Mrs. Courteen decked herself in the rosiest sattins, bade Betty close the shutters, draw the curtains and light the candles. Then she composed herself to read the last number of the _Prattler_ until a knock at the door announced the arrival of Mr. Gregory Moon and Major Constantine Tarry. Both vowed that their enchantress looked vastly well, and nodded agreement with her assertion that she believed she had a very fresh colour, no doubt due to the tonick air of the Wells.
"It flushes one merely to go upstairs," she declared. "I vow I take as much exercise in going up and down stairs as I do in taking my morning saunter to the Pump Room." The climb was euphemistically known as the Saunter. "Lud, lud," continued the widow, "complexions are droll things."
"Monstrous elusive, ma'am," said the Justice rather gloomily.
"Ha, ha," yapped the Major, "I pickled my skin in the Low Countries."
"That would be injudicious for a delicate surface. Height, Major," sighed Mrs. Courteen, "height! How we pine for it. Mortals! Dear! Dear!"
"I remember I once examined a vagabond who claimed to have been there," remarked Mr. Moon. "We ordered him a whipping."
"What became of him?" asked Mrs. Courteen.
"I believe he died shortly afterwards. Well! well! Kill or cure! Kill or cure!"
The widow flashed her white shoulders in an elaborate shudder.
"Talking of kill or cure," exclaimed the Major, jumping up, "did I ever repeat my tale of the Hessian captain?"
"Probably," said Mr. Moon mildly.
"What do you mean, sir?"
"You are somewhat inclined to repetition, sir."
Mrs. Courteen hurriedly assured Major Tarry that she for one had positively never heard it.
"He did not say 'have you heard my story, ma'am,' the Justice went on in the calm voice of despair. "He said 'have I repeated it?' I merely remarked that he probably has--dozens of times!"--Mr. Moon burst out in the nearest approach to a passionate enunciation that he ever attained.
"I vow you do him an injustice. Pray tell us the story, Major," and the widow tapped the sword-arm of the infuriated soldier three times. The painted chicken-skin fell with so persuasive a touch that the Apple sank to its normal position and, having turned his back on Mr. Moon, the Major began his tale.
"Well, Madam, you must know that in the year ... but before I tell this story, I should like to give you some idea of the disposition of his Majesty's forces."
Mrs. Courteen sighed. She knew what giving an idea of the disposition of the forces meant. It was useless to protest however, for the Major was already marching round the room in search of appropriate furniture.
He instantly declared that Mr. Moon's chair was necessary to the illustration.
"Pray excuse me, sir!" he rapped out.
The Justice, with a reproachful glance at Mrs. Courteen, moved ponderously to the couch.
"Well, Madam, here are Thistleton's Dragoons," and he gave a twist to the chair as he spoke.
"Oh, yes! Very droll!" said Mrs. Courteen.
"Here," the Major continued, seizing another chair and planting it vigorously down by the couch, "here is Buckley's Foot."
"Mine, sir," said the Justice.
"Your what, sir?"
"My foot, sir, not Buckfeast's."
The Major withered his rival with an eloquent silence.
"Here am I," he said, snatching from the mantelpiece a diminutive Worcester shepherdess and placing it between the two chairs.
The widow gazed anxiously at the pastoral soldier. It belonged to the owner of the house.
"Here is Tournai. You'll pardon me, sir, but I should be obliged if you would hand me the couch," said the Major fiercely.
The Justice moved wearily to the window-seat. That, at all events, was a fixture, he reflected gratefully.
After much exertion Tarry succeeded in moving the couch in front of the door, so that if the piece of furniture in question was a poor representation of what it was intended to convey, it certainly made of Mrs. Courteen's front parlour something very like an impregnable fortress.
"I should be glad to give you some idea of the enemy's earthworks," said the Major with a covetous glance in the direction of the chintz window-curtains.
Mrs. Courteen's fleeting expression of dismay warned him to prune the luxuriance of his examples, and as at that moment a tap at the door necessitated the instant surrender of Tournai to admit Mrs. Betty farther operations were stopped. Moreover the sudden capitulation involved the fracture of the Worcester shepherdess which, as Mr. Moon sardonically supposed, served to illustrate the point of the story.
