The Spider and the Fly

"Yes," said Ethel. "I presume you, also, by your question, are going?"

"Yes," said Bertie Fairfax, "I am glad to say."

Five minutes before he had sworn to Mr. Leicester Dodson that he wouldn't go to my Lady Darefield's ball for five hundred pounds, and five hundreds pounds were of some consequence to Mr. Bertie Fairfax.

"It is very hot for balls, but one must do his duty. I hope I may be able to persuade you to give me a dance?"

"I don't know," said Ethel, with a smile.

At that moment her horse walked on a little. Mr. Fairfax moved farther up the rail, and then conversation, no more confidential than that we have already given, continued until Lord Fitz was heard to exclaim "Good-by," and then joined his sister.

Both the gentlemen on foot raised their hats, Bertie Fairfax with his cordial, pleasant smile, Leicester Dodson with his grave and also pleasant grace, and after a return of the salutations the four young people parted.

"Well," said Lord Fitz, from whose mind the recent meeting had expunged the unpleasant remembrances of his morning interview, "what do you think of them?"

Ethel was silent for a moment.

"I don't know which was the handsomer," she said, thoughtfully.

"That's just like you women, Eth; you always think of the graces first."

"Well," said Ethel, "there was no time to know anything more about them. I think Mr. Fairfax is very pleasant – he has a nice voice and such frank eyes. There are some men with whom you feel friendly in the first ten minutes; he is one of them."

"You're right," said Lord Fitz. "Bertie's the jolliest and dearest old fellow going. Poor old Bert!"

"Why poor?" said Ethel.

"Because he is poor, deuced poor," said Lord Fitz, muttering under his breath, with a sigh, "Like some more of us."

"How do you mean?" said Ethel.

"Well," said Lord Fitz, "he has to work for his living. He's a barrister or something of that sort. But he writes and draws things for books, you know. I don't quite understand. He can sing like a nightingale and tell a story better than any man I know."

"He looks very happy," said Ethel, "although he is poor."

"Happy!" said Lord Fitz. "He's always happy. He's the best company going."

"And who is his friend? Mr. Dodson, is not his name?" asked Ethel.

"Yes, Leicester Dodson," said Lord Fitz. "He's one of your clever men. You can't understand whether he's serious or joking sometimes, and I've often thought he was making fun of me, only – "

"Only what?" asked his sister.

"Only I didn't think he'd have the impudence," said Lord Fitz, proudly. "It isn't nice to be sneered at by a tallow chandler."

"A what?" said Ethel.

"Well, the son of a tallow chandler. That's what his father was. A nice, quiet old boy. Haven't you heard of 'em? They live at Penruddie, which is about nine miles from that shooting box in Herefordshire – Coombe Lodge."

"So near," said Ethel. "No, I had not heard of him. He looks to be a gentleman, but I did not notice him very much. I like his friend's face best, yes, I am sure I do, though both the faces were nice."

"You don't take into account Leicester Dodson's coin," said Lord Fitz. "His people are immensely rich; tallow turns into gold, you know, if you only melt it long enough."

"That's a joke or a pun, Fitz," laughed Lady Ethel. "And really rather clever for you. And where does Mr. Fairfax live?"

"Oh, in chambers in the Temple – quite the clever bachelor, you know. Very snug they are, too, much more comfortable than any of the places. He gives good dinners sometimes – when he's in luck, as he calls it. Eth, you ought to have been a man, then you could have known some jolly good fellows."

"Thank you, if I were not on horseback I'd curtsey," said Ethel. "Can't I know good fellows as I am?"

"No," said simple Lord Fitz, "you can't! They won't let you; it's dangerous. You must only know men with long handles to their names like ours, and with their pockets full of money – unlike ours. You mustn't know Bertie Fairfax, for instance. The mother wouldn't allow it."

At that moment Ethel's horse started – his rider had, in reality, touched him with a spur – and got in front of Lord Fitz, so that the blush which suddenly crimsoned Ethel's beautiful face was hidden from her brother's light blue eyes.

Now, why should Lady Ethel Boisdale blush at the simple little speech of Lord Fitz? It could be of little consequence to her, surely, if her eyes were fated never to rest on Mr. Bertie Fairfax again. Why did she blush, and why, during the remainder of that park gallop, did she look forward to Lady Darefield's little ball?

