第20章

Her cousin Tom had come to her, and had been to her as a Newfoundland dog is when he jumps all over you just when he has come out of a horse-pond. She would have liked Tom had he kept his dog-like gambols at a proper distance. But when he would cover her with muddy water he was abominable. But this Augusta had not understood.

With Mr Traffick there would be no dog-like gambols; and, as he was not harsh to her, Ayala liked him. She had liked her uncle.

Such men were, to her thinking, more like dogs than lovers. She sang when Mr Traffick asked her, and made a picture for him, and went with him to the Coliseum, and laughed at him about Supply and Demand. She was very pretty, and perhaps Mr Traffick did like to look at her.

"I really think you were too free with Mr Traffick last night,"Augusta said to her one morning.

"Free! How free?"

"You were -- laughing at him."

"Oh, he likes that," said Ayala. "All that time we were up at the top of St Peter's I was quizzing him about his speeches.

He lets me say just what I please."

This was wormwood. In the first place there had been a word or two between the lovers about that going up of St Peter's, and Augusta had refused to join them. She had wished Septimus to remain down with her -- which would have been tantamount to preventing any of the party from going up; but Septimus had persisted on ascending. Then Augusta had been left for a long hour alone with her mother. Gertrude had no doubt gone up, but Gertrude had lagged during the ascent. Ayala had skipped up the interminable stairs and Mr Traffick had trotted after her with admiring breathless industry. This itself, with the thoughts of the good time which Septimus might be having at the top, was very bad. But now to be told that she, Ayala, should laugh at him; and that he, Septimus, should like it! "I suppose he takes you to be a child," said Augusta; "but if you are a child you ought to conduct yourself.""I suppose he does perceive the difference," said Ayala.

She had not in the least known what the words might convey --had probably meant nothing. But to Augusta it was apparent that Ayala had declared that her lover, her Septimus, had preferred her extreme youth to the more mature charms of his own true love -- or had, perhaps, preferred Ayala's raillery to Augusta's serious demeanour. "You are the most impertinent person I ever knew in my life," said Augusta, rising from her chair and walking slowly out of the room. Ayala stared after her, not above half comprehending the cause of the anger.

Then came the very serious affair of the ball. The Marchesa had asked that her dear little friend Ayala Dormer might be allowed to come over to a little dance which her own girls were going to have. Her own girls were so fond of Ayala! There would be no trouble. There was a carriage which would be going somewhere else, and she would be fetched and taken home. Ayala at once declared that she intended to go, and her Aunt Emmeline did not refuse her sanction. Augusta was shocked, declaring that the little dance was to be one of the great balls of the season, and pronouncing the whole to be a falsehood; but the affair was arranged before she could stop it.

But Mr Traffick's affair in the matter came more within her range.

"Septimus," she said, "I would rather you would not go to that woman's party." Septimus had been asked only on the day before the party -- as soon, indeed, as his arrival had become known to the Marchesa.

"Why, my own one?"

"She has not treated mamma well -- nor yet me.""Ayala is going." He had no right to call her Ayala. So Augusta thought.

"My cousin is behaving badly in the matter, and mamma ought not to allow her to go. Who knows anything about the Marchesa Baldoni?""Both he and she are of the very best families in Rome," said Mr Traffick, who knew everything about it.

"At any rate they are behaving very badly to us, and I will take it as a favour that you do not go. Asking Ayala, and then asking you, as good as from the same house, is too marked. You ought not to go."Perhaps Mr Traffick had on some former occasion felt some little interference with his freedom of action. Perhaps he liked the acquaintance of the Marchesa. Perhaps he liked Ayala Dormer.

Be that as it might, he would not yield. "Dear Augusta, it is right that I should go there, if it be only for half an hour."This he said in a tone of voice with which Augusta was already acquainted, which she did not love, and which, when she heard it, would make her think of her L#120,000. When he had spoken he left her, and she began to think of her L#120,000.

They both went, Ayala and Mr Traffick -- and Mr Traffick, instead of staying half an hour, brought Ayala back at three o'clock in the morning. Though Mr Traffick was nearly as old as Uncle Tringle, yet he could dance. Ayala had been astonished to find how well he could dance, and thought that she might please her cousin Augusta by praising the juvenility of her lover at luncheon the next day. She had not appeared at breakfast, but had been full of the ball at lunch. "Oh, dear, yes, I dare say there were two hundred people there.""That is what she calls a little dance," said Augusta, with scorn.

"I suppose that is the Italian way of talking about it," said Ayala.

"Italian way! I hate Italian ways."

"Mr Traffick liked it very much. I'm sure he'll tell you so.

I had no idea he would care to dance."

Augusta only shook herself and turned up her nose. Lady Tringle thought it necessary to say something in defence of her daughter's choice. "Why should not Mr Traffick dance like any other gentleman?""Oh, I don't know. I thought that a man who makes so many speeches in Parliament would think of something else. I was very glad he did, for he danced three times with me. He can waltz as lightly as -- " As though he were young, she was going to say, but then she stopped herself.

"He is the best dancer I ever danced with," said Augusta.