"You're killed, Tarry; you're dead as mutton. I doubt a cure is inconceivable."
Betty held a note in her hands.
"From Bow Ripple," she whispered excitedly.
_Chapter the Thirteenth_
MONARCHY IN ACTION
Mrs. Courteen scarcely believed Betty spoke the truth. Never could she remember such a gigantick wave of elation as swept over her on receipt of the Beau's letter. Yet, without a doubt, it was true. There was the royal notepaper and, as she reverently examined the outside, there was the river of the house of Ripple meandering in regular curves through meadows of sealing-wax. She marked the colour--lilac--as if faintly to adumbrate the imperial purple of Rome. Moreover, the sprinkled sand, a few particles of which still adhered to the surface, smelt of Courts. There were years of authority between the lines of the graceful superscription; the very "C" of the Crescent bellied in the breeze of Royal favour. Major Tarry and Mr. Moon regarded her with an expression compounded of jealousy and respect. Who was this woman, this correspondent with monarchs?
"Pray excuse me, neighbours," murmured the widow, sinking into a chair. The seal crackled musically as with smooth forefinger and shapely thumb she gently withdrew the diaphanous paper from its waxen prison; so must the golden bough have sounded to the touch of AEneas.
THE GREAT HOUSE, CURTAIN WELLS,
_February_,
MADAM--_I shall do myself the honour of waiting upon you this afternoon at half-past Four o'clock in order to the discussion of an Affair of the gravest moral Importance._
_In expectation, Madam, I subscribe myself,_
_Your obliged Servant,_
HORACE RIPPLE.
"Gemini!" cried Betty, "the Bow will be here in fourteen ticks."
"Gentlemen," said Mrs. Courteen with that stateliness which follows from intercourse with Princes, "gentlemen, I must beg to be excused."
The Major and the Justice solemnly advanced and, having kissed the outstretched hand, moved sadly from the room. As they went downstairs the former mused on the unrepeated story of the Hessian Captain, while the latter vowed to insert a supplementary chapter to his great Essay on Peace which should deal with the self-esteem of retired Majors. With similar thoughts no doubt Mr. Oliver Goldsmith went home from that famous dinner when General Oglethorpe, at the instigation of Dr. Samuel Johnson, spilled the Port on the bare mahogany board in order to draw a plan of the Siege of Belgrade. At any rate, old Mr. Hardcastle talks a great deal about that famous beleaguerment in the witty and diverting farce of _She Stoops to Conquer_. Mrs. Courteen tremulously sought her toilet-glass. 'An affair of the gravest moral importance.' Powder judiciously distributed removed any implied indifference in the freshness of her widowed cheeks. Paleness and morality were certainly akin. As for her lemon sack, Betty vowed she would find nothing more becoming to the unique occasion.
A dignified knock at the front door put an end to any longer hesitation, and Mrs. Courteen, like the Queen of Sheba, presented herself immediately.
The Great little Man was pacing the carpet of the front parlour, but at the widow's entrance he turned on his heels with a low bow.
"We are quite alone?" he inquired.
"Solitary indeed," replied the lady. Surely, surely he could not be contemplating an offer of marriage. Yet certainly such might well be described as an affair of the gravest moral importance. If weddings were not moral, what would become of our weak humanity?
"Madam," said the Beau. "'Tis only after long thought and exhaustive research among the social archives of Curtain Wells: 'tis only after a complete examination of my glorious predecessor, Beau Melon's notes on the amenities of Polite Cures in which he calls attention with a red cross to the special difficulty of tendering advice to perplexed visitors, that I am resolved to inform you of a fact which may distress your maternal heart, complicate your domestick arrangements, disturb your apprehensive piety and not inconceivably lend to-morrow's goblet a very wry flavour. Madam, your daughter is in love."
The widow raised two anguished hands, but Mr. Ripple continued:
"When I say in love, madam, I say so because I am not so cynical of maiden humanity as to suppose that she would sit in vivacious discourse with a young gentleman for the space of one hour and a half measured by the frequent chimes of the publick clock unless she were in love."
"You cannot mean this," palpitated the unhappy mother. "Say you cannot mean it!"