On the stroke of the hour when Ripton Thompson was accustomed to
consult his gold watch for practical purposes, and sniff freedom and
the forthcoming dinner, a burglarious foot entered the clerk’s office
where he sat, and a man of a scowling countenance, who looked a
villain, and whom he was afraid he knew, slid a letter into his hands,
nodding that it would be prudent for him to read, and be silent. Ripton
obeyed in alarm. Apparently the contents of the letter relieved his
conscience; for he reached down his hat, and told Mr. Beazley to inform
his father that he had business of pressing importance in the West, and
should meet him at the station. Mr. Beazley zealously waited upon the
paternal Thompson without delay, and together making their observations
from the window, they beheld a cab of many boxes, into which Ripton
darted and was followed by one in groom’s dress. It was Saturday, the
day when Ripton gave up his law-readings, magnanimously to bestow
himself upon his family, and Mr. Thompson liked to have his son’s arm
as he walked down to the station; but that third glass of Port which
always stood for his second, and the groom’s suggestion of aristocratic
acquaintances, prevented Mr. Thompson from interfering: so Ripton was
permitted to depart.
In the cab Ripton made a study of the letter he held. It had the
preciseness of an imperial mandate.
“Dear Ripton,—You are to get lodgings for a lady immediately. Not a
word to a soul. Then come along with Tom.
R.D.F.”
“Lodgings for a lady!” Ripton meditated aloud: “What sort of lodgings?
Where am I to get lodgings? Who’s the lady?—I say!” he addressed the
mysterious messenger. “So you’re Tom Bakewell, are you, Tom?”
Tom grinned his identity.
“Do you remember the rick, Tom? Ha! ha! We got out of that neatly. We
might all have been transported, though. I could have convicted you,
Tom, safe! It’s no use coming across a practised lawyer. Now tell me.”
Ripton having flourished his powers, commenced his examination: “Who’s
this lady?”
“Better wait till you see Mr. Richard, sir,” Tom resumed his scowl to
reply.
“Ah!” Ripton acquiesced. “Is she young, Tom?”
Tom said she was not old.
“Handsome, Tom?”
“Some might think one thing, some another,” Tom said.
“And where does she come from now?” asked Ripton, with the friendly
cheerfulness of a baffled counsellor.
“Comes from the country, sir.”
“A friend of the family, I suppose? a relation?”
Ripton left this insinuating query to be answered by a look. Tom’s face
was a dead blank.
“Ah!” Ripton took a breath, and eyed the mask opposite him. “Why,
you’re quite a scholar, Tom! Mr. Richard is well. All right at home?”
“Come to town this mornin’ with his uncle,” said Tom. “All well, thank
ye, sir.”
“Ha!” cried Ripton, more than ever puzzled, “now I see. You all came to
town to-day, and these are your boxes outside. So, so! But Mr. Richard
writes for me to get lodgings for a lady. There must be some mistake—he
wrote in a hurry. He wants lodgings for you all—eh?”
“’M sure I d’n know what he wants,” said Tom. “You’d better go by the
letter, sir.”
Ripton re-consulted that document. “‘Lodgings for a lady, and then come
along with Tom. Not a word to a soul.’ I say! that looks like—but he
never cared for them. You don’t mean to say, Tom, he’s been running
away with anybody?”
Tom fell back upon his first reply: “Better wait till ye see Mr.
Richard, sir,” and Ripton exclaimed: “Hanged if you ain’t the tightest
witness I ever saw! I shouldn’t like to have you in a box. Some of you
country fellows beat any number of cockneys. You do!”
Tom received the compliment stubbornly on his guard, and Ripton, as
nothing was to be got out of him, set about considering how to perform
his friend’s injunctions; deciding firstly, that a lady fresh from the
country ought to lodge near the parks, in which direction he told the
cabman to drive. Thus, unaware of his high destiny, Ripton joined the
hero, and accepted his character in the New Comedy.
