THE WAGER BOATS.
Tuesday morning rose, bright and propitious: a contrast to the two
previous days arranged for the boat-race. All was pleasure, bustle,
excitement at Hartledon: but the coolness that had arisen between the
brothers was noticed by some of the guests. Neither of them was disposed
to take the first step towards reconciliation: and, indeed, a little
incident that occurred that morning led to another ill word between
them. An account that had been standing for more than two years was sent
in to Lord Hartledon's steward; it was for some harness, a saddle, a
silver-mounted whip, and a few trifles of that sort, supplied by a small
tradesman in the village. Lord Hartledon protested there was nothing of
the sort owing; but upon inquiry the debtor proved to be Mr. Percival
Elster. Lord Hartledon, vexed that any one in the neighbourhood should
have waited so long for his money, said a sharp word on the score to
Percival; and the latter retorted as sharply that it was no business of
his. Again Val was angry with himself, and thus gave vent to his temper.
The fact was, he had completely forgotten the trifling debt, and was as
vexed as Hartledon that it should have been allowed to remain unpaid: but
the man had not sent him any reminder whilst he was away.
"Pay it to-day, Marris," cried Lord Hartledon to his steward. "I won't
have this sort of thing at Calne."
His tone was one of irritation--or it sounded so to the ears of his
conscious brother, and Val bit his lips. After that, throughout the
morning, they maintained a studied silence towards each other; and
this was observed, but was not commented on. Val was unusually quiet
altogether: he was saying to himself that he was sullen.
The starting-hour for the race was three o'clock; but long before that
time the scene was sufficiently animated, not to say exciting. It was a
most lovely afternoon. Not a trace remained of the previous day's rain;
and the river--wide just there, as it took the sweeping curve of the
point--was dotted with these little wager boats. Their owners for the
time being, in their white boating-costume, each displaying his colours,
were in highest spirits; and the fair gazers gathered on the banks were
anxious as to the result. The favourite was Lord Hartledon--by long odds,
as Mr. Shute grumbled. Had his lordship been known not to possess the
smallest chance, nine of those fair girls out of ten would, nevertheless,
have betted upon him. Some of them were hoping to play for a deeper stake
than a pair of gloves. A staff, from which fluttered a gay little flag,
had been driven into the ground, exactly opposite the house; it was the
starting and the winning point. At a certain distance up the river, near
to the mill, a boat was moored in mid-stream: this they would row round,
and come back again.
At three o'clock they were to take the boats; and, allowing for time
being wasted in the start, might be in again and the race won in
three-quarters-of-an-hour. But, as is often the case, the time was not
adhered to; one hindrance after another occurred; there was a great deal
of laughing and joking, forgetting of things, and of getting into order;
and at a quarter to four they were not off. But all were ready at last,
and most of the rowers were each in his little cockle-shell. Lord
Hartledon lingered yet in the midst of the group of ladies, all clustered
together at one spot, who were keeping him with their many comments and
questions. Each wore the colours of her favourite: the crimson and purple
predominating, for they were those of their host. Lady Kirton displayed
her loyalty in a conspicuous manner. She had an old crimson gauze skirt
on, once a ball-dress, with ends of purple ribbon floating from it and
fluttering in the wind; and a purple head-dress with a crimson feather.
Maude, in a spirit of perversity, displayed a blue shoulder-knot, timidly
offered to her by a young Oxford man who was staying there, Mr. Shute;
and Anne Ashton wore the colours given her by Lord Hartledon.
"I can't stay; you'd keep me here all day: don't you see they are waiting
for me?" he laughingly cried, extricating himself from the throng. "Why,
Anne, my dear, is it you? How is it I did not see you before? Are you
here alone?"
She had not long joined the crowd, having come up late from the Rectory,
and had been standing outside, for she never put herself forward
anywhere. Lord Hartledon drew her arm within his own for a moment and
took her apart.
"Arthur came up with me: I don't know where he is now. Mamma was afraid
to venture, fearing the grass might be damp."
"And the Rector _of course_ would not countenance us by coming," said
Lord Hartledon, with a laugh. "I remember his prejudices against boating
of old."
"He is coming to dinner."
"As you all are; Arthur also to-day. I made the doctor promise that. A
jolly banquet we'll have, too, and toast the winner. Anne, I just wanted
to say this to you; Val is in an awful rage with me for letting that
matter get to the ears of your father, and I am not pleased with him; so
altogether we are just now treating each other to a dose of sullenness,
and when we do speak it's to growl like two amiable bears; but it shall
make no difference to what I said last week. All shall be made smooth,
even to the satisfaction of your father. You may trust me."
