The Earl watched him for some moments in silence. Presently he said: ‘Is your engagement to be publicly announced, Charles?’
‘Why, I suppose so! There is no secret about it, you know.’
‘It is very wonderful,’ Worth observed. ‘What did she find in you to like so well?’
The Colonel grinned. ‘I don’t know.’
‘You would not, of course,’ Worth said dryly. ‘Forgive my curiosity, but does Lady Barbara mean to follow the drum?’
‘She would, I think, and like it very well. Women do, you know—have you ever met Juana, Harry Smith’s wife?’
‘I have not met Juana, nor have I met Harry Smith.’
‘He’s a rifleman: a rattling good fellow, mad as a coot! He went out to America with Pakenham, more’s the pity! He married a Spanish child after Badajos: it’s too long a story to tell you now, but you never saw such a little heroine in your life! I believe she would go with Harry into action if he would let her. I have seen her fording a river with the water right up to her horse’s girths. She will sleep out in the open by a camp fire, wrapped up in a blanket, and never utter a word of complaint. Bab is made of just that high-spirited stuff.’
‘I hope you may be right,’ said Worth, unable to picture the Lady Barbara in any such situations.
Not very far away, in the Rue Ducale, Lady Vidal shared this mental inability and did not scruple to say so. She had looked narrowly at her sister-in-law when she had come in to breakfast, and had not failed to notice the flame in Barbara’s eyes and the colour in her cheeks. ‘What have you been doing?’ she asked. ‘You look quite wild, let me tell you!’
‘Oh yes! I am quite wild!’ Barbara answered. ‘I have taken your advice, Gussie! There! Aren’t you pleased?’
‘I wish I knew what you meant!’
‘Why, that I am engaged to be married, to be sure!’
Her brother’s attention was caught by these words. ‘What’s that? Engaged? Nonsense!’
Lady Vidal exclaimed: ‘Bab! Are you serious? It is Lavisse?’
‘Lavisse?’ repeated Barbara, as though dragging the name up from the recesses of her memory. ‘No! Oh no! My staff officer!’
‘Are you mad? Charles Audley? You cannot mean it!’
‘Yes, I do—today, at least!’
Augusta said bitterly: ‘I never reckoned stupidity among your faults. Good God, Bab, how can you be such a fool? With your looks and birth you may marry whom you please: the lord knows you’ve had chances enough! and you choose a penniless soldier! I will not believe it of you!’
‘Charles Audley?’ said Vidal. He looked at his sister over frowningly, but not displeased. ‘Well, I must say I am surprised. A very good family—perfectly eligible!’
Augusta broke in angrily: ‘Eligible! A penniless younger son with no chance of inheriting the title! Pray, how do you propose to live, Bab? Do you see yourself in the tail of an army, sharing all the discomforts of a campaign with your Charles?’
‘I might, I think,’ said Barbara, considering it. ‘It would be something new—exciting!’
‘I have no patience with such folly!’
Vidal interposed to say in his heavy fashion: ‘It is not a brilliant match—by no means brilliant! I could wish him wealthier, but as for his being penniless—pooh! I daresay he has a very respectable competence.’
‘Then Bab will have to learn to live upon a competence,’ said Augusta. ‘I hope, my dear love, that you have not forgotten the terms of your late husband’s will?’
‘Oh, who cares! With a handsome fortune I had never enough money, so I may as happily live in debt on a mere competence.’
This ingenious way of looking at the matter had the effect of pulling down the corners of Vidal’s mouth. He began to read his sister a homily, but she interrupted him with a little show of temper, and ran out of the room, slamming the door behind her.
Lady Vidal remarked that if one thing were more certain than another it was that the e
ngagement would be of short duration.
‘I hope not,’ replied Vidal. ‘Audley is a very good sort of fellow, very well-liked. If she throws him over it will go hard with her in the eyes of the world. What I fear is that a sensible man will never bear with her tantrums. I wish to God she had stayed in England!’ He added with an inconsequence Augusta found irritating: ‘We must ask him to dine with us. I wish you will write him a civil note.’