It is, nevertheless, true that certain favoured people do have
beneficent omens to prepare them for their parts when the hero is in
full career, so that they really may be nerved to meet him; ay, and to
check him in his course, had they that signal courage. For instance,
Mrs. Elizabeth Berry, a ripe and wholesome landlady of advertised
lodgings, on the borders of Kensington, noted, as she sat rocking her
contemplative person before the parlour fire this very March afternoon,
a supernatural tendency in that fire to burn all on one side: which
signifies that a wedding approaches the house. Why—who shall say? Omens
are as impassable as heroes. It may be because in these affairs the
fire is thought to be all on one side. Enough that the omen exists, and
spoke its solemn warning to the devout woman. Mrs. Berry, in her
circle, was known as a certificated lecturer against the snares of
matrimony. Still that was no reason why she should not like a wedding.
Expectant, therefore, she watched the one glowing cheek of Hymen, and
with pleasing tremours beheld a cab of many boxes draw up by her bit of
garden, and a gentleman emerge from it in the set of consulting an
advertisement paper. The gentleman required lodgings for a lady.
Lodgings for a lady Mrs. Berry could produce, and a very roseate smile
for a gentleman; so much so that Ripton forgot to ask about the terms,
which made the landlady in Mrs. Berry leap up to embrace him as the
happy man. But her experienced woman’s eye checked her enthusiasm. He
had not the air of a bridegroom: he did not seem to have a weight on
his chest, or an itch to twiddle everything with his fingers. At any
rate, he was not the bridegroom for whom omens fly abroad. Promising to
have all ready for the lady within an hour, Mrs. Berry fortified him
with her card, curtsied him back to his cab, and floated him off on her
smiles.
The remarkable vehicle which had woven this thread of intrigue through
London streets, now proceeded sedately to finish its operations. Ripton
was landed at a hotel in Westminster. Ere he was halfway up the stairs,
a door opened, and his old comrade in adventure rushed down. Richard
allowed no time for salutations. “Have you done it?” was all he asked.
For answer Ripton handed him Mrs. Berry’s card. Richard took it, and
left him standing there. Five minutes elapsed, and then Ripton heard
the gracious rustle of feminine garments above. Richard came a little
in advance, leading and half-supporting a figure in a black-silk mantle
and small black straw bonnet; young—that was certain, though she held
her veil so close he could hardly catch the outlines of her face;
girlishly slender, and sweet and simple in appearance. The hush that
came with her, and her soft manner of moving, stirred the silly youth
to some of those ardours that awaken the Knight of Dames in our bosoms.
He felt that he would have given considerable sums for her to lift her
veil. He could see that she was trembling—perhaps weeping. It was the
master of her fate she clung to. They passed him without speaking. As
she went by, her head passively bent, Ripton had a glimpse of noble
tresses and a lovely neck; great golden curls hung loosely behind,
pouring from under her bonnet. She looked a captive borne to the
sacrifice. What Ripton, after a sight of those curls, would have given
for her just to lift her veil an instant and strike him blind with
beauty, was, fortunately for his exchequer, never demanded of him. And
he had absolutely been composing speeches as he came along in the cab!
gallant speeches for the lady, and sly congratulatory ones for his
friend, to be delivered as occasion should serve, that both might know
him a man of the world, and be at their ease. He forgot the smirking
immoralities he had revelled in. This was clearly serious. Ripton did
not require to be told that his friend was in love, and meant that life
and death business called marriage, parents and guardians consenting or
not.
Presently Richard returned to him, and said hurriedly, “I want you now
to go to my uncle at our hotel. Keep him quiet till I come. Say I had
to see you—say anything. I shall be there by the dinner hour. Rip! I
must talk to you alone after dinner.”
Ripton feebly attempted to reply that he was due at home. He was very
curious to hear the plot of the New Comedy; and besides, there was
Richard’s face questioning him sternly and confidently for signs of
unhesitating obedience. He finished his grimaces by asking the name and
direction of the hotel. Richard pressed his hand. It is much to obtain
even that recognition of our devotion from the hero.
