Mrs. Lascelles

“ If girls will be so stupid they must take the consequences.”
“Do you really think I ought?”
[316] “You know you ought, Mrs. Lascelles,” said Cheriton, almost sternly. “And you know that you will. It is the least that a woman and a mother can do.”
The mother of Jim Lascelles sighed deeply.
“Yes, Lord Cheriton,” said she, “I am afraid you are right.”
The gray eyes were fixed upon Gwydr. But Gwydr appeared to frown upon them.
How long Jim’s mother and Lord Cheriton sat on the round slab of slate by the marge of Lake Dwygy is not really material to this history. ”

“ Outrigger's chance in the Thames Handicap to-day; Uncle Joseph's dry champagne last night; the dress Mrs. Lascelles wore yesterday at the races; how Miss Ross had pulled in her waist this morning; on divine women in endless perspective, whom he had loved, or thought he loved, or made love to, without even that excuse, concluding how very few were equal to Helen. What a dear little thing it was as a child! What a graceful, engaging girl! So frank, so gentle, such a lady, and so fond of him! ”

“ Cecilia, we will go on shore at Torquay, and wait till the yacht returns with Lord B—. I don’t like these jokes; they may do very well for widows, and people of no rank.”
Now Mrs. Lascelles was sorry to find Miss Ossulton so much at her ease. She owed her no little spite, and wished for revenge. Ladies will go very far to obtain this. How far Mrs. Lascelles would have gone, I will not pretend to say; but this is certain, that the last innuendo of Miss Ossulton very much added to her determination. ”

“ Lascelles. "Lady Sycamore, or any other chaperon, would have seen it at once. Captain Vanguard is quartered at Windsor. Helen is staying at The Lilies. The young people meet every day. A mutual attachment, already, I firmly believe, in the bud, comes to maturity. General tableau! You give your blessing, and will become, I hope, more respectable as a father-in-law than you have hitherto been in other relations of life."
"I'll do anything for Helen—anything!" said Sir Henry vehemently. "And how can I thank you enough, Mrs. Lascelles, for your kindness and the interest you take in my girl? ”

“ Lascelles, with conviction, “that she is a barbarian also. I never heard of a goddess who wasn’t.”
It appeared there were things in the punt. Notably, a rod and tackle and a basket containing a very tolerable capture of trout.
“What beauties!” said Miss Perry, as she came ashore with the basket. “If I run with them straight to the cook, perhaps we might have some for dinner.”
Miss Perry, who was surprisingly fleet of foot, was proceeding to put this design into execution when she came full upon Mrs. Lascelles and Lord Cheriton. ”

“ I hate diplomacy."
"Miss Wilson, you have the dramatic instinct--"
"Mr Spencer, I wish you wouldn't talk nonsense. I believe you say that to everyone. I heard you tell Mrs Lascelles that when she appears on the stage she'll hold the audience in the hollow of her hand."
"So she will. She's going to appear in short skirts. When they catch sight of her they'll kill themselves with laughing."
When he said that a dreadful suspicion flashed across my mind that he was making fun of us all, including me; having a joke at our expense. ”

“ Lascelles,” said Aunt Caroline, “you appear to have acted in a prompt and courageous manner, and I congratulate you upon your manly conduct.”
“Thank you, Lady Crewkerne,” said Jim, with excellent gravity, “but I am happy to say Miss Perry has greatly exaggerated the occurrence.”
“Oh, no, Jim,” said Miss Perry. “Ask Goose.”
“There is one thing, Mr. Lascelles,” said the mistress of Pen-y-Gros Castle, “that I hope you will take to heart. In future the public will be strictly forbidden to climb the Devil’s Footstool.” ”

“ She had formerly been in the service of the Howard family and of the Dowager-Duchess of Norfolk, in whose houses Katharine Howard had passed her neglected childhood; and Lascelles, recalling the fact, had, he said, recommended his sister to apply to the young Queen, whom she had known so intimately as a girl, for a place in the household. “No,” replied the sister, “I will not do that; but I am very sorry for her.” “Why are you sorry for her?” asked Lascelles. “Marry,” quoth she, “because she is light, both in living and conditions” (i.e. behaviour) . ”

