Meryton

“ Bingley.
But the fellow is sailing under false colours. You do not know what the result may be. I really must speak of this again, Darcy, even at the risk of offending you. [Darcy makes an impatient gesture.] I am truly concerned at the foothold this rascal has already gained in the Bennet family. What he has failed to accomplish once he may succeed in again. These young ladies have no brother to defend them.
Darcy.
Neither have they the wealth to excite Wickham's cupidity. At any rate I do not wish to be the one to enlighten the neighbourhood. Besides, I understand that he has left Meryton. ”

“ At the table on one side are seated Darcy, Elizabeth, Bingley and Jane: A little behind them are Miss Bingley with Colonel Forster, Charlotte Lucas with an officer. At the table on the opposite side is Mrs. Bennet with Sir William and Lady Lucas. Behind them are more tables at which other guests are seated.]
Lydia.
[Entering with Denny, much excited, goes to Mrs. Bennet.] Mamma, have you heard the news? Mr. Denny has just told me that the regiment is to leave Meryton, and go to Brighton! Good heavens! What is to become of us, mamma? ”

“ There was something in the man's clear-cut face—something beyond aristocratic repose—as he looked down into her eyes—something which Sir John Meredith might perhaps have liked to see there. To all men comes, soon or late, the moment wherein their lives are suddenly thrust into their own hands to shape or spoil, to make or mar. It seemed that where a clever man had failed, this light-hearted girl was about to succeed. Two small clinging hands on Jack Meredith's breast had apparently wrought more than all Sir John's care and foresight. ”

“ At any rate the Countess was offensive now. She was positively vulgar, in consequence, to the mind of Miss Carrington, and Miss Carrington was drawn to think of a certain thing Ferdinand Laxley had said he had heard from the mouth of this lady’s brother when ale was in him. Alas! how one seed of a piece of folly will lurk and sprout to confound us; though, like the cock in the eastern tale, we peck up zealously all but that one!
The carriage rolled over the turf, attended by Andrew and Lady Jocelyn, and the hunt was seen; Mr. George some forty paces a-head; Seymour gaining on him, Rose next. ”

“ You want me to go back to that Platter—that God-forsaken Platter, as I may say.”
“Yes,” said Meredith. “That is about it. I would go myself—”
“God bless you! I know you would!” burst in Joseph. “You'd go like winkin'. There's no one knows that better nor me, sir; and what I says is—like master, like man. Game, sir—game it is! I'll go. I'm not the man to turn my back on a pal—a—a partner, sir, so to speak.”
“You see,” said Meredith, with the deep insight into men that made command so easy to him—“you see there is no one else. There is not another man in Africa who could do it.” ”

“ Each of our lives is like a book with one strong character moving through its pages. The strong character in Lady Cantourne's book had been Sir John Meredith. Her whole life seemed to have been spent on the outskirts of his—watching it. And what she had seen had not been conducive to her own happiness.
She knew that the note she had just received meant a great deal to Sir John Meredith. It meant that Jack had come home with the full intention of fulfilling his engagement to Millicent Chyne. At first she had rather resented Sir John's outspoken objection to her niece as his son's wife. ”

“ Sir John Meredith gave himself a little jerk—a throw back of the shoulders which was habitual—which might have been a tribute either to Millicent behind, or to Lady Cantourne in front.
The pleasantest part of existence in a large country house full of visitors is the facility with which one may avoid those among the guests for whom one has no sympathy. Millicent managed very well to avoid Sir John Meredith. The baron was her slave—at least he said so—and she easily kept him at her beck and call during the first evening. ”

“ She can make distinctions. Oh! I could beat her. They know it: all the servants know it: I can see it in their faces. I feel it when I pass them. The insolent wretches treat us as impostors; and this Conning—to defy me! Oh! it comes of my devotion to you. I am properly chastized. I passed Rose's maid on the stairs, and her reverence was barely perceptible.'
Evan murmured that he was very sorry, adding, foolishly: 'Do you really care, Louisa, for what servants think and say?'
The Countess sighed deeply: 'Oh! you are too thickskinned! Your mother from top to toe! It is too dreadful! ”

