Read Online The Determined Bachelor by Judith Harkness - Free Book Online

my own little scribblings might someday improve so much as not to be utterly put to shame by hers. It is my dearest wish that she will be able to guide my hand a little. That, of course, must wait a while. I dare not confess just yet.
    As to Sir Basil Ives and my new charge, I must start quite at the beginning to do the tale sufficient justice. You will laugh out loud if I do it at all well. If not, only imagine it were dramatized by Mr. Sheridan, for it has the makings of a farce, or of a comedy, at the least.
    I was set down in Huxsley by the post chaise, as you will remember, and was met there by a formidable equipage bearing the arms of the Earl of Hargate, who is my employer’s elder brother. There was no one to meet me save a manservant who looked as if he was inclined to gossip, but could not, alas, for he was riding outpost. The female servant who rode within said not two words during all the journey to London, but sat perfectly motionless in her seat, staring straight ahead and hardly blinking. Withall, she seemed so eloquent in her silence that it was obvious she disliked me: a thin, dour, very dry looking woman about fifty, who, as it turned out, is Lord Hargate’s housekeeper. From what I have seen of His Lordship’s establishment, I do not wonder but she spends the better part of her time riding about the countryside thus, for Hargate House is a perfect shambles where the children are never put to bed, the mistress never leaves her own, and the chief amusement of the butler is whist with the upstairs maid. But never mind, I shall tell you more about that family another time.
    Arriving in London about seven in the evening, we came straight here. “Here” is the house—and a very grand one, too—which Sir Basil has taken for the winter so that his ward may get a little acquainted with him before she is transported out of England. It is a modern building in Regent’s Terrace, which you will remember as being only half finished when we came to visit two years ago. Now it is nearly complete, and much handsomer than I supposed then it would ever be. That great expanse of marble is quite astonishing to behold, and when the trees have grown up a littlearound it, I believe it will be splendid. Our own house (you see I am already become quite proprietary) is a grand place like its neighbours—so close, in fact, that the walls on the side adjoin, and there are no windows save in front and back. The frontispiece is made of onyx, the roof seems to be held up by immense columns, very like an ancient Greek temple, which in truth is the style of the whole building. Mr. Richard Nash, whom you have heard so much discussed, is the architect of this whole scheme: of all of Regent’s Terrace, the new park around Carlton House, and St. James’s Street. They all bear a distinct resemblance to those etchings of the Acropolis in Papa’s study. I heard one wit the other day describe Mr. Nash’s plan as “a scheme to get up England in fancy dress,” which may be just, but I am much more pleased with his ideas of ornamentation than some of the others which are evidenced in the city. But enough for the time being. Now I must give you the picture of my own life, as it has been since Saturday last.
    I was met in very grand and very exemplary style by the Ambassador and Lady Cardovan. Sir Basil Ives struck me at once as coming from a novel (perhaps one not yet written?!): tall, exceedingly handsome, and strikingly cold. His features are finely chiseled, his mouth very finely made but rather too set for my own taste, his eyes gray and piercing. Were it not for a rare flicker of humour around his upper lip and at the most extreme corner of those eyes, I should be inclined to think him utterly devoid of humour as well as emotion. As it is, I cannot quite make him out, but am inclined to believe he is the diplomat par excellence . He is perfectly charming, if charm consists only in uttering