Bess was coming over the snow next morning from the thatched shed where
she had been milking Dame Ursula’s cows, when Dan Grimshaw slouched
round the corner of the cottage with his gun over his shoulder. He had
been away in the woods early and had brought back a hare, a brace of
woodcock, and a widgeon that he had knocked over in the old fish-ponds
of the Abbey of Holy Cross. A black spaniel followed at his heels. Bess,
in her red petticoat, her cheeks aglow under her coal-black hair, came
over the snow towards him with the fresh milk frothing in the pail.
“Morning to ye, Bess,” quoth the great, hairy-faced animal whose huge
calves and bulging shoulders were those of a stunted giant. “I’ve
brought ye back some game, lass, in return for breaking your sleep last
night. I’m sorry if I angered ye.”
He held out the hare and the three birds in one great red paw, grinning
amiably, yet with a glint in his red-brown eyes. Bess smiled at Dan
under her scarlet hood. A lass needed wit in such a woodland haunt as
this, where the strongest arm ruled, and men fought like quick, subtle,
and resourceful, glib with her tongue and clever with her eyes. The
felinity of her nature was developed when she must purr and fawn, or
spit and extend her claws as necessity commanded. Bess did not love
Black Dan, but Isaac Grimshaw’s son was a man to be humored rather than
rebuffed.
“You have a good heart, Dan,” she said, kindly enough. “I was oversharp
with ye last night. I jumped out of bed on the left side, and was as
cross in the cold as might be. Won’t you come in and take breakfast with
us?”
The man turned and walked with her towards the cottage, carrying the
game in one hand, the gun in the other. His eyes watched Bess as she
walked, tall and straight as a cypress, her stride almost that of a man,
her head poised finely on her slightly arched neck. He noticed the
muscles and sinews standing out in the strong brown forearm that carried
the pail, the trim, gray-stockinged ankles under the short red
petticoat.
“Did ye dream of me, Bess?” he asked, with a grin.
“Not I,” she laughed, good-humoredly.
“Or of young David?”
“No, nor of David.”
“Then ye did not dream at all, lass,” he said, with his brown eyes
burning.
“No, Dan, I have not seen my man as yet.”
Old Ursula came to the door of the cottage at the moment with a broom in
her brown fists, looking for all the world like an old witch. She gave
Dan a glare from her bright eyes, and scolded Bess for going out into
the snow in her best shoes.
“I have asked Dan to breakfast, mother,” said the girl, with a laugh;
“see the game he has brought us home.”
“Dan to breakfast, indeed! There be but two rashers in the pan and two
eggs in the pot. We can’t feed Dan at such short notice.”
The man frowned at her, kicked his dog that was for sparring with old
Ursula’s cat, tossed the hare and birds onto a settle by the door, and
jerked his gun up over his shoulder. He and Dame Ursula were not the
best of friends, and Black Dan, who feared no mortal thing in breeches,
stood half in awe of the old beldam. He clawed his fur cap from off his
head, stared hard at Bess, and stood fidgeting on the step.
“I reckon I’d better go home, lass,” he said, sulkily.
Bess set her milk-pail down on the stone floor and untied her hood.
“You take some cooking for, Dan,” she said, mischievously.
“I don’t want to lick shoe-leather for a welcome.”
“Never worry. We will be ready for you another day.”
Bess, having caught a significant twinkle in Dame Ursula’s eyes, gave
Dan Grimshaw a courtesy, and picked up her pail. The man pulled his fur
cap down over his eyes, and, with a last glance at the girl, plodded
away over the snow, whistling, his breath steaming on the frosty air.
Bess watched him go, and then closed and locked the door. Old Ursula was
bending over the fire, turning the bacon in the pan.
She looked at Bess curiously, and scolded the black cat that had put its
fore-paws on the milk-pail and was trying to lap the milk.
“Did you dream, lass?” she asked, inquisitively.
Bess looked serious of a sudden and colored, though her face hardly
betrayed any deepening flush. She was still puzzling over the face of
the man she had seen in her dream, and yet the girl was not in a mood to
confess to Mother Ursula in the matter.
“Not I,” she said, laughing, and taking a rough cloth from a drawer and
spreading it on the oak table.
“Not of David?”
“Why should I dream of David, mother?”
