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Page 15
They shook hands with decorous cordiality, and Stella sat down
demurely in the vacant chair. She felt as cold as ice toward him,
and looked it more or less. It made Mr. Medlicott nervous,
although she answered gently enough when he addressed her.
Inwardly she was trying to overcome the growing revulsion she was
experiencing. Tricks of speech, movements of hands--even the way
Eustace's hair grew--were all irritating her. She only longed to
contradict every word the poor man said, and she felt wretched and
unjust and at war with herself and fate. At last things almost
came to a point when he moved his chair so that he should be close
to her and a little apart from the others, and whispered with an
air of absolute proprietorship:
"My little Stella has changed her sweetly modest way of
hairdressing. I hardly think the new style is suitable to my
retiring dove."
"Why, it is only parted in the middle and brushed back into a
simple knot," Miss Rawson retorted, with sparkling eyes. "How can
you be so ridiculous, Eustace--it is merely because it is becoming
and more in the fashion that you object, there is nothing the
least remarkable in the style itself."
Mr. Medlicott's thin lips grew into a straight line.
"It is that very point--the suggestion of fashion that I object
to--the wife of a clergyman cannot be too careful not to make
herself attractive or remarkable in any way," he said
sententiously, his obstinate chin a little forward.
"But I am not a clergyman's wife yet," said Stella with some
feeling, "and can surely enjoy a few things of my age until I am--
and doing my hair how I please is one of them."
Mr. Medlicott shrugged his shoulders, he refused to continue this
unseemly altercation with his betrothed. He would force her to see
reason when once she should be his wife, until then he might have
to waive his authority, but should show her by his manner that she
had offended him, and judging from the attitudes of the adoring
spinsters he had left at Exminster that should be punishment
enough.
He turned to the Aunt Caroline now and addressed her exclusively
and Stella rebelliously moved her seat back a few inches and
looked across the room; and at that moment the tall, odd-looking
Russian came in, and retired to a seat far on the other side,
exactly opposite them. Here he ordered a hock and seltzer with
perfect unconcern, and smoked his cigarette. Miss Rawson could
hardly bear it.
"There is that extraordinary man again, Stella," Mrs. Ebley turned
to her and said. "I thought he had gone as he was not at luncheon
to-day. I am sure your fiance will agree with me that such an
appearance is sacrilegious--he must know he looks like a saint--
and I am quite sure, from what I have heard from Martha, he is not
one at all. He lives in the greatest luxury, Eustace," she
continued, turning to the Rev. Mr. Medlicott. "and probably does
no good to anyone in the world."
"How can you suppose that, Aunt Caroline," Stella answered with
some spirit, "it is surely very uncharitable to judge of people by
their appearances and--and what Martha repeats to you."
Mrs. Ebley gasped--never in her whole life had her niece spoken to
her in this tone. She to be rebuked! It was unspeakable. She could
only glare behind her glasses. What had come to the girl in the
last two days--if this manner was the result of travel, far better
to have stayed at home!
Here Canon Ebley joined in, hoping to bring peace:
"You have told Eustace what is in store for him to-night, have you
not, Caroline, my dear?" he asked. "We have to put on our best and
take our ladies to the Embassy to a rout, Eustace," he went on,
genially. "There are a Russian Grand Duke and Duchess passing
through, it appears, who are going to be entertained."
"There will be no dancing, I suppose," said Mr. Medlicott primly,
"because, if so, I am sorry, but I cannot accompany you--it is not
that I disapprove of dancing for others," he hastened to add, "but
I do not care to watch it myself. And I do not think it wise for
Stella to grow to care for it, either."
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