She gazed up at him in a curious way as she spoke, and it seemed to
Joseph that Captain Glen looked puzzled and wondering. Then his face
lit up, and he was going to speak to Miss Marie, when little Richard
Millet came rushing up, saying:
"I say, Glen, hang it all! play fair. Don't monopolise the company of
all the ladies. Miss Marie, may I have the pleasure?"
He offered his arm as if he were going to take her through some dance
instead of from the big landing amongst the flowers into the
drawing-room; but instead of taking the offered arm, Joseph seemed to
see that Miss Marie bowed gravely, and, looking handsome and queen-like,
laid her hand upon the arm of Lord Henry Moorpark, who, very quiet and
grave, had been hovering about ever since they rose from the table.
Then the old gentleman had walked off with her, leaving little Mr
Millet very cross, and it seemed to Joseph that he said something that
sounded like a bar across a river, but whether it was weir or dam,
Joseph's brains were too much confused to recall.
In fact, all this came out by degrees in the calm and solitude of his
pantry, when he had recovered next day from a splitting headache; and
then it was that he recalled how foolishly everybody behaved when Miss
Clotilde--Mrs Elbraham, he meant--went off with her rich husband: how
Miss Philippa wept upon her neck, and Miss Isabella trembled, and her
hands shook, when she kissed the young wife; how Mr Montaigne seemed to
bless her, and afterwards go and stand by Miss Ruth, taking her hand and
drawing it through his arm, patting the hand at the same time in quite a
fatherly way.
Lady Anna Maria Morton, too, was there, standing with that stuck-up Mr
"Rawthur" Litton, and Miss Marie with Lord Henry, and Lady Littletown,
who seemed to have the management of the whole business, with Captain
Glen; and at last, after the Honourable Philippa had kissed Mrs
Elbraham once again, and then nearly fainted in little Dick Millet's
arms, the bride and bridegroom passed on towards the carriage, while
people began to throw white slippers at them, and shower handfuls of
rice, some of which fell on the bride's bonnet and some upon the
bridegroom, a good deal going down inside his coat-collar and some in
his neck. But he went on smiling and bowing, and looking, Joseph
thought, very much like a publican who had been dressed up in tight
clothes, and then in consequence had burst into a profuse perspiration.
Glen was standing close by the carriage with a half-laugh upon his face
as the bridegroom passed, and Joseph thought he looked very tall and
strong and handsome, and as if he would like to pitch Mr Elbraham into
the middle of the fountain.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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