Ursula frowned, and mumbled over the pan. Isaac’s youngest son was her
favorite, a tall, flaxen-polled stripling, with a merry face and
good-humored blue eyes. Ursula did not love Black Dan. He was too big
and masterful, too surly, too much of a great bully.
Bess had spread the cloth.
“Dan came and threw stones at my window,” she said, suddenly.
“Hey!”
“I told him I wouldn’t have climbed out of bed to see his ugly face.”
Old Ursula forked the rashers onto a hot plate and looked at Bess
meaningly, wagging a lean forefinger to give emphasis to her words.
“You must be shy of Dan,” she said, shrewdly.
“Shy, mother?”
“The great fool is a rough, masterful dog. Throw him a bone now and
then, lass, to keep him from growing surly. He’s no mate for you, girl,
the great, black-faced oaf. David’s the lad to make a good husband. You
must be shy of Dan, Bess.”
The girl swept her black hair over her ears, laughed, and began to
bustle about the kitchen.
“I can take care of myself, mother,” she said.
“Better be your own mistress, lass, than let Black Dan have the handling
of your love.”
Thus a certain superficial similarity may be traced between the lots of
Richard Jeffray and Bess of the Woods. Both had a garrulous and
world-wise relative to stem with the calthrops of caution the careless
confidence of youth. While old Ursula pattered in the inglenook of Black
Dan’s ugliness of face and temper, and extolled the blond David for his
red cheeks and good-humored eyes, the Lady Letitia would ask her nephew
with the greatest gravity, “What color Miss Jilian fancied for her hair
this season? Had Miss Hardacre had that front tooth replaced? Had
Richard ever heard of the Soakington affair, when Miss Jilian had eloped
with Ensign Soakington of a marching regiment, and had been overtaken
and brought back unmarried by Sir Peter? Yes, it was quite true that
Miss Hardacre had spent the night with the ensign at an inn at Reigate
before Sir Peter and Brother Lot had ended the romance with their whips.
What! Richard had not heard the tale! Well, it was an old scandal, and
had happened ten years ago. Yes, there had been other affairs. Sir Peter
was wise in desiring to get his daughter married.”
Now Richard Jeffray was a sensitive youth, and though the Lady Letitia’s
sarcasms gored him beneath his air of amiable patience, he was not a
little disturbed by her gibes and her innuendoes. Richard had inherited
a chivalrous temper from his father, and he was something of a young
Quixote in his notions of honor. Certainly he had often idled beside
Miss Jilian’s tambour-frame, attended her as she warbled at the
harpsichord, danced and ridden with her, gazed into her gray eyes with a
fervor that was not platonic. Miss Hardacre had been very kind to him,
so had Sir Peter, and even Cousin Lot, in his insolent and patronizing
way. Moreover, the Lady Letitia herself was not a white statue of truth
and candor. Richard knew that she cheated poor Sugg at cards, rouged and
powdered, and wore false eyebrows. And surely Miss Jilian was a very
handsome young lady, and if she dressed somewhat gaudily, it was
fashion’s fault and not her own. Richard supposed that most young ladies
had indulged in love affairs in their teens. Had not he himself when a
boy ogled Dr. Sugg’s daughter Mary for weeks together? And in Italy he
had even imagined a little opera singer to be the finest feminine
creation the world had ever doted upon.
Thus the amiable and generous assling conceived that it would be a gross
piece of dishonor on his part were he to treat Miss Jilian Hardacre
after the fashion that the Lady Letitia advised. By reason of the
extreme delicacy of his sentiment he felt himself impelled rather to
exaggerate his courtesies to that young lady, lest he should be charged
with trifling with the pure peace of a spinster’s heart. It was not that
Richard stood altogether in awe of Cousin Lancelot’s hectoring courage.
Jeffray was no coward, though a dreamer. Very possibly his aunt’s
cynicisms had operated in a contrary direction to that which the old
pharmaceutist had intended. Contradiction begets contrariness; pessimism
preens the wings of ardor. It may have been that the lad’s innate sense
of chivalry was stirred, and that the lamps in that gorgeous Temple of
Beauty flashed a bewitching glamour into Richard’s soul. At all events,
he did not slink like a dishonest cur from the maligned maiden’s side.
He still continued to kiss her hand, and to admire her profile, a little
forcefully perhaps, as she sat and played to him on the harpsichord.
