# On the Stairs

Extracted from Windsor magazine, vol. 20 1904, pp. 50-60. Accompanying illustrations by Penrhyn Stanlaws omitted.
ON THE STAIRS.
By H. B. MARRIOTT WATSON.*
IN all the glory of her eighteen summers and the white mists of her evening frock, Lady Molly Calverley emerged from her room on the precise stroke of ten. Immediately across the landing the nursery door burst open, and three white figures flashed forth and came to a hushed pause of breathless wonder and respect before her.
"Oh, Molly!" ejaculated Eilean, with a long, quivering sigh.
"It is rather pretty, isn't it?" said Molly, with the aloofness of one who is, of course, critical and on the whole dispassionately pleased.
"It's lovely!" panted Marjorie, who was seven.
"Madame Seraphine hasn't done it badly," acquiesced Molly with an expert air.
"It goes awfully well with your hair, Molly dear," said Marjorie affectionately.
"How absurd!" said Eilean, who was quite fourteen. "Things don't go with your hair, child."
"Yes, they do," maintained Marjorie stoutly. "They go with all sorts of things; don't they, Molly? I've heard mamma say: 'It won't go with my complexion,' and Evelyn's awfully particular what things go with her."
"She'd need to be," said Eilean, turning up her nose.
"It does go with Molly's hair," reiterated Marjorie with tenacity.
"How long shall you stay up?" inquired Eilean.
"Oh, till the ball's over—three o'clock or four," said Molly, with a great display of indifference.
"Oh, Molly, you are a fib!" said ten-year-old Cicely. "I heard mamma say you must be in bed by twelve."
"You little——" Molly turned in anger, but quickly remembered her new dignity. She moved around again with the chilling severity of lofty scorn.
"Molly, do let me button your glove," pleaded Marjorie, and her sister graciously extended her hand. Meanwhile the critical Cicely walked round her, bent on investigation. But the gown passed muster even in her jealous eyes. She pulled Eilean's nightgown.
"Eily, shall we tell her we're going to sit up?"
Eilean gesticulated fiercely. "No; you just shut up, you little fool, or you'll spoil everything. And don't tell Marjorie, either," she added menacingly.
"Well, good night, children," said Molly in her languid Society voice. "Better go to bed. You'll catch cold there." She descended the stairs with leisurely grandeur.
"Isn't she conceited?" whispered Cicely. "I expect Evelyn will take it out of her if she isn't careful."
"What'll Evelyn do, Cicely?" inquired little Marjorie.
"Look here, child, just you go to bed. You can't keep your eyes open," declared Eilean promptly, and marched her small sister back into the nursery.
The stars shone in a clear sky, and that faint, twinkling light alone entered the room. Of this dormitory Eilean was the acknowledged sovereign, and her rule was iron. Delia, having attained the blissful age of sixteen, had a chamber to herself and other privileges.
Eilean and her companions crept back to bed and waited, Marjorie's sleepy head reposing on the doll she had surreptitiously taken with her.
"Will mamma come in, do you think?" inquired Cicely in a sweet voice through the darkness.
"Of course she won't," responded Eilean with decision.
"But she often does when she's going out," persisted the little girl.
"She's not going out, stupid," said Eilean shortly. "And just you keep quiet, or else Marjorie will not get to sleep." She emphasised the significance of this remark by a vehement dig with her fist at her sister's dim form recumbent under the blankets. So silence reigned, and was invaded only by the heavy breathing of Marjorie, to which the others listened with some impatience and anxiety. Presently there was a clatter on the floor, followed by a cry. Marjorie's doll had slipped its mistress's clasp and fallen, and that little mistress was awake and in terror.
"O—oh!" she cried to the darkness. "It's a mouse!"
"It isn't a mouse, you little duffer!" said Eilean angrily. "It's only your rotten doll. If you don't go to sleep, I'll shake you."