“ Lascelles was never a great talker, like Catherine; but she was certainly a woman to whom one could talk. And talk to her I did thenceforward, with a conscientious conviction that I was doing my duty, and only an occasional qualm for its congenial character, while Bob listened with a wondering eye, or went his own way without a word. ”

“ The ladies in the cabin were not in a very enviable situation. As for the elder Miss Ossulton (but perhaps, it will be better in future to distinguish the two ladies, by calling the elder simply Miss Ossulton, and her niece, Cecilia) , she was sitting with her salts to her nose, agonised with a mixture of trepidation and wounded pride. Mrs. Lascelles was weeping, but weeping gently. Cecilia was sad, and her heart was beating with anxiety and suspense—when the maid rushed in. ”

“ Do you know that if it were not for my timely lectures, Lascelles would grow the most insufferable gossip about town? There is not a match nor a divorce near St. James's of which he cannot repeat all the whys and wherefores. I call him Sir Benjamin Backbite; and I believe he hates me worse than Asmodeus himself."
"Such a man's dislike," rejoined Mary, "is the highest encomium he can bestow. I never yet heard him speak well of any person who did not resemble himself." ”

“ They looked round in amazement; at last his lordship said to Adams, who stood forward—“What men are you?”
“Belong to the yacht, ye’r honour.”
Lord B— heard laughing in the cabin; he would not wait to interrogate the men; he walked aft, followed by Mr Stewart, looked down the skylight, and perceived his daughter and Mrs Lascelles, with, as he supposed, Hautaine and Ossulton.
Pickersgill had heard the boat rub the side, and the sound of the feet on deck, and he talked the more loudly, that the ladies might be caught by Lord B— as they were. ”

“ Nobody was in the least unkind to her, any more than the conservative Miss Stones had been to Rose, unless in calling "little May" "Miss Millar," a promotion which somehow cut her to the heart.
The lady principal, Miss Lascelles, was an excellent intellectual woman, of mingled aristocratic and spirituelle antecedents. In another country and nation she might have been a distinguished dame de salon. As it was, she was sufficiently harassed and overworked in her double office of decorous, authoritative chaperon and qualified guide, philosopher, and friend to the girls under her charge. ”

“ The lady who, when she smiles, shows so many dimples in her pretty oval face, is a young widow of the name of Lascelles. She married an old man to please her father and mother, which was very dutiful on her part. ”

“ What I want you to do is to break this news of poor Lascelles' death as best you can to my sister, as soon as you get a chance, and just make them both understand that they're to know nothing of any Ferdinand Carbonnell. If I've been recognised here, as I think I have, and anyone comes questioning, just say I'm Lord Glisfoyle, and if they press for any address give them the Hotel de l'Opera."
"I don't quite understand. Why——"
"That's all right; I can't spare another second," and I hurried off, leaving him staring after me with the telegram in his hand, the very picture of bewilderment. ”

“ Really, Lascelles, making due allowance for the fact that your father was one of the most rash and hasty men I ever encountered, and allowing further for the fact that my old friend has a deplorable absence of, shall we say, amenity, your behavior amounted neither more nor less than to suicide.”
“I don’t regret what I did,” said Jim, “as far as that old Gorgon of a woman is concerned. I am afraid I should behave in just the same way again if I were placed in a similar position. ”

“ Lascelles?"
"Before that was her name. I have also met her original husband. If you had known him, you would be less hard on her."
Catherine's eyes were still wide open. They were rather hard eyes, after all. "Why did you not tell me you had known her, when you wrote?" she asked.
"It wouldn't have done any good. I did what you wanted done, you know. I thought that was enough."
"It was enough," echoed Catherine, with a quick return of grace. She looked into the fire. "I don't want to be hard upon the poor thing, Duncan! I know you think we women always are, upon each other. ”

“ Miss Beaufort perceived that her answer was expected.
"I really cannot discover anything in the matter so very reprehensible," replied she. "Perhaps the person you speak of may have the qualifications of a gentleman; he may be above his situation." "Ah! above it, sure enough!" cried Lascelles, laughing boisterously at his own folly. He is tall enough to be above everything, even good manners; for notwithstanding his plebeian calling, I find he doesn't know how to keep his distance."
"I am sorry for that, Lascelles," cried Berrington, measuring the puppy with his good-natured eye ”

