Lady Maude's Mania

“Oh, Dolly, Dolly,” said her mistress at last, “this is very, very sad.”

At this moment through the open window, faintly heard, there floated, softened by distance, that delicious, now forgotten, but once popular strain – “I’m a young man from the country, but you don’t get over me.”

Dorothy Preen, Sussex yeoman’s daughter, was a young woman from the country, and was it because the air seemed apropos that the maiden suddenly uttered an ejaculation which sounded like Ow! and dropping the ivory-backed brush, plumped herself down upon the carpet, as if making a nursery cheese, and began to sob as if her heart would break? Was it the appropriate nature of the air? No; it was the air producer.

“Oh, Dolly, Dolly, I don’t know what to say,” said Lady Maude gently, as she gave her hair a whisk and sent it all flying to one side. “I don’t want to send you back home.”

“No, no, no, my lady, please don’t do that,” blubbered the girl.

“But her ladyship is thinking very seriously about it, Dolly, and you see you were found talking to him.”

“Ye – ye – yes, my lady.”

“But, you foolish girl, don’t you understand that he is little better than a beggar – an Italian mendicant?”

“Ye-ye-yes, my lady.”

“Then how can you be so foolish?”

“I – I – I don’t know, my lady.”

“You, a respectable farmer’s daughter, to think of taking up with a low man who goes about the streets turning the handle of an organ. Dolly, Dolly, my poor girl, what does it mean?”

“I – I – I don’t know, my lady. Ow! I am so miserable.”

“Of course you are, my good girl. There, promise me you’ll forget it all, and I’ll speak to her ladyship, and tell her you’ll be more sensible, and get her to let you stay.”

“I – I can’t, my lady.”

“Cannot what?”

“Forget him, my lady.”

“Why not?”

“Be-be-because he is so handsome.”

“Oh, Dolly, I’ve no patience with you.”

“N-n-no, my lady, because you – you ain’t – ain’t in love,” sobbed the girl with angry vehemence, as she covered her face with her hands and rocked herself to and fro.

“For shame, Dolly,” cried Maude, with her face flamingly red. “If a woman is in love that is no reason for her degrading herself. I’m shocked at you.”

“Ye-ye-yes, my lady, bu-bu-but you don’t know; you – you – you haven’t felt it yet. Wh-wh-when it comes over you some day, you – you – you’ll be as bad as I am. Ow! ow! ow! I’m a wretched, unhappy girl.”

“Then rouse yourself and think no more of this fellow. For shame of you!”

“I – I can’t, my lady. He – he – he’s so handsome, and I’ve tried ever so to give him up, but he takes hold of you like.”

“Takes hold of you, Dolly? Oh, for shame!”

“I – I d-d-d-don’t mean with his hands, my lady, b-b-but with his great dark eyes, miss, and – and he fixes you like; and once you’re like I am you’re always seeing them, and they’re looking right into you, and it makes you – you – you feel as if you must go where he tells you to, and – and I can’t help it, and I’m a wretched, unhappy girl.”

“You are indeed,” said Maude with spirit. “It is degrading in the extreme. An organ-grinder – pah!”

“It – it – it don’t matter what he is, my lady,” sobbed Dolly. “It’s the man does it. And – and some day wh-wh-when you feel as I do, miss, you’ll – ”

“Silence,” cried Lady Maude. “I’ll hear no more such nonsense. Get up, you foolish girl, and go on brushing my hair. You shall think no more of that wretched creature.”

Just at that moment, after a dead silence, an air from Trovatore rang out from the pavement below, and Dolly, who had picked up the brush, dropped it again, and stood gazing toward the window with so comical an expression of grief and despair upon her face that her mistress rose, and taking her arm gave her a sharp shake.

“You silly girl!” she cried.

“But – but he’s so handsome, my lady, I – I can’t help it. Do – do please send him away.”

“Why, the girl’s fascinated,” thought Maude, whose cheeks were flushed, and whose heart was increasing its speed as she eagerly twisted up her hair and confined it behind by a spring band.

“If – if you could send him away, my lady.”

“Send him away! Yes: it is disgraceful,” cried Maude, and as if moved by some strange influence she rapidly made herself presentable and looked angrily from the window.

There was an indignant look in her eyes, and her lips parted to speak, but at that moment the mechanical music ceased, and the bearer of the green baize draped “kist of whustles” looked up, removed his soft hat, smiled and displayed his teeth as he exclaimed in a rich, mellow voice —

“Ah, signora – ah, bella signora.”