“ Mrs. Mel seemed to speak without much effort, though the pale flush of her cheeks showed that she felt what she was doing. Juliana was pale as death, watching Rose. Intensely bright with the gem-like light of her gallant spirit, Rose’s eyes fixed on Evan. He met them. The words of Ruth passed through his heart. But the Countess, who had given Rose to Evan, and the Duke to Caroline, where was her supporter? The Duke was entertaining Caroline with no less dexterity, and Rose’s eyes said to Evan: “Feel no shame that I do not feel!” but the Countess stood alone. It is ever thus with genius! ”

“ Having been taught to take all the chances and changes of life with a well-bred calmness of demeanour, Jack Meredith turned the teaching against the instructor. He pursued the course of his social duties without appearing to devote so much as a thought to the quarrel which had taken place in the conservatory. His smile was as ready as ever, his sight as keen where an elderly lady looked hungry, his laughter as near the surface as society demands. It is probable that Sir John suffered more, though he betrayed nothing. ”

“ After a visit to Evan, the sisters sailed together into the drawing-room.
'Uniformity is sometimes a gain,' murmured the Countess, as they were parting in the middle of the room. She saw that their fine figures, and profiles, and resemblance in contrast, produced an effect. The Duke wore one of those calmly intent looks by which men show they are aware of change in the heavens they study, and are too devout worshippers to presume to disapprove. Mr. George was standing by Miss Carrington, and he also watched Mrs. Strike. ”

“ As a matter of fact, Merryon wondered himself sometimes; for she flirted with him more than all in that charming, provocative way of hers, coaxed him, laughed at him, brilliantly eluded him. She would perch daintily on the arm of his chair when he was busy, but if he so much as laid a hand upon her she was gone in a flash like a whirling insect, not to return till he was too absorbed to pay any attention to her. And often as those daring red lips mocked him, they were never offered to his even in jest. ”

“ Was Evan intoxicated, and his dreadful secret unlocked last night?
'And who may have told you of this, Conning?' she asked.
Maria plunged into one of the boxes, and was understood to say that nobody in particular had told her, but that among other flying matters it had come to her ears.
'My brother is Charity itself,' sighed the Countess. 'He welcomes high or low.'
'Yes, but, my lady, a, tailor!' Maria repeated, and the Countess, agreeing with her scorn as she did, could have killed her. At least she would have liked to run a bodkin into her, and make her scream. ”

“ His sister, the Countess, once explained to him what Demogorgon was, in the sensation it entailed. “You are skinned alive!” said the Countess. Evan was skinned alive. Fly, wretched young man! Summon your pride, and fly! Fly, noble youth, for whom storms specially travel to tell you that your mistress makes faces in the looking-glass! Fly where human lips and noses are not scornfully distorted, and get thee a new skin, and grow and attain to thy natural height in a more genial sphere! ”

“ One’s life seems more perfect when one has seen what nature can do. The fellow was stupendous! I conceive him present. Who’ll fire a house for me? Is it my deficiency of attraction, or a total dearth of gallant snobs?”
The Countess was drowned. The muscles of her smiles were horribly stiff and painful. Caroline was getting pale. Could it be accident that thus resuscitated Mel, their father, and would not let the dead man die? Was not malice at the bottom of it? The Countess, though she hated Mr. George infinitely, was clear-headed enough to see that Providence alone was trying her. ”

“ He had as nearly as possible realised Sir John Meredith's idea of what an English gentleman should be, and the old aristocrat's standard was uncompromisingly high. Public school, University, and two years on the Continent had produced a finished man, educated to the finger-tips, deeply read, clever, bright, and occasionally witty; but Jack Meredith was at this time nothing more than a brilliant conglomerate of possibilities. ”

“ Both he and Joseph had, without making mention of it to each other, counted entirely on finding the Gordons at home. It was more than a disappointment—very much more for Jack Meredith. But in real life we do not analyse our feelings as do men in books—more especially books of the mawko-religious tenor written by ladies. Jack Meredith only knew that he felt suddenly afraid of dying when he read Maurice Gordon's letter, and that when the half-caste woman came into the room and gently asserted her claim, as it were, to supreme authority in this situation, the fear seemed to be allayed. ”