One morning, a week or more after his debate with Aunt Letitia, Richard
rode over to Hardacre House and dined with Sir Peter, Mr. Lot, and
certain of the latter gentleman’s sporting friends. These bluff Sussex
boobies could by no means fathom young Jeffray’s character. They took
his sensitive reserve for pride, his occasional outbursts of enthusiasm
for sentimentality. Among these gentlemen the manly virtues were of the
florid order. He who swore most, drank most, debauched most, was voted a
fine fellow, a man of blood and bottom. Richard Jeffray, refined,
sensitive, and a scholar, shrivelled and shrank before these noisy
boors. They did not love him for his melancholy and his silence. “The
young fool wanted pap and a flannel binder.” One rosy-gilled quipster
made it his especial business that day to point his jokes at Richard’s
expense, till he was called to order by Cousin Lot across the table.
“Tie up your funny nag, Tom,” quoth Mr. Lancelot, with a glint of the
eye, “he’s a stale and dull beast. Dick Jeffray’s too much of a
gentleman to straddle your spavined jokes.”
Mr. Piggott blinked and guffawed. Next moment he spilled his wine, and
squealed as the heel of Mr. Lot’s boot came crunching upon his toe under
the table.
“Damn it, sir—”
“Hallo, was that your foot, Tom? Beg pardon; I’ve got such infernal long
legs.”
Mr. Piggott took the hint, mopped up the wine with a napkin, and
relapsed into silence. He was one of the Hardacre toadies who swilled
Sir Peter’s punch, swore in voluble admiration over Mr. Lot’s escapades,
and always expressed himself ravished by Miss Jilian’s charms. Sir Peter
had instructed his son as to the necessity for blanketing Richard’s
sensitive soul. Hence, Mr. Lot, wise in his generation, had come to
regard Jeffray as a prospective brother-in-law, a pretty bridegroom to
be cherished for Miss Jilian’s sake. He might despise the youth himself,
but it was not Sir Peter’s policy to suffer Richard to be frightened
from Hardacre by his raw-boned and boisterous guests.
Richard did not see the fair Mistress Jilian that day. Cousin Lot
announced to him, with a leer, that his sister was abed with a sick
headache. Should he deliver a note to her from her dear cousin? It would
do Jilian a world of good no doubt to get a glimpse of her cousin’s
pretty sentences. Richard blushed, smiled, contented himself with
sending his “sympathetic and cousinly respect” to the suffering angel.
The truth was this, though Richard did not know it, Miss Hardacre had
been trying some new cosmetic from town, and the treacherous stuff had
blistered her fair cheeks. She was lying abed with a plaster of chalk
and olive-oil over her face, and her sweet soul full of tempestuous
indignation.
The snow was still lying an inch deep over the grass when Jeffray bowed
over Sir Peter’s gnarled and gouty hand, smiled sheepishly at Lot, and
mounted his mare for Rodenham. Mists were creeping up the valleys,
rolling over the woods like smoke, wiping out the blues and purples of
the distance with steaming vapor. The high ground by Beacon Rock was
still clear, while below the mist seemed like a gray sea beating upon
the dark coast-line of the moors. Here and there a tall clump of trees
stood out like a black and isolated rock in the midst of the water.
Richard had passed Beacon Rock and was in the fringe of the fog when a
shrill cry came to him from a thicket of pines known as the Queen’s
Circle, standing on a knoll to the left of the road. He reined in to
listen, the mist drifting about him in ragged eddies, raw and cold with
the thawing snow. Richard could see the clump of trees towering dimly
through the vapor. Angry voices came eddying over the moor. Jeffray
could distinguish a woman’s above the growling of the deeper undertones.
“Let him be, Dan, you coward!”
“Stand aside, wench—”
“Will you fight a mere lad? Off, you great coward! I’ll hold him, David,
run, lad, run!”
There was an angry uproar, an oath or two, the sound of men scuffling
and struggling together. A woman’s figure broke away suddenly through
the moving mist, red cloaked, hood thrown back, black hair in a tangle.
She came close to Jeffray’s horse, her hands to her bosom, her white
face straining towards the west. She ran up to him, snatched at his
bridle, looking up fiercely in his face.
“Quick, or he’ll murder him—”
“Who?”
