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When the Duke and his daughter reached Custins they found a large party assembled, and were somewhat surprised at the crowd. Lord and Lady Nidderdale were there, which might have been expected as they were part of the family. With Lord Popplecourt had come his recent friend Adolphus Longstaff. That too might have been natural.
"I do not know whether you approve it," Lady Cantrip said to the Duke; "but Mary has become very intimate with our new American friend." At this time Lady Cantrip had become very nervous, so as almost to wish that Lady Mary's difficulties might be unravelled elsewhere than at Custins. "They seem to be sensible people," said the Duke.
I never touch my own pheasants till November." "Why are you so abstemious?" "The birds are heavier and it answers better. But if I thought you would be at Custins it would be much nicer." Lady Mary again told him that as yet she knew nothing of her father's autumn movements. But at the same time the Duke was arranging his autumn movements, or at any rate those of his daughter.
The Duke himself when he saw the young man was hardly more comfortable. He had brought his daughter to Custins, feeling that it was his duty to be with her; but he would have preferred to leave the whole operation to the care of Lady Cantrip. He hardly liked to look at the fish whom he wished to catch for his daughter.
Miss Boncassen saw the Duke of Omnium for the first time at Custins, and there had the first opportunity of asking herself how such a man as that would receive from his son and heir such an announcement as Lord Silverbridge would have to make him should she at the end of three months accept his offer. She was quite aware that Lord Silverbridge need not repeat the offer unless he were so pleased.
"All that is over now, and shall be forgotten." Then he spoke of his immediate plans. He would at once go back to England by slow stages, by very slow stages, staying a day or two at Salzburg, at Ratisbon, at Nuremberg, at Frankfort, and so on. In this way he would reach England about the 10th of October, and Mary would then be ready to go to Custins by the time appointed.
Boncassen to chew the cud of the grandeur around her in the sleepy comfort of an arm-chair. "And so everything is settled for both of us," said Isabel. "Of course I knew it was to be settled for you. You told me so at Custins." "I did not know it myself then. I only told you that he had asked me. And you hardly believed me." "I certainly believed you." "But you knew about Lady Mabel Grex."
I have been asked to go to Custins, and suppose I shall turn up there some time in the autumn. And now shall I tell you what I expect? I do expect that you will come over to see me. "I did see her the other day," you will say, "and she did not make herself pleasant." I know that. How was I to make myself pleasant when I found myself so completely snuffed out by your American beauty?
It was not that she was ashamed of her love, but that she could not bring herself to yield altogether in reference to the great descent which Silverbridge would have to make. On the day after this, the last day of the Duke's sojourn at Custins, the last also of the Boncassens' visit, it came to pass that the Duke and Mr. Boncassen, with Lady Mary and Isabel, were all walking in the woods together.
And each earnest man is in earnest about something that nobody else cares for." When they were again in the drawing-room, Lord Popplecourt was seated next to Lady Mary. "Where are you going this autumn?" he asked. "I don't know in the least. Papa said something about going abroad." "You won't be at Custins?" Custins was Lord Cantrip's country seat in Dorsetshire.
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