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  Laurence stared at him. ‘If you’re trying to bamboozle me into believing that Julian ain’t dangling after that girl it’s you who have missed your tip, Waldo! You won’t tell me that he –’

  ‘The only thing I shall tell you,’ interposed Sir Waldo, ‘is that you’re after the fair! Oh, don’t look so affronted! Console yourself with the reflection that as little as I discuss Julian’s business with you do I discuss yours with him!’

  He said no more, leaving Laurence puzzled and aggrieved. He had his own reasons for believing that Julian had been cured of his passing infatuation; but if Laurie, bent on detaching Tiffany, had not discovered that his young cousin now had his eyes turned towards a very different quarry so much the better, he thought, profoundly mistrusting Laurie’s mischief-making tongue. If Julian’s interest in Miss Chartley became fixed, nothing could more surely prejudice his mother against the match than to learn of it from Laurie. The first news of it must come from Julian himself; after which, he reflected wryly, it would be his task to reconcile the widow. She would be bitterly disappointed, but she was no fool, and must already have begun to doubt whether her cherished son would gratify her ambition by offering for any one of the damsels of rank, fortune, and fashion in whose way she had thrown him. She was also a most devoted parent; and once she had recovered from her initial chagrin Sir Waldo believed that she would very soon take the gentle Patience to her bosom. A pungent description of the beautiful Miss Wield would go a long way towards settling her mind.

  For himself, he was much inclined to think that after his various tentative excursions Julian had found exactly the wife to suit him. Just as Patience differed from Tiffany, so did Julian’s courtship of her differ from his eager pursuit of Tiffany. He had begun with liking; his admiration had been kindled by the Leeds episode; and he was now, in Sir Waldo’s judgment, quietly and deeply in love. From such references to Patience as he from time to time let fall, his cousin gathered that she had every amiable quality, a well-informed mind, and a remarkable readiness to meet Julian’s ideas, and to share his every sentiment. Sir Waldo guessed that he was a frequent visitor at the Rectory, but there were none of the rides, picnics, and evening parties which had attended his transitory passion for Tiffany. Probably that was why Laurence seemed not to have realized that he had suffered a change of heart; no doubt Laurie supposed him to be in his elder cousin’s company when he found him missing from Broom Hall; and was misled by the innate civility which made him continue to call at Staples into thinking him still Tiffany’s worshipper.

  It was during one of these morning visits that Julian learned that the al fresco ridotto which Tiffany had coaxed her aunt to hold in the gardens was to be postponed. Charlotte still continued to be languid and out of spirits; the doctor recommended a change of air and sea-bathing; so Mrs Underhill was going to take her to Bridlington, where she had a cousin living with his wife in retirement. She explained apologetically to Lindeth, and to Arthur Mickleby, whom Lindeth had found kicking his heels in the Green Saloon, that she hoped they wouldn’t be vexed, but she didn’t feel able for a ridotto when Charlotte was so poorly. Both young men expressed their regrets, and said everything that was polite; and Arthur reminded Mrs Underhill, in a heartening way, of how he had been taken to Bridlington after the measles, and how quickly he had plucked up there.

  In the middle of this speech Tiffany came in wearing her driving-dress, and with Laurence at her heels. ‘Bridlington? Who is going to that stupid place?’ she demanded. She extended a careless hand to Lindeth. ‘How do you do? I haven’t seen you this age! Oh, Arthur, have you been waiting for me? Mr Calver has been teaching me how to loop a rein. You are not going to Bridlington, are you? It is the dullest, horridest place imaginable! Why don’t you go to Scarborough?’

  ‘’Tisn’t me, it’s Charlotte,’ explained Arthur. ‘I was telling Mrs Underhill, how much good it did me when I was in queer stirrups.’

  ‘Oh, Charlotte! Poor Charlotte! I daresay it will be the very thing for her. When does she go, ma’am?’

