第51章

"Yes, it is. You wouldn't stand up till you had heard all about me.""I don't know anything about you now."

"Then come and walk about and I'll tell you. Then we shall be ready for a waltz. Do you waltz well?""Do you?"

"I'll back myself against any Englishman, Frenchman, German, or Italian, for a large sum of money. I can't come quite up to the Poles. The fact is, the honester the man is the worse he always dances. Yes; I see what you mean. I must be a rogue. Perhaps I am -- perhaps I'm only an exception. I knew your father.""Papa!"

"Yes, I did. He was down at Stalham with the Alburys once. That was five years ago, and he told me he had a daughter named Ayala.

I didn't quite believe him."

"Why not?"

"It is such an out-of-the-way name."

"It's as good as Jonathan, at any rate." And Ayala again nodded her head.

"There's a prejudice about Jonathan, as there is about Jacob and Jonah. I never could quite tell why. I was going to marry a girl once with a hundred thousand pounds, and she wouldn't have me at last because she couldn't bring her lips to say Jonathan.

Do you think she was right?"

"Did she love you?" said Ayala, looking up into his face.

"Awfully! But she couldn't bear the name; so within three months she gave herself and all her money to Mr Montgomery Talbot de Montpellier. He got drunk, and threw her out of the window before a month was over. That's what comes of going in for sweet names.""I don't believe a word of it," said Ayala.

"Very well. Didn't Septimus Traffick marry your cousin?""Of course he did, about a month ago."

"He is another friend of mine. Why didn't you go to your cousin's marriage?""There were reasons," said Ayala.

"I know all about it," said the Colonel. "You quarrelled with Augusta down in Scotland, and you don't like poor Traffick because he has got a bald head.""I believe you're a conjuror," said Ayala.

"And then your cousin was jealous because you went to the top of St Peter's, and because you would walk with Mr Traffick on the Pincian. I was in Rome, and saw all about it.""I won't have anything more to do with you," said Ayala.

"And then you quarrelled with one set of uncles and aunts, and now you live with another.""Your aunt told you that."

"And I know your cousin, Tom Tringle."

"You know Tom?" asked Ayala.

"Yes; he was ever so good to me in Rome about a horse; I like Tom Tringle in spite of his chains. Don't you think, upon the whole, if that young lady had put up with Jonathan she would have done better than marry Montpellier? But now they're going to waltz, come along."Thereupon Ayala got up and danced with him for the next ten minutes.

Again and again before the evening was over she danced with him;and although, in the course of the night, many other partners had offered themselves, and many had been accepted, she felt that Colonel Jonathan Stubbs had certainly been the partner of the evening. Why should he be so hideously ugly? said Ayala to herself, as she wished him goodnight before she left the room with the Marchesa and Nina.

"What do you think of my nephew?" asked the Marchesa, when they were in the carriage together.

"Do tell us what you think of Jonathan," said Nina.

"I thought he was very good-natured."

"And very handsome?"

"Nina, don't be foolish. Jonathan is one of the most rising officers in the British service, and luckily he can be that without being beautiful to look at.""I declare," said Nina, "sometimes, when he is talking, I think him perfectly lovely. The fire comes out of his eyes, and he rubs his old red hairs about till they sparkle. Then he shines all over like a carbuncle, and every word he says makes me die of laughter.""I laughed too," said Ayala.

"But you didn't think him beautiful," said Nina.

"No, I did not," said Ayala. "I liked him very much, but I thought him very ugly. Was it true about the young lady who married Mr Montgomery de Montpellier and was thrown out of a window a week afterwards?""There is one other thing I must tell you about Jonathan," said Nina. "You must not believe a word that he says.""That I deny," said the Marchesa; "but here we are. And now, girls, get out of the carriage and go up to bed at once."Ayala, before she went to sleep, and again when she woke in the morning, thought a great deal about her new friend. As to shining like a carbuncle -- perhaps he did, but that was not her idea of manly beauty. And hair ought not to sparkle. She was sure that Colonel Stubbs was very, very ugly. She was almost disposed to think that he was the ugliest man she had ever seen. He certainly was a great deal worse than her cousin Tom, who, after all, was not particularly ugly. But, nevertheless, she would very much rather dance with Colonel Stubbs. She was sure of that, even without reference to Tom's objectionable love-making. Upon the whole she liked dancing with Colonel Stubbs, ugly as he was.

Indeed, she liked him very much. She had spent a very pleasant evening because he had been there. "It all depends upon whether anyone has anything to say." That was the determination to which she came when she endeavoured to explain to herself how it had come to pass that she had liked dancing with anybody so very hideous. The Angel of Light would of course have plenty to say for himself, and would be something altogether different in appearance.