Tom Bakewell also received his priming, and, to judge by his chuckles
and grins, rather appeared to enjoy the work cut out for him. In a few
minutes they had driven to their separate destinations; Ripton was left
to the unusual exercise of his fancy. Such is the nature of youth and
its thirst for romance, that only to act as a subordinate is pleasant.
When one unfurls the standard of defiance to parents and guardians, he
may be sure of raising a lawless troop of adolescent ruffians, born
rebels, to any amount. The beardless crew know that they have not a
chance of pay; but what of that when the rosy prospect of thwarting
their elders is in view? Though it is to see another eat the Forbidden
Fruit, they will run all his risks with him. Gaily Ripton took rank as
lieutenant in the enterprise, and the moment his heart had sworn the
oaths, he was rewarded by an exquisite sense of the charms of
existence. London streets wore a sly laugh to him. He walked with a
dandified heel. The generous youth ogled aristocratic carriages, and
glanced intimately at the ladies, overflowingly happy. The
crossing-sweepers blessed him. He hummed lively tunes, he turned over
old jokes in his mouth unctuously, he hugged himself, he had a mind to
dance down Piccadilly, and all because a friend of his was running away
with a pretty girl, and he was in the secret.
It was only when he stood on the doorstep of Richard’s hotel, that his
jocund mood was a little dashed by remembering that he had then to
commence the duties of his office, and must fabricate a plausible story
to account for what he knew nothing about—a part that the greatest of
sages would find it difficult to perform. The young, however, whom
sages well may envy, seldom fail in lifting their inventive faculties
to the level of their spirits, and two minutes of Hippias’s angry
complaints against the friend he serenely inquired for, gave Ripton his
cue.
“We’re in the very street—within a stone’s-throw of the house, and he
jumps like a harlequin out of my cab into another; he must be mad—that
boy’s got madness in him!—and carries off all the boxes—my
dinner-pills, too! and keeps away the whole of the day, though he
promised to go to the doctor, and had a dozen engagements with me,”
said Hippias, venting an enraged snarl to sum up his grievances.
Ripton at once told him that the doctor was not at home.
“Why, you don’t mean to say he’s been to the doctor?” Hippias cried
out.
“He has called on him twice, sir,” said Ripton, expressively. “On
leaving me he was going a third time. I shouldn’t wonder that’s what
detains him—he’s so determined.”
By fine degrees Ripton ventured to grow circumstantial, saying that
Richard’s case was urgent and required immediate medical advice; and
that both he and his father were of opinion Richard should not lose an
hour in obtaining it.
“He’s alarmed about himself,” said Ripton, and tapped his chest.
Hippias protested he had never heard a word from his nephew of any
physical affliction.
“He was afraid of making you anxious, I think, sir.”
Algernon Feverel and Richard came in while he was hammering at the
alphabet to recollect the first letter of the doctor’s name. They had
met in the hall below, and were laughing heartily as they entered the
room. Ripton jumped up to get the initiative.
“Have you seen the doctor?” he asked, significantly plucking at
Richard’s fingers.
Richard was all abroad at the question.
Algernon clapped him on the back. “What the deuce do you want with
doctor, boy?”
The solid thump awakened him to see matters as they were. “Oh, ay! the
doctor!” he said, smiling frankly at his lieutenant. “Why, he tells me
he’d back me to do Milo’s trick in a week from the present day.—Uncle,”
he came forward to Hippias, “I hope you’ll excuse me for running off as
I did. I was in a hurry. I left something at the railway. This stupid
Rip thinks I went to the doctor about myself. The fact was, I wanted to
fetch the doctor to see you here—so that you might have no trouble, you
know. You can’t bear the sight of his instruments and skeletons—I’ve
heard you say so. You said it set all your marrow in revolt—‘fried your
marrow,’ I think were the words, and made you see twenty thousand
different ways of sliding down to the chambers of the Grim King. Don’t
you remember?”
