"I'm afraid," she began quite apologetically."I'm afraid that the servants, Burrill and the footmen, you know, will be--will think--""Say," he took her up, " let's give Burrill and the footmen the Willies out and out.If they can't stand it, they can write home to their mothers and tell 'em they've got to take 'em away.Burrill and the footmen needn't worry.They're suitable enough, and it's none of their funeral, anyhow."He wasn't upset in the least.Miss Alicia, who, as a timid dependent either upon "poor dear papa" or Mr.Temple Barholm, had been secretly, in her sensitive, ladylike little way, afraid of superior servants all her life, knowing that they realized her utterly insignificant helplessness, and resented giving her attention because she was not able to show her appreciation of their services in the proper manner--Miss Alicia saw that it had not occurred to him to endeavor to propitiate them in the least, because somehow it all seemed a joke to him, and he didn't care.After the first moment of being startled, she regarded him with a novel feeling, almost a kind of admiration.
Tentatively she dared to wonder if there was not something even rather--rather ARISTOCRATIC in his utter indifference.
If be had been a duke, he would not have regarded the servants' point of view; it wouldn't have mattered what they thought.Perhaps, she hastily decided, he was like this because, though he was not a duke, boot-blacking in New York notwithstanding he was a Temple Barholm.
There were few dukes as old of blood as a Temple Barholm.That must be it.She was relieved.
Whatsoever lay at the root of his being what he was and as he was, he somehow changed the aspect of things for her, and without doing anything but be himself, cleared the atmosphere of her dread of the surprise and mental reservations of the footmen and Burrill when she came down to dinner in her high-necked, much-cleaned, and much-repaired black silk, and with no more distinguishing change in her toilet than a white lace cap instead of a black one, and with "poor dear mamma's" hair bracelet with the gold clasp on her wrist, and a weeping-willow made of "poor dear papa's" hair in a brooch at her collar.
It was so curious, though still "nice," but he did not offer her his arm when they were going into the dining-room, and he took hold of hers with his hand and affectionately half led, half pushed, her along with him as they went.And he himself drew back her chair for her at the end of the table opposite his own.He did not let a footman do it, and he stood behind it, talking in his cheerful way all the time, and he moved it to exactly the right place, and then actually bent down and looked under the table.
"Here," he said to the nearest man-servant, "where's there a footstool? Get one, please," in that odd, simple, almost aristocratic way.It was not a rude dictatorial way, but a casual way, as though he knew the man was there to do things, and he didn't expect any time to be wasted.
And it was he himself who arranged the footstool, making it comfortable for her, and then he went to his own chair at the head of the table and sat down, smiling at her joyfully across the glass and silver and flowers.
"Push that thing in the middle on one side, Burrill," he said."It's too high.I can't see Miss Alicia."Burrill found it difficult to believe the evidence of his hearing.
"The epergne, sir? " he inquired.
"Is that what it's called, an apern? That's a new one on me.Yes, that's what I mean.Push the apern over.""Shall I remove it from the table, sir?" Burrill steeled himself to exact civility.Of what use to behave otherwise? There always remained the liberty to give notice if the worst came to the worst, though what the worst might eventually prove to be it required a lurid imagination to depict.The epergne was a beautiful thing of crystal and gold, a celebrated work of art, regarded as an exquisite possession.It was almost remarkable that Mr.Temple Barholm had not said, "Shove it on one side," but Burrill had been spared the poignant indignity of being required to "shove.""Yes, suppose you do.It's a fine enough thing when it isn't in the way, but I've got to see you while I talk, Miss Alicia," said Mr.
Temple Barholm.The episode of the epergne-- Burrill's expression, and the rigidly restrained mouths of Henry and James as the decoration was removed, leaving a painfully blank space of table-cloth until Burrill silently filled it with flowers in a low bowl--these things temporarily flurried Miss Alicia somewhat, but the pleased smile at the head of the table calmed even that trying moment.
Then what a delightful meal it was, to be sure! How entertaining and cheerful and full of interesting conversation! Miss Alicia had always admired what she reverently termed "conversation." She had read of the houses of brilliant people where they had it at table, at dinner and supper parties, and in drawing-rooms.The French, especially the French ladies, were brilliant conversationalists.They held "salons"in which the conversation was wonderful--Mme.de Stael and Mme.
Roland, for instance; and in England, Lady Mary Wortley Montague, Sydney Smith, and Horace Walpole, and surely Miss Fanny Burney, and no doubt L.E.L., whose real name was Miss Letitia Elizabeth Landon--what conversation they must have delighted their friends with and how instructive it must have been even to sit in the most obscure corner and listen!