"Well," said Leicester, as the two equestrians rode away, and left the pedestrians looking after them, "what do you think of the Lady Ethel Boisdale? You have been wrapped in a silence unusual and remarkable for the last three minutes; unusual because on such occasions as the present you generally indulge in a rhapsody of admiration, or a deluge of candid abuse, extraordinary because silence at any time is extraordinary in you."

"Hold your tongue, you cynical fellow," exclaimed Bertie, still looking after the brother and sister. "So that is the sister of whom simple Fitz is always talking – Lady Ethel! A pretty name, and it suits her. An Ethel should be dark, or at least brown shadowed; an Ethel should have deep, thoughtful eyes, a pleasant, rather dreamy smile, and a touch of hauteur over face, figure, and voice. She has all these – "

"And fifty more virtues, attributes, and peculiarities which your confounded imagination can endow her with! Nonsense! She's a nice-looking girl, with a sensible face, and the pride proper for her station. You can't make anything more of her."

"Can't I?" said his friend; "you can't, you mean. I call her beautiful. She is going to Lady Darefield's ball to-night; I – I shall go, after all, I think, Leicester."

"I thought so," said Leicester Dodson, with a smile of ineffable wisdom and sagacity. "I thought somebody said they wouldn't go to the confounded ball for five hundred pounds, and that the same somebody was pitying me for having promised to grace it with my presence."

"I thought you'd die if I didn't keep you company, and so, as I like to borrow your money, and don't want you to die, I'll go. I say, Leicester, haven't the Lacklands a small place in Herefordshire near you? What do they call it – Coombe Lodge?"

"Perhaps they have," said Mr. Leicester. "I believe that there are few counties which are not honored by the Lacklands in that way. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, merely for idle curiosity."

"H'm! you promised to come and spend a week or two with me," said Mr. Leicester. "Will you come?"

"Oh, chaff away," said Bertie Fairfax, good-temperedly. "But I'll take you seriously; I will come."

"Done," said Leicester, still chaffing as his light-hearted friend called it. "I'm going down next week. Come with me?"

"Thanks," said Bertie, "I'll think it over. I'll come and cut you out with the Mildmay heiress! Hah! hah!"

He laughed as Leicester turned to him with a look of mild surprise.

"You didn't know that I was posted up in that intelligence! I've a dozen little birds who bring me news night and morning, and I've heard – "

"Pshaw!" interrupted Leicester. "I've dined with mamma and papa at Mildmay Park, and that – that's positively all. My dear Bertie. I am not a marrying man; now you are, but, mark me, Lady Ethel Boisdale is not meant for you."

"Thank you," said Bertie, "I'm very much obliged, but who said that she was?"

And with a light laugh the subject was dropped.

That night when Lady Ethel Boisdale entered the magnificent saloons of Lady Darefield's mansion in Park Place she looked round the room with calm, yet expectant eyes, and dropped them very suddenly as they met the also searching and expectant gaze of Mr. Bertie Fairfax.

It is one thing to exchange glances and smiles with a belle in a ballroom, but quite another matter to get a dance with her.

The saloons were crowded by the best of the land, eligible parties were in abundance, and Mr. Bertie Fairfax, handsome, sweet-natured and lovable though he was, found himself somewhat out in the cold.

It was not an unusual position for him, and on other occasions he had laughed good-naturedly in the smoking-room of his club, saying that there had been too many iron pitchers going down the stream for such a fragile, unsatisfactory delf affair as himself to hope for success.

But to-night it was different.

He wanted to dance with Lady Ethel Boisdale; why he could scarcely have told.

She was very beautiful; but he had seen faces far more lovely even than hers; she was very graceful, tall and full of a sweet, proud dignity, but Bertie Fairfax had seen some of the ladies of the Papal court, and remembered their faces.

She was, as it happened, just the realization of the young fellow's ideal, and – yet it must be written – he was already half in love with her.

Round her, forming a sort of bodyguard or watchdog, continually hovered in majestic grace the Countess of Lackland, her mamma.

Bertie was aware that her ladyship knew all about him, and that it was utterly vain to hope that he might be allowed to fill a vacant line in the Lady Ethel's little dancing programme.

He watched her dancing for some time, watched her as she spun round in two waltzes with Leicester Dodson for her partner, then the disappointed Bertie made his way out on to the corridor and leaned against the balustrade, gnawing his tawny mustache and trying to make up his mind to go to his club.