“Black Dan. He’s a devil when angry. Quick! You have pistols; give me
one—”
She snatched one from Jeffray’s holster, looked to the priming, and
without so much as waiting for a word from him, darted away over the
heather. Richard, as though compelled, turned his horse, clapped in the
spurs, and followed. He could see two men struggling together in the
mist under the trees. The girl was running towards them, brandishing her
pistol, and shouting as she ran.
“Off, Dan, or I’ll shoot ye. David, there’s help coming. Take your hand
off his throat, you devil.”
The struggling figures swayed and fell of a sudden. Young David, with
Dan’s fist at his throat, had tripped the giant, and slipped free in the
fall. Quick as a cat he broke away from his brother’s clutches as they
rolled on the ground, and scrambling up, took to his heels over the
heather. Dan was up and after him like a plunging hound, shouting and
cursing as he lumbered in pursuit. Before Bess had reached the trees
they had both disappeared down the hill-side into the mist.
She turned suddenly and faced Jeffray, and held out the pistol to him by
the stock as he rode up. He had recognized her as the girl he had seen
under the beech-trees with the old woman tending pigs.
“Thanks for your pistol,” she said, frankly, “David’s broken away, and
can run three yards to Dan’s two. The lad will be safe enough now.”
Jeffray had taken the pistol from her and thrust it back into the
holster. He was studying her angry yet handsome face, framed by its
glorious sheen of hair.
“What were they fighting about?” he asked.
Bess laughed, flashed a look at him out of her fierce eyes.
“About me,” she said.
“You?”
“Yes. I must run home to warn Ursula and old Isaac. Good-night.”
She swung away suddenly over the heather, leaving Jeffray as though he
had known since birth who Dan and David, Isaac and old Ursula were. The
man watched her tall figure melt into the mist, wondering the while who
this wild elf could be. Regaining the road, he trotted on again towards
Rodenham, keeping a sharp watch upon the misty woods. That same evening
he called Peter Gladden, the butler, to him in the library, and drew
from the old man all he knew concerning the woodlanders who lived in the
forest of Pevensel.
V
The great drawing-room at Rodenham was full of candles, powdered heads
and waving feathers, gentlemen in purple, red, or blue, dames in
gorgeous gowns and swelling hoops. The room had been the prior’s parlor
of old, and still retained its slender pillars capped with foliage, its
deeply moulded groins, its many vaults, now painted azure and crusted
with silver stars. Candles were ranged around the walls in sconces
between the long, gilded mirrors that made the room look like a
magician’s maze. The panelling was painted after the French fashion with
Cupids, garlands, and festoons of flowers. The furniture was also
French, Louis Quinze; fauteuils, canopies carved and gilt and covered
with tapestry; handsome commodes; here a fantastic buhl-table, or a
chased and inlaid escritoire. There were two fireplaces in the long and
curious room, both with oak logs stacked upon their burnished irons.
Richard Jeffray was entertaining some of his Sussex neighbors under the
especial patronage of the Lady Letitia. The Hardacre coach had rolled
over the priory bridge before dusk to deposit Sir Peter, Mr. Lancelot
and the fair Jilian at Richard’s porch. The Perkabys, of Rookhurst, were
present with their three sleepily handsome daughters, dark odalisques
who spoke slowly and looked love. Dr. Sugg bustled to and fro in his
best gown, beaming upon every one, and shaking the powder out of his
full-bottomed wig. Squire Bilson had driven over with his wife and son
from Marling to take snuff with Squire Rokeley of Marvelscombe, whose
harriers were the boast of all the Sussex Nimrods. Some half a score
lesser folk completed the assemblage—a lawyer, a few young gentlemen of
sporting tastes, Mary Sugg, Dr. Sugg’s daughter, and several elderly
ladies whose plumes nearly swept the star-dusted ceiling.
Richard in black, with white silk stockings and silver buckled shoes,
his hair powdered and caught up at the back with a black velvet bow,
stood behind his aunt’s chair as the guests came to pay their respects
to the venerable dowager. The Lady Letitia might have stood for the high
priestess of fashion with her immense toupé, her gorgeous damasks, her
rouge and patches, her diamonds and her portentous fan. It was the Lady
Letitia herself who had devised the “rout,” her nephew having consented
in the innocence of his heart. He had never seen the Lady Letitia
campaigning before, and had no notion of the strategies and ambuscades
she had planned that night. From the moment that the first guest had
been announced by Peter Gladden, the dowager had taken the function to
herself, and ousted her nephew from all premiership or authority.
