03 Mary Wakefield (17 page)

“Of course,” she hastened to say, “I’ve heard of the Battle of The Plains of Abraham.”

That did not mollify him.

“I thought everyone,” he said, “had heard of the Battle of Queenston Heights.”

“I am terribly ignorant, I’m afraid.”

“And you a teacher!”

“But I want to learn about Canada.”

“The place to learn is the West,” he declared. “These old provinces are worn out.”

“Do tell me more about your ranch.”

He was happy again. They strolled across the dewy lawn and Mary got her feet wet without ever noticing. Clive Busby talked interestingly. She felt so free.

But, after a time, she began to be restless. She forgot to listen to the young man’s descriptions of life on the prairies. She longed to go indoors, to discover if Philip Whiteoak would ask her to dance. So far this evening they had no more than touched hands in the
Grand Chain. There had been no more than a smiling interchange of glances.

When, at last, her partner reluctantly led her back to the drawing-room, the first couple she saw were Philip Whiteoak and Muriel Craig. They were dancing the gavotte, and Mary had a swift pang of jealousy when Clive Busby exclaimed:

“What a stunning couple! Do you know who the young lady is? By Jove, she can dance.”

They stood just inside the door watching the dancers. From the summer darkness without, above the sound of the music, came the melancholy cry of a whip-poor-will. Mary stood, leaning on Clive Busby’s arm, half-stifled by that pang, even to the pain of which she felt she had no right, since Philip had not noticed her that evening. She was nothing to him. All his thoughts were fastened on Miss Craig.

And no wonder. Mary was forced to admit she was beautifully turned out, and had to acknowledge to herself that she was not without beauty. She was less tall than Mary, her neck and her face were shorter. Her neck was round, white and strong, her shoulders, rising above the cream-coloured brocaded taffeta of her dress, were boneless. Her thick light brown hair was piled high on her head and in it shone a pearl and diamond sunburst. Her lips were parted, so Mary thought in her jealousy, as though she were breathless in the admiration that shone up at Philip out of round light eyes.

“Shall we dance?” asked Clive Busby.

“No, thank you. I’m a little tired.”

“Come now,” he looked his unbelief, “not really?”

“Yes. Just a little. Anyhow this dance is over.”

“Of course, there’ll be other fellows you’ll want to dance with. I can’t expect to monopolize you.”

“It’s very kind of you to ask me.”

“Dear me, how formal we are! Are all English girls so formal?”

“I’m not really.”

“I wish I knew what is in your mind.”

“You might be surprised.”

“I’ll bet I’d not be half as surprised as you would be, if you knew what’s in mine.”

“Whatever are the musicians playing?”

“Don’t you know? That’s a Highland fling. I believe that Mrs. Whiteoak and Dr. Ramsey are going to dance it.”

Adeline and the doctor were indeed taking the floor, he wearing an expression of almost mournful gravity, her face lit by an hilarious grin.

“This,” he announced, “is a Scottish reel and I taught it to Mrs. Whiteoak in her youth.”

“Nonsense,” she declared, “it’s an Irish jig and I taught it to you.”

Whichever it was they were at it, their bodies galvanized by Gallic energy, their feet flying. The doctor’s expression never changed, indeed one might have said his life depended on the accuracy with which he executed the steps. Only once more did he open his lips and then it was to utter the brief shout, so in keeping with the dance. It seemed a pity that he was not wearing the kilt.

Adeline had opened the evening, partnered by her eldest son. They had been a striking couple. Since then she had danced several times but there was something of wildness and recklessness in this dance that best suited her nature. She held up her violet moiré skirt that was trimmed with heavy gold passementerie, showing her slim feet and ankles, in black silk stocking and low-heeled black satin slipper with silver buckles.

Augusta looked on at this performance in mingled wonder and pain. She wondered at her mother’s ability so to skip about. She could not have done it. She thought the dance barbarous and was pained by Adeline’s obvious delight in it. She had a feeling that Dr. Ramsey had always been in love with Adeline and this made her uncomfortable.

Nicholas and Ernest regarded the exhibition with amusement and gratification. They were proud of Adeline. At the height of the reel Philip took his nose in his hand and emitted an amazingly good imitation of the bagpipes.