Hippias emphatically did not remember, and he did not believe the
story. Irritation at the mad ravishment of his pill-box rendered him
incredulous. As he had no means of confuting his nephew, all he could
do safely to express his disbelief in him, was to utter petulant
remarks on his powerlessness to appear at the dinner-table that day:
upon which—Berry just then trumpeting dinner—Algernon seized one arm of
the Dyspepsy, and Richard another, and the laughing couple bore him
into the room where dinner was laid, Ripton sniggering in the rear, the
really happy man of the party.
They had fun at the dinner-table. Richard would have it; and his
gaiety, his by-play, his princely superiority to truth and heroic
promise of overriding all our laws, his handsome face, the lord and
possessor of beauty that he looked, as it were a star shining on his
forehead, gained the old complete mastery over Ripton, who had been,
mentally at least, half patronizing him till then, because he knew more
of London and life, and was aware that his friend now depended upon him
almost entirely.
After a second circle of the claret, the hero caught his lieutenant’s
eye across the table, and said:
“We must go out and talk over that law-business, Rip, before you go. Do
you think the old lady has any chance?”
“Not a bit!” said Ripton, authoritatively.
“But it’s worth fighting—eh, Rip?”
“Oh, certainly!” was Ripton’s mature opinion.
Richard observed that Ripton’s father seemed doubtful. Ripton cited his
father’s habitual caution. Richard made a playful remark on the
necessity of sometimes acting in opposition to fathers. Ripton agreed
to it—in certain cases.
“Yes, yes! in certain cases,” said Richard.
“Pretty legal morality, gentlemen!” Algernon interjected; Hippias
adding: “And lay, too!”
The pair of uncles listened further to the fictitious dialogue, well
kept up on both sides, and in the end desired a statement of the old
lady’s garrulous case; Hippias offering to decide what her chances were
in law, and Algernon to give a common-sense judgment.
“Rip will tell you,” said Richard, deferentially signalling the lawyer.
“I’m a bad hand at these matters. Tell them how it stands, Rip.”
Ripton disguised his excessive uneasiness under endeavours to right his
position on his chair, and, inwardly praying speed to the claret jug to
come and strengthen his wits, began with a careless aspect: “Oh,
nothing! She—very curious old character! She—a—wears a wig. She—a—very
curious old character indeed! She—a—quite the old style. There’s no
doing anything with her!” and Ripton took a long breath to relieve
himself after his elaborate fiction.
“So it appears,” Hippias commented, and Algernon asked: “Well? and
about her wig? Somebody stole it?” while Richard, whose features were
grim with suppressed laughter, bade the narrator continue.
Ripton lunged for the claret jug. He had got an old lady like an
oppressive bundle on his brain, and he was as helpless as she was. In
the pangs of ineffectual authorship his ideas shot at her wig, and then
at her one characteristic of extreme obstinacy, and tore back again at
her wig, but she would not be animated. The obstinate old thing would
remain a bundle. Law studies seemed light in comparison with this
tremendous task of changing an old lady from a doll to a human
creature. He flung off some claret, perspired freely, and, with a
mental tribute to the cleverness of those author fellows, recommenced:
“Oh, nothing! She—Richard knows her better than I do—an old
lady—somewhere down in Suffolk. I think we had better advise her not to
proceed. The expenses of litigation are enormous! She—I think we had
better advise her to stop short, and not make any scandal.”
“And not make any scandal!” Algernon took him up. “Come, come! there’s
something more than a wig, then?”
Ripton was commanded to proceed, whether she did or no. The luckless
fictionist looked straight at his pitiless leader, and blurted out
dubiously, “She—there’s a daughter.”
“Born with effort!” ejaculated Hippias. “Must give her pause after
that! and I’ll take the opportunity to stretch my length on the sofa.