The elder men had gathered about one of the fires, and were discussing
the past hunting season, Squire Rokeley posing as chief mentor and
critic. The ladies were bobbing their plumes, smirking and chattering
together, while Miss Julia Perkaby, who had been besought by the Lady
Letitia with much graciousness to seat herself at the harpsichord,
thrilled the assemblage with her rich contralto. Miss Jilian Hardacre
had established herself on a causeuse by the wall, with Mr. Richard
standing by her, looking aristocratic and even distinguished in his
black coat, frilled shirt, knee-breeches and silk stockings.
Miss Jilian was a plump and comely woman, with masses of auburn hair
decked out with artificial flowers and ribbons, a pair of experienced
gray eyes, a full bosom and a simpering red mouth. She wore a white gown
flowered with violets, a green hoop, white satin slippers, an abundance
of lace, and a chain of garnets about her throat. There were three
patches upon her face, one above the delightful dimple on her left
cheek, one to the right of the round chin, another above her right
eyebrow. But for a slight thinness of the neck, the sternomastoid
muscles showing too patently, and some faint wrinkles about the eyes,
Miss Jilian contradicted the Lady Letitia’s insinuations very
charmingly.
Richard, bending over this delightful morsel of old-world perfume and
affectation, was unbosoming himself of delicate inquiries as to her
health.
“I hope you have been afflicted with no more headaches,” he was asking
with true lover-like solicitude. “Sir Peter appeared uncommonly
distressed about you a week ago.”
Miss Jilian’s gray eyes searched Richard’s face suspiciously for the
moment. Had that wretch Lot told him the truth about that horrible
cosmetic? No. The lad was as ingenuous and sincere as any Galahad.
“La, Richard,” she said, fluttering her ivory fan painted with Cupids
and peacocks, “it is strange that you should remember the days when I
keep my bed.”
“Are they not sunless days?” quoth Mr. Richard, with a fine bow.
“Oh, Richard, I am sure you are poking fun at me.”
“Are you not the Sussex sun, Jilian?”
“Oh, cousin, how can you say such things? La, Miss Perkaby is singing;
we must cease our chatter.”
Miss Hardacre spread her fan and screened the bold mortal from the glow
of her luminous countenance. Richard could see a round white chin and a
mass of auburn hair.
“I would rather hear you talk, Jilian. I cannot think why Aunt Letitia
asked the girl to sing. She has a fine voice, though, but—not half so
fine as yours.”
A gray eye peeped demurely over the ivory screen.
“Do you think so, cousin?”
“Of course I think so, Jilian.”
A loud burst of laughter came from the farther end of the room, marring
the melody like an ass braying. It was Lot’s laugh, a blatant and
self-assertive expression of merriment that seemed to stand in need of
being passed through some refining sieve. Richard glanced at the gay
coated gentlemen about the fire, a cordon of purple, red, and blue, and
noticed that his cousin’s protuberant blue eyes appeared fixed upon
Jilian and himself. Richard blushed as though all the ladies in the room
were studying him. He stood up and drew a little apart from Miss Jilian
as the Lady Letitia came sailing down upon them like a gorgeous galleon
freighted with all the spices of India and the silks of China.
His aunt’s air of extreme amiability towards Miss Hardacre puzzled
Jeffray not a little. She darted a look at him, seated herself beside
the fair Jilian, and desired her nephew to go and talk to Mrs. Perkaby
and her daughters. Richard departed in all innocence, leaving these
instinctive and inveterate enemies together on the causeuse. They were
soon chatting and smiling, sparring and feinting at each other with that
admirable and hypocritical amiability that makes men marvel. The
dowager’s keen eyes were subjecting Miss Hardacre’s person and toilet to
a minute and insolent examination. She talked effusively the while to
that young lady, a malicious innuendo or half-veiled snub in every
sentence.
“I hope to take Richard to The Wells with me,” said the Lady Letitia,
staring steadily in Miss Hardacre’s face. “My nephew is a generous lad,
but very gauche and inexperienced. It is my wish that Richard should see
what elegant and modish people are like. He is wasted—stifled—you must
perceive, Miss Hardacre, in this quagmire of a county.”