But Marjorie, thus acquainted with the misfortune that had befallen her doll, refused to go off until it was found, which at last Cicely succeeded in doing. It was a quarter of an hour later that Eilean sat up.
"Cicely!" she called, but there was no answer.
She got up. "Cicely!" she whispered hard over her sister's bed.
Cicely came out of her sweet first sleep, rubbing her eyes.
"What is it?" she demanded. "It's not time to get up yet."
"You little idiot, don't wake Marjorie. I wish I'd let you sleep and gone without you. It's time to go. The supper will be all ready now."
The word had an instantaneous effect, and Cicely was on her feet, groping in the murk of the room.
Eilean stole to the door and looked down the stairs. "I believe I can see Evelyn," she whispered on her return. "There's ever so many people in the hall. We'd better go by ones, and you cry 'Cave!' if you hear anything."
The door was closed on the murmurous sleep of little Marjorie, and the truants descended slowly.
Meanwhile, Molly, unaware of these Machiavelian designs, had gone down to the ground floor and stopped before the library door. She opened it and peeped in.
"Tiggy, are you ready? Would you like to see me?" she asked exultantly.
There was the sound of a book shutting, and then the Hon. Roger Martin emerged into the light. He was in evening dress and he had an unlighted cigarette in his hand. Deliberately he turned up the gas to its fullest height, and then, placing his glass in his eye, surveyed the girl from head to foot.
"Do you like it, Tiggy?" she asked, displaying some bashfulness under this severe scrutiny.
Tiggy jerked the glass from his eye. "Yes, Molly Bawn," said he. "That is, so far as I have been able to see it yet. This is a matter that cries for deliberation. If you don't mind, Molly, I will light a cigarette and——"
"It will make me smell very smoky," said Molly indignantly.
"My dear, if we keep our distances," suggested Tiggy, "there should be no difficulty in evading that danger. For example, if you will stand in the full brightness of the light, I will retire to the fireplace and give the question of your looks my best consideration."
"Don't be so horrid, Tiggy," said Molly scornfully. "You think things are always to make fun of. Nothing's serious to you."
"Do you think so?" asked Mr. Martin, pausing reflectively with a lighted match in his hand. Then he lit his cigarette. "Perhaps you're right. You see, in forty years one gets to see that nothing is serious—not even dressing. But now that I have had time to examine you more particularly, I agree. You do look splendid. I congratulate you, and I will drink your health to-night in my best port."
"In papa's," said Molly smiling.
Again the Honourable Roger appeared to think. He shook his head. "No, Molly Bawn, I think not. You see, I'm too old by reason of my fast-emerging crown to be at home at dances, and——"
"But this is mine—this is the very first I've been at," said Molly mournfully.
"True. I had forgotten. On second thoughts, I will drink it in papa's. You're right. I'll stay."
"Oh, Tiggy, you're a brick!" said Molly, delighted, and seemed as if she were going to throw her arms about her old friend. But Tiggy withdrew a step.
"I'm afraid," he said politely, and indicated the cigarette. "Charming as the embraces of young ladies are to old fogeys, I'm afraid."
Molly made him a grimace and left the library. She remembered that she had yet to show herself to Evelyn—Evelyn, who had endeavoured to postpone her début for six months more at least. But Evelyn was already in the ballroom, and thither Molly vanished under her mother's wing, demure, self-contained, and beautiful. On the first landing two white-clad forms were stowed behind the balustrade, under cover of an ancient armchair.
"Eilean," whispered the younger dolefully, "when do you think we can get anything to eat?"
"How can I tell, silly?" was the response. "Possess your souls in patience, as Miss Graham says."
"But I'm tired of seeing all these people; they're not interesting a bit," proclaimed poor Cicely. "That fat man down there has had three ices."
Eilean fumbled in her gown and suddenly produced some chocolates which she munched. "You can have one if you like, Cicely," she said graciously.