Just then, as he had almost decided, Leicester Dodson came out, hot and flushed, but with his usual grave reserve about his mouth and eyes.

"Ah! Bert!" he said. "Taking a cooler; you're wise in your generation. They ought to keep a weighing machine outside in the lobbies, so that a man could see how much he'd fined down after each dance. I've lost pounds since the Lancers. It's hotter than a siesta hour in Madrid. You look cool."

"I don't feel particularly hot. I haven't been dancing. I feel like the skeleton at the feast; I think I shall carry my bones to the club. Will you come?"

"I'm engaged for another turn with Lady Ethel Boisdale," said Leicester Dodson, leaning over the balustrade and skillfully concealing a yawn.

"Lucky dog," said Bertie, enviously.

"Eh?" said Leicester. "By the way, you said she'd half promised you a dance; you don't mean to say you haven't called for payment, Bert; she's the best-looking woman in the room, and the most sensible – "

"Too sensible to dance with Mr. Fairfax, or her mamma has had all her training trouble for nothing," said Bertie.

"Nonsense! She's looking this way; go and ask her, man. I'll wait until the waltz is over, then we'll go on to the club, for, between you and me and that hideous statue, which is all out of drawing, by the way, I have had pretty well enough; and you seem, to judge by your face, to have had a great deal too much."

Bertie, without a word left his friend, fought his way through the crowd, and, after some maneuvering, gained Lady Ethel's side.

"Have you saved me that dance which you half promised me this morning?" he said.

Lady Ethel turned – she did not know that he was so near – and a smile, bright, but transient, passed across her face.

"There is one dance – it is only a quadrille," she said; "all the waltzes are gone."

"I am grateful for the quadrille only, and do not deserve that," he said.

"I thought you had gone," said Ethel. "My brother was looking for you just now, and I told him that I had seen you go out."

"I was in the corridor cooling," said Bertie Fairfax.

"Is it cool there?" she asked; "I thought it could not be cool anywhere to-night."

Then Lord Fitz came up, his simple face all flushed with the heat and the last dance.

"Hello, Bert, I've been looking for you. I say – "

"You must tell me when the dance is over," said Bertie, "there is no time."

And he led his partner to her place in a set.

A quadrille has the advantage over its more popular sister, the waltz; it allows of conversation.

Bertie could talk well; he had always something light and pleasant to say, and he had a musical voice in which to say it.

He was generally too indolent to talk much, but neither his natural laziness nor the heat seemed to weigh upon him to-night, and he talked about this matter and on that until Ethel, who was not only beautiful but cultivated, was delighted.

Too delighted, perhaps, for my Lady Lackland, from her place of espionage in a corner, put up her eyeglass and scanned her daughter's rapt and sometimes smiling face with something that was not altogether a pleased expression.

"Who is that good-looking young fellow with whom Ethel's dancing?" she asked of the dowager Lady Barnwell, a noted scandalmonger, and an authority on every one's position and eligibilities.

"That is young Fairfax. Handsome, is he not? Pity he's so poor."

"Poor, is he?" said the countess, grimly.

"Oh, yes, dreadfully. Works for his living – a writer, artist, or something of that sort. Really, I don't know exactly. He is in the Temple. Very amusing companion, evidently. Lady Ethel looks charmed with her partner."

"Yes," said Lady Lackland, coldly, in her heart of hearts she determined that her daughter should receive a lecture upon the imprudence of wasting a dance upon such doubtful and dangerous men as Bertie Fairfax.

Meanwhile, Ethel was enjoying herself, and when Bertie, whose handsome face was beaming with quiet satisfaction and pleasure, softly suggested that they should try the corridor, Lady Ethel, after a moment's hesitation, on the score of prudence, replied with an affirmative, and they sought the lobby.

Here there were a seat for the lady and a leaning-post for Mr. Fairfax, and the conversation which had been interrupted was taken up again.

Bertie was in the midst of an eloquent defense of a favorite artist, of whom Lady Ethel did not quite approve, when Lord Fitz again appeared.

"What an eel you are, Bert! I've been everywhere for you. I say, we're going down to Coombe Lodge; it's so beastly hot up here in town, and we're going to make a little summer picnic party; you know, just a nice number. Cecil Carlton, Leonard Waltham and his sister, and two or three more. My sister is going, ain't you, Ethel? Will you come?"