Miss Jilian’s gray eyes glittered. She was no novice in the fine art of
polite insolence, and knew enough of the world to recognize the string
that worked the Lady Letitia’s tongue.
“I wish Cousin Richard joy of so experienced a school-mistress,” she
said, tartly; “he himself has confessed to me, madam, that he does not
love the fashionable world.”
Aunt Letitia tilted her Roman nose.
“Truth, Miss Hardacre, I think you misread the lad’s meaning. He
referred to country fashions; and who can blame him? La, dear Miss
Perkaby is about to sing again; a divine voice, and such grace and
breeding,” and the Lady Letitia sat in stately silence through the song
with a beatific appreciative smirk upon her bedizened face.
“Delicious,” she chattered at the end, bowing and beaming at Miss Julia
Perkaby; “the lass has such soul. My dear nephew dotes on Miss Perkaby’s
singing, and he is forever humming her songs over to himself. And do you
sing, my dear?”
Miss Hardacre, flushed and angry, answered that she did.
“And Richard never told me. What a memory the lad has! Upon my soul,
Miss Hardacre, the simpleton informed me that your hair was nut brown,
when I can see with my own eyes how much gold there is in it. My poor
nephew’s pate is always stuffed full of poetry. I expect that you have
found him very absent-minded at times, my dear.”
Miss Hardacre’s cheeks were covered with a rare bloom, and she looked as
though it would have afforded her exquisite pleasure to slap the Lady
Letitia’s face.
“I find Cousin Richard very intelligent,” she retorted; “he has read
some of his poetry to me. I can admire his genius, madam, though I do
not pretend to be clever.”
The dowager elevated her eyebrows and nodded.
“Indeed!” she said, with a chuckle, “why, the lad must read his poetry
to half the girls in the county. Mary Sugg, I have heard the doctor say,
compares his verse to Spenser’s. Of course, my dear Miss Hardacre,
Richard must find a woman of your mature years a most discerning
critic.”
“Then, madam,” said the younger lady, with a toss of the head, “you must
hear a great deal of Mr. Richard’s poetry?”
“I, my dear? I cannot abide the stuff. The dear lad showed me a little
poem he had written on a certain young lady,” and the dowager beamed; “a
young lady—well, I must not give away the boy’s secrets. It was all
about dark eyes and raven locks, hearts and darts, love and dove.
Terrible! All boys scribble this species of stuff, my dear. They
discover a new goddess every month, and write poems about her cherry
lips till a cherrier-lipped wench appears. By-the-way, who is that very
over-dressed person—that young farmer fellow with his back to the
fire?”
The Lady Letitia was indicating Mr. Lancelot with her fan. Again Miss
Jilian’s gray eyes glistened; she bit her red lip, and looked at the
dowager with extreme disdain.
“That gentleman, madam, is my brother.”
“Nonsense, my dear—”
“I assure you, madam, I know my own brother when I see him.”
The Lady Letitia did not appear in the least disturbed.
“Ah, now I recognize a certain family likeness,” she said. “Bless me,
there is that wicked boy Richard making love to Miss Julia Perkaby. Hey!
Is it not amusing to watch these young things coquetting? We women, Miss
Hardacre, who have had our day, can afford to smile at the delightful
follies of youth. Hem! What, supper-time already? I declare, there is
Peter Gladden ready to announce it to us. I must find you a gentleman,
my dear, to give you an arm. The young things will sort themselves as
they think fit.”
There appeared to be a conspiracy afoot that night to render Jeffray’s
hospitality obnoxious in every detail to the Hardacre folk. How was it
that etiquette was so flagrantly outraged, that Mrs. Perkaby flaunted
into the supper-room before a baronet’s daughter, and that Richard found
himself shackled to Miss Julia Perkaby by his aunt’s machinations? How
was it that Sir Peter was desired to give his arm to Mrs. Bilson, a lady
who had slandered him outrageously on a certain occasion, and whom the
baronet had detested ever since? How was it that Mr. Lot, whose
astonished eyes beheld Richard in possession of his own especial flame,
Miss Perkaby, was sent down with Miss Sugg, poor Mary, whose yellow face
was as plain as a millstone, and whose conversation consisted of prim
and monosyllabic nothings? And how was it that Miss Jilian was abandoned
to Dr. Sugg, the elderly spinster’s refuge, and plumped down in an
obscure corner? Never had so ill-assorted and tactless an affair been
planned.