Cicely exclaimed quite loudly in her excitement: "Oh! where did you get them? Oh, Eilean, you stole them off the cook's table!"
"No, I didn't, you little, ungrateful wretch!" retorted the elder girl. "If you say that again, you shan't have any."
"Well, I won't, then, Eily," said Cicely penitently. "May I have two?"
"Yes," said Eilean, "but not the big ones." She examined the paper carefully, and they both crouched, munching contentedly.
"Where did you really get them, Eily?" inquired the persistent Cicely.
"Don't ask no questions, and you won't be told no lies, as cook says," remarked Eilean slowly. She rose and hurriedly peeped over the railings. "This is jolly slow. No one there yet. I wonder where Douglas is."
"Oh!" sighed Cicely, "I wish we had some of those cheesecakes that I saw cook making. They are such a nice colour."
"What's it matter what colour they are, stupid? They're awfully good, though. But," said Eilean, with sudden austerity, "you mustn't have any at this time of night. It wouldn't be good for you. You ought to be in bed and asleep."
"So ought you," retorted Cicely.
"Shut up, you little cat!" rejoined Eilean. "If you dare cheek me, I'll—— What's that?" she broke off to ask eagerly.
Below a door creaked and opened, and steps sounded in the hall: both children peered silently through the banisters, all eyes and ears.
"It's Douglas, and he's got something," whispered Eilean in a shout; and in an instant scurried down the stairs, followed by Cicely, flushed and excited, and her fair hair tumbling about her pretty face. Eilean reached the place as the servant came abreast of the wide stairway, a tray in his hand.
"Douglas, Douglas!" cried Cicely from behind, "what have you got there? Do let us see."
"Now, then, Lady Eilean, please let me pass," said Douglas.
For answer Eilean whipped something off the tray.
"Tarts, Cicely, tarts," she cried enthusiastically.
"Now, Lady Eilean," protested the unhappy Douglas.
"Oh, what jam?" inquired Cicely breathlessly.
"Strawberry," said Eilean, with her mouth full.
Cicely, too, made her raid, and Douglas backed away, resisting with increasing indignation.
"You should be ashamed of yourselves, big girls like you!" he declared. "And dressed like that, too! I'll tell my lady."
"Look out—cave!" cried Eilean in a warning voice, and they vanished up the stairs in a flight of white.
Douglas retired in offended dignity; and suddenly into the hall broke a low tide of music from the ballroom. The sound of voices, too, ascended; then the tide ebbed, as if a door had been shut, but the voices continued. Eilean, from her position of safety, peered down again. She had half a puff in her hand, and Cicely's face was smeared with jam.
"It's Molly," she cried.
Molly it was, and another Molly from the sister they knew and quarrelled with. Her début seemed to have crowned Molly with a halo; she lolled rapturously, yet with virginal tranquillity, on a seat below in the company of a young man.
"Thanks, awfully," rose to the listening children. "It's not nearly so hot now. It's so kind of you."
The young man seemed at once pleased and fluttered. "Er—couldn't we—the stairs is a jolly place," he suggested.
"Oh, Eilean, they're coming up!" said Cicely in affright.
"H'sh!" commanded Eilean; "it's only Molly. Who cares?"
Yet her heart was going faster, for there was something rather formidable about Molly to-night. The couple ascended, however, only part of the way and sat on the uncomfortable but traditional seat, staring down into the hall, which was now filling. The children's eyes wandered to the new-comers, but returned to Molly, who was, after all, nearer home, and therefore of more immediate interest.
"My word! Just look at her!" commented Eilean. "Doesn't she just fancy herself?"
"I know who she's got there," volunteered Cicely. "It's 'Goggles.'"
Eilean nudged her to invite her silent attention, for "Goggles" was speaking.
"Will you allow me? There is a lock of your hair——"
"Thanks, awfully much," came in Molly's languid accents.
"Who's 'Goggles'?" asked Eilean, in a whisper.