He ran off from her, stepped into the skiff, and was taking the sculls,
when he uttered a sudden exclamation, leaped out again, and began to run
with all speed towards the house.
"What is it? Where are you going?" asked the O'Moore, who was the
appointed steward.
"I have forgotten--" _What_, they did not catch; the word was lost on the
air.
"It is bad luck to turn back," called out Maude. "You won't win."
He was already half-way to the house. A couple of minutes after entering
it he reappeared again, and came flying down the slopes at full speed.
Suddenly his foot slipped, and he fell to the ground. The only one who
saw the accident was Mr. O'Moore; the general attention at that moment
being concentrated upon the river. He hastened back. Hartledon was then
gathering himself up, but slowly.
"No damage," said he; "only a bit of a wrench to the foot. Give me your
arm for a minute, O'Moore. This ground must be slippery from yesterday's
rain."
Mr. O'Moore held out his arm, and Hartledon took it. "The ground is not
slippery, Hart; it's as dry as a bone."
"Then what caused me to slip?"
"The rate you were coming at. Had you not better give up the contest, and
rest?"
"Nonsense! My foot will be all right in the skiff. Let us get on; they'll
all be out of patience."
When it was seen that something was amiss with him, that he leaned rather
heavily on the O'Moore, eager steps pressed round him. Lord Hartledon
laughed, making light of it; he had been so clumsy as to stumble, and had
twisted his ankle a little. It was nothing.
"Stay on shore and give it a rest," cried one, as he stepped once more
into the little boat. "I am sure you are hurt."
"Not I. It will have rest in the boat. Anne," he said, looking up at her
with his pleasant smile, "do you wear my colours still?"
She touched the knot on her bosom, and smiled back to him, her tone full
of earnestness. "I would wear them always."
And the countess-dowager, in her bedecked flounces and crimson feather,
looked as if she would like to throw the knot and its wearer into the
river, in the wake of the wager boats. After one or two false starts,
they got off at last.
"Do you think it seemly, this flirtation of yours with Lord Hartledon?"
Anne turned in amazement. The face of the old dowager was close to her;
the snub nose and rouged cheeks and false flaxen front looked ready to
eat her up.
"I have no flirtation with Lord Hartledon, Lady Kirton; or he with me.
When I was a child, and he a great boy, years older, he loved me and
petted me as a little sister: I think he does the same still."
"My daughter tells me you are counting upon one of the two. If I say to
you, do not be too sanguine of either, I speak as a friend; as your
mother might speak. Lord Hartledon is already appropriated; and Val
Elster is not worth appropriating."
Was she mad? Anne Ashton looked at her, really doubting it. No, she was
only vulgar-minded, and selfish, and utterly impervious to all sense of
shame in her scheming. Instinctively Anne moved a pace further off.
"I do not think Lord Hartledon is appropriated yet," spoke Anne, in a
little spirit of mischievous retaliation. "That some amongst his present
guests would be glad to appropriate him may be likely enough; but what if
he is not willing to be appropriated? He said to Mr. Elster, last week,
that they were wasting their time."
"Who's Mr. Elster?" cried the angry dowager. "What right has he to be
at Hartledon, poking his nose into everything that does not concern
him?--what right has he, I ask?"
"The right of being Lord Hartledon's brother," carelessly replied Anne.
"It is a right he had best not presume upon," rejoined Lady Kirton.
"Brothers are brothers as children; but the tie widens as they grow up
and launch out into their different spheres. There's not a man of all
Hartledon's guests but has more right to be here than Val Elster."
"Yet they are brothers still."
"Brothers! I'll take care that Val Elster presumes no more upon the tie
when Maude reigns at--"
For once the countess-dowager caught up her words. She had said more than
she had meant to say. Anne Ashton's calm sweet eyes were bent upon her,
waiting for more.
"It is true," she said, giving a shake to the purple tails, and taking a
sudden resolution, "Maude is to be his wife; but I ought not to have let
it slip out. It was unintentional; and I throw myself on your honour,
Miss Ashton."
"But it is not true?" asked Anne, somewhat perplexed.
"It _is_ true. Hartledon has his own reasons for keeping it quiet at
present; but--you'll see when the time comes. Should I take upon myself
so much rule here, but that it is to be Maude's future home?"
"I don't believe it," cried Anne, as the old story-teller sailed off.
