The Real Charlotte - Edith Somerville [96]
“And do you like being stationed here, Mr Hawkins?” said Mrs. Rattray after a pause.
“Eh? what? Oh yes, of course I do—awfully! you’re all such delightful people y’know!”
Mrs. Rattray bridled with pleasure at this audacity.
“Oh, Mr. Hawkins, I’m afraid you’re a terrible flatterer! Do you know that one of the officers of the Foragers said he thought it was a beastly spawt!”
“Beastly what? Oh yes, I see. I don’t agree with him at all; I think it’s a capital good spot.” (Why did that old ass, Mrs. Corkran stick her great widow’s cap just between him and the curtain? Francie had leaned forward and looked at him that very second, and that infernal white tow-row had got in his way.)
Mrs. Rattray thought it was time to play her trump card.
“I suppose you read a great deal, Mr. Hawkins? Dr. Rattray takes the—a—the Pink One I think he calls it—I know, of course, it’s only a paper for gentlemen,” she added hurriedly, “but I believe it’s very comical, and the doctor would be most happy to lend it to you.”
Mr. Hawkins, whose Sunday mornings would have been a blank without the solace of the Sporting Times, explained that the loan was unnecessary, but Mrs. Rattray felt that she had nevertheless made her point, and resolved that she would next Sunday study the Pink One’s inscrutable pages, so that she and Mr. Hawkins might have, at least, one subject in common.
By this time the younger members of the company had finished their tea, and those nearest the door began to make a move. The first to leave the room were Francie and Lambert, and poor Hawkins, who had hoped that his time of release had at length come, found it difficult to behave as becomes a gentleman and a soldier, when Mrs. Rattray, with the air of one who makes a concession, said she thought she could try another saucer of raspberries, Before they left the table the piano had begun again upstairs, and a muffled thumping, that shook flakes from the ceiling down on to the tea-table, told that the realities of the evening had begun at last.
“I knew the young people would be at that before the evening was out,” said Mrs. Beattie with an indulgent laugh, “though the girls let on to me it was only a musical party they wanted.”
“Ah well, they’ll never do it younger!” said Mrs. Baker, leaning back with her third cup of tea in her hand. “Girls will be girls, as I’ve just been saying to Miss Mullen.”
“Girls will be tom-fools!” said Miss Mullen with a brow of storm, thrusting her hands into her gloves, while her eyes followed Hawkins, who had at length detached Mrs. Rattray from the pleasures of the table, and was hurrying her out of the room.
“Oh now, Miss Mullen, you mustn’t be so cynical,” said Mrs. Beattie from behind the tea-urn; “we have six girls, and I declare now Mr. Beattie and I wouldn’t wish to have one less.”
“Well, they’re a great responsibility,” said Mrs. Corkran with a slow wag of her obtrusively widowed head, “and no one knows that better than a mother. I shall never forget the anxiety I went through—it was just before we came to this parish—when my Bessy had an offer. Poor Mr. Corkran and I disapproved of the young man, and we were both quite distracted about it. Indeed we had to make it a subject of prayer, and a fortnight afterwards the young man died. Oh, doesn’t it show the wonderful force of prayer?”
“Well now I think it’s a pity you didn’t let it alone,” said Mr. Lynch, with something resembling a wink at Miss Mullen.
“I daresay Bessy’s very much of your opinion,” said Charlotte, unable to refrain from a jibe at Miss Corkran, pre-occupied though she was with her own wrath. She pushed her chair brusquely back from the table. “I think, with your kind permission, Mrs. Beattie, I’ll go upstairs and see what’s going on. Don’t stir Mr. Lynch, I’m able to get that far by myself.”
When Miss Mullen arrived at the top of the steep flight of stairs, she paused on the landing amongst the exiled drawing-room