“ A few seconds of miserable suspense would possibly ensue ere his trust and loyalty conquered all fears, and he sat down to write first to his wife, enclosing the letter from Court, and then to tell Burleigh that some serious misconstruction must have been placed on the fact that he always empowered his lady to interest herself in such persons as Lascelles and his doings, the better to keep her spouse apprised of Mary’s plots: “I willed my wife to deal with him and others to whom the Queen bears familiar 84countenance, so as the better to learn her intentions.” ”

“ She had scandalized Miss Lascelles in the earlier days of their acquaintance by her energetic determination to have "a good time of it." She had made the lady principal's hair stand on end by calmly suggesting nice rides and rows and luncheons at village inns, tête-à-tête with the "mooniest" young fellows who could be laid hold of and crammed with stories about America and the doings of American girls. ”

“ The captain of them told the steward that he was Lord B—, and that if he dared to call him anything else, he would cut his throat from ear to ear; and if the cook don’t give them a good dinner, they swear that they’ll chop his right hand off, and make him eat it without pepper or salt!”
Miss Ossulton screamed, and went off into hysterics. Mrs. Lascelles and Cecilia went to her assistance; but the latter had not forgotten the very different behaviour of Jack Pickersgill, and his polite manners, when he boarded the vessel. ”

“ What Miss Lascelles was bound to do was to see that Miss Millar did not run into the opposite extreme, and bring on a brain fever by over-study. "And you know, my dear," finished the kind, experienced woman, who was easily softened, who had always the greatest difficulty to keep from being sympathetic, "that would be a great deal worse than merely being turned back in your examinations, though Dr. Millar is not rich, and there may be obstacles—I sincerely trust they will not be insurmountable—to your coming back in the autumn, to work with a will and at the same time with moderation." ”

“ That young chap Lascelles turned out absolutely first rate. He charged five hundred guineas for that picture. I am telling everybody.’”
Jim Lascelles found his good fortune a little difficult to accept. Further, he seemed to be rather troubled by it.
“I hope it is quite fair to Lord Kendal,” he said, “to charge him five hundred guineas for a picture I should be only too glad to paint for fifty?”
Cheriton was amused.
“My dear Lascelles,” said he, “simplicity is greatly to be desired in art, but it is well not to take it into the market-place. ”

“ Lascelles has made a serious indictment against you.”
“Has he?” said Miss Perry, opening very large, very round, and very blue eyes upon Jim.
“Mr. Lascelles complains,” said Cheriton, with paternal severity, “that while he is assiduously engaged in copying that famous portrait of your great-grandmamma, you persist in coming into this room in your smartest gowns; in sitting in the middle of that sofa; in absorbing the best light; in posing in a manner that no really sensitive painter can possibly resist ”

“ Very many of the Thirlwall Hall girls do much better the second year than they have done the first," Miss Lascelles continued to warn her girl-graduate, with the delicate consideration and tact which qualified the lady principal for her office. "It is bad policy to enter hastily into a competition with failure staring you in the face. ”

“ As for the portrait, I intend, by hook or by crook, to finish it.”
“Well, Lascelles,” said Cheriton, giving the young fellow a kindly touch on the arm in parting, “do what you can; and when the work is complete you must let me see it.”
It was a new Jim Lascelles who returned to Balham by the twelve-thirty from Victoria and took luncheon with his mother. He called at the greengrocer’s just as you get out of the station, and arrived at the Acacias with a number of paper bags tucked under [208] each arm. ”

“ Lascelles-Trevor close at our heels.
"Step into the coffee-room, Mr. Southam, if you please. I am going to send for a cab. Mrs. Barnes!" That lady appeared. "I have effected this man's capture, as I told you that I probably should do."
So she had known all along who he was, and in concealing the fact, in a sense, had betrayed me. And this was the meaning of her futile, eleventh-hour attempt at warning of the night before.
"Let me have a cab at once. And allow no one to enter this man's bedroom until I have had an opportunity of examining all that it contains. I shall hold you responsible." ”