There was some wanton spirit whispering malicious suggestions about the
board. Sir Peter gulped down his food, swore in serious silence, while
Mrs. Bilson favored him with an occasional glare over her bony shoulder.
Mr. Lot, surly and morose, watched Richard and Miss Julia Perkaby with
jealous attention, while Mary Sugg shivered and twisted her fingers into
knots at his elbow. Dr. Sugg attempted in vain to bring the sparkle of a
smile to Miss Hardacre’s outraged eyes. The Lady Letitia alone appeared
amiable and garrulous and wholly at her ease. For the rest, a sulky and
distraught silence possessed the majority of the guests.
The plot developed still further when the gentlemen left their wine to
join the ladies in the drawing-room. Card-tables with candles, ivory
markers, and packs of cards had been set out by Peter Gladden and the
footmen. The Lady Letitia was astir on the instant, bustling about like
some gorgeous bumble-bee, setting every one in order, taking the whole
function to herself.
“Sir Peter would play whist; yes, and Mrs. Bilson was dying for a game.
Dr. Sugg, will you partner me, please? We will challenge Mrs. Bilson and
Sir Peter. Squire Rokeley, and you, Mr. Perkaby, will you two gentlemen
arrange the other tables? No doubt the young folk would like to dance at
the other end of the room. Mary will play for you on the harpsichord.
Richard, dear, will you walk a minuet with Miss Julia Perkaby? Mrs.
Perkaby, madam, I remember seeing your sweet daughter dance last season
at The Wells. All the men were watching her—upon my soul, they were,
madam. Miss Jilian, my dear, will you join the young folk, or take a
hand at cards?”
Richard, helplessly obedient to his august relative’s commands, walked a
minuet with Miss Julia Perkaby, while Mr. Lot glared at him from a
corner, and Miss Hardacre chatted to young Bilson, a spotty youth who
was about to take up a commission in the Foot Guards. Miss Sugg’s bony
fingers tinkled rapidly over the notes, while Richard, hot and ill at
ease, performed with the black-eyed and stately Julia, catching every
now and again his cousin Lot’s sulky stare and a glimpse of Miss
Jilian’s haughty face. More minuets and country-dances followed. Youth
tripped it under the painted roof, curls jigged, fans flickered. The
evening was well advanced before Richard found himself seated once again
beside Miss Jilian on the causeuse by the wall.
He did not find Miss Hardacre in the most angelic of tempers. In truth,
she tilted her chin at Mr. Richard, played restlessly with her fan, and
appeared most relentlessly chilling. Jeffray, though he was ignorant of
the Lady Letitia’s treachery, yet felt that the evening had been
miserably mismanaged. There stood Cousin Lot looking as surly and as
savage as an unpaid creditor, while fat Sir Peter glowered over his
cards at Mrs. Bilson’s funereal face. Miss Hardacre herself appeared
clouded by the prevailing sulkiness, though there was an unpleasant
glint in her sweet, gray eyes.
“La, Richard,” she yawned, “you are not coming to sit by your cousin,
surely? How hot the room is! I am sure it must be nearly time for us to
go.”
Miss Hardacre was plying her fan with rapid jerks, and staring
contemptuously the while at the dark-eyed Miss Perkaby, who was smiling
at Richard across the room.
“I hope you are not tired, Jilian?”
“Tired! I suppose I look a poor washed-out thing! I have nerves, sir,
and a delicate body. It is those heavy women who can foot it till
cock-crow. Miss Perkaby dances well, eh, cousin?”
Richard blushed.
“Does she?” he asked, helplessly, beginning to suspect what had angered
this angel of a woman.
“Your dear aunt, sir, hinted that I am getting too old to dance.”
“You—too old—to dance?”
“Yes. And did you notice, Richard, that I was sent down to supper with
Dr. Sugg? So you read your poetry to Mary Sugg, cousin, eh? And write
verses about Miss Julia Perkaby? Heavens, how hot the room is! I wish
the butler would announce our coach.”
Richard, pitifully bewildered, stared at Miss Jilian, and felt that the
room was certainly overheated.
“I have never read my poems to Mary Sugg,” he began.
Miss Jilian’s lip curled.
“She thinks them equal to Spenser’s, cousin.”
“What! Did she tell you so?”
“Oh, dear, no; she is not so innocent.”
