The tutor was all complacence. 'It proves that your ladyship's
stratagem,' he said, 'was to the point last night.' 'Oh, Dunborough will live to thank me for that!' she answered.
'Gadzooks, he will! It is first come first served with these madams.
This will open his eyes if anything will.' 'Still--it is to be hoped she will leave before he returns,' Mr.
Thomasson said, with a slight shiver of anticipation. He knew Mr.
Dunborough's temper.
'Maybe,' my lady answered. 'But even if she does not--' There she broke
of, and stood peering through the window. And suddenly, 'Lord's sake!'
she shrieked, 'what is this?' The fury of her tone, no less than the expletive--which we have ventured
to soften--startled Mr. Thomasson to his feet. Approaching the window in
trepidation--for her ladyship's wrath was impartial, and as often
alighted on the wrong head as the right--the tutor saw that she had
dropped her quizzing-glass, and was striving with shaking hands--but
without averting her eyes from the scene outside--to recover and
readjust it. Curious as well as alarmed, he drew up to her, and, looking
over her shoulder, discerned the seat and Julia; and, alas! seated on
the bench beside Julia, not Sir George Soane, as my lady's indifferent
sight, prompted by her wishes, had persuaded her, but Mr. Dunborough!
The tutor gasped. 'Oh, dear!' he said, looking round, as if for a way of
retreat. 'This is--this is most unfortunate.' My lady in her wrath did not heed him. Shaking her fist at her
unconscious son, 'You rascal!' she cried. 'You paltry, impudent fellow!
You would do it before my eyes, would you? Oh, I would like to have the
brooming of you! And that minx! Go down you,' she continued, turning
fiercely on the trembling, wretched Thomasson--'go down this instant,
sir, and--and interrupt them! Don't stand gaping there, but down to
them, booby, without the loss of a moment! And bring him up before the
word is said. Bring him up, do you hear?' 'Bring him up?' said Mr. Thomasson, his breath coming quickly. 'I?' 'Yes, you! Who else?' 'I--I--but, my dear lady, he is--he can be very violent,' the unhappy
tutor faltered, his teeth chattering, and his cheek flabby with fright.
'I have known him--and perhaps it would be better, considering my sacred
office, to--to--' 'To what, craven?' her ladyship cried furiously.
'To leave him awhile--I mean to leave him and presently--' Lady Dunborough's comment was a swinging blow, which the tutor hardly
avoided by springing back. Unfortunately this placed her ladyship
between him and the door; and it is not likely that he would have
escaped her cane a second time, if his wits, and a slice of good
fortune, had not come to his assistance. In the midst of his palpitating
'There, there, my lady! My dear good lady!' his tune changed on a sudden
to 'See; they are parting! They are parting already. And--and I think--I
really think--indeed, my lady, I am sure that she has refused him! She
has not accepted him?' 'Refused him!' Lady Dunborough ejaculated in scorn. Nevertheless she
lowered the cane and, raising her glass, addressed herself to the
window. 'Not accepted him? Bosh, man!' 'But if Sir George had proposed to her before?' the tutor suggested.
'There--oh, he is coming in! He has--he has seen us.' It was too true. Mr. Dunborough, approaching the door with a lowering
face, had looked up as if to see what witnesses there were to his
discomfiture. His eyes met his mother's. She shook her fist at him. 'Ay,
he has,' she said, her tone more moderate. 'And, Lord, it must be as you
say! He is in a fine temper, if I am any judge.' 'I think,' said Mr. Thomasson, looking round, 'I had better--better
leave--your ladyship to see him alone.' 'No,' said my lady firmly.