It put new life into the dancers who were beginning to pant a little, but his three spaniels who were outside the French windows waiting for him, recognized his voice, even though so distorted, and thinking he was in dire predicament, rushed in to save him.

The music stopped.

Philip caught Sport and Spot by their collars and dragged them out but Jake ran here and there yelping in a panic till captured by Mary. He lolled blissfully against her shoulder and she followed Phillip on to the lawn. His face lighted with surprise as he saw her.

“Good girl!” he exclaimed, and gently took the puppy from her.

Mary stood looking at him, her spirit crying out in her distress, “Good Girl! And you have never once asked me to dance and never will!”

Adeline appeared in the doorway, followed by Clive Busby. She was well pleased with her son for his attentions to Miss Craig. She was almost pleased with Mary.

“Those dogs of yours behave disgracefully, Philip,” she said. “Do shut the door on them and then bring Miss Craig in to supper. All our guests are starving. And here is Clive Busby eager to take in Miss Wakefield.” She stood with her hand on the door knob, smiling at Mary as she passed. Then she said, in an undertone to Philip:

“That’s quite a case. Young Busby is plainly smitten. What a capital match it would be for that girl.”

“Yes,” he agreed absently, and wondered what Mary could possibly see in Clive Busby.

“Now, Philip, don’t keep Miss Craig waiting, while you play with your dogs.” She ordered him about, with feminine pleasure, as though he were a big boy and he obeyed, half-sulkily.

Muriel Craig tucked a firm white hand under his arm. She gathered up her skirts in the other. She said:

“This is the happiest evening I’ve had in a long while. You can’t imagine how dull life has become for me, since my father’s illness.”

“I’m glad you’ve enjoyed the dancing.”

“I think our steps suit, don’t you?”

“Indeed I do.” His eyes followed the musicians who were leaving to go to the basement for refreshment.

Muriel Craig continued, “I do hope you will come often to see Father. He’s taken a great fancy to you. He gets so bored by the society of his nurse and bored a tiny bit by me too, I’m afraid.”

“I’m going to see him tomorrow,” said Philip.

“In the morning?”

“Yes.”

“Will you stay to lunch?”

“I’d like to. Thanks very much.”

The dining-room was full of people gathered about the table where wax candles in the tall candelabra cast their radiance on white and red roses and gilded the sheen of the damask cloth. There were hot chicken pasties, and cold tongue, and devilled eggs, and sliced peaches in thick cream, and brandied peaches and ice cream, made, with much exertion, in a churnlike freezer, by Eliza. There was coffee and claret cup and cocoanut layer cake and almond meal macaroons and brandy snaps. In short, Adeline had ordered the supper.

She enjoyed having her friends, young and old, about her after an absence. She enjoyed the good food, eating it with gusto, in the knowledge that no digestive complications would follow. She was pleased with her sons. Nicholas, well rid of that wife of his, looked happy and handsome. He was laying himself out to make their guests happy. Who wouldn’t be pleased with a son like Ernest? — making money hand over fist, with no more exertion than the notifying of his intentions to brokers. As for Philip, he seemed to have forgotten all about the governess and was listening to seemingly entertaining talk by Miss Craig.

Muriel Craig had chosen a corner where Philip’s back would be toward the room, and Mary Wakefield. She talked rather breathlessly, never allowing his attention to waver. She really was, he thought, a quick and amusing woman. She talked fluently of her travels, she had been about quite a bit and could scarcely bear to hear about a place she had not visited, or a book she had not read.
Philip was an excellent companion for her because he was by nature receptive and had neither travelled nor read widely. His pleasant laugh punctuated her anecdotes. She said she adored ice cream and he saw to it that she had several helpings.

As they were returning to the drawing-room, from where came the sound of the musicians tuning their instruments, she said: “I think you are so fortunate in your children’s governess. She strikes me as a most good-natured creature.”

“Yes. She’s very nice,” he answered, a little coldly.

“It means so much to have a good kind creature about them.”

“It does indeed.” He looked about him for the good kind creature but she was not to be seen.

“I can’t possibly dance after all that supper,” said Muriel Craig. “Could we go out for a stroll? There’s such heavenly moonlight.”

