George Fenn - By Birth a Lady

Of course she must make allowances for him. He had been busy and bothered about the prize-giving, so how could he attend to her? He was different from other men: so frank and straightforward and bold. She had always felt that he must love her; and after what Sir Philip Vining had hinted to papa, and papa had told mamma, and mamma had pinched her arm and told her in a whisper, what was there to prevent her being Lady Vining and the mistress of Blandfield Court?

“At last!” said Laura, and this time quite aloud, as Charley came up; when, taking his arm, she bestowed upon him a most reproachful glance. “I declare I thought your friends were to be quite neglected!”

“Neglected? O, I don’t know,” said Charley; and then there was a pause.

“Why, you grow quite distrait ,” said Laura pettishly. “Why, what can you see to take your attention there?”

She followed his gaze, which was directed towards a seat across the lawn, whereon were her companion of the day before, one of the “children,” and Max Bray leaning in an attitude over the back.

“Shall we be moving?” said Charley abstractedly.

“O yes, please do!” said Laura. “I’m dying for want of an ice, or a cup of tea. I’ve been pestered for the last half-hour by that horrible fat boy!”

“Fat boy!” said Charley wonderingly.

“Yes; you know whom I mean – Hugh Lingon. So glad to have you come and set me free!”

Charley Vining did not say anything; but he led his companion towards the refreshment-tent, carefully avoiding the open lawn, and taking her, nowise unwilling, round by the shady walks where there were but few people, her steps growing slower, and her hand more heavy in its pressure. And still Charley Vining was quiet and thoughtful; but he led his companion to the refreshment-tent, handed the demanded ice, and then sauntered with her towards the lawn, still gay with fashionably-dressed groups.

“Had we not better get in the shade?” said Laura languidly. “The afternoon sun is quite oppressive.”

“Let’s cross over to Max,” said Charley. “That seems a pleasant shady seat.”

Laura did not speak, but she looked sidewise in his preoccupied countenance, and, evidently piqued at what she considered his indifference, allowed herself to be led across the lawn.

“By the way, Miss Bray,” said Charley suddenly, “you never introduced me to your lady friend.”

“Lady friend!” said Laura, as if surprised.

“Yes, the fair girl that friend Max there seems so taken with. Is it his fiancée ?” Laura Bray’s eyes glittered as she bent forward and looked intently in her companion’s face; then a tightness seemed to come over the muscles of her countenance, giving her a hard bitter look, as a flash of suspicion crossed her mind. The next moment she smiled; but it was not a pleasant smile, though it displayed two rows of the most brilliantly-white teeth. But, apparently determined upon her course, she increased the pace at which they were walking till they stood in front of the seat where, with a troubled look in her eyes, sat, listening perforce to the doubtless agreeable conversation of Mr Maximilian Bray, the lady of the railway station, and the companion of Laura in the brougham.

It was with a look almost of malice that, stopping short, Laura fixed her eyes upon Charley Vining, to catch the play of his countenance as, without altering the direction of her glance, she said aloud:

“Miss Bedford, this gentleman has requested to be introduced to you – Mr Charles Vining.” Then, with mock courtesy, and still devouring each twitch and movement, she continued: “Mr Charles Vining – Miss Bedford, our new governess !”

Mr Onesimus Bray led rather an uncomfortable life at home, and more than once he had confided his troubles to the sympathising ear of Sir Philip Vining. Laura was given to snubbing him; Max made no scruple about displaying the contempt in which he held his parent; while as to Mrs Bray, the wife of his bosom, the principal cause of his suffering from her was the way in which she sat upon him.

Now it must not be supposed that Mrs Bray literally and forcibly did perform any such act of cruelty; for this was only Mr Bray’s metaphorical way of speaking in alluding to the way in which he was kept down and debarred from having a voice in his own establishment, the consequence being that he sought for solace and recreation elsewhere.

Mr Onesimus Bray was far from being a poor man; so that if he felt inclined to indulge in any particular hobby, his banker never said him “Nay,” while if Mrs Bray’s somewhat penurious alarms could be laid by the promise of profit, she would raise not the slightest opposition to her husband’s projects. At the present time, Mr Bray’s especial hobby was a model farm, in which no small sum of money had been sunk – of course, with a view to profit; but so far the returns had been nil . The old farmers of the neighbourhood used to wink and nod their heads together, and cackle like so many of their own geese at what they called Mr Bray’s “fads” – namely, at his light agricultural carts and wagons; despising, too, his cows and short-legged pigs; but, all the same, losing no chance of obtaining a portion of his stock when occasion served.

Moved by a strong desire to possess the finest Southdown sheep in the county, Mr Bray had purchased a score of the best to be had for money, among which was a snowy-wooled patriarchal ram, as noble-looking a specimen of its kind as ever graced a Roman triumphal procession ere bedewing with its heart’s blood the sacrificial altar. Gentle, quiet, and inoffensive, the animal might have been played with by a child before it arrived at Mr Bray’s model farmstead; but having been there confined for a few days in a brick-walled pig-sty, the unfortunate quadruped attracted the notice of the young gentleman whose duty it was to clean knives, boots, and shoes at the Elms, and wait table at dinner, clothed in a jacket glorious with an abundant crop of buttons gracefully arranged in the outline of a balloon over his padded chest. It occurred to this young gentleman one afternoon when alone, that a little playful teasing of the ram might afford him some safe sport; so fetching a large new thrum mop from the kitchen, he held it over the side of the pig-sty, shaking it fiercely and threateningly at the ram, till the poor beast answered the challenge of the – to him – strange enemy by backing as far as possible, and then running with all his might at the suddenly-withdrawn mop, when his head would come with stunning violence against the bricks, making the wall quiver again.

The pleasant pastime used to be carried on very frequently, till most probably, not from soreness – rams’ heads being slightly thick, and able to suffer even brick walls – but from disappointment at not being able to smite its adversary, the ram became changed into a decidedly vicious beast, and, as such, he was turned out into one of Mr Bray’s pleasant meadows.

Now, as it fell upon a day, perfectly innocent of there being any vicious animal in the neighbourhood, Ella Bedford had passed through this very meadow during a walk with her three pupils. The morning was bright and sunshiny, and the sight of a fine snowy-wooled sheep cropping the bright green herbage was not one likely to create alarm. Had it been a cow, or even a calf, it might have been different, and the stiles and footpaths avoided for some other route; for the female eye is a strong magnifier of the bovine race, and we have known ladies refuse to pass through a field containing half-a-dozen calves, which had been magnified, one and all, into bulls of the largest and fiercest character.