Maude Diphoos’ head was withdrawn rapidly and her cheeks paled, flushed, and turned pale again, as she stood gazing at her maid, and wondering what had possessed her to attempt to do such a thing as dismiss this man.

“Ah, signora! Ah, bella signora!” came again from below; and this seemed to arouse Maude to action, for now she hastily closed the window and seated herself before the glass.

“Undo my hair and finish brushing it,” she said austerely; “and, Dolly, there is to be no more of this wicked folly.”

“No, my lady.”

“It is disgraceful. Mind, I desire that you never look out at this man, nor speak to him again.”

“No, my lady.”

“I shall ask her ladyship to look over your error, and mind that henceforth you are to be a very good girl.”

“Yes, my lady.”

“There: I need say no more; you are very sorry, are you not?”

“Ye-yes, my lady.”

“Then mind, I shall expect you to do credit to my interference, for her ladyship will be exceedingly angry if anything of this kind occurs again. Now, you will try?”

“Ye-yes, my lady,” sobbed poor Dolly, “I’ll try; but you don’t know, miss, how hard it is. Some day you may feel as I do, and then you’ll be sorry you scolded me so much.”

“Silence, Dolly; I have not scolded you so much. I have only interfered to save you from ruin and disgrace.”

“Ruin and disgrace, my lady?”

“Yes, you foolish girl. You could not marry such a man as that. There, now go downstairs – no, go to your own room and bathe your eyes before you go down. I feel quite ashamed of you.”

“Yes, my lady, so do I,” sobbed Dolly. “I’m afraid I’m a very wicked girl, and father will never forgive me; but I can’t help it, and – Ow – ow – ow!”

“Dolly! Dolly! Dolly! There, do go to your room,” cried Maude impatiently, and the poor girl went sobbing away, leaving her mistress to sit thinking pensively of what she had said.

Lady Maude Diphoos should have continued dressing, but she sat down by her mirror with her head resting upon her hand thinking very deeply of the weak, love-sick girl who had just left the room. Her thoughts were strange, and it seemed to her that so soon as she began to picture the bluff, manly, Saxon countenance of Charley Melton, the dark-eyed, black-bearded face of the Italian leered at her over his shoulder, and so surely as she made an effort to drive away the illusion, the face disappeared from one side to start out again upon the other.

So constant was this to the droning of the organ far below that Maude shivered, and at last started up, feeling more ready now to sympathise with the girl than to blame as she hurriedly dressed, and prepared to go downstairs to join her ladyship in her afternoon drive.

“Are you aware, Maude, that I have been waiting for you some time?”

“No, mamma. The carriage has not yet come.”

“That has nothing whatever to do with it,” said her ladyship. “You have kept me waiting. And by the way, Maude, I must request that you do not return Mr Melton’s very particular bows. I observed that you did yesterday in the Park, while directly afterwards, when Sir Grantley Wilters passed, you turned your head the other way.”

“Really, mamma, I – ”

“That will do, child, I am your mother.”

“The carriage is at the door, my lady,” said Robbins, entering the room; and soon afterwards the ladies descended to enter the barouche and enjoy the air, “gravel grinding,” in the regular slow procession by the side of the Serpentine, where it was not long before Maude caught sight of Charley Melton, with his ugly bull-dog by his legs.

He bowed, but Lady Barmouth cut him dead. He bowed again – this time to Maude, who cut him alive, for her piteous look cut him to the heart; and as the carriage passed on the remark the young man made concerning her ladyship was certainly neither refined nor in the best of taste.

Chapter Six.

Not at Home

For Charley Melton’s father was better, hence his presence in town, where he had sped as soon as he found that the Diphoos family had left the Hurst, where Lady Barmouth hatched matrimony.

That cut in the Park was unpleasant, but nothing daunted in his determination not to be thrown over, the young man made his way next day to Portland Place, eager, anxious, and wondering whether Maude would be firm, or allow herself to be influenced by her ladyship to his downfall.

Robbins unclosed the door at the great family mansion looking very severe and uncompromising. So stern was his countenance, and so stiff the bristles on his head, that any one with bribery in his heart would have felt that silver would be an insult.

“Not at home.”

He left his card, and called next day.

“Not at home.”

He waited two days, and called again.

“Not at home.”

Another two days, and another call. The same answer.

“Not at home.”

Charley Melton turned away with his brow knit, and then thought over the past, and determined that, come what might, he would not be beaten.

