Chapter I

It was the night of the annual Marston Servants' Ball, held always, according to immemorial custom, on the first Wednesday in January. It was a tremendous affair, and was to begin at ten o'clock and to end with breakfast about seven next morning. There was but one shadow upon the festivities this evening, and that the attack of influenza that had prostrated the master of the house. However, as Mrs. Brandreth-Smith explained with magnificent generosity to Underhill on the morning of the day, that should make no difference: Master Percy would take his father's place; and all should be as usual. (As a matter of fact it admirably suited her ambition of making Percy realize his own importance.)

Preparations began the very instant that dinner was over. The, Family retired as usual to the drawing-room, together with their guests who had been good enough to consent to come over and dine; and a band of men, gathered in the stone passage on the way to the kitchen, precipitated themselves upon the dining-room. It was a point of honour in the house that not the faintest interruption should be caused to the sacred routine of Family-Life. Coffee was served as usual by Mr. Underhill and one of the men; the card-tables were set out; Helen and Mabel Marridon performed at the piano. •..

And, at ten o'clock precisely, Mr. Underhill appeared in the door of the drawing-room and announced to Madam that all was ready.

Digitized by Google

It was with a pleased excitement — (which of course he would not acknowledge to himself) — that Percy, ushering Mr. Bennett immediately in front of him, followed the four ladies across the hall. It really seemed to him that Greatness had descended on his head, as a crown from heaven. At dinner he had sat in his father's place and conversed with Miss Marridon: he had found her a very charming girl indeed. Among other subjects he had discussed A Gentleman of Fortune — (which Miss Marridon had also seen at His Highness') — and had mentioned in the most casual manner in the world that he knew, slightly, Miss Farham. Did not Miss Marridon think she had acted very well?... Yes; just so... He thought so too. Very well indeed....

After dinner his duties had been explained to him.

The ball was to open with Sir Roger de Coverley. (He did not know how to dance it? Very well: The girls and he must practise it at once.... They had done so.) And he, Percy, was to dance it with Mrs. Gladwin, the housekeeper; and his mother would perform the same condescension towards Mr. Underhill. After that ceremonial, he was, officially, free until supper at one, when he was to escort Mrs. Gladwin, on his arm, downstairs to the Servants' Hall, and respond, at the close of that meal, to the health of the Family. After supper he was at liberty to go to bed. It was thought that the servants would enjoy themselves with more abandon when the majestic presences had been removed. Until supper, as has been said, he was officially free; but it would be taken very kindly if he would dance with a few of the servants — one from each department, for instance — the kitchen, the

Digitized by Google still-room, the house proper, the stables, the laundry, the farm, the keepers' households; and of course he might dance with his sister, if he liked, and Mrs. Bennett, and Miss Marridon. Yes... all that would be perfectly in order, so long as he did not dance with these exclusively.

(He had booked Miss Marridon at once for a waltz and a polka; Mrs. Bennett for the lancers; and his sister, vaguely, for something called a schottische.) The elder ladies would probably retire about eleven or half -past.

The dining-room presented an exceedingly festal appearance as the little procession came in. All the furniture had been removed, except for a single line of chairs that ran round the walls: and from these chairs arose, as the Family entered, a line of menial guests. At the further end, opposite the windows, rose a small platform, and upon this was a company of four musicians — two stringed instruments, a cornet and a piano. From side to side from the tops of the tall portraits hung streamers of green-stuff and ribbons. The door into the billiard-room was open, and faces peered in, smiling. The low murmur of voices stopped as Mrs. Brandreth-Smith entered. There must have been at least a couple of hundred persons, all told, from the houses round, from the village, and from Marston itself. It was an inspiriting sight to the young man who was for the time the host, and who, some day would be host in reality. The hostess beckoned to Percy as she majestically took her seat, and he slipped up beside her.

" Do your best, my boy," she whispered. " Remember you're head of the family to-day. And dance with Mabel too, won't you? "

Digitized by Google

Sir Roger de Coverley was a great affair. Percy had sufficiently grasped its principles to be fairly at his ease as he led out Mrs. Gladwin — a small severe energetic-looking woman of about fifty, with a neat black cap with violet ribbons and a dress that creaked as she moved.

