Lady Maude's Mania

“Yes, very handsome,” sighed Maude, thoughtfully.

“Ah, Justine, I cannot be angry with the poor girl for being in love.”

“Ma foi, non, miladi, it is our nature to have our weakness there. I too, I confess to it all. Yais.”

“You, Justine! you?” cried Maude, staring hard at the dark shining eyes of the Frenchwoman, who looked too hard to have had a soft sensation in her life.

“Oui, miladi. It is my secret, and I hide him. But I too love with a grand ardour that cannot be what you call him in your tongue.”

“Appeased, Justine,” sighed Maude.

“Non, non, miladi. Ah, yais, I have him, squench, which can nevaire be squench.”

“Poor Justine!” sighed Maude; and then recovering herself, and shrinking from being so intimate with her mother’s maid. “But no, no, I could not go.”

“Why not, miladi?” said the wily Frenchwoman. “Monsieur Hector is a gentleman that an empress might trust.”

“Yes, yes; but – oh, this is dreadful.”

“Her ladyship does not think of Sir Wilters’ great sorrow if he find my young lady has lose all her hair,” said Justine, smiling as she watched the effect of her words; and a few minutes after she was attending Maude on her way to Upper Gimp Street.

The waxen lady had her head turned in the opposite direction, but the waxen gentleman watched her coming, and looked a combination of the mysterious and admiring as, closely veiled, Maude walked swiftly by Justine’s side, trembling the while, and feeling certain that every one she passed knew her errand and was watching her.

Dreading the visit as she did, it was with something like relief that she stood within the curtained door, face to face with bland, chivalrous Monsieur Hector, who rose, laid down his three days’ old copy of the Petit Journal, and bowed profoundly.

“Miladi will excuse that I do not attend her myself?” he said, respectfully. “Monsieur my assistant is at miladi’s service.”

As Maude bowed, he opened the inner door that led to his private consulting room, and returned to the front, to indulge for the next two hours in pleasant converse with Justine.

At last Justine rose to go.

“One instant, my beautiful,” whispered Monsieur Hector. “When do I come to see La Grande Chouette?”

“Oh, I had forgotten, – to-morrow,” said Justine.

“Cette chère picture!” said Hector, taking a photograph from over the little stove and kissing it, “remains with me for ever. But stay,” he said, addressing the real instead of the image. “Behold a little packet which I prepare for my beautiful – tooth-powder for her beauteous teeth; scent of the best, but not so sweet as her gentle breath; soap for her soft skin. Ah, sweet soap, sweet soap! if I were only you to be pressed in her hands,” he added, kissing it, and then presenting his offerings to his goddess, who received them like a deity, and held out one hand for him to kiss, with which he was apparently quite content.

Then he struck a table gong, and evidently conveyed by it due notice to his assistant that he had devoted sufficient time to the new client, who shortly after came out, closely veiled, took Justine’s arm, and the waxen lady had one glance at her, while the waxen gentleman looked more mysterious than ever, as he watched her till she was out of sight.

Chapter Fifteen.

Lady Barmouth receives Information

“Maude, I will not allow it,” cried Lady Barmouth, one morning. “That wretched organ man is always haunting this house, and you are constantly giving him money.”

“The poor fellow is a foreigner and in distress, and he does no harm,” said Maude.

“No harm? He distracts me with his dreadful noise.”

“Plays that tune from Trovatore where the fellow’s shut up rather nicely,” said his lordship, rubbing his leg.

“Barmouth!”

“Yes, my dear.”

“Be quiet. And mind this, Maude, I have given instructions to the servants that this dreadful Italian is to be sent away.”

“Very well, mamma,” said Maude, coldly, “only be fair – send every man away who comes to the house. Be consistent in what you do.”

“Is the girl mad?” exclaimed Lady Barmouth. “What does she mean?”

“I mean, mamma,” cried Maude, with spirit, “that I will not – I cannot marry Sir Grantley Wilters.”

“Maude, you’ll break my heart,” cried her ladyship.

“Tom, this is your fault for bringing that wicked young man to the house.”

“What – Wilters?”

“No, no, no, my boy,” said his lordship, rubbing his leg. “Your mamma means Charley Melton, and I – I – I – damme, I can’t understand it all about him. I’m sure I – I – I – don’t think he’s so bad as he’s being painted.”

Maude darted a look of gratitude towards him, and then one of reproach at her brother, who stood biting his nails.

“Barmouth, will you leave that leg alone,” cried her ladyship. “You give me the creeps; and if you cannot talk sensibly, hold your tongue. Everybody knows, even Tom, if he would only speak, that this man – pah! I cannot utter his name – is degraded to the utmost degree; but he has managed to play upon a foolish girl’os heart, and she is blind to his wickedness.”

“Mamma,” cried Maude, “I am not blind; and I will not believe these calumnies. Mr Melton never professed to be rich, and I do not believe he either gambles or drinks.”

“Believe them or not, Maude, my word and your papa’s are passed to Sir Grantley Wilters, and you will be his wife. So no more folly, please.”

Maude turned pale, and glanced at Tom, who stood biting his nails, and then at her father, who grew more wrinkled, and rubbed his leg. She then turned to Tryphie, whose look was sympathising, but meant no help. For poor dependent Tryphie hardly dare say that her soul was her own. Maude felt that she was alone, and, even in these nineteenth century times, being as helplessly driven into marriage with a man she detested as if in the days of old chivalry, when knights and barons patronised ironmongery for costume, and carried off captive maidens to their castles to espouse them before shaven friar, or else dispense with his services.

“Maude,” said her ladyship then, “I wished to spare your feelings, and if you had been less recalcitrant” – that was a word that her ladyship had been hoarding up for the occasion, and it rather jarred against her second best set of teeth as she used it; it was such a hard, stony word, and so threatening to the enamel – “I should have kept this back, but now I must tell you that for your papa’s and my own satisfaction, we have had inquiries made as to this – this – Mr Melton’s character, by an impartial person, and you shall hear from his lips how misguided you have been.”

Maude turned pale, but, setting her teeth, she threw up her head and remained defiant and proud.

“After hearing this, I trust that your sense of duty to your parents will teach you to behave to Sir Grantley Wilters more in accordance with your relative positions. He does not complain, but I can often see that he is wounded by your studied coldness.”

“Not he; damned sight too hard.”

“Diphoos,” said her ladyship, “I had hoped that your visit to purer atmospheres taken at the expense of your papa would have had a more refining influence upon you.”

“So it has,” said Tom, sharply; “but if you keep on making use of that worn-out cad’s name, I must swear, so there.”

Her ladyship did not reply, but pointed to the bell, and Lord Barmouth dropped the hand with which he was about to caress his leg, toddled across the room and rang, surreptitiously feeling in one of his pockets directly after to see if something was safe.

Tryphie Wilders crossed to her cousin and took her hand, whispering a few consolatory words, while her ladyship played the heaving billow a little as she settled herself in her chair in a most magisterial manner.

“Robbins,” said her ladyship, as the butler entered, “has that gentleman arrived?”