The Nonesuch Read online

  ‘Oh, no!’ she said, adding simply: ‘He couldn’t be!’

  Miss Chartley protested involuntarily: ‘Oh, Tiffany, how can you? I beg your pardon, but indeed you shouldn’t – !’

  ‘It’s perfectly true!’ argued Miss Wield. ‘I didn’t make my face, so why shouldn’t I say it’s beautiful? Everyone else does!’

  Young Mr Underhill instantly entered a caveat, but Miss Chartley was silenced. Herself a modest girl, she was deeply shocked, but however much she might deprecate such vain-glory honesty compelled her to acknowledge that Tiffany Wield was the most beautiful creature she had ever seen or imagined. Everything about her was perfection. Not the most spiteful critic could say of her that it was a pity she was too tall, or too short, or that her nose spoiled her loveliness, or that she was not so beautiful in profile: she was beautiful from every angle, thought Miss Chartley. Even her dusky locks, springing so prettily from a wide brow, curled naturally; and if attention was first attracted by her deep and intensely blue eyes, fringed by their long black lashes, closer scrutiny revealed that a little, straight nose, enchantingly curved lips, and a complexion like the bloom on a peach were equally worthy of admiration. She was only seventeen years of age, but her figure betrayed neither puppy-fat nor awkward angles; and when she opened her mouth it was seen that her teeth were like matched pearls. Until her return, a short time since, to Staples, where her childhood had been spent, Patience Chartley had been generally held to be the prettiest girl in the neighbourhood, but Tiffany had quite eclipsed her. Patience had been brought up to believe that one’s appearance was a matter of no importance, but when the parent who had inculcated one with this dictum said that it gave him pleasure merely to rest his eyes on Tiffany’s lovely face one might perhaps be pardoned for feeling just a trifle wistful. No one, thought Patience, observing herself in the mirror when she dressed her soft brown hair, was going to look twice at her when Tiffany was present. She accepted her inferiority meekly, so free from jealousy that she wished very much that Tiffany would not say such things as must surely repel her most devout admirers.

  Apparently sharing her views, Mrs Underhill expostulated, saying in a voice which held more of pleading than censure: ‘Now, Tiffany-love! You shouldn’t talk like that! Whatever would people think if they was to hear you? It’s not becoming – and so, I’ll be bound, Miss Trent will tell you!’

  ‘Much I care!’

  ‘Well, that shows what a pea-goose you are!’ struck in Charlotte, firing up in defence of her idol. ‘Because Miss Trent is much more genteel than you are, or any of us, and –’

  ‘Thank you, Charlotte, that will do!’

  ‘Well, it’s true!’ muttered Charlotte rebelliously.

  Ignoring her, Miss Trent smiled at Mrs Underhill, saying: ‘No, ma’am; not at all becoming, and not at all wise either.’

  ‘Why not?’ Tiffany demanded.

  Miss Trent regarded her thoughtfully. ‘Well, it’s an odd circumstance, but I’ve frequently observed that whenever you boast of your beauty you seem to lose some of it. I expect it must be the change in your expression.’

  Startled, Tiffany flew to gaze anxiously into the ornate looking-glass which hung above the fireplace. ‘Do I?’ she asked naïvely. ‘Really do I, Ancilla?’

  ‘Yes, decidedly,’ replied Miss Trent, perjuring her soul without the least hesitation. ‘Besides, when a female is seen to admire herself it sets up people’s backs, and she finds very soon that she is paid fewer compliments than any girl of her acquaintance. And nothing is more agreeable than a prettily turned compliment!’

  ‘That’s true!’ exclaimed Tiffany, much struck. She broke into laughter, flitting across the room to bestow a brief embrace upon Miss Trent. ‘I do love you, you horrid thing, because however odious you may be you are never stuffy ! I won’t admire myself any more: I’ll beg pardon for being an antidote instead! Oh, Patience, are you positively sure Sir Waldo is coming?’

  ‘Yes, for Wedmore told Papa that he had received orders from Mr Calver’s lawyer to have all in readiness for Sir Waldo by next week. And also that he is bringing another gentleman with him, and several servants. The poor Wedmores! Papa said all he might to soothe them, but they have been thrown into such a quake! Mr Smeeth seems to have told them how rich and grand Sir Waldo is, so, of course, they are in dread that he will expect a degree of comfort it is not in their power to provide for him.’

  ‘Now, that,’ suddenly interjected Mrs Underhill, ‘puts me in mind of something I should like to know, my dear! For when my Matlock told me I couldn’t credit it, for all she had it from Mrs Wedmore herself. Is it true that Mr Calver left them nothing but twenty pounds, and his gold watch?’

  Patience nodded sorrowfully. ‘Yes, ma’am, I’m afraid it is. I know one shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, but one can’t help feeling that it was very wrong and ungrateful, after so many years of faithful service!’

  ‘Well, for my part, I never did see, and no more I ever shall, that being dead makes a scrap of difference to what you was like when you were alive!’ said Mrs Underhill, with unwonted energy. ‘A nasty, disagreeable clutchfist he was, and you may depend upon it that’s what he is still! And not in heaven either! If you can tell me who ever said one should speak respectfully of those who have gone to the other place, you’ll have told me something I never heard before, my dear!’

  Patience was obliged to laugh, but she said: ‘No, indeed, but perhaps one ought not to judge, without knowing all the circumstances. Mama, I own, feels as you do, but Papa says we can’t know what may have been at the root of poor Mr Calver’s churlishness, and that we should rather pity him. He must have been very unhappy!’

  ‘Well, your Papa is bound to say something Christian, being a Reverend,’ replied Mrs Underhill, in a reasonable spirit. ‘The ones I pity are the Wedmores – not but what they’d have left that old screw years ago, if they’d had a mite of sense, instead of believing he’d leave them well provided for, which anyone could have guessed he wouldn’t, whatever he may have promised them! How are they going to find another situation at their time of life? Tell me that!’

  But as Miss Chartley was quite unable to tell her she only sighed, and shook her head, thus affording Tiffany an opportunity to turn the conversation into another, and, in her view, far more important channel. She asked her aunt how soon after his arrival she meant to call on Sir Waldo.

  Mrs Underhill’s origins were humble; with the best will in the world to conduct herself like a lady of quality she had never managed to grasp all the intricacies of the social code. But some things she did know. She exclaimed: ‘Good gracious, Tiffany, whatever next? As though I didn’t know better than go calling on a gentleman! If your uncle were alive it would have been for him to do, if he’d thought fit, which I daresay he wouldn’t have, any more than I do myself, because what’s the use of leaving cards on this Sir Waldo if he don’t mean to stay at Broom Hall?’

  ‘Then Courtenay must do so!’ said Tiffany, paying no heed to the latter part of this speech.

  But Courtenay, to her considerable indignation, refused to do anything of the sort. Modesty was not one of his outstanding characteristics, nor were his manners, in his own home, distinguished by propriety; but the suggestion that he, at the age of nineteen, should have the effrontery to thrust himself on Sir Waldo affected him so profoundly that he turned quite pale, and told his cousin that she must be mad to suppose that he would be so impudent.

  The urgency with which Miss Wield conducted the ensuing argument, and the burst of angry tears which ended it made Mrs Underhill feel very uneasy. She confided, later, to Miss Trent that she did hope Sir Waldo wasn’t going to upset them all. ‘I’m sure I don’t know why anyone should be in a fuss over him, but there’s Tiffany as mad as fire, all because Courtenay don’t feel it would be the thing for him to call! Well, my dear, I don’t scruple to own that that’s put me a tr