" You must correct me if I make any mistakes/' he said smilingly. And an anxious smile had come and gone on her face in answer — as sharp as a gleam of sun on a heavy day.

Once the movement had begun too, the dance itself was inspiriting. A kind of elementary gaiety seized on him, as the music clashed and beat and the figures whirled. Delightful little vignettes too, whose comic element translated itself into pleasure, flashed before him. The vision of his mother, majestic yet gracious, a skirt grasped in one hand, with her other hand enfolded in Mr. Underbill's large white glove, prancing down the middle; Mr. Underbill himself — this time like a slightly drunken Dissenter (if such a thing can be imagined), capering beside her, guiding her with an appearance of being about to hand her over some dangerous ground — entertainment and deference wedded in unspeakable incongruity: the Rector, whose slightly swelling outline was emphasized by his black silk waistcoat and his rather tight trousers, in pumps with his toes turned out, escorting Mrs. Blenkinsop, the coachman's wife, under an arch of arms; Helen, clasped by James who held her as if rescuing her from danger, firmly yet politely; Mabel whirling in the arms of Mr. Blenkinsop himself — Mrs. Bennett, very natural-looking with the faintest wrinkle of alarm between her eyes, dancing with Charles — all these visions, that caught his eye from time to time — brought out on his face, and kept there, a smile that was completely genuine. The music beat and clashed; the whirl went on; and Percy, intensely aware of his high

Digitized by Google position, began to be carried away, in spite of himself, by the solemn simplicity of the sight and the movements.

in

" I'm so hot, I don't know what to do," he said to Mabel an hour later. "And how dreadfully funny, and dreadfully nice it all is.... Oh! Did you see mother when Sir Roger stopped suddenly? "

She smiled in that pleasant way she had. He thought he had never got on with anybody quite so quickly as with this girl.... She was as easy as a sister — easier than Helen in fact. He had gathered too, from a sentence or so, that she was rather religious too, in a way (though he did not know what way); and even that seemed to commend her to him. This was the end of their second dance: the room had become like an oven, and they had slipped out into the hall by mutual consent, and were sitting here now on an ottoman whence they could watch the brightly lit dancing through the great double doors.

He had got to know her better at lunch, a week ago; but this was the first time he had seen her in evening dress; and she really was charming. (Helen had said he would like her; he remembered.) She was little and fair and fresh, and surprisingly at her ease always: she had a little almost triangular face like a cat, fresh blue eyes with darkish lashes, and very white teeth, throat and arms.

" I think your mother's splendid," she said. " I am so glad you're keeping up the Servants' Ball. I don't know how the neighbourhood would get on without it.... Got your speech all ready? "

Her face creased up into delicious dimples of amusement 1

"Oh Lord!" said Percy. "Yes, I suppose so. Let's

Digitized by Google see. I begin by saying what a pleasure it is to see so many friends — (slight emphasis on ' friends ') — about me. That I am quite unaccustomed to public speaking, but that it would be impossible, merely because of the— er — slight indisposition of my father, to let this... this occasion go by without a few words of welcome from... from — from who? I forget."

" From those " prompted Mabel.

" Oh, yes — from those who have found, though strangers, such a cordial welcome in the neighbourhood. Then there's my mother's pet bit. I don't like that. But I suppose I must say it."

" Go on," said Mabel. " You're doing it beautifully."

" Well," continued Percy. " It is however with great satisfaction — oughtn't I to say ' gratification? ' — (that's the Royal word always, you know!)."

" You can't say ' great gratification.' It wouldn't sound right."

" All right — well — with great satisfaction that I remember that although personally we are strangers, our family at least are not. We have been known in this neighbourhood — I know all that, Miss Marridon."

" Well, how do you end? The last sentence is the most important, you know. Otherwise you might not ever be able to leave off; and what in the world should we all do then?"

