"You don't come and call on me," said the Colonel.
"What! -- all the way down to Aldershot? I should like, but Idon't quite dare to do that."
The visit was very successful. Though it was expected, Hamel was found in his artist's costume, with a blouse or loose linen tunic fitted close round his throat, and fastened with a belt round his waist. Lucy thought that in this apparel he was certainly as handsome as could ever have been any Apollo -- and so thinking, had contrived her little plans in such a way that he should certainly be seen at his best. To her thinking Colonel Stubbs was not a handsome man. Hamel's hair was nearly black, and she preferred dark hair. Hamel's features were regular, whereas the Colonel's hair was red, and he was known for a large mouth and broad nose, which were not obliterated though they were enlightened by the brightness of his eyes. "Yes," said Ayala to herself, as she looked at Hamel; "he is very good looking, but nobody would take him for an Angel of Light.""Ayala has come to see you at your work," said Lucy, as they entered the studio.
"I am delighted to see her. Do you remember where we last met, Miss Dormer?""Miss Dormer, indeed," said Ayala. "I am not going to call you Mr Hamel. Yes; it was high up among the seats of the Coliseum.
There has a great deal happened to us all since then.""And I remember you at the bijou."
"I should think so. I knew then so well what was going to happen,"said Ayala.
"What did you know?"
"That you and Lucy were to fall in love with each other.""I had done my part of it already," said he.
"Hardly that, Isadore," said Lucy, "or you would not have passed me in Kensington Gardens without speaking to me.""But I did speak to you. It was then I learned where to find you.""That was the second time. If I had remained away as I ought to have done, I suppose you never would have found me."Ayala was then taken round to see all those magnificent groups and figures which Sir Thomas would have disposed of at so many shillings apiece under the auctioneer's hammer. "It was cruel.
-- was it not?" said Lucy.
"He never saw them, you know," said Ayala, putting in a good-natured word for her uncle.
"If he had," said the sculptor, "he would have doubted the auctioneer's getting anything. I have turned it all in my mind very often since, and I think that Sir Thomas was right.""I am sure he was wrong," said Lucy. "He is very good-natured, and nobody can be more grateful to another person than I am to him -- but I won't agree that he was right about that.""He never would have said it if he had seen them," again pleaded Ayala.
"They will never fetch anything as they are," continued the sculptor, "and I don't suppose that when I made them I thought they would.
They have served their purpose, and I sometimes feel inclined to break them up and have them carted away.""Isadore!" exclaimed Lucy.
"For what purpose?" asked Ayala.
"They were the lessons which I had to teach myself, and the play which I gave to my imagination. Who wants a great figure of Beelzebub like that in his house?""I call it magnificent," said Ayala.
"His name is Lucifer -- not Beelzebub," said Lucy. "You call him Beelzebub merely to make little of him.""It is difficult to do that, because he is nearly ten feet high.
And who wants a figure of Bacchus? The thing is, whether, having done a figure of Bacchus, I may not be better able to do a likeness of Mr Jones, when he comes to sit for his bust at the request of his admiring friends. For any further purpose that it will answer, Bacchus might just as well be broken up and carted away in the dust-cart." To this, however, the two girls expressed their vehement opposition, and were of opinion that the time would come when Beelzebub and Bacchus, transferred to marble, would occupy places of honour in some well-proportioned hall built for the purpose of receiving them. "I shall be quite content,"said Hamel, "if the whole family of the Jones's will have their busts done about the size of life, and stand them up over their bookshelves. My period for Beelzebubs has gone by." The visit, on the whole, was delightful. Lucy was contented with the almost more than divine beauty of her lover, and the two sisters, as they made their return journey to Kingsbury Crescent in another hansom, discussed questions of art in a spirit that would have been delightful to any aspiring artist who might have heard them.
Then came the wedding, of which some details were given at the close of the last chapter, at which two brides who were very unlike to each other were joined in matrimony to two bridegrooms as dissimilar. But the Captain made himself gracious to the sculptor who was now to be connected with him, and declared that he would always look upon Lucy as a second sister to his dear Gertrude.
And Gertrude was equally gracious, protesting, when she was marshalled to walk up to the altar first, that she did not like to go before her darling Lucy. But the dimensions of the church admitted but of one couple at a time, and Gertrude was compelled to go in advance. Colonel Stubbs was there acting as best man to Hamel, while Lord John Battledore performed the same service for Captain Batsby. Lord John was nearly broken-hearted by the apostacy of a second chum, having heard that the girl whom Frank Houston had not succeeded in marrying was now being taken by Batsby without a shilling. "Somebody had to bottle-hold for him," said Lord John, defending himself at the club afterwards, "and I didn't like to throw the fellow over, though he is such a fool! And there was Stubbs, too," continued his Lordship, "going to take the other girl without a shilling! There's Stubbs, and Houston, and Batsby, all gone and drowned themselves. It's just the same as though they'd drowned themselves!" Lord John was horrified -- nay, disgusted -- by the folly of the world. Nevertheless, before the end of the year, he was engaged to marry a very pretty girl as devoid of fortune as our Ayala.