The next day he went again, with his dog trotting closely at his heels. He knocked; the door was opened by Robbins the butler, and to the usual inquiry, that individual responded as before —

“Not at home, sir.”

As Melton left his card and turned to go away, Joby quietly walked in, crossed the hall, and went upstairs, while his master, who was biting his lips, turned sharply back and slipped half a sovereign into the butler’s hand.

“Look here, Robbins,” he said; “you may trust me; what does this mean?”

The butler glanced behind him, and let the door swing nearly to as he stood upon the step.

“Fact is, sir, her ladyship said they was never to be at home to you.”

A curious smile crossed Melton’s lip as he nodded shortly and turned away, going straight back to his chambers in Duke Street, Saint James’s, and walking impatiently up and down till he was fain to cease from utter exhaustion, when he flung himself impatiently in his chair, and sat trying to make plans for the future.

Meanwhile Joby, feeling himself quite at home in the Portland Place mansion, had walked straight into the dining-room, where the luncheon was not yet cleared away. The dog settled himself under the table, till, hearing a halting step, he had come slowly out to stand watching Lord Barmouth, who toddled in hastily, and helped himself to three or four slices of cold ham, which he was in the act of placing in his pocket as the dog touched him on the leg.

“Eh! I’m very sorry, Robbins – I – eh? Oh dear, how you frightened me, my good dog,” he said; “I thought it was the butler.”

He was hurrying out when, thinking that perhaps the visitor might also like a little extra refreshment, he hastily took up a couple of cutlets and threw them one by one to the dog, who caught them, and seemed to swallow them with one and the same movement, pill-fashion, for they disappeared, and Joby waited for more.

“I dare not take any more, my good dog,” said his lordship, stooping down and patting him; and then, feeling that there was nothing more to be done here, Joby quietly trotted upstairs into the drawing-room, where Maude was seated alone, with her head resting upon her hand, and the tears silently stealing down her cheeks.

She uttered a faint cry, for the dog’s great blunt muzzle was laid upon her soft white hand, when, seeing who it was, the poor girl, with a hysterical sob, threw herself down upon her knees beside the great ugly brute, flung her arms round his neck, and hugged him to her breast. “Oh Joby, Joby, Joby, you dear good dog,” she sobbed, “how did you come here?” and then, with flushed cheeks, and a faint hope in her breast that the dog’s master might be at hand, she paused with her head thrown back, listening intently.

But there was not a sound to be heard, and she once more caressed the dog, who, with his head resting upon her shoulder, blinked his great eyes and licked his black muzzle as if he liked it all amazingly.

Maude sobbed bitterly as she knelt by the dog, and then a thought seemed to strike her, for she felt its collar, and hesitated; then going to the table she opened a blotter, seized a sheet of note paper, and began to write.

At the end of a few moments she stopped though.

“I dare not – I dare not,” she sighed. “It would certainly be found out, and what would he think of me? What does he think of me?” she wailed. “He must believe me not worth a thought. I will send – just a line.”

She wrote a few words, folded the paper up small, and was taking some silk from her work-basket, when a cough on the stairs made her start and return to her chair.

“She will see the dog and be so angry,” thought Maude, as the rustling of silk proclaimed the coming of her ladyship, when, to her great joy Joby uttered a low growl and dived at once beneath the couch, where he curled himself up completely out of sight.

“Maude,” said her ladyship, in an ill-used tone, “you are not looking so well as you should.”

“Indeed, mamma?”

“By no means, child; and as I am speaking to you, I may as well say that I could not help noticing last night that you were almost rude to Sir Grantley Wilters. I must beg that it does not occur again.”

“Mamma!”

“There, there, there, that will do,” said her ladyship, “not a word. I am going out, and I cannot be made nervous by your silly nonsense.”

“Indeed, mamma, I – ”

“I will not hear excuses,” cried her ladyship. “I tell you I am going out. If Sir Grantley Wilters calls, I insist upon your treating him with proper consideration. As I have told you, and I repeat it once for all, that silly flirtation with Mr Melton is quite at an end, and now we must be serious.”

“Serious, mamma!” cried Maude, rising; “I assure you – ”

“That will do, child, that will do. You must let older people think for you, if you please. Be silent.”

Lady Barmouth sailed out of the room, and with a flush upon her countenance Maude returned to her work-basket for the silk, starting as she did so, for something touched her, and there was Joby’s great head with the prominent eyes staring up at her, as if to say, “Are you ready?”

