“I see no reason for your being indelicate, Mr. Butterfield,” answered Mrs. Chatterton; and she rustled away, dignity in flounces.
Never had my flat known such wealth of plate and tissue-paper. Had Jupiter, in wooing Danaë, adopted a silver currency, he could scarce have crowded more lavishly the Grecian tower. Ladies slipped in and out of the miscellaneous collection with feminine calculations and judgments, which I noted in secret joy, estimating, apparently, the whole affair in its comparison with previous functions. And above all, and more insistent from their very quietness, were heard the mysterious confabulations.
I crossed over to Mrs. Carmichael and Caroline. “Well, little sister,” I said, glancing at Mrs. Carmichael, “and what unspeakable things has Mrs. Kit been telling you now?”
“Oh, Rollo,” she replied, placing her hand pleadingly on my sleeve, “she hasn’t. Please don’t tease me to-night, dear. I am not a bit happy. I almost wish I was not going to be married.”
“Then she has?” I returned. “Mrs. Kit, how could you? But there--you’re all alike. They’re not in the least interested in you, Carrie, my dear. It’s just a wedding. A woman and a bridecake----”
“What do you know about it?” Mrs. Carmichael said disdainfully.
“Madame,” I replied, “the exultation of your sex in all that pertains to a wedding is barely fit for the contemplation of a bachelor. Cannot you disguise your interest in some seemly manner?”
“If you’ll arrange these cards,” she retorted, “instead of concerning yourself with things of no moment to you, you’ll be of much more service. _Will_ you be so good as to label these presents--and with as little talk as is convenient to you?”
This to me, mind, in my own house! I looked to Caroline to espouse my cause and to resent the outrage on my feelings; but she merely looked plaintively. With a sigh, which Mrs. Kit, calling after me, qualified as “avoirdupois,” I tried Mrs. Vicars, who was fluttering round the other end of the glittering table, arranging the nuptial tribute in symphonic harmonies of the Kensington amateur order. Mrs. Vicars is æsthetic at a street’s length, and, as Millicent Dixon had once spitefully said, wears her art upon her sleeves for Jays to laugh at. She was placing her own offering, something in plush and oil colour, modestly, shrinkingly, all but out of sight.