The Hand of Ethelberta Part 35

'If you don't yet you will know. But come down from your perch--the dining-room door will not be open again for some time--and I will show you about the rooms upstairs. This is a larger house than Mrs.

Petherwin's, as you see. Just come and look at the drawing-rooms.'

Wis.h.i.+ng much to get rid of Menlove, yet fearing to offend her, Picotee followed upstairs. Dinner was almost over by this time, and when they entered the front drawing-room a young man-servant and maid were there rekindling the lights.

'Now let's have a game of cat-and-mice,' said the maid-servant cheerily.

'There's plenty of time before they come up.'

'Agreed,' said Menlove promptly. 'You will play, will you not, Miss Chickerel?'

'No, indeed,' said Picotee, aghast.

'Never mind, then; you look on.'

Away then ran the housemaid and Menlove, and the young footman started at their heels. Round the room, over the furniture, under the furniture, through the furniture, out of one window, along the balcony, in at another window, again round the room--so they glided with the swiftness of swallows and the noiselessness of ghosts.

Then the housemaid drew a jew's-harp from her pocket, and struck up a lively waltz sotto voce. The footman seized Menlove, who appeared nothing loth, and began spinning gently round the room with her, to the time of the fascinating measure

'Which fas.h.i.+on hails, from countesses to queens, And maids and valets dance behind the scenes.'

Picotee, who had been accustomed to unceiled country cottages all her life, wherein the scamper of a mouse is heard distinctly from floor to floor, exclaimed in a terrified whisper, at viewing all this, 'They'll hear you underneath, they'll hear you, and we shall all be ruined!'

'Not at all,' came from the cautious dancers. 'These are some of the best built houses in London--double floors, filled in with material that will deaden any row you like to make, and we make none. But come and have a turn yourself, Miss Chickerel.'

The young man relinquished Menlove, and on the spur of the moment seized Picotee. Picotee flounced away from him in indignation, backing into a corner with ruffled feathers, like a pullet trying to appear a hen.

'How dare you touch me!' she said, with rounded eyes. 'I'll tell somebody downstairs of you, who'll soon see about it!'

'What a baby; she'll tell her father.'

'No I shan't; somebody you are all afraid of, that's who I'll tell.'

'Nonsense,' said Menlove; 'he meant no harm.'

Playtime was now getting short, and further antics being dangerous on that account, the performers retired again downstairs, Picotee of necessity following. Her nerves were screwed up to the highest pitch of uneasiness by the grotesque habits of these men and maids, who were quite unlike the country servants she had known, and resembled nothing so much as pixies, elves, or gnomes, peeping up upon human beings from their shady haunts underground, sometimes for good, sometimes for ill--sometimes doing heavy work, sometimes none; teasing and worrying with impish laughter half suppressed, and vanis.h.i.+ng directly mortal eyes were bent on them. Separate and distinct from overt existence under the sun, this life could hardly be without its distinctive pleasures, all of them being more or less pervaded by thrills and t.i.tillations from games of hazard, and the perpetual risk of sensational surprises.

Long before this time Picotee had begun to be anxious to get home again, but Menlove seemed particularly to desire her company, and pressed her to sit awhile, telling her young friend, by way of entertainment, of various extraordinary love adventures in which she had figured as heroine when travelling on the Continent. These stories had one and all a remarkable likeness in a certain point--Menlove was always unwilling to love the adorer, and the adorer was always unwilling to live afterwards on account of it.

'Ha-ha-ha!' in men's voices was heard from the distant dining-room as the two women went on talking.

'And then,' continued Menlove, 'there was that duel I was the cause of between the courier and the French valet. Dear me, what a trouble that was; yet I could do nothing to prevent it. This courier was a very handsome man--they are handsome sometimes.'

'Yes, they are. My aunt married one.'

'Did she? Where do they live?'

'They keep an hotel at Rouen,' murmured Picotee, in doubt whether this should have been told or not.

'Well, he used to follow me to the English Church every Sunday regularly, and I was so determined not to give my hand where my heart could never be, that I slipped out at the other door while he stood expecting me by the one I entered. Here I met M. Pierre, when, as ill luck would have it, the other came round the corner, and seeing me talking to the valet, he challenged him at once.'

'Ha-ha-ha!' was heard again afar.

'Did they fight?' said Picotee.

'Yes, I believe they did. We left Nice the next day; but I heard some time after of a duel not many miles off, and although I could not get hold of the names, I make no doubt it was between those two gentlemen. I never knew which of them fell; poor fellow, whichever it was.'

'Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!' came from the dining-room.

'Whatever are those boozy men laughing at, I wonder?' said Menlove. 'They are always so noisy when the ladies have gone upstairs. Upon my soul, I'll run up and find out.'

'No, no, don't,' entreated Picotee, putting her hand on her entertainer's arm. 'It seems wrong; it is no concern of ours.'

'Wrong be hanged--anything on an impulse,' said Mrs. Menlove, skipping across the room and out of the door, which stood open, as did others in the house, the evening being sultry and oppressive.

Picotee waited in her seat until it occurred to her that she could escape the lady's-maid by going off into her father's pantry in her absence. But before this had been put into effect Menlove appeared again.

'Such fun as they are having up there,' she said. 'Somebody asked Mr.

Neigh to tell a story which he had told at some previous time, but he was very reluctant to do so, and pretended he could not recollect it. Well, then, the other man--I could not distinguish him by his voice--began telling it, to prompt Mr. Neigh's memory; and, as far as I could understand, it was about some lady who thought Mr. Neigh was in love with her, and, to find whether he was worth accepting or not, she went with her maid at night to see his estate, and wandered about and got lost, and was frightened, and I don't know what besides. Then Mr. Neigh laughed too, and said he liked such common sense in a woman. No names were mentioned, but I fancy, from the awkwardness of Mr. Neigh at being compelled to tell it, that the lady is one of those in the drawing-room.

I should like to know which it was.'

'I know--have heard something about it,' said Picotee, blus.h.i.+ng with anger. 'It was nothing at all like that. I wonder Mr. Neigh had the audacity ever to talk of the matter, and to misrepresent it so greatly!'

'Tell all about it, do,' said Menlove.

'O no,' said Picotee. 'I promised not to say a word.'

'It is your mistress, I expect.'

'You may think what you like; but the lady is anything but a mistress of mine.'

The flighty Menlove pressed her to tell the whole story, but finding this useless the subject was changed. Presently her father came in, and, taking no notice of Menlove, told his daughter that she had been called for. Picotee very readily put on her things, and on going outside found Joey awaiting her. Mr. Chickerel followed closely, with sharp glances from the corner of his eye, and it was plain from Joey's nervous manner of lingering in the shadows of the area doorway instead of entering the house, that the butler had in some way set himself to prevent all communion between the fair lady's-maid and his son for that evening at least.

He watched Picotee and her brother off the premises, and the pair went on their way towards Exonbury Crescent, very few words pa.s.sing between them.

Picotee's thoughts had turned to the proposed visit to Knollsea, and Joey was sulky under disappointment and the blank of thwarted purposes.

30. ON THE HOUSETOP

'Picotee, are you asleep?' Ethelberta whispered softly at dawn the next morning, by the half-opened door of her sister's bedroom.

'No, I keep waking, it is so warm.'

'So do I. Suppose we get up and see the sun rise. The east is filling with flame.'

'Yes, I should like it,' said Picotee.