"Thanks," said Bertie, with something like a flush, and certainly a sparkle in his light eyes. "But I am booked to Leicester Dodson."

"Oh, yes, the Cedars; what a bore for us. Never mind, the Lodge isn't far off, and, if you go down, we shall all be together."

"Yes," said Bertie, glancing at the fair face beneath him, which was turned, with a quiet look of interest, to her brother; "yes. When do you go?"

"Next week, if Ethel can get herself away from this sort of thing."

"I shall be very glad to go," said Ethel; "I am longing for the green trees and a little country air."

"It's done, then; all the odds taken," said simple Lord Fitz.

At that moment came up Ethel's next partner.

Bertie relinquished her, with a smothered sigh. He knew that he should not see her again that night, for her programme was full.

"We may meet in a country lane next week," he said, softly.

"We may," she said, with a smile that parted her lips bewitchingly, and then she was called away.

Bertie looked after her, then slowly descended the broad stairs, got his crush hat and strolled into the open street.

"That's the most sensible thing you've done for the last two hours," said Leicester Dodson's voice, behind him. "I'll follow your example," and he took out his cigar case. "Here, my man," he added, as his neat brougham drove up.

"Let us walk," said Bertie.

And they started slowly for the club.

It was very hot there, however, and the pair were soon in Leicester's chambers, which were in the same inn and only one floor below Bertie's.

Leicester Dodson was a wealthy man, and quite able to afford luxurious apartments in the Albany, or at Meurice's, but he preferred a quiet set of chambers near those of his fast friend, Bertie.

He did not work in them, but he read a great deal, and he enjoyed half an hour now and then spent in watching his hard-working friend.

He would sit in Bertie's armchair, with his legs extended before him, watching Bertie engaged on some article or poem or drawing, and, as he watched, would almost wish that he also had to work for his living.

So Mr. Leicester was somewhat of a philosopher and a cynic, as Bertie had said, and at times found life rather wearisome.

To-night he drew himself a chair – Bertie was extended upon an ancient, but comfortable, sofa, and, lighting a fresh cigar, rang for claret and ice.

"Dreadfully hot, Bert. What on earth makes us hang about this horrible town, in this terrible weather? Fancy staying in London when all the green fields are holding out their hands and shouting, 'Come, and roll on us'! Fashion is a wonderful thing – so are you. Why on earth don't you speak? I never knew you so silent for so many minutes together, in my life. Are you asleep?"

"No," said Bertie. "Push the claret across the table with the poker, will you? When did you say you were going down to the Cedars, Les?"

"When you like," said Leicester Dodson, coloring slightly and turning his face away from his companion. "To-morrow, if you like; I was going to say I wish I'd never left it, but I came up this week because – "

"Because what?" asked Bertie, as he stopped.

"Because," said Leicester Dodson, looking hard at the fire, in his grave, sedate way, "discretion is the better part of valor."

"What on earth do you mean?" exclaimed Bertie Fairfax. "You never mean to tell me you were afraid of a man?"

"No," said Leicester, with his cynical smile; "of a woman. There, don't ask me any more. I am not going to make a fool of myself, Bert, but while we're on the subject, I'll say that it would never do for either of us to do that."

"No," said Bertie Fairfax, with an unusual bitterness. "We can never marry, Les. You, because you are too – "

"Selfish," interrupted Mr. Dodson, placidly.

"And I, because I am too poor – "

"You will be rich enough some day, you clever dog," said Mr. Dodson, sententiously.

"Yes, when I'm an old man, gray-headed and bent double. Never mind."

"I won't. Don't you, either," said Leicester; "and now for the Cedars. Suppose we say the end of the week?"

"Yes, that will do," said Bertie. "The Lacklands – at least, some of them – are going down to Coombe Lodge next week."

"Oh," said Leicester, significantly, glancing at the frank, pleasant face of his friend.

"Yes," retorted Bertie, "and the Mildmays are still at the Park, I suppose?"

"Yes," said Leicester, shrugging his shoulders with an air of indifference he was far from feeling. "So that we shall be all together – like moths round a candle," he added, cynically, as Bertie rose, with a yawn, to mount to his own chambers.

Yes, all together, and near the meshes of that web which a skillful, cunning spider was weaving for them.

Captain Murpoint had laid his delicate web ready for his flies.