Smash hit

“Hem!” said I. “Is the figure that of a bald elderly gentleman?”

Louisa sighed her affirmative.

“By the bye,” continued I. “It is constantly reported that he has taken to — ”

“What?” interrupted the Marchioness. “Not proof spirits, I hope! Watered Hollands I know scarcely satisfied him.”

“No, madam, repress your fears. I was alluding merely to his dress. The pantaloons are gone: he sports white tights and silks.”

Low as the whisper was in which I communicated these stunning tidings, it thrilled along Louisa’s nerves to her heart. During the pause which followed, I waited in breathless expectation for the effect. It came at last. Tittering faintly, she exclaimed, “You don’t say so! Lord! how odd! But after all, I think it’s judicious, you know. Nothing can exhibit more perfect symmetry than his leg, and then he does get older of course, and a change of costume was becoming advisable. Yet I should almost fear there would be too much deep shade and — at this hour — the unbroken retirement of the vale.

“Charles,” said my fair companion in her usual voice, half a whisper, half a murmur. “Charles, what a sweet night — a premature summer night! It only wants the moon to make it perfect — then I could see my villa. Those stars are not close enough to bring out the white front fully from its laurels. And yet I do see a light glittering there. Is it not from my drawing-room window?”

“Probably,” was my answer, and I said no more. Her ladyship’s softness is at times too surfeiting, more especially when she approaches the brink of the sentimental.

“Charles,” she pursued, in no wise abashed by my coolness. “How many fond recollections come on us at such a time as this! Where do you think my thoughts always stray on a summer night? What image do you think ‘a cloudless clime and starry skies’ always suggests?”

“Perhaps,” said I, “that of the most noble Richard, Marquis of Wellesley, as you last saw him, reposing in gouty chair and stool, with eyelids gently closed by the influence of the pious libations in claret with which he has concluded the dinner of rice-currie, devilled turkey and guava.”

Louisa, instead of being offended, laughed with silver sound. “You are partly right,” said she. “The figure you have described does indeed form a portion of my recollections. Now, will you finish the picture, or shall I do it in your stead?”

“I resign the pencil into hands better qualified for its management,” rejoined I.

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