Heigho! that’s true what Austin says: ‘The general prayer should be for
a full stomach, and the individual for one that works well; for on that
basis only are we a match for temporal matters, and able to contemplate
eternal.’ Sententious, but true. I gave him the idea, though! Take care
of your stomachs, boys! and if ever you hear of a monument proposed to
a scientific cook or gastronomic doctor, send in your subscriptions. Or
say to him while he lives, Go forth, and be a Knight! Ha! They have a
good cook at this house. He suits me better than ours at Raynham. I
almost wish I had brought my manuscript to town, I feel so much better.
Aha! I didn’t expect to digest at all without my regular incentive. I
think I shall give it up.—What do you say to the theatre to-night,
boys!”
Richard shouted, “Bravo, uncle!”
“Let Mr. Thompson finish first,” said Algernon. “I want to hear the
conclusion of the story. The old girl has a wig and a daughter. I’ll
swear somebody runs away with one of the two! Fill your glass, Mr.
Thompson, and forward!”
“So somebody does,” Ripton received his impetus. “And they’re found in
town together,” he made a fresh jerk. “She—a—that is, the old
lady—found them in company.”
“She finds him with her wig on in company!” said Algernon. “Capital!
Here’s matter for the lawyers!”
“And you advise her not to proceed, under such circumstances of
aggravation?” Hippias observed, humorously twinkling with his stomachic
contentment.
“It’s the daughter,” Ripton sighed, and surrendering to pressure,
hurried on recklessly, “A runaway match—beautiful girl!—the only son of
a baronet—married by special licence. A—the point is,” he now
brightened and spoke from his own element, “the point is whether the
marriage can be annulled, as she’s of the Catholic persuasion and he’s
a Protestant, and they’re both married under age. That’s the point.”
Having come to the point he breathed extreme relief, and saw things
more distinctly; not a little amazed at his leader’s horrified face.
The two elders were making various absurd inquiries, when Richard sent
his chair to the floor, crying, “What a muddle you’re in, Rip! You’re
mixing half-a-dozen stories together. The old lady I told you about was
old Dame Bakewell, and the dispute was concerning a neighbour of hers
who encroached on her garden, and I said I’d pay the money to see her
righted!”
“Ah,” said Ripton, humbly, “I was thinking of the other. Her garden!
Cabbages don’t interest me”—
“Here, come along,” Richard beckoned to him savagely. “I’ll be back in
five minutes, uncle,” he nodded coolly to either.
The young men left the room. In the hall-passage they met Berry,
dressed to return to Raynham. Richard dropped a helper to the
intelligence into his hand, and warned him not to gossip much of
London. Berry bowed perfect discreetness.
“What on earth induced you to talk about Protestants and Catholics
marrying, Rip?” said Richard, as soon as they were in the street.
“Why,” Ripton answered, “I was so hard pushed for it, ’pon my honour, I
didn’t know what to say. I ain’t an author, you know; I can’t make a
story. I was trying to invent a point, and I couldn’t think of any
other, and I thought that was just the point likely to make a jolly
good dispute. Capital dinners they give at those crack hotels. Why did
you throw it all upon me? I didn’t begin on the old lady.”
The hero mused, “It’s odd! It’s impossible you could have known! I’ll
tell you why, Rip! I wanted to try you. You fib well at long range, but
you don’t do at close quarters and single combat. You’re good behind
walls, but not worth a shot in the open. I just see what you’re fit
for. You’re staunch—that I am certain of. You always were. Lead the way
to one of the parks—down in that direction. You know?—where she is!”
Ripton led the way. His dinner had prepared this young Englishman to
defy the whole artillery of established morals. With the muffled roar
of London around them, alone in a dark slope of green, the hero,
leaning on his henchman, and speaking in a harsh clear undertone,
delivered his explanations. Doubtless the true heroic insignia and
point of view will be discerned, albeit in common private’s uniform.