"Oh — all that about the faces I see about me; and that I wish them a good appetite and a good-night. Then I sit down."

" Storms of applause," said Mabel.

Percy really was enjoying himself vastly. It appeared to him that he had never before realized exactly how

Digitized by Google much his change of fortune signified. A few months ago he would not, indeed, actually have danced at a Servants' Ball in the capacity of guest; but he would have been near enough to the position in which he might have done so, to have resented violently the idea. But to dance here now, as host; to feel so confident of his position and of the obviousness of his condescension, as to be able to hold Mrs. Gladwin round her hard cylindrical waist, without the suspicion of any thought except that of his own goodness and friendliness — this seemed to establish him eternally on the high hills. (And it was just what his mother wished, too.)

He liked Miss Marridon, too, very much indeed; and the lofty security of them both under these queer circumstances, made him feel very near to her: he found himself talking with an ease which he had never experienced before in female society. They danced again together once before supper; and he had the pleasure of seeing her only a couple of places off, escorted by James, when he sat down at last at the head of the table. He had half thought, while they sat out together in the hall, of confiding in her about Gladys Farham; but had concluded, finally, that perhaps she would not understand.

The supper was a vast success.

The great Servants' Hall, stone-floored and steel-pillared, was hung from wall to wall with streamers. Two long tables ran the length of it, piled here and there with crackers. Over the fire-place, amid a bower of greenery, was a Turkey-red shield bearing the inscription (in cotton-wool) " Welcome To All." A dozen men took it by turns to wait; and half-way through a very black-haired man (Mr. Given by name — who wound the clocks, as Percy learned from his lady) — sang a comic song to the accompaniment of Charles on the zither.

Digitized by Google

The speeches were magnificent.

First, Mr. Underhill rose from the head of the second table.

" Mr. Percy, Miss Helen.... Ladies and Gentlemen," he began; and then delivered a most excellent little discourse, saying all the right things, and none of the wrong ones. He commented, with regret, on the absence of their generous host, but hastened to add that Mr. Percy, "as they had learned that evening, was in more senses than one, a host in himself." (Silence followed this sally, and then loud laughter. Mr. Underhill permitted himself a discreet glance of deprecation towards Mr. Percy, mingled with respectful humour.) Everyone was brought in; Miss Marridon's name was received with strong applause, and she smiled very charmingly in response. The Rector and his wife — (though not present) — were referred to as the " yet more recent strangers at the Rectory whom we already regard as our friends." Helen was " the young lady who has already won all hearts." Around Mrs. Brandreth-Smith's name, alone, was there cast no halo of words; she was mentioned indeed, with gratitude, but her personal augustness, apparently, was sufficient glory. He ended by proposing the health of the Family and the Guests.

Then Sharpe stood up — the lean body-servant of Mr. Brandreth-Smith, and a recent addition to the household — and did his duty in a business-like and unflowery manner. He proposed Mrs. Gladwin's health, coupled to that of Mr. Underhill, reminding the company that all the actual arrangements for their comfort and entertainment — arrangements rendered possible, of course, as Mr. Underhill had remarked, only by the generosity of Mr. and Mrs. Brandreth-Smith — had been made by the personal exertions of the two whose health he proposed.

Then a gamekeeper proposed the health of the house-

Digitized by Google hold generally and responded to the health of the guests. Mr. Underhill rose again and "in Mrs. Gladwin's name and my own "begged to thank the guests for their presence and their cordiality: and finally Percy rose to his feet.

It was absolutely the first time in his life that he had ever addressed an audience. He leaned his hands on the table: he fixed his eyes, after a moment or two, upon a flower-pot before him; and repeated his sentences. More than once the room swam into mist before him, all except Mabel Marridon's motionless face; and he settled his intention (so to speak) upon her from beginning to end. He felt, vaguely, that it was very important that she should carry away a good impression of him — he did not quite know why. And he acquitted himself quite creditably. There was loud applause as he ended, and sitting down, with a slippery hand took up and drank off his glass of port. Then he glanced up at Mabel and smiled tremulously; and she smiled back at him frankly.

