第323章

'I must know more of this, sir, before you leave the house,' said Lady Demolines. He saw that between them both there might probably be a very bad quarter of an hour in store for him; but he swore to himself that no union of dragon and tigress should extract from him a word that could be taken as a promise of marriage.

The old woman was now kneeling by the head of the sofa, and Johnny was standing close by her side. Suddenly Madalina opened her eyes--opened them very wide, and gazed around her. Then slowly she raised herself on the sofa, and turned her face first upon her mother and then upon Johnny. 'You here, mamma!' she said.

'Dearest one, I am near you. Be not afraid,' said her ladyship.

'Afraid! Why should I be afraid? John! My own John! Mamma, he is my own.' And she put out her arms to him, as though calling to him to come to her. Things were now very bad with John Eames --so bad that he would have given a very considerable lump out of Lord De Guest's legacy to be able to escape at once into the street. The power of a woman, when she chooses to use it recklessly, is, for the moment, almost unbounded.

'I hope you find yourself a little better,' said John, struggling to speak, as though he were not utterly crushed by the occasion.

Lady Demolines slowly raised herself from her knees, helping herself with her hands against the shoulder of the sofa--for though still very clever, she was old and stiff--and then offered both her hands to Johnny. Johnny cautiously took one of them, finding himself unable to decline them both. 'My son!' she exclaimed; and before he knew where he was the old woman had succeeded in kissing his nose and whiskers. 'My son!' she said again.

Now that the time had come for facing the dragon and the tigress in their wrath. If they were to be faced at all, the time for facing them had certainly arrived. 'I don't quite understand,' he said, almost in a whisper. Madalina put out one arm towards him, and the fingers trembled.

Her lips were opened, and the white row of interior ivory might be seen plainly; but at the present conjuncture of affairs she spoke not a word.

She spoke not a word; but her arm remained stretched towards him, and her fingers did not cease to tremble.

'You do not understand!' said Lady Demolines, drawing herself back and looking, in her short open cloak, like a knight who has donned his cuirass, but has forgotten to put on his leg-gear. And she shook the bright ribbons of her cap, as a knight in his wrath shakes the crest of his helmet. 'You do not understand, Mr Eames! What is it, sir, that you do not understand?'

'There is some misconception, I mean,' said Johnny.

'Mother!' said Madalina, turning her eyes from her recent lover to her tender parent; trembling all over, but still keeping her hand extended.

'Mother!'

'My darling! But leave him to me, dearest. Compose yourself.'

''Twas the word that he said--this moment; before he pressed me to his heart.'

'I thought you were fainting,' said Johnny.

'Sir!' said Lady Demolines, as she spoke, shook her crest, and glared at him, and almost flew at him in her armour.

'It may be that nature has given way with me, and that I have been in a dream,' said Madalina.

'That which mine eyes saw was no dream,' said Lady Demolines. 'Mr Eames, I have given you the sweetest name that can fall from an old woman's lips. I have called you my son.'

'Yes, you did, I know. But, as I said before, there is some mistake. Iknow how proud I ought to be, and how happy, and all that kind of thing.

But--' Then there came a screech from Madalina, which would have awakened the dead, had there been any dead in that house. The page and cook, however, took no notice of it, whether they were awakened or not.

And having screeched, Madalina stood erect upon the floor, and she also glared at her recreant lover. The dragon and the tiger were there before him now, and he knew that it behoved him to look to himself. As he had a battle to fight, might it not be best to put a bold face upon it? 'The truth is,' said he, 'that I don't understand this kind of thing.'

'Not understand it, sir?' said the dragon.

'Leave him to me, mother,' said the tigress, shaking her head again, but with a kind of shake differing from that which she had used before.

'This is my business, and I'll have it out for myself. If he thinks I am going to put up with this kind of nonsense he's mistaken. I've been straightforward and above board with you, Mr Eames, and I expect to be treated in the same way in return. Do you mean to tell my mother that you deny that we are engaged?'