A Lady of Quality - Frances Hodgson Burnett

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stock of her own upon which she could always draw, and her voice being more shrill than his, if not of such bigness, her ear-piercing shrieks and indomitable perseverance always proved too much for him in the end. It must be admitted likewise that her violence of temper and power of will were somewhat beyond his own, notwithstanding her tender years and his reputation. In fact, he found himself obliged to observe this, and finally made something of a merit and joke of it.

      “There is no managing of the little shrew,” he would say. “Neither man nor devil can bend or break her. If I smashed every bone in her carcass, she would die shrieking hell at me and defiance.”

      If one admits the truth, it must be owned that if she had not had bestowed upon her by nature gifts of beauty and vivacity so extraordinary, and had been cursed with a thousandth part of the vixenishness she displayed every day of her life, he would have broken every bone in her carcass without a scruple or a qualm. But her beauty seemed but to grow with every hour that passed, and it was by exceeding good fortune exactly the fashion of beauty which he admired the most. When she attained her tenth year she was as tall as a fine boy of twelve, and of such a shape and carriage as young Diana herself might have envied. Her limbs were long, and most divinely moulded, and of a strength that caused admiration and amazement in all beholders. Her father taught her to follow him in the hunting-field, and when she appeared upon her horse, clad in her little breeches and top-boots and scarlet coat, child though she was, she set the field on fire. She learned full early how to coquet and roll her fine eyes; but it is also true that she was not much of a languisher, as all her ogling was of a destructive or proudly-attacking kind. It was her habit to leave others to languish, and herself to lead them with disdainful vivacity to doing so. She was the talk, and, it must be admitted, the scandal, of the county by the day she was fifteen. The part wherein she lived was a boisterous hunting shire where there were wide ditches and high hedges to leap, and rough hills and moors to gallop over, and within the region neither polite life nor polite education were much thought of; but even in the worst portions of it there were occasional virtuous matrons who shook their heads with much gravity and wonder over the beautiful Mistress Clorinda.

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      Uncivilised and almost savage as her girlish life was, and unregulated by any outward training as was her mind, there were none who came in contact with her who could be blind to a certain strong, clear wit, and unconquerableness of purpose, for which she was remarkable. She ever knew full well what she desired to gain or to avoid, and once having fixed her mind upon any object, she showed an adroitness and brilliancy of resource, a control of herself and others, the which there was no circumventing. She never made a blunder because she could not control the expression of her emotions; and when she gave way to a passion, ’twas because she chose to do so, having naught to lose, and in the midst of all their riotous jesting with her the boon companions of Sir Jeoffry knew this.

      “Had she a secret to keep, child though she is,” said Eldershawe, “there is none—man or woman—who could scare or surprise it from her; and ’tis a strange quality to note so early in a female creature.”

      She spent her days with her father and his dissolute friends, treated half like a boy, half a fantastical queen, until she was fourteen. She hunted and coursed, shot birds, leaped hedges and ditches, reigned at the riotous feastings, and coquetted with these mature, and in some cases elderly, men, as if she looked forward to doing naught else all her life.

      But one day, after she had gone out hunting with her father, riding Rake, who had been given to her, and wearing her scarlet coat, breeches, and top-boots, one of the few remaining members of her mother’s family sent his chaplain to remonstrate and advise her father to command her to forbear from appearing in such impudent attire.

      There was, indeed, a stirring scene when this message was delivered by its bearer. The chaplain was an awkward, timid creature, who had heard stories enough of Wildairs Hall and its master to undertake his mission with a quaking soul. To have refused to obey any behest of his patron would have cost him his living, and knowing this beyond a doubt, he was forced to gird up his loins and gather together all the little courage he could muster to beard the lion in his den.

      The first thing he beheld on entering the big hall was a beautiful tall youth wearing his own rich black hair, and dressed in scarlet coat for hunting. He was playing with a dog, making it leap over his crop, and both laughing and swearing at its clumsiness. He glanced at the chaplain with a laughing, brilliant eye, returning the poor man’s humble bow with a slight nod as he plainly hearkened to what he said as he explained his errand.

      “I come from my Lord Twemlow, who is your master’s kinsman,” the chaplain faltered; “I am bidden to see and speak to him if it be possible, and his lordship much desires that Sir Jeoffry will allow it to be so. My Lord Twemlow—”

      The beautiful youth left his playing with the dog and came forward with all the air of the young master of the house.

      “My Lord Twemlow sends you?” he said. “ ’Tis long since his lordship favoured us with messages. Where is Sir Jeoffry, Lovatt?”

      “In the dining-hall,” answered the servant. “He went there but a moment past, Mistress.”

      The chaplain gave such a start as made him drop his shovel hat. “Mistress!” And this was she—this fine young creature who was tall and grandly enough built and knit to seem a radiant being even when clad in masculine attire. He picked up his hat and bowed so low that it almost swept the floor in his obeisance. He was not used to female beauty which deigned to cast great smiling eyes upon him, for at my Lord Twemlow’s table he sat so far below the salt that women looked not his way.

      This beauty looked at him as if she was amused at the thought of something in her own mind. He wondered tremblingly if she guessed what he came for and knew how her father would receive it.

      “Come with me,” she said; “I will take you to him. He would not see you if I did not. He does not love his lordship tenderly enough.”

      She led the way, holding her head jauntily and high, while he cast down his eyes lest his gaze should be led to wander in a way unseemly in one of his cloth. Such a foot and such—! He felt it more becoming and safer to lift his eyes to the ceiling and keep them there, which gave him somewhat the aspect of one praying.

      Sir Jeoffry stood at the buffet with a flagon of ale in his hand, taking his stirrup cup. At the sight of a stranger and one attired in the garb of a chaplain, he scowled surprisedly.

      “What’s this?” quoth he. “What dost want, Clo? I have no leisure for a sermon.”

      Mistress Clorinda went to the buffet and filled a tankard for herself and carried it back to the table, on the edge of which she half sat, with one leg bent, one foot resting on the floor.

      “Time thou wilt have to take, Dad,” she said, with an arch grin, showing two rows of gleaming pearls. “This gentleman is my Lord Twemlow’s chaplain, whom he sends to exhort you, requesting you to have the civility to hear him.”

      “Exhort be damned, and Twemlow be damned too!” cried Sir Jeoffry, who had a great quarrel with his lordship and hated him bitterly. “What does the canting fool mean?”

      “Sir,” faltered the poor message-bearer, “his lordship hath—hath been concerned—having heard—”

      The handsome creature balanced against the table took the tankard from her lips and laughed.

      “Having heard thy daughter rides to field in breeches, and is an unseemly-behaving wench,” she cried, “his lordship sends his chaplain to deliver a discourse thereon—not choosing to come himself. Is not that thy errand, reverend sir?”

      The chaplain, poor man, turned pale, having caught, as she spoke, a glimpse of Sir Jeoffry’s reddening visage.

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