"Mr. Galbraith," said Cicely, with satisfaction at her own knowledge. "He wears glasses, and he can't see anything without them. That's him. He called on mamma and broke a vase, and said 'Awfully sorry,' and then sat down on his hat."
"I s'pose that's why he's looking so closely at Molly," suggested Eilean. "I wouldn't let a man come so near me."
"Not if he gave you chocolates enough?" inquired Cicely, with interest.
Eilean struggled with her high principles and all but foundered. "N—n—o," she returned at last.
"Awfully good dance, wasn't it?" said "Goggles," below.
He was over-young and greatly self-conscious, particularly of his hands; whereas Molly was serenely placid.
"Awfully," she agreed, and, as the conversation threatened to languish, made a desperate effort. "What kind of dance do you think the best?"
"Oh, the waltz is the only dance, don't you know," said her partner, and in his fervour knocked down her fan, which he recovered after fulsome apologies.
"So do I. Waltzing's heavenly," said Molly; adding: "Of course, if you have a partner who can dance."
"What rot are they talking?" asked Eilean. "What did she say?"
"She says waltzing's heavenly," said Cicely.
"Isn't she putting on side? She can't waltz at all. Miss Graham told her so."
"'Goggles's' nose is rather red," observed Cicely critically.
"I wish they'd go," said Eilean discontentedly; "I want to creep into Douglas's pantry."
Meanwhile, Mr. Galbraith had been whipping up his mental resources and now braced himself.
"Do you know, Lady Molly, of whom you remind me?" he asked in agitation.
"No, I haven't the least idea," answered she with demure indifference.
"Don't you know that poem of Tennyson's?" he went on with even greater emotion—"Elaine, you know, the lily maid of Astolat—Tennyson's, don't you know. You don't mind, do you?"
"Oh, no," said Molly, with increasing languor.
"What does he say?" inquired Eilean.
"He says she's a lily," said sharp-eared Cicely. Eilean giggled and then choked her laughter with a restraining hand.
"Oh, my!" she whispered. "I call her a daisy."
"I thought you and she were chums," said Cicely.
"So we were till yesterday," assented her sister. "But she told Miss Graham I ought to be smacked. It's all this ball."
"She slapped me this morning," said Cicely meditating. "They are beasts. I do wish they'd go."
"Whom did you say I was like?" inquired Molly after a pause. It would be nice to put that down, and she had clean forgotten.
"Elaine," said the young man, trembling—"the beautiful girl who died and drifted down in a barge, you know, with her fair young face looking upwards to the heavens. Tennyson's 'Idylls,' you know."
"Of course," said Molly vaguely, and assumed by slow degrees an attitude more consistent with this evidently lovely and interesting creature. But Eilean had caught this and once more had to choke herself.
"Her fair young face turned up to heaven! Look at her fair young face! Ain't she turning it up?" she commented.
"You know Tennyson well, of course, Lady Molly?" went on "Goggles," encouraged by his success.
"Oh, yes, well," asseverated Molly with emphasis.
"Who does she say she knows?" asked Eilean of her sister.
"I don't know—Dennison or something," said Cicely sleepily.
"I'm very glad you like poetry," pursued Mr. Galbraith. "I think it's—well, it catches hold of you somehow, doesn't it?"
"Oh, I adore poetry. I'm always reading it," said Molly rapturously.
"Oh, what a story!" remarked the critic above. "She never reads anything. How she can tell such lies!"
"What are you going do, Eily?" demanded Cicely in an awed whisper, for Eilean had risen to her feet.
"I'm going to frighten them. They're talking such muck," said that young lady elegantly, and coughed very loudly and pointedly. There was criticism, there was sarcasm, and there was condemnation in that cough. Galbraith started nervously, and Molly gave a jump, but Eilean had dropped behind her barricade again.
"Do you think——" began the young man nervously. "I thought——"
Molly knew well enough what it was. "It's those beastly children," she thought, but aloud said only graciously and nervously: "I don't think——" and came to a pause.
