“Truth, Miss Hardacre, I think you misread the lad’s meaning. He referred to country fashions; and who can blame him? La, dear Miss Perkaby is about to sing again; a divine voice, and such grace and breeding,” and the Lady Letitia sat in stately silence through the song with a beatific appreciative smirk upon her bedizened face.
“Delicious,” she chattered at the end, bowing and beaming at Miss Julia Perkaby; “the lass has such soul. My dear nephew dotes on Miss Perkaby’s singing, and he is forever humming her songs over to himself. And do you sing, my dear?”
Miss Hardacre, flushed and angry, answered that she did.
“And Richard never told me. What a memory the lad has! Upon my soul, Miss Hardacre, the simpleton informed me that your hair was nut brown, when I can see with my own eyes how much gold there is in it. My poor nephew’s pate is always stuffed full of poetry. I expect that you have found him very absent-minded at times, my dear.”
Miss Hardacre’s cheeks were covered with a rare bloom, and she looked as though it would have afforded her exquisite pleasure to slap the Lady Letitia’s face.
“I find Cousin Richard very intelligent,” she retorted; “he has read some of his poetry to me. I can admire his genius, madam, though I do not pretend to be clever.”
The dowager elevated her eyebrows and nodded.
“Indeed!” she said, with a chuckle, “why, the lad must read his poetry to half the girls in the county. Mary Sugg, I have heard the doctor say, compares his verse to Spenser’s. Of course, my dear Miss Hardacre, Richard must find a woman of your mature years a most discerning critic.”
“Then, madam,” said the younger lady, with a toss of the head, “you must hear a great deal of Mr. Richard’s poetry?”
“I, my dear? I cannot abide the stuff. The dear lad showed me a little poem he had written on a certain young lady,” and the dowager beamed; “a young lady—well, I must not give away the boy’s secrets. It was all about dark eyes and raven locks, hearts and darts, love and dove. Terrible! All boys scribble this species of stuff, my dear. They discover a new goddess every month, and write poems about her cherry lips till a cherrier-lipped wench appears. By-the-way, who is that very over-dressed person—that young farmer fellow with his back to the fire?”