"Four!" cried the Duchess, with a gurgle of youthful laughter.
"Oh, Jack! Jack! I protest, as you sit there you are growing more
youthful every minute."
"Gad so, mam! then I'll go before I become a mewling infant--I say a
puling brat, mam."
"Stay a moment, Jack. I want you to explain your wishes to Mr. Beverley
in regard to Cleone's future."
"Certainly, your Grace--I say by all means, mam."
"Very well, then I'll begin. Listen--both of you. Captain Chumly,
being a bachelor and consequently an authority on marriage, has,
very properly, chosen whom his ward must marry; he has quite settled
and arranged it all, haven't you, Jack?"
"Quite, mam, quite."
"Thus, Cleone is saved all the bother and worry of choosing for
herself, you see, Mr. Beverley, for the Captain's choice is fixed,--
isn't it, Jack?"
"As a rock, mam--I say as an accurs--ha! an adamantine crag, mam.
My ward shall marry my nephew, Viscount Devenham, I am determined
on it--"
"Consequently, Mr. Beverley, Cleone will, of course,
marry--whomsoever she pleases!"
"Eh, mam? I say, what?--I say--"
"Like the feminine creature she is, Mr. Beverley!"
"Now by Og,--I say by Og and Gog, mam! She is my ward, and so long
as I am her guardian she shall obey--"
"I say boh! Jack Chumly,--I say bah!" mocked the Duchess, nodding
her head at him. "Cleone is much too clever for you--or any other man,
and there is only one woman in this big world who is a match for her,
and that woman is--me. I've watched her growing up--day by day--year
after year into--just what I was--ages ago,--and to-day she
is--almost as beautiful,--and--very nearly as clever!"
"Clever, mam? So she is, but I'm her guardian and--she loves
me--I think, and--"
"Of course she loves you, Jack, and winds you round her finger
whenever she chooses--"
"Finger, mam! finger indeed! No, mam, I can be firm with her."
"As a candle before the fire, Jack. She can bend you to all the
points of your compass. Come now, she brought you here this
afternoon against your will,--now didn't she?"
"Ah!--hum!" said the Captain, scratching his chin.
"And coaxed you into your famous Trafalgar uniform, now didn't she?"
"Why as to that, mam, I say--"
"And petted you into staying here much longer than you intended, now
didn't she?"
"Which reminds me that it grows late, mam," said the Captain, taking
out his watch and frowning at it. "I must find my ward. I say I will
bring Cleone to make you her adieux." So saying, he bowed and strode
away across the lawn.
"Poor Jack," smiled the Duchess, "he is such a dear, good, obedient
child, and he doesn't know it. And so your name is Beverley, hum! Of the
Beverleys of Ashleydown? Yet, no,--that branch is extinct, I know. Pray
what branch are you? Why, here comes Sir Mortimer Carnaby,--heavens,
how handsome he is! And you thrashed him, I think? Oh, I know all
about it, sir, and I know--why!"