"Did she see you?" asked Cicely in alarm.
"No," said Eilean, "but she knows we're here now. I gave her a fright. She won't be able to carry on now. Why, he's got closer again. She is a sly cat."
"What I like about poetry, you know," resumed poor "Goggles," "is that it seems to—to—well—to ennoble you, don't you know. Don't you feel that, Lady Molly?"
"Often," said Molly.
"Rats!" said Eilean in a loud whisper from above.
"Goggles" cast an apprehensive glance towards the ceiling.
"It's all right. He won't see us," said Eilean. "He hasn't got his glasses on."
Hut Molly did. Her colour rose as she was aware now of two white forms that grinned at her over the balustrade in the confidence of their security; and she paid the young man but scant attention. He had warmed to his theme under the stimulus of success.
"Poetry elevates, I think—gives you ideals, you know. Most men want some influence of that sort. Do you know, Lady Molly, that I think men are awful beasts, really, compared with women. Women are on a different plane, don't you know—on a higher, loftier plane——"
As he paused tremulously, Molly put in a civil and gracious "Do you think so?" adding to that a frown slantwise at the abominable children. "Go to bed, you little beasts!"
This, being a fine aside, escaped the ardent youth, who continued: "I'm sure I don't know what we should do without women. I'm afraid we should come to grief awfully."
"Oh, you'd get on quite well," said Molly sweetly, and the shafts of her angry eyes penetrated the heartless breasts of her sisters.
"Woman," said "Goggles" sententiously, "is so much more delicate, more refined in her mind than——"
"Beasts!" ejaculated Molly under her breath. "Go away!"
"—kinder, more considerate of the feelings of others," continued "Goggles" more complacently, "and more saintlike, if I may say so."
"Do you really think so?" languished Molly, but suddenly started to her feet. "I must go now."
The door below had opened again and admitted into the hall a confident-looking man of five-and-thirty, with a quizzical expression. His gaze took in the stairs with a humorous twinkle.
"What, Lady Molly, not dancing, and on such an occasion?" he said.
"Lady Molly was suffering from the heat——" began "Goggles" with dignity.
"Ah, to be sure," said the new-comer. "I suffer from the heat myself, too, sometimes, and can sympathise."
"It was very hot in the smaller room, Mr. Miles," said Molly with a certain timidity which she had not displayed before.
"Was it?" said Miles. "Well, I found it very hot in the conservatory. It is odd how many places are too hot on these occasions. I hope you're cooler now." He examined her intently. "Yes, you must have been hot. I can see your face is still very much flushed. Allow me to recommend that you cool down a little more; and if Mr. Galbraith will allow me——" He ended with a glance at this latter, who, however, did not budge. But Molly turned on him very chillingly.
"It is very kind of you, Mr. Galbraith, to have brought me out of the heat," said she politely. "I am so much obliged to you."
"There, she's going to turn off 'Goggles' now she's got Miles. Isn't she a cat?" observed Eilean to Cicely.
Poor "Goggles" was a little taken aback. "Oh, don't mention it," he said. "It was nothing. I'm glad——" But apparently he did not see that he was now expected to go, cast as rubbish to the void, his task fulfilled.
"Yes, I think you're distinctly getting cooler, Lady Molly," asserted Miles with his twinkle. "And since Lady Molly Calverley is so much cooler, Mr. Galbraith, your kind offices are evidently at an end."
"I rather like Mr. Miles," remarked Eilean pensively. "He does talk such a lot of rubbish."
"Lady Molly——" began the unhappy "Goggles" timidly, but was forthwith interrupted.
"Oh, Mr. Galbraith," said Molly sweetly, "would you be so good as to see if you can find Miss Graham for me? It would be so kind of you. Thanks awfully."
Muttering awkwardly that he would be delighted, but not looking delighted, the youth went.