“ Carry, are you packed?”
This in reality was the first note of the retreat from Beckley; and having blown it, the hideous little trumpeter burst into scarlet perspirations, mumbling to Lady Jocelyn: “Now, my lady, mind you stand by me.”
The Countess walked straight up to him.
“Dear Andrew! this sun is too powerful for you. I beg you withdraw into the shade of the house.”
She was about to help him with all her gentleness.
“Yes, yes. All right, Louisa,” rejoined Andrew. “Come, go and pack. The fly’ll be here, you know—too late for the coach, if you don’t mind, my lass. Ain’t you packed yet?” ”

“ George facing her at table, the Countess sat down, determined to eat and be happy.
A man with the education and tastes of a young country squire, is not likely to know much of the character of women; and of the marvellous power they have of throwing a veil of oblivion between themselves and what they don’t want to remember, few men know much. Mr. George had thought, when he saw Mrs. Strike leaning to Evan, and heard she was a Harrington, that she was rather like the Lymport family ”

“ Meantime the Iocasta, as smoothly as before she was ignorant of how the world wagged, slipped up the river with the tide; and the sun hung red behind the forest of masts, burnishing a broad length of the serpentine haven of the nations of the earth. A young Englishman returning home can hardly look on this scene without some pride of kinship. Evan stood at the fore part of the vessel. Rose, in quiet English attire, had escaped from her aunt to join him, singing in his ears, to spur his senses: “Isn’t it beautiful? Isn’t it beautiful? Dear old England!” ”

“ The young it seasons and strengthens; the old it happily kills off; and thus, what is, is made to work harmoniously with what we would have be.
After quitting Evan, Rose hied to her friend Jenny Graine, and in the midst of sweet millinery talk, darted the odd question, whether baronets or knights ever were tradesmen: to which Scottish Jenny, entirely putting aside the shades of beatified aldermen and the illustrious list of mayors that have welcomed royalty, replied that it was a thing quite impossible. Rose then wished to know if tailors were thought worse of than other tradesmen. ”

“ When the call for active help reached her, you beheld a different woman.
The demonstrativeness the Countess thirsted for was afforded her by Juley Bonner, and in a measure by her sister Caroline, who loved Evan passionately. The latter was in riding attire, about to mount to ride and meet them, accompanied by the Duke. Caroline had hastily tied up her hair; a rich golden brown lump of it hung round her cheek; her limpid eyes and anxiously-nerved brows impressed the Countess wonderfully as she ran down the steps and bent her fine well-filled bust forward to ask the first hurried question. ”

“ Countess.'
'Well, and she—?'
'She was willing, too, till Lady Jocelyn came and took Miss Bonner home to Beckley, and because Evan had written to my lady to fetch her, the Countess—she was angry. That was all. Because of that, you know. But yet she agreed. But when Miss Bonner had gone, it turned out that the Major was the obstacle. They were all willing enough to have Evan there, but the Major refused. I didn't hear him. I wasn't going to ask him. I mayn't be a match for three women, but man to man, eh, Tom? ”

“ I acknowledge that. If he knew how to dress his shoulders properly, and to direct his eyes—Oh! the eyes! you should see how a Portuguese nobleman can use his eyes! Soul! my dears, soul! Can any of you look the unutterable without being absurd! You look so.”
And the Countess hung her jaw under heavily vacuous orbits, something as a sheep might yawn.
“But I acknowledge that Evan is no worse than the rest of you,” she repeated. “If he understood at all the management of his eyes and mouth! But that’s what he cannot possibly learn in England—not possibly! As for your poor husband, Harriet! ”

“ A man was standing there—a bulky, broad-featured, coarse-lipped man with keen black eyes that twinkled maliciously between thick lids, and a black beard that only served to emphasize an immensely heavy under-jaw. Merryon summed him up swiftly as a Portuguese American with more than a dash of darker blood in his composition. ”

“ More than once they had to pause and sit by the path, while the lad rested.
After that she talked with Claus. Had they come from far, she asked him?
"From beyond seas," he answered with a clumsy gesture to the south. "Yonder—they call it Brighthelmstone—we came a-land. We are bound to the king's army."
"Ay, the king," said Rupert, suddenly, and opened his eyes. "I am going to fight for the king of England, even as my father fought. For," said he, and his eyes sought Merrylips' face, yet seemed not to see her, "I am English born." ”