Folding her note very small, she tied it securely to the inside of the dog’s collar, and then, laying her hands upon his ears, kissed his great ugly forehead.

“There, good dog, take that to your master,” she said. “Go home.”

The dog started up, uttered a low bark, and, as if he understood her words, made for the door.

“No, no,” cried Maude, who repented now that she had gone so far; “come back, good dog, come back. What will he think of me? What shall I do!”

She ran to the door, but the dog had disappeared, and to her horror she heard the front door open as the carriage wheels stopped at the door. Trembling with dread she ran to the window and saw that the carriage was waiting for Lady Barmouth; but what interested her far more was the sight of Joby trotting across the wide thoroughfare, and evidently making his way straight off home, where he arrived in due course, and set to scratching at the door till Charley Melton got up impatiently and let him in.

“Ah, Joby,” he said, carelessly; and then, heedless of the dog – “But I’ll never give her up,” he said sharply, as he rose and took an old pipe from the chimney-piece, which he filled and then sat down.

As he did so, according to custom, Joby laid his head in his master’s hand, Melton pulling the dog’s ears, and patting him with one hand, thinking of something else the while. His thoughts did not come back, even when his hand came in contact with the paper which now came off easily at his touch.

Melton’s thoughts were with the writer, and he had a pipe in the other hand; but his brain suggested to him that he might just as well light the pipe, incited probably thereto by the touch of the paper which he began to open out, after putting his meerschaum in his mouth; and he was then dreamily doubling the note, when his eyes fell upon the characters, his pipe dropped from his lips and broke upon the floor, as he read with increasing excitement —

“I am driven to communicate with you like this, for I dare not try to post a note. Pray do not think ill of me; I cannot do as I would, and I am very, very unhappy.”

That was all; and Charley Melton read it through again, and then stood looking puzzled, as if he could not comprehend how he came by the letter.

“Why, Joby must have stayed behind to-day,” he cried, “and – yes – no – of course – here are the silken threads attached to his collar, and – and – oh, you jolly old brute! I’ll never repent of giving twenty pounds for you again.”

He patted Joby until the caresses grew too forcible to be pleasant, and the dog slipped under his master’s chair, while the note was read over and over again, and then carefully placed in a pocket-book and transferred to the owner’s breast – a serious proceeding with a comic side.

“No, my darling,” he said, “I won’t think ill of you; and as for you, my dear Lady Barmouth, all stratagems are good in love and war. You have thrown down the glove in casting me off in this cool and insolent manner; I have taken it up. If I cannot win her by fair means, I must by foul.”

He walked up and down the room for a few minutes in a state of intense excitement.

“I can’t help the past,” he said, half aloud. “I cannot help what I am, but win her I must. I feel now as if I can stop at nothing to gain my ends, and here is the way open at all events for a time. Joby, you are going to prove your master’s best friend.”

Chapter Seven.

Down Below

“If I had my way,” said Mr Robbins, “I’d give orders to the poliss, and every one of ’em should be took up. They’re so fond of turning handles that I’d put ’em on the crank. I’d make ’em grind.”

“You have not the taste for the music, M’sieur Robbins,” said Mademoiselle Justine, looking up from her plate at dinner in the servants’ hall, and then glancing side wise at Dolly Preen, who was cutting her waxy potato up very small and soaking it in gravy, as she bent down so as not to show her burning face.

“Haven’t I, ma’amselle? P’r’aps not; but I had a brother who could a’most make a fiddle speak. I don’t call organs music, and I object on principle to a set of lazy ronies being encouraged about our house.”

Dolly’s face grew more scarlet, and Mademoiselle Justine’s mouth more tight as a couple of curious little curves played about the corners of her lips.

“Well, all I can say,” said the cook, “is, that he’s a very handsome man.”

“Handsome!” exclaimed Robbins, “I don’t call a man handsome as can’t shave, and never cuts his greasy hair. Handsome! Yah, a low, macaroni-eating, lazy rony, that’s what he is. There’s heaps of ’em always walking about outside the furren church doors, I’ve seen ’em myself.”

“But some of ’em’s exiles, Mr Robbins,” said the stout, amiable-looking cook. “I have ’eared as some on ’em’s princes in disguise.”

“My faith!” ejaculated Mademoiselle Justine, sardonically.

“Yes, ma’amselle, I ayve,” said cook, defiantly, “I don’t mean Frenchy exiles, with their coats buttoned up to their chins in Leicester Square, because they ain’t got no washing to put out, but Hightalian exiles.”

