The Coryston Family | Page 7

she said, quietly.
He took his snubbing without resentment.
"I suppose so. I don't often miss, do I? Well, I hear Marcia was the
beauty at the Shrewsbury House ball, and that--" he whispered
something, laughing in her ear.
Lady Coryston looked a little impatient.
"Oh, I dare say. And if it's not he, it will be some one else. She'll marry
directly. I always expected it. Well, now I must go. Have you seen

Arthur?"
"Mother! Hullo, Sir Wilfrid!"
There was the young orator, flushed and radiant. But his mother could
say very little to him, for the magnificent person in charge of the
Gallery and its approaches intervened. "No talking allowed here, sir,
please." Even Lady Coryston must obey. All she could add to her
hurried congratulations was:
"You're coming in to-night, remember, Arthur?--nine-thirty."
"Yes, I've paired. I'm coming. But what on earth's up, mother?"
Her lips shut closely.
"Remember, nine-thirty!" She turned and went back into the darkness
of the Gallery.
Arthur hesitated a moment in the passage outside. Then he turned back
toward the little entrance-room opposite the entrance to the ordinary
Ladies' Gallery, where he found another attendant.
"Is Miss Glenwilliam here?" he inquired, carelessly.
"Yes, sir, in the front row, with Mrs. Verity and Mrs. Frant. Do you
wish to speak to her, sir? The Gallery's pretty empty."
Arthur Coryston went in. The benches sloped upward, and on the
lowest one, nearest the grille, he saw the lady of his quest, and was
presently bending over her.
"Well," he said, flushing, "I suppose you thought it all bosh!"
"Not at all! That's what you have to say. What else can you say? You
did it excellently."
Her lightly mocking eyes looked into his. His flush deepened.

"Are you going to be at the Frenshams' dance?" he asked her, presently.
"We're not invited. They're too savage with father. But we shall be at
the Opera to-morrow night."
His face lightened. But no more talk was possible. A Minister was up,
and people were crowding back into the Gallery. He hurriedly pressed
her hand and departed.

CHAPTER II
Lady Coryston and her daughter had made a rapid and silent meal.
Marcia noticed that her mother was unusually pale, and attributed it
partly to the fatigue and bad air of the House of Commons, partly to the
doings of her eldest brother. What were they all going to meet for after
dinner--her mother, her three brothers, and herself? They had each
received a formal summons. Their mother "wished to speak to them on
important business." So Arthur--evidently puzzled--had paired for the
evening, and would return from the House at nine-thirty; James had
written to say he would come, and Coryston had wired an hour before
dinner--"Inconvenient, but will turn up."
What was it all about? Some business matter clearly. Marcia knew very
well that the family circumstances were abnormal. Mothers in Lady
Coryston's position, when their husbands expire, generally retire to a
dower-house, on a jointure; leaving their former splendors--the family
mansion and the family income--behind them. They step down from
their pedestal, and efface themselves; their son becomes the head of the
family, and the daughter-in-law reigns in place of the wife. Nobody for
many years past could ever have expected Lady Coryston to step down
from anything. Although she had brought but a very modest dowry,
such from earliest days had been the strength and dominance of her
character, that her divine right of rule in the family had never been
seriously questioned by any of her children except Coryston; although
James, who had inherited money from his grandmother, was entirely
independent of her, and by the help of a detached and humorous mind

could often make his mother feel the stings of criticism, when others
were powerless. And as for Coryston, who had become a
quasi-Socialist at Cambridge, and had ever since refused to suit his
opinions in the slightest degree to his mother's, his long absences
abroad after taking his degree had for some years reduced the personal
friction between them; and it was only since his father's death, which
had occurred while he himself was in Japan, and since the terms of his
father's will had been known, that Coryston had become openly and
angrily hostile.
Why should Coryston, a gentleman who denounced property, and was
all for taxing land and landlords into the Bankruptcy Court, resent so
bitterly his temporary exclusion from the family estates? Marcia could
not see that there was any logical answer. If landlordism was the curse
of England, why be angry that you were not asked to be a landlord?
And really--of late--his behavior! Never coming to see his
mother--writing the most outrageous things in support of the
Government--speaking for Radical candidates in their very own
county--denouncing by name