  ‘Well, my dear, I believe I’ll take her this week,’ said Mrs Underhill nervously. ‘There’s no sense in keeping her here, so low and dragged as she is, and Cousin Matty for ever begging me to pay her a visit, and to bring Charlotte along with me. I’ve been asking his lordship’s pardon, and Arthur’s too, for being obliged to put off the ridotto.’

  ‘Put off my ridotto!’ exclaimed Tiffany. ‘Oh, no ! You can’t mean to be so cruel, ma’am!’

  ‘I’m sure I’m as sorry as I can be, love, but you can’t have a party without I’m here, now, can you? It wouldn’t be seemly.’

  ‘But you must be here, aunt! Send Nurse with Charlotte, or Ancilla! Oh, pray do!’

  ‘I couldn’t be easy in my mind, letting the poor lamb go without me, and I wouldn’t have the heart for a ridotto, nor any kind of party. But there’s no need to get into a fidget, love, for I don’t mean to stay above a sennight – that is, not if Charlotte’s going on well, and don’t dislike to be left with Cousin George and Cousin Matty, which I daresay she won’t. But she made me promise her I’d go with her, and so I did. Not that I intended otherwise.’

  ‘How can she be so abominably selfish?’ cried Tiffany, flushing. ‘Making you go away when she knows that I need you! Depend upon it, she did it for spite, just to spoil my ridotto!’

  Arthur looked rather startled, but it was Lindeth who inter-posed, saying: ‘It is very natural that she should wish for her mama, don’t you think?’

  ‘No!’ Tiffany replied crossly. ‘For she would as lief have Ancilla! Oh, I know! Ancilla shall be hostess in your stead, aunt! Famous! We shall do delightfully!’

  But Mrs Underhill was steadfast in refusing to entertain this suggestion. Observing the rising storm signals in Tiffany’s eyes, she sought to temper the disappointment by promising to hold the ridotto as soon as she returned from Bridlington; but this only made Tiffany stamp her foot, and declare that she hated put-offs, and marvelled that her aunt should be taken in by Charlotte’s nonsense. ‘For my part, I believe she could be perfectly stout if she chose! She is putting on airs to be interesting, which I think quite odious, and so I shall tell her!’

  ‘Here!’ protested Arthur, shocked. ‘That’s coming it a bit strong! I beg pardon, but – but you shouldn’t say that!’ He added haltingly: ‘And although I should have enjoyed it, there – there are several people who don’t take to the notion. Well – Mrs Chartley won’t permit Patience to come, and, as a matter of fact – Mama won’t let my sisters either. Not to a moonlight party in the gardens!’

  ‘There! if I didn’t say it wasn’t the thing!’ exclaimed Mrs Underhill.

  ‘Who cares whether they come or not?’ said Tiffany scorn-fully. ‘If they choose to be stuffy, I promise you I don’t!’

  Arthur reddened, and got up to take his leave. Mrs Underhill, acutely embarrassed, pressed his hand warmly, and gave him a speaking look; but Tiffany turned her shoulder on him, saying that he was quite as stuffy as his sisters.

  ‘I must be going too, ma’am,’ Lindeth said. ‘Pray tell Charlotte how sorry I am to hear that she’s so much pulled, and tell her to take care she don’t get her toes pinched by a crab when she goes sea-bathing!… Are you coming, Laurie?’

  ‘Oh, don’t wait for me! I have been thinking, Miss Wield, if we might perhaps get up a party to dance at one of the Assemblies in Harrogate – instead of the ridotto. Would you countenance it, ma’am? With Miss Trent, of course, or some older lady, if any might be persuaded?’

  Tiffany’s eyes lit up, but Mrs Underhill looked dismayed, and faltered: ‘Oh, dear! No, no, don’t suggest it, Mr Calver, for it’s the very thing Mr Burford – that’s Tiffany’s uncle, and her guardian, you know – don’t wish for! Because she ain’t out yet and he won’t have her going to public dances, for which, of course, he can’t be blamed.’

  ‘It wasn’t he,