Джорджетт Хейер: Sylvester, or The Wicked Uncle

“Five!”

“Well, only five with whom I could perhaps bear to spend a large part of my life. There is Lady Jane Saxby: she’s pretty, and good-natured. Then there’s Barningham’s daughter: she has a great deal of vivacity. Miss Bellerby is a handsome girl, with a little reserve, which I don’t dislike. Lady Mary Torrington—oh, a diamond of the first water! And lastly Miss Orton: not beautiful, but quite taking, and has agreeable manners.” He paused, his gaze still fixed on the smouldering logs. The Duchess waited expectantly. He looked up presently, and smiled at her. “Well, Mama?” he said affably. “Which of them shall it be?”

After an astonished moment the Duchess said: “Dearest, are you roasting me? You can’t in all seriousness be asking me to choose for you!”

“No, not choose precisely. I wish you will advise me, though. You’re not acquainted with any of them, but you know their families, and if you should have a decided preference—”

“But, Sylvester, have you no preference?”

“No, that’s the devil of it: I haven’t. Whenever I think one more eligible than any of the others as sure as check I find she has some fault or trick which I don’t like. Lady Jane’s laugh, for instance; or Miss Orton’s infernal harp! I’ve no turn for music, and to be obliged to endure a harp’s being eternally twanged in my own house—no, I think that’s coming it a trifle too strong, don’t you, Mama? Then Lady Mary—”

“Thank you, I have heard enough to be able to give you my advice!” interrupted his mother. “Don’t make an offer for any one of them! You are not in love!”

“In love! No, of course I am not. Is that so necessary?”

“Most necessary, my dear! Don’t, I beg you, offer marriage where you can’t offer love as well!”

He smiled at her. “You are too romantic, Mama.”

“Am I? But you seem to have no romance in you at all!”

“Well, I don’t look for it in marriage, at any rate.”

“Only in the muslin company?”

He laughed. “You shock me, Mama! That’s a different matter. I shouldn’t call it romance either—or only one’s first adventure, perhaps. And even when I was a greenhead, and fell in love with the most dazzling little bird of Paradise you ever saw, I don’t think I really fancied myself to have formed a lasting passion! I daresay I’m too volatile, in which case—”

“No such thing! You have not yet been fortunate enough to meet the girl for whom you will form a lasting passion.”

“Very true: I haven’t! And since I’ve been on the town for nearly ten years, and may be said to have had my pick of all the eligible debutantes that appear yearly on the Marriage Mart, we must conclude that if I’m not too volatile I must be too nice in my requirements. To be frank with you, Mama, you are the only lady of my acquaintance with whom I don’t soon become heartily bored!”

A tiny frown appeared between her winged brows as she listened to this speech. It was spoken in a bantering tone, but she found it disturbing. “Your pick of them, Sylvester?”

“Yes, I think so. I must have seen all the eligibles, I fancy.”

“And have made quite a number of them the objects of your gallantry—if the things I hear are to be believed!”

“My aunt Louisa,” said Sylvester unerringly. “What an incorrigible gossip your sister is, my dear! Well, if I have now and then shown a preference at least she can’t accuse me of having been so particular in my attentions as to have raised false hopes in any maiden’s bosom!”

The hint of laughter had quite vanished from her eyes. The image she cherished of this beloved son was all at once blurred; and a feeling of disquiet made it difficult for her to know what she should say to him. As she hesitated, an interruption occurred. The door was opened; a pretty, plaintive voice said: “May I come in, Mama-Duchess?” and there appeared on the threshold a vision of beauty dressed in a blue velvet pelisse, and a hat with a high poke-front which made a frame for a ravishing countenance. Ringlets of bright gold fell beside damask cheeks; large blue eyes were set beneath delicately arched brows; the little nose was perfectly straight; and the red mouth deliciously curved.

“Good morning, my love. Of course you may come in!” said the Duchess.

The vision had by this time perceived her brother-in-law, and although she did come in she said with a marked diminution of cordiality: “Oh! I didn’t know you had Sylvester with you, ma’am. I beg your pardon, but I only came to discover if Edmund was here.”

“I haven’t seen him this morning,” replied the Duchess. “Is he not with Mr. Leyburn?”

“No, and it is particularly vexatious because I wish to take him with me to visit the Arkholmes! You know I have been meaning for days to drive over to the Grange, ma’am, and now, on the first fine morning we have had for an age, no one can tell me where he is!”

“Perhaps he has slipped off to the stables, little rogue!”

“No, though, to be sure, that was what I expected too, for ever since Sylvester took to encouraging him to haunt the stables—”

“My dear, they all do so, and without the least encouragement!” interposed the Duchess. “Mine certainly did—they were the most deplorable urchins! Tell me, did you have that charming pelisse made from the velvets we chose from the patterns sent down last month? How well it has made up!”

The effect of this attempt to divert the beauty’s thoughts was unfortunate. “Yes, but only think, ma’am!” exclaimed Ianthe. “I had a suit made from it for Edmund to wear when he goes out with me—quite simple, but after the style of that red dress the boy has on in the picture by Reynolds. I forget where I saw it, but I thought at once how well Edmund would look in it if only it were not red but blue!”

“Wouldn’t he just!” muttered Sylvester.

“What did you say?” demanded Ianthe suspiciously.

“Nothing.”

“I suppose it was something ill-natured. To be sure, I never hoped that you would think it pretty!”

“You are mistaken. The picture you would both present would be pretty enough to take one’s breath away. Assuming, of course, that Edmund could be persuaded to behave conformably. Standing within your arm, with that soulful look on his face—no, that won’t do! He only wears that when he’s plotting mischief. Well—”

“Sylvester, will you be silent?” begged the Duchess, trying not to laugh. “Don’t heed him, my dear child! He’s only quizzing you!”

“Oh, I know that, ma’am!” said Ianthe, her colour considerably heightened. “I know, too, who it is who teaches poor little Edmund not to mind me!”

“Oh, good God, what next?” Sylvester exclaimed.

“You do!” she insisted. “And it shows how little affection you have for him! If you cared a rap for him you wouldn’t encourage him to run into heaven knows what danger!”

“ What danger?”

“Anything might happen to him!” she declared. “At this very moment he may be at the bottom of the lake!”

“He is nowhere near the lake. If you must have it, I saw him making off to the Home Wood!”

“And you made not the smallest effort to call him back, I collect!”

“No. The last time I interfered in Edmund’s illicit amusements I figured in your conversation as a monster of inhumanity for three days.”

“I never said any such thing, but only that—besides, he may change his mind, and go to the lake after all!”

“Make yourself easy: he won’t! Not while he knows I’m at home, at all events.”

She said fretfully: “I might have known how it would be! I would as lief not to go to the Grange at all now, and I wouldn’t, only that I have had the horses put to. But I shan’t know a moment’s peace of mind for wondering if my poor, orphaned child is safe, or at the bottom of the lake!”