Richard, very flushed and unhappy, began to suspect the Lady Letitia of
mendacity. Mary Sugg had never seen his verses. And the dowager had
talked for some time to Jilian, perhaps poisoning the girl’s mind.
“My dear cousin—” he began.
“Won’t you go and talk to Miss Perkaby, Richard? I am such a dull
creature. Heavens! what is the matter with Sir Peter, yonder?”
A sudden hubbub had arisen at the Lady Letitia’s table. The baronet, a
look of overheated indignation on his face, had thrown down his cards
and was taking snuff with great vigor. The Lady Letitia was turning over
the tricks with a wicked smile in her eyes. Parson Sugg appeared flushed
and uncomfortable, while Mrs. Bilson sat bolt upright in her chair. The
players at the other tables were glancing curiously at one another.
“Pardon me, Sir Peter.”
“Pardon you, madam!”
“See. You did revoke. See, sir, you played a club here.”
“Damn the club, madam!”
Mrs. Bilson uttered a little squeak of indignation, tilted her nose, and
stared at the baronet with shocked pity.
“It is evident that my partner has made a mistake, Lady Letitia,” she
said, with unpleasant emphasis upon the error.
“Such mistakes will occur,” said Dr. Sugg, mildly.
“I am afraid the wine was rather heavy, Sir Peter. I told Gladden to be
chary of the port—”
The baronet flared up at last with righteous and disgusted wrath.
“What, madam! You hint that I am fuddled? I can see the pips as clear as
you can.”
“Sir Peter!”
“I think it is time that we laid down our cards,” said Mrs. Bilson,
rising.
“Exactly, madam. I heartily agree with you, madam,” retorted the
baronet, savagely, “whist is only fit for old women.”
“Oh, Sir Peter!”
“Sir Peter!”
“Will you be so good as to ring for my coach, Richard Jeffray? Lot,
Jilian, it is time we were moving. Lady Letitia, I kiss your hand.
Gentlemen, good-night.”
Jeffray had hurried forward with an expression of pain upon his face. He
glanced angrily at the Lady Letitia, and followed Sir Peter, who had
marched pompously out of the room. The baronet frowned at him and
ignored the hand that Richard had extended.
“Order my coach, lad,” was all he said.
“But, Sir Peter—”
They had reached the hall, and Richard, who had given his orders to
Peter Gladden, turned to appease the angry baronet. Sir Peter, who had
been bubbling with a seething sense of wrong, exploded his wrath in
Richard’s face.
“Don’t ask me to any more of your infernal drums or routs,” he said.
“Those old women were for hinting that I cheated—cheated, sir, to
pocket their damned miserly sixpences!”
“I am sure, Sir Peter—”
“Deuce take your sureness, sir. I tell you that painted old image of an
aunt of yours tricked us here, sir, to make fun of us before that old
she-dog of a Bilson and the rest. Damme, sir, are we Hardacres to be set
down to supper after all the Bilsons and Perkabys and nobodies in the
county? Come, Jill, my lass, they sent you down with the snuffler, did
they! Deuce take you, sir, my daughter ain’t one to be treated as though
she were born on a dung-heap and dragged up in a hovel!”
Richard, bewildered, shamed and very miserable, turned to Miss Hardacre
with a piteous and boyish appeal in his dark eyes.
“I wish I had never given the party,” he said.
“Thank you, cousin!”
“It was my aunt’s doing.”
“To be sure, little ’un,” quoth Mr. Lot, with a glum grin, “and you
didn’t enjoy yourself at all, eh? Julia Perkaby’s a fine wench, Richard.
What! Don’t know when a woman’s got a pair of deuced fine eyes in her
head?”
Mr. Lot laughed loudly and slapped Jeffray on the shoulder with a vigor
that was not wholly inspired by cousinly regard. Peter Gladden was
standing at the hall door with a lantern in his hand; the Hardacre
coach-horses were pawing the gravel without.
“Come, Sir Peter, I don’t think we are prime-beef here.”
Richard was still gazing ruefully at Jilian, watching her enfold her
auburn head in a light-blue wrapper.
“I am very sorry,” he said, in a humble aside.
Miss Hardacre made him a fine courtesy.
“La, cousin, don’t apologize,” she said, “we have had a delicious
evening. I am sure Miss Julia’s dancing was superb.”