"Why, Graham's out. She knows that well enough," observed the critical Eilean.
"Now, that was very clever of you, Lady Molly," said Miles approvingly. "How do you women manage to do things so neatly? That was really knowing."
"Oh, we have to manage sometimes," said Molly demurely.
"Dear me!" said the man, leaning back in the seat they had taken, "I hope you'll never get rid of me like that."
"Oh, Mr. Miles!" protested Molly. "But he's only a boy."
"And I——" said Miles. "Yes, I'm quite aware I'm almost an old man. Let me see, how old are you?"
"Guess," said Molly archly.
"Thirty," said he. Molly laughed, and shook her head. "Thirty-five." She laughed louder.
"I believe you're just pretending," she said.
"I have it now," said he; and in answer to the eager question of her eyes. "You're just half as old as I am."
"Oh, but," protested Molly, "that isn't a proper guess."
"Oh, yes, it is," he avowed. "I know my own age, and yours is just half."
"Well, but how——" began Molly, puzzled. "I don't know yours, you see."
"Ah, well, it's your" turn to guess, then," said Miles. Molly buried her nose in her bouquet. "I couldn't," she said coquettishly.
"Try," said the man encouragingly.
"Are you—are you," asked Molly cautiously, "thirty-six?"
"How clever of you!" said he with enthusiasm. "I never thought you would have guessed it."
"It was clever, wasn't it?" said Molly delightedly, "for I really thought you must be older."
"And it was clever of me to guess you were eighteen, wasn't it?"
"Ah, but you had three shots," said Molly, triumphantly rocking herself with her hands clasped about her knee.
"What are they talking about now?" inquired Eilean above.
"He says he's thirty-six," said Cicely.
"Why, what a cram! I believe he's about fifty," remarked Eilean bluffly.
"I wonder when he'll die?" said Cicely without much curiosity.
"Well, now, Lady Molly, do you think I'm old enough?" inquired Miles with a feint of great earnestness.
"Old enough?" she echoed in wonder.
"I mean, to be married," said he.
Molly resumed her rocking and answered carelessly: "Oh, of course."
Mr. Miles regarded his finger-nails with a frown. "Yet no one will have me," he said moodily.
Molly stopped rocking again, for this was getting interesting. "Have you asked them?" she said, and, when he nodded dismally—
"Were they—really nice?"
"Very," he assented, sighing.
This was more interesting than ever. "Why wouldn't they have you?" she inquired.
"I couldn't marry all of them, you see," said Mr. Miles reproachfully.
"No, but I mean——" said Molly, thrown thus into confusion of mind; and then her brain cleared. "You didn't ask them all at the same time?" she inquired with astonishment.
"Some of them," confessed Mr. Miles with another sigh.
"Oh!" said Molly aghast, and came to a pause. "That was very wicked."
"It was. I am very wicked," agreed Mr. Miles.
Molly rose. "I'm afraid I must be going now," she said firmly.
"Please don't go just yet," pleaded Mr. Miles. "I want to ask your advice very seriously. Do you think anyone would marry me?"
Molly looked at him doubtfully. She had a sort of distrust of him, but he seemed very grave, and it was flattering.
"Of course, someone might," she said. "I don't think you are too old at all."
"No?" said Mr. Miles humbly.
"But——" continued Molly. He waited, expectant, "—you're rather old," she said with brutal frankness.
"I suppose I am," assented Mr. Miles, again sighing.
"Everyone wouldn't think so," Molly hastened to assure him.
"Really?" he inquired with spirit.
"At least—perhaps," added Molly conscientiously.
Mr. Miles appeared to relapse once more into gloom. "Oh, well," he said with resignation, "I suppose I can go down to the grave, unloved and unhonoured. So you don't think anyone really could care for me?"
Molly shifted in her seat a little uncomfortably. "I'm sure that someone—at least—of course, someone could," she answered remorsefully.
