Sylvester Read Online Free PDF Page B

as Sylvester might be caught by some wretchedly designing creature quite unworthy of his attention. ‘And no fear of his marrying to disoblige you, as the saying goes,’ said Miss Penistone brightly, but with an anxious eye on the Duchess. ‘With so many girls on the catch for him I daresay you would be quite in a worry if he were not so sensible. That thought came into my head once—so absurd!—and I mentioned it to Louisa, when she was staying here in the summer. “Not he!” she said—you know her abrupt way! “He knows his worth too well!” Which set my mind quite at rest, as you may suppose.’
    It did not seem to have exercised the same beneficial effect on the Duchess’s mind, for she put up a hand to shade her eyes. Miss Penistone knew then what was amiss: she had had one of her bad nights, poor Elizabeth!
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    Sylvester made no further mention of his matrimonial plans; nor, since she could not fail to be cheerful whenever he came to visit her, did he suspect that his mother was troubled for him. Had he known it he would have supposed her merely to dislike the thought of his marriage, and would not have found it difficult to put any such scheme aside; if she had told him that she was more disturbed by the fear, which was taking uncomfortably strong possession of her mind, that he had become arrogant he would have been distressed to think that he could have said anything to put such a notion into her head, and would have done his best to joke her out of it. He knew it to be false: he was acquainted with several persons to whom the epithet might well apply, and he thought them intolerable. Few men were more petted and courted than he; there were not many hostesses who would not have forgiven him such slights as were not uncommonly dealt them by spoiled men of rank and fashion. But no hostess would ever be given cause to complain of Sylvester’s courtesy; and no insignificant person who perhaps rendered him a trifling service, or even did no more than touch his hat to him, would have reason to think himself despised. To reserve one’s civility for people of consequence was a piece of ill-breeding, dishonourable to oneself, as disgusting as to make a parade of greatness, or to curse a servant for clumsiness. Sylvester, who did not arrive at parties very late, refuse to stand up for country dances, take his bored leave within half an hour of his arrival, leave invitations unanswered, stare unrecognizingly at one of his tenants, or fail to exchange a few words with every one of his guests on Public Days at Chance, was not very likely to believe that a charge of arrogance levelled against him was anything but a calumny, emanating probably from a tuft-hunter whom he had snubbed, or some pert mushroom of society whose pretensions he had been obliged to depress.
    The Duchess knew this, and felt herself to be at a loss. She would have liked to have been able to consult with someone who had his interests as much to heart as herself, and must know better than she (since she never saw Sylvester but in her own apartments) how he conducted himself in society. There was only one such person; but although she felt both respect and affection for Lord William Rayne, Sylvester’s uncle, and for two years his guardian, very little reflection was needed to convince her that any attempt to get him to enter into her rather vague apprehensions would only make him think her the victim of such crotchets as might be expected to attack an invalid. Lord William was old-fashioned, very bluff and kind, but very full of starch as well. He had some influence over Sylvester, of whom he was as fond as he was proud: a word from him would carry weight, but unfortunately one of his terse reproofs would be more easily drawn from him by what he thought a failure on his nephew’s part to remember his exalted station, than by his placing himself on too high a form.
    He stayed at Chance at Christmas, and so far from affording the Duchess reassurance