I put it to my impartial reader whether such a remark, though made with the kindest intentions, was not enough to drive any woman mad with spite. I broke away from Lady Scapegrace, and rushed back into the house. We were to leave Scamperley that day by the afternoon train. Gertrude was already packing my things; but I was obliged to go to the drawing-room for some work I had left there, and in the drawing-room I found a whole bevy of ladies assembled over their different occupations.
Women never spare each other; and I had to go through the ordeal, administered ruthlessly, and with a refinement of cruelty known only to ourselves. Even Mrs. Lumley, my own familiar friend, had no mercy.
"We ought to congratulate you, I conclude, Miss Coventry," said one.
"He's a relation of yours, is he not?" inquired another.
"Only a very great _friend_," laughed Mrs. Lumley, shaking her curls.
"It's a great marriage for _him_," some one else went on to say--"far better than he deserves. Poor thing! he'll lead her a sad life; he's a shocking flirt!"
Now, if there is one thing to my mind more contemptible than another, it is that male impostor whom ladies so charitably designate by the mild term "a flirt." It is all fair for _us_ to have our little harmless vanities and weaknesses. We are shamefully debarred from the nobler pursuits and avocations of life; so we may be excused for passing the time in such trivial manoeuvres as we can invent to excite the envy of our own and triumph over the pride of the opposite sex. But that a man should lower himself to act the part of a slave, "tied to an apron-string," and voluntarily be a fool, without being an honest one--it is too degrading!
Such a despicable being does us an infinity of harm: he encourages us to display all the worst points of the female character; he cheats us of our due amount of homage from many a noble heart, and perhaps robs us of our own dignity and self-respect. Yet such is the creature we encourage in our blind vanity, and whilst we vote him "so pleasant and agreeable," temper our commendation with the mild remonstrance, "though I am afraid he's rather a flirt!"
I saw the drawing-room on that morning was no place for me; so I folded my work, and curbing my tongue, which I own had a strong inclination to take its part in the war of words, I sought my own room, and found there, in addition to the litter and discomfort inseparable from the process of packing, a letter just arrived by the post. It was in Cousin Amelia's hand, and bore the Dangerfield postmark. "What now?" I thought, dreading to open it lest it might contain some fresh object of annoyance, some further inquiries or remarks calculated to irritate my already overdriven temper out of due bounds.