"That she loves him, and that her mother is anxious to secure him, is
evident; but he is truthful and open, and would never conceal it. No, no,
Lady Maude! you are cherishing a false hope. You are very beautiful, but
you are not worthy of him; and I should not like you for my sister-in-law
at all. That dreadful old countess-dowager! How she dislikes Val, and how
rude she is! I'll try not to come in her way again after to-day, as long
as they are at Hartledon."
"What are you thinking of, Anne?"
"Oh, not much," she answered, with a soft blush, for the questioner was
Mr. Elster. "Do you think your brother has hurt himself much, Val?"
"I didn't know he had hurt himself at all," returned Val rather coolly,
who had been on the river at the time in somebody's skiff, and saw
nothing of the occurrence. "What has he done?"
"He slipped down on the slopes and twisted his ankle. I suppose they will
be coming back soon."
"I suppose they will," was the answer. Val seemed in an ungracious
mood. He and Mr. O'Moore and young Carteret were the only three who had
remained behind. Anne asked Val why he did not go and look on; and he
answered, because he didn't want to.
It was getting on for five o'clock when the boats were discerned
returning. How they clustered on the banks, watching the excited rowers,
some pale with their exertions, others in a white heat! Captain Dawkes
was first, and was doing all he could to keep so; but when only a boat's
length from the winning-post another shot past him, and won by half a
length. It was the young Oxonian, Mr. Shute--though indeed it does not
much matter who it was, save that it was not Lord Hartledon.
"Strike your colours, ladies, you that sport the crimson and purple!"
called out a laughing voice from one of the skiffs. "Oxford blue wins."
Lord Hartledon arrived last. He did not get up for some minutes after the
rest were in. In short, he was distanced.
"Hart has hurt his arm as well as his foot," observed one of the others,
as he came alongside. "That's why he got distanced."
"No, it was not," dissented Lord Hartledon, looking up from his skiff at
the crowd of fair faces bent down upon him. "My arm is all right; it only
gave me a few twinges when I first started. My oar fouled, and I could
not get right again; so, finding I had lost too much ground, I gave up
the contest. Anne, had I known I should disgrace my colours, I would not
have given them to _you_."
"Miss Ashton loses, and Maude wins!" cried the countess-dowager,
executing a little dance of triumph. "Maude is the only one who wears
the Oxford blue."
It was true. The young Oxonian was a retiring and timid man, and none had
voluntarily assumed his colours. But no one heeded the countess-dowager.
"You are like a child, Hartledon, denying that your arm's damaged!"
exclaimed Captain Dawkes. "I know it is: I could see it by the way you
struck your oar all along."
What feeling is it in man that prompts him to disclaim physical
pain?--make light of personal injury? Lord Hartledon's ankle was
swelling, at the bottom of the boat; and without the slightest doubt
his arm _was_ paining him, although perhaps at the moment not very
considerably. But he maintained his own assertions, and protested his
arm was as sound as the best arm present. "I could go over the work again
with pleasure," cried he.
"Nonsense, Hart! You could not."
"And I _will_ go over it," he added, warming with the opposition. "Who'll
try his strength with me? There's plenty of time before dinner."
"I will," eagerly spoke young Carteret, who had been, as was remarked,
one of those on land, and was wild to be handling the oars. "If Dawkes
will let me have his skiff, I'll bet you ten to five you are distanced
again, Hartledon."
Perhaps Lord Hartledon had not thought his challenge would be taken
seriously. But when he saw the eager, joyous look of the boy Carteret--he
was not yet nineteen--the flushed pleasure of the beardless face, he
would not have retracted it for the world. He was just as good-natured
as Percival Elster.
"Dawkes will let you have his skiff, Carteret."
Captain Dawkes was exceedingly glad to be rid of it. Good boatman though
he was, he rarely cared to spend his strength superfluously, when nothing
was to be gained by it, and had no fancy to row his skiff back to its
moorings, as most of the others were already doing with theirs. He leaped
out.
"Any one but you, Hartledon, would be glad to come out of that
tilting thing, and enjoy a rest, and get your face cool," cried the
countess-dowager.
"I dare say they might, ma'am. I'm afraid I am given to obstinacy; always
was. Be quick, Carteret."
Mr. Carteret was hastily stripping himself of his coat, and any odds and
ends of attire he deemed superfluous. "One moment, Hartledon; only one
moment," came the joyous response.
"And you'll come home with your arm and your ankle like your colours,
Hartledon--crimson and purple," screamed the dowager. "And you'll be laid
up, and go on perhaps to locked jaw; and then you'll expect me to nurse
you!"
"I shall expect nothing of the sort, ma'am, I pledge you my word; I'll
nurse myself. All ready, Carteret?"