“Bah!” ejaculated Mademoiselle Justine, “that for you! What know you?” and she snapped her fingers.

“Pr’aps a deal more than some people thinks, and I don’t like to sit still and hear poor people sneered at because they are reduced to music.”

“But I don’t call that music,” said Robbins, contemptuously.

“Don’t you, Mr Robbins? – then I do.”

At this stage of the proceedings Dolly could bear her feelings no more, but got up and left the hall to ascend the back stairs to her own room, and sit down in a corner, and cover her face with her natty apron.

“Pore gell,” exclaimed the cook. “It’s too bad.”

“What is too bad, Madame Downes?” said Mademoiselle Framboise.

“To go on like that before the pore thing. She can’t help it.”

“Bah!” ejaculated the French maid, “it is disgust. An organ man! The child is affreusement stupide.”

“I have a heart of my own,” sighed the cook.

“Yais, but you do not go to throw it to a man like that, Madame Downes.”

“Hear, hear!” said the butler, and there was a chorus of approval.

“I say it is disgust – disgrace,” continued Mademoiselle Justine. “The girl is mad, and should be sent home to the bon papa down in the country.”

“I have a heart of my own,” said Mrs Downes again. “Ah, you needn’t laugh, Mary Ann. Some people likes footmen next door.”

The housemaid addressed tossed her head and exclaimed, “Well, I’m sure!”

“And so am I,” replied the cook, regardless of the sneers and smiles of the rest of the domestics at the table. “As I said before, I have a heart of my own, and if some people follow the example of their betters,” – here Mrs Downes stared very hard at the contemptuous countenance of the French maid, – “and like the furren element, it’s no business of nobody’s.”

Madame Justine’s eyes flashed.

“Did you make that saying for me, Madame Downes?” she flashed out viciously.

“Sayings ain’t puddens,” retorted cook.

“I say, make you that vairy witty jeer for me?” cried Mademoiselle Justine viciously.

“What I say is,” continued the cook, who, having a blunter tongue, stood on her defence, but heaping up dull verbiage round her position as a guard against the Frenchwoman’s sharp attack, “that a man’s a man, and if he’s a furrener it ain’t no fault of his. I should say he’s a count at least, and he’s very handsome.”

“Counts don’t count in this country,” said Robbins smiling, and waiting for the applause of the table.

“Count indeed!” cried Mademoiselle Justine. “Count you the fork and spoons, Mr Robbins, and see that these canaille music men come not down the air —ree. As for that green-goose girl Preen – Bah! she is a little shild for her mamma to vip and send to bed wizout her soop —paire. Madame Downes, you are a vairy foolish woman.”

Mademoiselle Justine rose from her seat, and made a movement as if to push back a chair; but she had been seated upon a form which accommodated half a dozen more domestics, and in consequence she had to climb out and glide toward the door, through which she passed with a rustle like that of a cloud of dead leaves swept into a barn.

“You’ve put ma’amselle out, Mrs Downes,” said Robbins with condescension.

“That’s easy enough done, Mr Robbins. It’s her furren blood. I don’t like young people to be sneered at if they’re a bit tender. I’ve got a heart of my own.”

“And a very good heart too, Mrs Downes,” said the butler.

“Hear, hear,” said Joseph the footman.

“Hear, hear, hear, hear, hear!” cried the page-boy, a young gentleman who lived in a constant state of suppression, and consequently in his youthful vivacity was always seeking an opportunity to come to the surface. This appeared to him to be one. His chief had paid a compliment which had been cheered by the said chief’s first-lieutenant Joseph, so Henry, the bearer of three rows of buttons, every one of which he longed to annex for purposes of play, cried “hear, hear, hear,” as the footman’s echo, and rapped loudly upon the table with the haft of his knife.

A dead silence fell upon the occupants of the servants’ hall, and Henry longed to take flight; but the butler fixed him as the Ancient Mariner did the wedding guest, and held him with his glittering eye.

“There, I knowed you’d do it,” whispered the footman. “You’re always up to some of your manoeuvres.”

“Henry,” said the butler in his most severe tones, and with the look upon his countenance that he generally reserved for Lord Barmouth, “I don’t know where you were brought up, my good boy, and I don’t want to know, but have the goodness to recollect that you are now in a nobleman’s service, where, as there is no regular steward’s room for the upper servants, you are allowed to take your meals with your superiors. I have before had occasion to complain of your behaviour, eating with your knife, breathing all over your plate, and sniffing at the table in a most disgusting way.”