Isabel turned away; Pansy was about to be restored to her, and she welcomed the diversion.We know how much she liked Lord Warburton; she thought him pleasanter even than the sum of his merits warranted;there was something in his friendship that appeared a kind of resource in case of indefinite need; it was like having a large balance at the bank.She felt happier when he was in the room; there was something reassuring in his approach; the sound of his voice reminded her of the beneficence of nature.Yet for all that it didn't suit her that he should be too near her, that he should take too much of her good-will for granted.She was afraid of that; she averted herself from it; she wished he wouldn't.She felt that if he should come too near, as it were, it might be in her to flash out and bid him keep his distance.Pansy came back to Isabel with another rent in her skirt, which was the inevitable consequence of the first and which she displayed to Isabel with serious eyes.There were too many gentlemen in uniform; they wore those dreadful spurs, which were fatal to the dresses of little maids.It hereupon became apparent that the resources of women are innumerable.Isabel devoted herself to Pansy's desecrated drapery; she fumbled for a pin and repaired the injury; she smiled and listened to her account of her adventures.Her attention, her sympathy were immediate and active; and they were in direct proportion to a sentiment with which they were in no way connected-a lively conjecture as to whether Lord Warburton might be trying to make love to her.It was not simply his words just then; it was others as well; it was the reference and the continuity.This was what she thought about while she pinned up Pansy's dress.If it were so, as she feared, he was of course unwitting; he himself had not taken account of his intention.But this made it none the more auspicious, made the situation none the less impossible.The sooner he should get back into right relations with things the better.He immediately began to talk to Pansy-on whom it was certainly mystifying to see that he dropped a smile of chastened devotion.Pansy replied, as usual, with a little air of conscientious aspiration; he had to bend toward her a good deal in conversation, and her eyes, as usual, wandered up and down his robust person as if he had offered it to her for exhibition.She always seemed a little frightened; yet her fright was not of the painful character that suggests dislike; on the contrary, she looked as if she knew that he knew she liked him.Isabel left them together a little and wandered toward a friend whom she saw near and with whom she talked till the music of the following dance began, for which she knew Pansy to be also engaged.The girl joined her presently, with a little fluttered flush, and Isabel, who scrupulously took Osmond's view of his daughter's complete dependence, consigned her, as a precious and momentary loan, to her appointed partner.About all this matter she had her own imaginations, her own reserves; there were moments when Pansy's extreme adhesiveness made each of them, to her sense, look foolish.But Osmond had given her a sort of tableau of her position as his daughter's duenna, which consisted of gracious alternations of concession and contraction; and there were directions of his which she liked to think she obeyed to the letter.
Perhaps, as regards some of them, it was because her doing so appeared to reduce them to the absurd.
After Pansy had been led away, she found Lord Warburton drawing near her again.She rested her eyes on him steadily; she wished she could sound his thoughts.But he had no appearance of confusion."She has promised to dance with me later," he said.
"I'm glad of that.I suppose you've engaged her for the cotillion."At this he looked a little awkward."No, I didn't ask her for that.It's a quadrille.""Ah, you're not clever!" said Isabel almost angrily."I told her to keep the cotillion in case you should ask for it.""Poor little maid, fancy that!" And Lord Warburton laughed frankly.
"Of course I will if you like."
"If I like? Oh, if you dance with her only because I like it-!
"I'm afraid I bore her.She seems to have a lot of young fellows on her book."Isabel dropped her eyes, reflecting rapidly; Lord Warburton stood there looking at her and she felt his eyes on her face.She felt much inclined to ask him to remove them.She didn't do so, however;she only said to him, after a minute, with her own raised:
"Please let me understand."
"Understand what?"
"You told me ten days ago that you'd like to marry my stepdaughter.
You've not forgotten it!"
"Forgotten it? I wrote to Mr.Osmond about it this morning.""Ah," said Isabel, "he didn't mention to me that he had heard from you."Lord Warburton stammered a little."I-I didn't send my letter.""Perhaps you forgot that."
"No, I wasn't satisfied with it.It's an awkward sort of letter to write, you know.But I shall send it to-night.""At three o'clock in the morning?"
"I mean later, in the course of the day.""Very good.You still wish then to marry her?""Very much indeed."