I want to make you have a good time. And I should like very much to present some of my friends to you, if it wouldn't bore you.
Then it would be awfully kind of you to come down to Branches.""We are much obliged to you, Lord Lambeth," said Bessie.
"What is Branches?"
"It's a house in the country. I think you might like it."Willie Woodley and Mrs. Westgate at this moment were sitting in silence, and the young man's ear caught these last words of Lord Lambeth's. "He's inviting Miss Bessie to one of his castles,"he murmured to his companion.
Mrs. Westgate, foreseeing what she mentally called "complications,"immediately got up; and the two ladies, taking leave of Lord Lambeth, returned, under Mr. Woodley's conduct, to Jones's Hotel.
Lord Lambeth came to see them on the morrow, bringing Percy Beaumont with him--the latter having instantly declared his intention of neglecting none of the usual offices of civility.
This declaration, however, when his kinsman informed him of the advent of their American friends, had been preceded by another remark.
"Here they are, then, and you are in for it.""What am I in for?" demanded Lord Lambeth.
"I will let your mother give it a name. With all respect to whom,"added Percy Beaumont, "I must decline on this occasion to do any more police duty. Her Grace must look after you herself.""I will give her a chance," said her Grace's son, a trifle grimly.
"I shall make her go and see them."
"She won't do it, my boy."
"We'll see if she doesn't," said Lord Lambeth.
But if Percy Beaumont took a somber view of the arrival of the two ladies at Jones's Hotel, he was sufficiently a man of the world to offer them a smiling countenance.
He fell into animated conversation--conversation, at least, that was animated on her side--with Mrs. Westgate, while his companion made himself agreeable to the younger lady.
Mrs. Westgate began confessing and protesting, declaring and expounding.
"I must say London is a great deal brighter and prettier just now than it was when I was here last--in the month of November.
There is evidently a great deal going on, and you seem to have a good many flowers. I have no doubt it is very charming for all you people, and that you amuse yourselves immensely.
It is very good of you to let Bessie and me come and sit and look at you. I suppose you will think I am very satirical, but I must confess that that's the feeling I have in London.""I am afraid I don't quite understand to what feeling you allude,"said Percy Beaumont.
"The feeling that it's all very well for you English people.
Everything is beautifully arranged for you.""It seems to me it is very well for some Americans, sometimes,"rejoined Beaumont.
"For some of them, yes--if they like to be patronized.
But I must say I don't like to be patronized. I may be very eccentric, and undisciplined, and outrageous, but I confess I never was fond of patronage. I like to associate with people on the same terms as I do in my own country; that's a peculiar taste that I have.
But here people seem to expect something else--Heaven knows what!
I am afraid you will think I am very ungrateful, for I certainly have received a great deal of attention. The last time I was here, a lady sent me a message that I was at liberty to come and see her.""Dear me! I hope you didn't go," observed Percy Beaumont.
"You are deliciously naive, I must say that for you!"Mrs. Westgate exclaimed. "It must be a great advantage to you here in London. I suppose that if I myself had a little more naivete, I should enjoy it more. I should be content to sit on a chair in the park, and see the people pass, and be told that this is the Duchess of Suffolk, and that is the Lord Chamberlain, and that I must be thankful for the privilege of beholding them.
I daresay it is very wicked and critical of me to ask for anything else. But I was always critical, and I freely confess to the sin of being fastidious. I am told there is some remarkably superior second-rate society provided here for strangers.
Merci! I don't want any superior second-rate society.
I want the society that I have been accustomed to.""I hope you don't call Lambeth and me second rate," Beaumont interposed.
"Oh, I am accustomed to you," said Mrs. Westgate. "Do you know that you English sometimes make the most wonderful speeches?
The first time I came to London I went out to dine--as I told you, I have received a great deal of attention. After dinner, in the drawing room, I had some conversation with an old lady;I assure you I had. I forget what we talked about, but she presently said, in allusion to something we were discussing, 'Oh, you know, the aristocracy do so-and-so; but in one's own class of life it is very different.' In one's own class of life!
What is a poor unprotected American woman to do in a country where she is liable to have that sort of thing said to her?""You seem to get hold of some very queer old ladies;I compliment you on your acquaintance!" Percy Beaumont exclaimed.
"If you are trying to bring me to admit that London is an odious place, you'll not succeed. I'm extremely fond of it, and I think it the jolliest place in the world.""Pour vous autres. I never said the contrary," Mrs. Westgate retorted.
I make use of this expression, because both interlocutors had begun to raise their voices. Percy Beaumont naturally did not like to hear his country abused, and Mrs. Westgate, no less naturally, did not like a stubborn debater.
"Hallo!" said Lord Lambeth; "what are they up to now?"And he came away from the window, where he had been standing with Bessie Alden.
"I quite agree with a very clever countrywoman of mine," Mrs. Westgate continued with charming ardor, though with imperfect relevancy.
She smiled at the two gentlemen for a moment with terrible brightness, as if to toss at their feet--upon their native heath--the gauntlet of defiance.
"For me, there are only two social positions worth speaking of--that of an American lady and that of the Emperor of Russia.""And what do you do with the American gentlemen?" asked Lord Lambeth.