"Ah! but fancy what it is to me," sighed out Mrs. Gibson; "so long as
I have been without seeing the dear family--and seeing so little of
them the other day when I was at the Towers (for the duchess would
have my opinion on Lady Alice's trousseau, and kept asking me so many
questions it took up all the time)--and Lady Harriet's last words
were a happy anticipation of our meeting to-night. It's nearly twelve
o'clock."
Every one of any pretensions to gentility was painfully affected by
the absence of the family from the Towers; the very fiddlers seemed
unwilling to begin playing a dance that might be interrupted by the
entrance of the great folks. Miss Phoebe Browning had apologized
for them--Miss Browning had blamed them with calm dignity; it was
only the butchers and bakers and candlestick-makers who rather
enjoyed the absence of restraint, and were happy and hilarious.
At last, there was a rumbling, and a rushing, and a whispering, and
the music stopped; so the dancers were obliged to do so too; and in
came Lord Cumnor in his state dress, with a fat, middle-aged woman
on his arm; she was dressed almost like a girl--in a sprigged muslin,
with natural flowers in her hair, but not a vestige of a jewel or a
diamond. Yet it must be the duchess; but what was a duchess without
diamonds?--and in a dress which farmer Hudson's daughter might have
worn! Was it the duchess? Could it be the duchess? The little crowd
of inquirers around Mrs. Gibson thickened, to hear her confirm their
disappointing surmise. After the duchess came Lady Cumnor, looking
like Lady Macbeth in black velvet--a cloud upon her brow, made more
conspicuous by the lines of age rapidly gathering on her handsome
face; and Lady Harriet, and other ladies, amongst whom there was one
dressed so like the duchess as to suggest the idea of a sister rather
than a daughter, as far as dress went. There was Lord Hollingford,
plain in face, awkward in person, gentlemanly in manner; and
half-a-dozen younger men, Lord Albert Monson, Captain James, and
others of their age and standing, who came in looking anything if not
critical. This long-expected party swept up to the seats reserved
for them at the head of the room, apparently regardless of the
interruption they caused; for the dancers stood aside, and almost
dispersed back to their seats, and when "Money-musk" struck up again,
not half the former set of people stood up to finish the dance.
Lady Harriet, who was rather different to Miss Piper, and no more
minded crossing the room alone than if the lookers-on were so many
cabbages, spied the Gibson party pretty quickly out, and came across
to them.