" Well! " she said to him, as he led her out to dance ten minutes later.

" Did I make a fool of myself? " asked Percy.

" You spoke extraordinarily well," she said.

He lay long awake that night, or rather in the early morning, and his whole being throbbed and beat with romance.

He had danced vigorously until nearly two o'clock (Mabel went to bed half an hour earlier) — and although he affected to be amused, particularly when she was there, at the social graces and solemnities of the dancers, he enjoyed himself quite enormously and quite seriously. The dances were what are called old-fashioned; and in

Digitized by Google waltz after waltz he whirled round housemaid after housemaid; in the lancers more than once he faced Mr. Underhill and Mrs. Gladwin; and in Highland dances he whooped with the loudest of them. A kind of permanent grin be-came fixed on his face, relaxed only when he rushed off to get cool and refresh himself with claret-cup and a cigarette.

The fever of dancing and music, then, got into his blood; and, as he lay in bed between the curiously cool sheets, his head ringing with music and rhythm and voices, Romance — of the kind that is produced by such means — held high dominion over him.

It was a complicated sort of romance. Gladys, of course, was the personality on which everything centred;, again and again during the night he had half closed his eyes in order to imagine that it was with her that he was dancing; he had pictured her coming in through the great double doors, herself the mistress of the house; he had rehearsed little speeches that might be made to her, and the answers she would give: yet, as he lay now, with every pulse beating — hearing even from his dignified and remote room, gusts of music from beneath rise and fall again into silence as doors opened and shut — it was under the aspect of Mabel that she presented herself — Mabel's face and hands, the little clear voice speaking in his ear, as it had spoken when they had waltzed together — and yet underneath Mabel he perceived Gladys.

Once or twice before he slept, he wondered whether it was not a little too complicated to be perfectly loyal.... Then he dozed off, and the phantom whirling begam again.

In spite of the heaviness that lay on his eyes almost like a physical external pressure, he jumped straight out

Digitized by Google of bed and ran to the window, so soon as he heard the sound of wheels and understood what it meant. Romance gilded the thought even of servants driving away in the chilly dawning, back again to duty.

The back door was just within range of his window, where the brakes were drawn up; and in spite of the cold he watched with absorbed interest the cloaked and hooded figures climb up into the carriages. Underhill was there, presiding, resembling a very dissipated host. Percy could see his crumpled shirt-front, and made out, with immense delight, a large pink paper cap, obviously from a cracker, which crowned that austere and venerable head. Once, as the second brake drove off, the butler gravely executed a few Highland steps on the cobbled stones, flinging up a large hand in the proper manner, in farewell to the waving jolting figures in the brake.

When the last brake was gone, Percy looked out an instant at the park, so solemn and pure in the gradually broadening light. The heads of great trees were on a level with his window, and beyond them again the greyish green slopes of the winter landscape. Slow, pale mists were rising and dispersing from the direction of the river, drifting like phantoms behind the copses. And, somehow, this vision so apart from the hot excitement of the night, this grave and splendid world turning slowly to meet the red winter sun — this frost-bound silence and magnificence, worked on him like a suggestive background to the vivid thoughts with which his weary head so whirled — thoughts of Gladys, and Mabel, and his own wealth and power — as he thought them — even his religion: he pictured a lonely priest, so great was his romance, passing across that park to a little church aglow with candles and a divine presence....

Oh! but he was to meet Mabel at breakfast. He drew

Digitized by Google the curtains together again, leaving the shutters open, and went back to bed to think about it.

He awoke again, an hour later, to find the morning fully come, and James, inexpressibly correct and self-contained — such a vivid contrast to the capering white-gloved James of last night — placing his clothes on the chair.

" Hope you had a good time last night," said Percy genially.

" Yes, sir; thank you, sir."

James was a little pale under the eyes. Percy reflected he would be paler yet before night. "Aren't you awfully tired?"

" No, sir, thank you, sir. That is, not particularly, sir."

Oh! the world was very good, thought Percy.... He would meet Mabel at breakfast.

Digitized by Google