His lordship
had business in London, while Sir Denzil Warner, who came to Fareham House
daily, was also detained in the city by some special attraction, which made
hawk and hound, and even his worthy mother's company, indifferent to him.
Lady Fareham had an air of caring for neither town nor country, but on the
whole preferred town.
"London has become a positive desert--and the smoke from the smouldering
ruins poisons the garden and terrace whenever there is an east wind," she
complained. "But Oxfordshire would be a worse desert--and I believe I
should die of the spleen in a week, if I trusted myself in that great
rambling Abbey. I can just suffer life in London; so I suppose I had best
stay till his lordship has finished his business, about which he is so
secret and mysterious."
Denzil was more devoted, more solicitous to please than ever; and had a
better chance of pleasing now that most of her ladyship's fine visitors
had left town. He read aloud to Hyacinth and her sister as they worked--or
pretended to work--at their embroidery frames. He played the organ, and
sang duets with Angela. He walked with her on the terrace, in the cold,
bleak afternoon, and told her the news of the town--not the scandals and
trivialities which alone interested Lady Fareham, but the graver facts
connected with the state and the public welfare--the prospects of war or
peace, the outlook towards France and Spain, Holland and Sweden, Andrew
Marvel's last speech, or the last grant to the King, who might be relied
on to oppose no popular measure when his lieges were about to provide a
handsome subsidy or an increase of his revenue.
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