“They’ve been plotting against me for a year, Rip! When you see her,
you’ll know what it was to have such a creature taken away from you. It
nearly killed me. Never mind what she is. She’s the most perfect and
noble creature God ever made! It’s not only her beauty—I don’t care so
much about that!—but when you’ve once seen her, she seems to draw music
from all the nerves of your body; but she’s such an angel. I worship
her. And her mind’s like her face. She’s pure gold. There, you’ll see
her to-night.
“Well,” he pursued, after inflating Ripton with this rapturous
prospect, “they got her away, and I recovered. It was Mister Adrian’s
work. What’s my father’s objection to her? Because of her birth? She’s
educated; her manners are beautiful—full of refinement—quick and soft!
Can they show me one of their ladies like her?—she’s the daughter of a
naval lieutenant! Because she’s a Catholic? What has religion to do
with”—he pronounced “Love!” a little modestly—as it were a blush in his
voice.
“Well, when I recovered I thought I did not care for her. It shows how
we know ourselves! And I cared for nothing. I felt as if I had no
blood. I tried to imitate my dear Austin. I wish to God he were here. I
love Austin. He would understand her. He’s coming back this year, and
then—but it’ll be too late then.—Well, my father’s always scheming to
make me perfect—he has never spoken to me a word about her, but I can
see her in his eyes—he wanted to give me a change, he said, and asked
me to come to town with my uncle Hippy, and I consented. It was another
plot to get me out of the way! As I live, I had no more idea of meeting
her than of flying to heaven!”
He lifted his face. “Look at those old elm branches! How they seem to
mix among the stars!—glittering fruits of Winter!”
Ripton tipped his comical nose upward, and was in duty bound to say,
Yes! though he observed no connection between them and the narrative.
“Well,” the hero went on, “I came to town. There I heard she was
coming, too—coming home. It must have been fate, Ripton! Heaven forgive
me! I was angry with her, and I thought I should like to see her
once—only once—and reproach her for being false—for she never wrote to
me. And, oh, the dear angel! what she must have suffered!—I gave my
uncle the slip, and got to the railway she was coming by. There was a
fellow going to meet her—a farmer’s son—and, good God! they were going
to try and make her marry him! I remembered it all then. A servant of
the farm had told me. That fellow went to the wrong station, I suppose,
for we saw nothing of him. There she was—not changed a bit!—looking
lovelier than ever! And when she saw me, I knew in a minute that she
must love me till death!—You don’t know what it is yet, Rip!—Will you
believe, it?—Though I was as sure she loved me and had been true as
steel, as that I shall see her to-night, I spoke bitterly to her. And
she bore it meekly—she looked like a saint. I told her there was but
one hope of life for me—she must prove she was true, and as I give up
all, so must she. I don’t know what I said. The thought of losing her
made me mad. She tried to plead with me to wait—it was for my sake, I
know. I pretended, like a miserable hypocrite, that she did not love me
at all. I think I said shameful things. Oh what noble creatures women
are! She hardly had strength to move. I took her to that place where
you found us, Rip! she went down on her knees to me, I never dreamed of
anything in life so lovely as she looked then. Her eyes were thrown up,
bright with a crowd of tears—her dark brows bent together, like Pain
and Beauty meeting in one; and her glorious golden hair swept off her
shoulders as she hung forward to my hands.—Could I lose such a
prize.—If anything could have persuaded me, would not that?—I thought
of Dante’s Madonna—Guido’s Magdalen.—Is there sin in it? I see none!
And if there is, it’s all mine! I swear she’s spotless of a thought of
sin. I see her very soul? Cease to love her? Who dares ask me? Cease to
love her? Why, I live on her!—To see her little chin straining up from
her throat, as she knelt to me!—there was one curl that fell across her
throat”....
Ripton listened for more. Richard had gone off in a muse at the
picture.
“Well?” said Ripton, “and how about that young farmer fellow?”
The hero’s head was again contemplating the starry branches. His
lieutenant’s question came to him after an interval.