Adeline came into the hall. “How sensible you are!” she exclaimed. “That’s just what I should like to do, but the night air gives me a buzzing in my left ear. Infirmities of age coming on me, you know.” She showed her fine teeth in a smile that quickly sobered as she saw Mary standing alone on the porch.

“Ah, there you are, Miss Wakefield,” she said. “I have been looking for you. Here is a young man who is dying for a waltz with you. Mr. Robertson,” she turned to the young man whom she had only that moment espied, “this is Miss Wakefield, who waltzes like a dream.”

Mr. Robertson was pale, with hair parted in the middle, and a very high collar which had gone very limp from the heat. He vaguely offered his arm to Mary, and began vaguely to waltz round and round with her. Apparently he never had heard of reversing.

Mary felt slightly dizzy. A surge of almost intolerable disappointment made her limbs heavy. She wished she were upstairs, alone in her bedroom. She had a mind to make an excuse to go to see if the children were safely tucked up. She had a sudden feeling of love for the children. With them she might find ease from the anguish of jealousy. But Mr. Robertson, though vague-looking, was firm. He held her closely, turning round and round.

And, after him, returned Clive Busby to make sure she had not forgotten her promise to drive with him.

The time dragged on. It was past midnight. It was two o’clock. The guests were leaving. Horses, scarcely able to endure the waiting to return to their own stables, pawed the gravel drive. Carriage lamps flashed. There were shouts of “Whoa!”

Lily Pink was spending the night at Jalna. Her mother was delicate and could not endure the late hours, so Lily was to remain. Like Mary she had an ache in her heart. Not that she had expected Philip would ask her to dance and, even if she had, she was sure she would have danced her worst. But she could not comfort herself. The ache persisted. She stood smilingly with the family in the drawing-room that now looked very large and bare, while they congratulated themselves that the party had gone so well.

“And did you enjoy yourself, my dear?” Augusta asked her kindly.

“Oh, yes, Lady Buckley. It was lovely.”

“You looked very nice dancing. I always like dotted Swiss muslin on a young girl.”

“Mother and I made the dress ourselves.”

“Your mother is an excellent needlewoman and I’m glad you take after her. I have always enjoyed sewing.”

“I’ve always hated it,” said Adeline.

Ernest observed gallantly, “My very best dance of the evening was with Lily.”

“She treated me with scorn,” said Philip. “Never once glanced in my direction.”

“But there were those who did,” put in Sir Edwin. “No one could fail to notice the die-away looks Miss Craig gave you.”

Nicholas remarked, “That young woman is a strange mixture of rigidity and voluptuousness. From the waist down she dances like a boarding-school miss, and from the waist up like Salome.”

“This is scarcely proper conversation in front of a young girl,” said Augusta.

“Oh, I don’t mind.” Lily blushed prettily. “And after all, Salome is biblical.”

Philip went to the dining-room where all signs of supper had been cleared away, save for the remains of the tongue on a platter on the sideboard. He cut three slices from the tongue and, with these on his palm, went to the back of the hall where, in a small room, his three spaniels had retired to their respective mats. He fed a slice of tongue to each. The parent dogs took their share gently and a little reproachfully, as though this were poor compensation for the evening they had spent, but Jake wolfed his, trying to swallow Philip’s hand with it. He patted all three.

“Good dogs. Now lie down. Go to mats.”

Jake tried to take possession of each of his parents’ mats in turn but when driven off by them curled himself up on his own, with only an upturned roguish eye to show that he lived.

As Philip returned through the hall, he reflected with content that the party was over, his crops which were above the average in quality, were almost completely garnered, his horses promised well. In a day or two he would go on the fishing trip he had been looking forward to. Before long there would be the duck shooting. Would he ever get Jake properly trained for a gun dog? He doubted it. Jake was a bit of a fool. His best friend couldn’t deny that.

When he was passing his mother’s door she called to him.

“Come in, Philip, and tell me good night.”

He found her still dressed but with her hair hanging about her shoulders. Her parrot sitting on her wrist, gazed into her face with a possessive air. He chuckled in pleasure over her return to him.

“He won’t let me undress,” she said. “He’s for billing and cooing the whole night through.”