"All ready. Same point as before, Hart?"
"Same point: round the boat and home again."
"And it's ten sovs. to five, Hart?"
"All right. You'll lose, Carteret."
Carteret laughed. He saw the five sovereigns as surely in his possession
as he saw the sculls in his hands. There was no trouble with the start
this time, and they were off at once.
Lord Hartledon took the lead. He was spurring his strength to the
uttermost: perhaps out of bravado; that he might show them nothing was
the matter with his arm. But Mr. Carteret gained on him; and as they
turned the point and went out of sight, the young man's boat was the
foremost.
The race had been kept--as the sporting men amongst them styled it--dark.
Not an inkling of it had been suffered to get abroad, or, as Lord
Hartledon had observed, they should have the banks swarming. The
consequence was, that not more than half-a-dozen curious idlers had
assembled: those were on the opposite side, and had now gone down with
the boats to Calne. No spectators, either on the river or the shore,
attended this lesser contest: Lord Hartledon and Mr. Carteret had it all
to themselves.
And meanwhile, during the time Lord Hartledon had remained at rest in his
skiff under the winning flag, Percival Elster never addressed one word to
him. There he stood, on the edge of the bank; but not a syllable spoke
he, good, bad, or indifferent.
Miss Ashton was looking for her brother, and might just as well have
looked for a needle in a bottle of hay. Arthur was off somewhere.
"You need not go home yet, Anne," said Val.
"I must. I have to dress for dinner. It is all to be very smart to-night,
you know," she said, with a merry laugh.
"With Shute in the post of honour. Who'd have thought that awkward, quiet
fellow would win? I will see you home, Anne, if you must go."
Miss Ashton coloured vividly with embarrassment. In the present state of
affairs, she did not know whether that might be permitted: poor Val was
out of favour at the Rectory. He detected the feeling, and it tended to
vex him more and more.
"Nonsense, Anne! The veto has not yet been interposed, and they can't
kill you for allowing my escort. Stay here if you like: if you go, I
shall see you home."
It was quite imperative that she should go, for dinner at Hartledon was
that evening fixed for seven o'clock, and there would be little enough
time to dress and return again. They set out, walking side by side. Anne
told him of what Lord Hartledon had said to her that day; and Val
coloured with shame at the sullenness he had displayed, and his heart
went into a glow of repentance. Had he met his brother then, he had
clasped his hand, and poured forth his contrition.
He met some one else instead, almost immediately. It was Dr. Ashton,
coming for Anne. Percival was not wanted now: was not invited to continue
his escort. A cold, civil word or two passed, and Val struck across the
grove into the high-road, and returned to Hartledon.
He was about to turn in at the lodge-gates with his usual greeting to
Mrs. Capper when his attention was caught by a figure coming down the
avenue. A man in a long coat, his face ornamented with red whiskers. It
required no second glance for recognition. Whiskers and coat proclaimed
their owner at once; and if ever Val Elster's heart leaped into his
mouth, it certainly leaped then.
He went on, instead of turning in; quietly, as if he were only a stranger
enjoying an evening stroll up the road; but the moment he was past the
gates he set off at breakneck speed, not heeding where. That the man was
there to arrest him, he felt as sure as he had ever felt of anything in
this world; and in his perplexity he began accusing every one of
treachery, Lord Hartledon and Pike in particular.
The river at the back in this part took a sweeping curve, the road kept
straight; so that to arrive at a given point, the one would be more
quickly traversed than the other. On and on went Val Elster; and as soon
as an opening allowed, he struck into the brushwood on the right,
intending to make his way back by the river to Hartledon.
But not yet. Not until the shades of night should fall on the earth:
he would have a better chance of getting away from that shark in the
darkness than by daylight. He propped his back against a tree and waited,
hating himself all the time for his cowardice. With all his scrapes and
dilemmas, he had never been reduced to this sort of hiding.
And his pursuer had struck into the wood after him, passed straight
through it, though with some little doubt and difficulty, and was already
by the river-side, getting there just as Lord Hartledon was passing in
his skiff. Long as this may have seemed in telling, it took only a short
time to accomplish; still Lord Hartledon had not made quick way, or he
would have been further on his course in the race.
Would the sun ever set?--daylight ever pass? Val thought _not_, in his
impatience; and he ventured out of his shelter very soon, and saw for his
reward--the long coat and red whiskers by the river-side, their owner
conversing with a man. Val went further away, keeping the direction of
the stream: the brushwood might no longer be safe. He did not think they
had seen him: the man he dreaded had his back to him, the other his face.
And that other was Pike.