“Young Tom? Why, it’s young Tom Blaize—son of our old enemy, Rip! I
like the old man now. Oh! I saw nothing of the fellow.”
“Lord!” cried Ripton, “are we going to get into a mess with Blaizes
again? I don’t like that!”
His commander quietly passed his likes or dislikes.
“But when he goes to the train, and finds she’s not there?” Ripton
suggested.
“I’ve provided for that. The fool went to the South-east instead of the
South-west. All warmth, all sweetness, comes with the South-west!—I’ve
provided for that, friend Rip. My trusty Tom awaits him there, as if by
accident. He tells him he has not seen her, and advises him to remain
in town, and go for her there to-morrow, and the day following. Tom has
money for the work. Young Tom ought to see London, you know, Rip!—like
you. We shall gain some good clear days. And when old Blaize hears of
it—what then? I have her! she’s mine!—Besides, he won’t hear for a
week. This Tom beats that Tom in cunning, I’ll wager. Ha! ha!” the hero
burst out at a recollection. “What do you think, Rip? My father has
some sort of System with me, it appears, and when I came to town the
time before, he took me to some people—the Grandisons—and what do you
think? one of the daughters is a little girl—a nice little thing enough
very funny—and he wants me to wait for her! He hasn’t said so, but I
know it. I know what he means. Nobody understands him but me. I know he
loves me, and is one of the best of men—but just consider!—a little
girl who just comes up to my elbow. Isn’t it ridiculous? Did you ever
hear such nonsense?”
Ripton emphasized his opinion that it certainly was foolish.
“No, no! The die’s cast!” said Richard. “They’ve been plotting for a
year up to this day, and this is what comes of it! If my father loves
me, he will love her. And if he loves me, he’ll forgive my acting
against his wishes, and see it was the only thing to be done. Come!
step out! what a time we’ve been!” and away he went, compelling Ripton
to the sort of strides a drummer-boy has to take beside a column of
grenadiers.
Ripton began to wish himself in love, seeing that it endowed a man with
wind so that he could breathe great sighs, while going at a tremendous
pace, and experience no sensation of fatigue. The hero was communing
with the elements, his familiars, and allowed him to pant as he
pleased. Some keen-eyed Kensington urchins, noticing the discrepancy
between the pedestrian powers of the two, aimed their wit at Mr.
Thompson junior’s expense. The pace, and nothing but the pace, induced
Ripton to proclaim that they had gone too far, when they discovered
that they had over shot the mark by half a mile. In the street over
which stood love’s star, the hero thundered his presence at a door, and
evoked a flying housemaid, who knew not Mrs. Berry. The hero attached
significance to the fact that his instincts should have betrayed him,
for he could have sworn to that house. The door being shut he stood in
dead silence.
“Haven’t you got her card?” Ripton inquired, and heard that it was in
the custody of the cabman. Neither of them could positively bring to
mind the number of the house.
“You ought to have chalked it, like that fellow in the Forty Thieves,”
Ripton hazarded a pleasantry which met with no response.
Betrayed by his instincts, the magic slaves of Love! The hero heavily
descended the steps.
Ripton murmured that they were done for. His commander turned on him,
and said: “Take all the houses on the opposite side, one after another.
I’ll take these.” With a wry face Ripton crossed the road, altogether
subdued by Richard’s native superiority to adverse circumstances.
Then were families aroused. Then did mortals dimly guess that something
portentous was abroad. Then were labourers all day in the vineyard,
harshly wakened from their evening’s nap. Hope and Fear stalked the
street, as again and again the loud companion summonses resounded.
Finally Ripton sang out cheerfully. He had Mrs. Berry before him,
profuse of mellow curtsies.
Richard ran to her and caught her hands: “She’s well?—upstairs?”
“Oh, quite well! only a trifle tired with her journey, and
fluttering-like,” Mrs. Berry replied to Ripton alone. The lover had
flown aloft.
The wise woman sagely ushered Ripton into her own private parlour,
there to wait till he was wanted.