"Ah, but what sort of person?" he inquired.
"Oh, a very nice person, I'm sure," said Molly distantly. "Someone——"
"Yes, someone——?" he encouraged her.
"Someone you'd like," said Molly vaguely.
"She'd have to be younger than I am," said Mr. Miles.
"Oh, yes," said Molly.
"Much younger," he insisted.
Molly dubiously agreed "Ye—es."
"About half my age, I should say?" he declared with a little interrogation. But Molly did not reply. "And she must have grey eyes." Molly cast a glance at him and then dropped hers hastily. "And brown hair," concluded Mr. Miles.
Molly was fluttered, even frightened, and yet—— O marvellous sex, in which so many passions have reign and make anarchy at once! Pride, fear, maidenly modesty, delicious thrills of vanity, and a certain formidable fascination were at war in a tremulous frame.
"I—I must really be going," she pronounced, rising.
"Going?" he echoed. "Why, when we were getting on so nicely! And you were giving me such good advice!"
"I—I really must go," persisted Molly, but somehow she didn't.
"Now, where were we?" went on Mr. Miles in his most even voice. "Oh, we were talking about you. That's right."
"About me?" said Molly, with a fresh flutter.
"Certainly. I was saying something about your eyes and your hair."
"Indeed, you were——" began Molly, but was drowned by his fluency.
"And, oh, yes, I remember now. You were saying that you could quite understand anyone caring for me, and——"
"Oh, I was not, Mr. Miles!" cried Molly with some heat. "I said—I was saying——" she stammered in her confusion.
But here chance came to her rescue, for "Tiggy" suddenly appeared in the hall and addressed her.
"Lady Templeton has been asking for you, Molly," he said, and eyed Mr. Miles askew through his glass. Mr. Miles sat on, cheerful, unruffled. Molly rose in a little alarm, and Mr. Miles rose also.
"May I take you back?" said he.
"I will take Lady Molly Calverley back, thank you," said Tiggy.
Mr. Miles showed his teeth in a pleasant smile and vanished. Tiggy looked after him reflectively. Then he was aware that Molly was asking a question. He turned.
"Yes, she was, but she is not any longer," he said in his deliberate way.
"Oh!" said Molly.
"And I am deputed by Lady Templeton to take you to the supper-room," pursued Tiggy, rubbing his eyeglass with his handkerchief.
"I'm not all hungry, thank you," said Molly loftily.
"In that case we will sit here a little," said Tiggy, planting himself in Mr. Miles's vacated chair. Molly's face was cross, but at last she sat down.
"I want to dance," she said fretfully.
"So I have perceived for some time," said Tiggy; "and if you will spare me a moment to recover from the efforts of my waltz with the Duchess, I will with pleasure give you the next."
"You are absurd, Tiggy," said Molly, with a little laugh, which, nevertheless, did not hide her vexation.
"So," resumed Tiggy, "that is Mr. Miles, is it?"
"Yes," said Molly, pretending to cover a little yawn.
"A nice fellow?" inquired Tiggy.
"Very," said Molly with emphasis, "Quite charming,"
Tiggy played with his chain and surveyed his companion's profile meditatively: she tapped her feet on the floor and looked indifferently about the hall. Somehow Tiggy was being treated differently—she did not know why. It seemed a special occasion on which people assumed imaginary and heroic values. Why, here was poor old Tiggy being held at arm's length and used with Society hauteur! She had never fenced with Tiggy before, but now she was insensibly drawn into it. Was it being grown up of a sudden? She stared now at Tiggy with interest. Had he assumed new and strange proportions? And if so, why?
"He's rather old," said Tiggy, an eyelid flickering.
"Not at all," said Molly with contemptuous disdain. "He's only thirty-six."
"Oh, that's young, is it? Then when does age begin? I am anxious to learn?"
"At forty," said Molly, with the cruelty of wantonness.
