Next day at Badsworth Hall, a stately luncheon was in progress. Luncheon, or indeed any meal, partaken of under the rolling and excitable eye of Sir Morton Pippitt, was always a function fraught with considerable embarrassment to any guests who might happen to be present, being frequently assisted by the Shakespearean stage direction 'alarums and excursions.' With Sir Morton at the head of the table, and the acid personality of his daughter Miss Tabitha at the foot, there was very little chance of more than merely monosyllabic conversation, while any idea of merriment, geniality or social interchange of thought, withered in conception and never came to birth.
The attention of both host and hostess was chiefly concentrated on the actual or possible delinquencies of the servants in attendance--and what with Sir Morton's fierce nods and becks to unhappy footmen, and Miss Tabitha's freezing menace of brow bent warningly against the butler, those who, as visitors, were outside these privacies of the domestic circle, never felt altogether at their ease. But the fact that other people were made uncomfortable by his chronic irascibility moved Sir Morton not at all, so long as he personally could enjoy himself in his own fashion, which was to browbeat, bully and swear at every hapless household retainer that came across his path in the course of the day. He was more than usually choleric and fussy in the 'distinguished' presence of Lord Roxmouth, for though that individual had gone the social pace very thoroughly, and was, to put it mildly, a black sheep of modern decadence, hopelessly past all regeneration, he still presented the exterior appearances of a gentleman, and was careful to maintain that imperturbable composure of mien, dignity of bearing, and unruffled temper which indicate breeding, though they are far from being evidences of sincerity. And thus it very naturally happened that in the companionship of the future Duke of Ormistoune, Sir Morton did not shine.
His native vulgarity came out side by side with his childish pomposity, and Roxmouth, after studying his habits, customs and manners for two or three days, began to feel intensely bored and out of humour.
"Upon my word,"--he said, to his fidus Achates, Marius Longford,--"I am enduring a great deal for the sake of the Vancourt millions! To follow an erratic girl like Maryllia from one Continental resort to another was bad enough,-but to stay here in tame, highly respectable country dullness is a thousand times worse! Why on earth, my good fellow, could you not have found a more educated creature to play host to me than this terrible old Bone-Boiler?"