Джорджетт Хейер: Sylvester, or The Wicked Uncle

When Sylvester was ushered into her crowded drawing-room she greeted him with a snort; but she was pleased to receive a visit from him nevertheless; and after telling him acidly that she had well-nigh forgotten what he looked like she unbent sufficiently to give him her hand, and allow him to kiss it. Mollified by the grace with which he performed this courtesy she waved him to a chair on the opposite side of the fireplace and bade him tell her how his mother did.

“I left her pretty well, I think,” he answered. “But tell me, ma’am, how you do?”

She told him. The recital lasted for twenty minutes, and might have lasted longer had she not suddenly bethought herself of something she wanted to know. She broke off her account of her aches and ails abruptly, saying: “Never mind that! What’s this I’m hearing about your brother’s widow? The on-dit is that she’s going to marry a man-milliner. I knew his father: a namby-pamby creature he was, though he passed for an amiable man. They tell me the son is a Pink of the Ton. I suppose he has a genteel fortune? Old Fotherby should have cut up warm.”

“Oh, as rich as Golden Ball!” Sylvester replied.

“Is he indeed? H’m!” She was evidently impressed by this, but said after a reflective moment: “In a vast hurry to be married again, ain’t she? What happens to the boy?”

“He will remain at Chance, of course.”

She stared at him. “What, is your poor mother to be charged with the care of him?”

“No, certainly not.” He held up his quizzing-glass, twisting it between finger and thumb, and watching the flash of firelight on its magnifying lens. “I am thinking of getting married myself, ma’am.”

“Well, it’s high time,” she responded snappishly. “The Torrington girl, I collect?”

“I suppose she might answer the purpose—if I could be sure she would not be hipped at Chance. It is an object with me, you know, ma’am, to choose a wife who will be acceptable to my mother.”

If she thought this an odd reason for matrimony she did not say so. “Is your heart engaged?” she demanded.

“Not in the least,” he replied. “You see what a quandary I am in! Do advise me!”

She did not speak for a minute, but he knew that she was on the alert, and was content to wait, idly swinging his quizzing-glass.

“You can pour yourself out a glass of wine!” she said suddenly. “I’ll take one too—though I don’t doubt I shall suffer for it.”

He rose, and crossed the room to where Horwich had set a silver tray on a side-table. When he came back to the fire, and put a glass of sherry into the Dowager’s hand, he said lightly: “Now, if you were only a fairy godmother, ma’am, you would wave your wand, and so conjure up exactly the bride I want!”

He returned to his chair as he spoke, and had embarked on a change of subject when she interrupted him, saying: “I may not be able to wave a wand, but I daresay I could produce an eligible bride for you.” She set her glass down. “What you want, Sylvester, is a pretty-behaved girl of good birth, good upbringing, and an amiable disposition. If your Uncle William were not a zany he would have arranged just such an alliance for you years ago, and you may depend upon it you would have been very comfortable in it. Well, I haven’t meddled, though I own I’ve been tempted, when I’ve heard how you were making up to first this female and then that. However, you’ve now applied to me, and it’s my belief that if you wish for a wife who will know what her duty is and be more acceptable than any other to your mother, you could do no better for yourself than to offer for my granddaughter. I don’t mean one of Ingham’s girls, but Phoebe: my Verena’s child.”

He was extremely annoyed. His godmother was not playing the game as he had planned it. Those carefully casual words of his should have prompted her not to hold him up at the sword’s point, but to have produced her granddaughter presently (at the start of the season, perhaps) for his inspection. There was a lack of finesse about her conduct of the affair which vexed and alarmed him; for while the notion of marrying the daughter of his mother’s dear friend had taken possession of his mind its hold was not so strong that it could not speedily be broken by the discovery that Miss Marlow was lacking in the qualities he considered indispensable in his wife. In Lady Ingham’s bluntness he saw an attempt to force his hand, and nothing could more surely set up the back of a young man who had been, virtually, his own master from the time he was nineteen, and the master of a great many other persons as well. He said in a cool tone: “Indeed? Have I met your granddaughter, ma’am? I think I have not.”

“I don’t know. She was brought out last season—it should have been done before, but she contracted scarlet fever, and so it was put off for a year. She will be twenty in October: I’m not offering you a schoolroom miss. As for the rest—I imagine you must several times have been in company with her, for she was taken to all the ton parties. I saw to that! If I had left it to that woman Marlow married as his second the poor child would have spent her time at museums, and the Concerts of Ancient Music, for that’s Constance Marlow’s notion of disporting herself in town! Marlow married her before Phoebe was out of leading-strings, the more fool he! Not but what I give the woman credit for having done her duty by the child. She has been well brought-up—no question about that!” Glancing across at Sylvester she saw that he was wearing his satyr-look, and she said with the sharpness of defiance: “ I couldn’t take charge of the girl! At my age, and with my indifferent health it wasn’t to be thought of!”

He said nothing, nor did the satyr-look abate. Since Lady Ingham had made no attempt during the previous season to bring her granddaughter to his notice he concluded that Miss Marlow was probably a plain girl, unlikely to attract him. He tried to remember whether he had seen a girl with Lady Marlow on the few occasions when he had found himself in company with that forbidding lady. If he had, she held no place in his memory.

“Phoebe’s not one of your beauties,” said the Dowager, almost as if she had read his mind. “She don’t show to advantage with her mother-in-law, but to my way of thinking she’s not just in the ordinary style. If pink-and-white’s your fancy, she wouldn’t do for you. If you want quality, and a girl with a quick understanding, you’d like her. As for her fortune, she won’t inherit much from Marlow, but her mother’s dowry was tied up in her, so she’ll have that, besides what I shall leave her.” She was silent for a minute, but said presently: “It would please your mother, and I don’t deny it would please me too. I want to see Verena’s child comfortably established. She’s not an heiress, but her fortune won’t be contemptible; and as for her birth, Marlow’s a fool, but his blood’s well enough; and the Inghams may look as high as they please when it comes to matchmaking. But if an alliance with my granddaughter isn’t to your taste, pray don’t hesitate to tell me so!”

This set the seal on his resentment. She was apparently trying to fluster him into committing himself. A stupid move: she ought to know that hers was not the first trap set for him. He rose, smiling at her with apparently unruffled serenity, and said, as he lifted her hand to his lips: “I can’t suppose, my dear ma’am, that you need my assurance that on the score of eligibility I could have no possible objection to the match. I shall only say, therefore, that I hope to have the pleasure of meeting Miss Marlow—this season, perhaps? Ah, that will be delightful!”

He left her with no clue to his sentiments, but in an angry mood that was not soothed by the reflection that he had laid himself open to her attack. She had proposed to him only what he had had in mind when he visited her, but the alacrity with which she had snapped at the chance offered her was almost as offensive as her attempt to force his hand. It was also stupid, for it inspired him with nothing more than a desire to cross Miss Marlow off the list of his eligibles, and propose without much waste of time to one of the remaining five. Unfortunately, the impropriety of such conduct made it impossible for him to administer this salutary lesson to the Dowager. She must regard it as a studied insult (which, indeed, it would be), and so wholly beneath him was it to insult her that he could only shrug, and resign himself. There was nothing to be done now until he had met Miss Marlow.