If Tiggy winced inside, he did not show it. All he said was "Ah!" He might have said more but for an interruption from the gallery.
The gallery had been very quiet for some time, for, if the truth must be known, it had fallen asleep; but now it woke up in some alarm at discovering where it was.
"Oh, goodness!" said Eilean, after rubbing her eyes, "if there isn't Molly still with that man!"
Cicely's appearance with dishevelled hair was of one to whom mundane and mortal considerations made no immediate appeal. Her soul, vanished from her vacant eyes, was wandering in fairyland.
"Let's give her another fright," said daring Eilean.
Cicely sat up and stared. "Come on," said the elder child, and moved furtively down the stairs. Cicely, half asleep, stumbled after her without any proper consciousness of what was going on.
"Booh!" cried Eilean suddenly and loudly over the balustrade.
Molly shrieked; the Honourable Roger Martin started.
"Jiminy, it's only Tiggy!" said Eilean regretfully.
"Yes, only Tiggy," said that gentleman; "alas! only Tiggy."
"We thought it was Miles," explained Eilean frankly.
"An excusable mistake," remarked the Honourable Roger suavely.
"You little wretches, if you don't go to bed, I'll tell Evelyn at once!" said Molly vindictively.
Eilean and Cicely retreated up the stairs. "You daren't!" called back the blackmailers in defiance. "We know too much. We've been sitting here all the time."
Tiggy shook his head sorrowfully. "All right, Tiggy; we're really going," said Eilean, and they vanished. The gallery had given expression to its feelings and was content; but it went to bed hungry.
The periodical inundation into the hall flooded Molly and her partner immediately afterwards, and they drifted away in separate directions. As a matter of fact, Roger Martin went home, walking slowly through the cool night air to the Albany. And it was not so very much later that Lady Molly was obliged to obey the stern commands of her elder sister, Evelyn, and seek her Cinderella couch. There she sat on her bed triumphant, counting up her gains and victories.
"It was only because I looked so well that Evelyn sent me to bed," she mused. "She was jealous, I know. Young Galbraith admired me, and Sir William Graves, and old Buckle, and Mr. Miles, and——"
A sudden thought took her, and she opened her door and stepped stealthily across to the nursery. The noise of heavy breathing reached her. She entered soundlessly and crept up to the bed which she knew to be Eilean's. Then she shook the sleeping girl with discreet violence.
Eilean opened her eyes drowsily. "What is it?" she asked. "It's not time yet, I'm sure."
"Eily, wake up, you pig!" said Molly, strenuously using her arms.
Eilean sat up. "What's the matter?" she asked vacantly.
"I've just come to tell you that your conduct has been disgraceful, and I will certainly complain to mother," said Molly, in whom the passion of resentment was now flaring. "Exhibiting yourself like that, too!"
Eilean was now wide awake. "Well, and you behaved disgracefully, too," she retorted, "with that man Miles."
"You don't understand, child," said Molly loftily. "I'm grown up."
There was naturally something clinching in this argument, and Eilean's ready tongue failed on this occasion.
There was the noise of someone moving on another bed.
"You see," said Molly, following up her victory, "I can be engaged if I like now."
"Oh, Molly, are you engaged?" cried Cicely ecstatically and shrilly from her corner.
"Not yet," said Molly with dignity. "I am in no hurry. I'm going to pick very carefully." Then, as her thoughts went back to the evening, a wrong revived in her memory. "And if it hadn't been for you little beasts, Mr. Galbraith would have proposed to me—and Mr. Miles, too."
"Goggles—that fool!" ejaculated Eilean. "But you wouldn't have had him?"
"No, but I wanted to refuse him," said Lady Molly reflectively, and she found her way to the door. "And Mr. Miles, too," she said from the distance. "Good night."
"And Tiggy—and Tiggy, too!" cried Cicely breathlessly, but Molly was already gone.
* Copyright, 1904, by H. B. Marriott Watson, in the United States of America.
This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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