to have associated, whose ways of life had unfitted him for a family circle, and who knew that he was watched, criticised, and tolerated.

Charles Haredale had never dined in his father’s house since his own sister Blanche had left home. He hated his step-mother, and, in blaming her for her share in the family misfortunes, eased himself a little of his self-blame. He received the kindest welcome from his aunt, who had once been fond of him, and still regarded him as the “hope” of the family, still believed that all should be pardoned to the heir.

He was meant to be an easy-going, good-natured man like his father; but his conduct had passed the bounds which he could justify to himself, his present situation contained elements difficult to swallow, and a sense of shame-faced discomfort made him look sulky.

“Here is Amethyst, Charles,” said Lady Haredale, in her sweetest tones, “you have hardly seen her since she was a baby.”

“Oh yes, I have,” said Charles, “of course I’ve seen her. Every one’s seen her. Very glad to know her, I’m sure. Great privilege.”

Amethyst shook hands, rather glad that this strange brother did not offer to kiss her, and he nodded shyly at the younger ones.

“Una? No – should never have known her. Oh yes – that’s Tory. No mistake about her.”

“You used to give me rides on your back,” said Tory, in a tone that made her sisters inclined to shake her; but just then Carrie came in, trim and fashionable in blue silk, and was introduced in due form, as Sir Richard Grattan and his sister were announced.

Sir Richard was a fair, fresh-coloured man of thirty, well-dressed and well-looking. There was nothing against him in manner, character, or appearance, and his wealth was so great, that he was worthy spoil – “big game” for the beauty of the season; while it was an open secret that the beauty of the season was the prize he meant to win. He had met Amethyst at a country house in the winter, and, with the inherited energy and determination that had made his great fortune, took measures to win what, he was enough in love to know, was not to be had without trouble and pains. He had won the good will of all her family, and he did not think the lady discouraging; but he recognised that he must let her have her great success, and submit to the approach of at any rate apparent rivals.

The right of intimacy in the house was allowed both to him and to his sisters, and he took full advantage of it. He now greeted Charles, to the surprise of the girls, as an old acquaintance, with slightly patronising friendliness, and Tory, watching with her keen eyes, caught a look, under the polite response, of savage annoyance.

“We are all here but your uncle, my dear Carrie,” said Lady Haredale, glancing round.

“Perhaps he won’t come. Sometimes he doesn’t,” said Carrie, in her clear abrupt voice.

But “Mr Oliver Carisbrooke,” chimed in with the end of her sentence, and a small slight man, with a bronzed face and a little grey pointed beard, came in. There was a little greeting and introducing, and then, men being scarce, there was a difficulty as to pairing off for dinner. Lady Haredale laughed, apologised, and went in with her two little girls. Mr Carisbrooke was given to Miss Haredale, but Amethyst found herself on his other side, and when she turned away from Sir Richard Grattan to give him courteously a small share of her attention, making some trivial remark about the London season, he looked at her keenly for a moment, and said —

“You find it very delightful?”

Amethyst was suddenly seized with the most curious self-questioning, and felt as if she wanted to settle with herself, first of all the fact of her delight, and then the why and the wherefore of it, before she answered – as of course she did —

“Oh yes, I do indeed.”

Chapter Twenty

The Beauty

A soirée was held at a new and fashionable Art Gallery, the shining lights alike of Fame and Fashion were streaming in at the doors, and spreading themselves through the rooms, when Sylvester Riddell sprang out of a hansom cab, and mounted the steps, glancing about him at the various celebrities as he passed, exchanging greetings with his friends, and watching secretly for one face.

“Iris” had just made its appearance before the public. Sylvester, at present, was suffering from a fit of depression as to its merits, and was disposed to think that it would be an utter failure. His father’s criticisms rang in his ears, and were echoed by his own understanding, and he had felt himself so unable to decide as to the hero’s final fate, that he had left the poem unfinished, calling it “Iris, as far as Manifested” and had taken leave of Amelot, still straining after the mystic vision.

Some of his friends told him that this indefiniteness was far more artistic than a commonplace conclusion, but he knew that his father would never grant that imagination could result in vagueness. He did not think himself that it could, but for him the story of Iris was still incomplete, and he could not decide on its outcome. Lucian was off to the Rocky Mountains; and the interest of Sylvester’s life had consisted in picking up reports as to the success of the new beauty.

He was engaged as art critic to a very select and enlightened journal, hence his presence to-night, and he made his way at once to the portrait of the “Hon. Amethyst Haredale, by – ,” and so encountered several of his acquaintance, all looking and criticising, for the picture was much talked of, and was painted by a rising artist. It represented Amethyst in a simple white dress, showing the long soft curves of her neck and arms, her ideal perfection of form and feature. The head was slightly turned over the shoulder, and the eyes looked out at the spectators, with the mystical far-away look which Sylvester had caught in their depths, even in the first freshness of her happy girlhood. It was somewhat faintly coloured, less blooming than the original.