ALBEMARLE PROPOSES
Ned Tucker did not long leave his proposal to Holles unconfirmed. He
sought him in the matter again at the Paul’s Head three days later,
on the Sunday, and sat long in talk with him in the little parlour,
to the profound disquieting of Mrs. Quinn, who had observed from the
gentleman’s bearing and apparel that he was a person of consequence.
He found the Colonel a little more malleable to-day, a little less
insistent upon serving only governments _in esse_. The fact was that,
as day followed day without word from Albemarle, Holles approached the
conclusion that things were indeed as Tucker had represented them. His
hopes sank, and his dread of that score of his which was daily mounting
at the Paul’s Head added to his despair.
Still, he did not altogether yield to Tucker’s persuasions; but neither
did he discourage him when the latter promised to visit him again on
the morrow, bringing another old friend of their Parliament days. And
on the Monday, true to his promise, Tucker came again, accompanied this
time by a gentleman some years his senior, named Rathbone, with whom
Colonel Holles recalled some slight acquaintance. This time they came
with a very definite proposal, empowered, so they told him, by one
whose name they would not yet utter, but which, if uttered, must remove
his every doubt.
“For that, Randal, you will accept our word, I know,” said the grave
Tucker.
Holles nodded his agreement, and the proposal was disclosed. It offered
him a position which in an established government would have been
dazzling. It was dazzling even as things were, to one in his desperate
case, driven to the need of making a gambler’s throw. If on the one
side he probably set his head, at least the stake they offered could
hardly have been greater.
And they tempted him further by revelations of how far their
preparations were advanced, and how thorough these were.
“Heaven,” said Rathbone, “is on our side. It has sent this plague
to stir men to bethink themselves of the rulers they have chosen.
Our agents have discovered four cases in the City to-day: one in
Wood Street, one in Fenchurch Street, and two in Crooked Lane. The
authorities hoped to keep it from the knowledge of the people. But
we are seeing to that. At this moment our preachers are proclaiming
it, spreading terror that men may be driven by it to the paths of
righteousness.”
“When the devil was sick the devil a monk would be,” said Holles. “I
understand.”
“Then you should see that all is ready, the mine is laid,” Tucker
admonished him. “This is your opportunity, Randal. If you delay now....”
A tap at the door interrupted him. Tucker bounded up, propelled by his
uneasy conspirator’s conscience. Rathbone, too, glanced round uneasily.
“Why, what’s to startle you?” said the Colonel quietly, smiling to
behold their fears. “It is but my good hostess.”
She came in from the common room bearing a letter that had just been
brought for Colonel Holles.
He took it, wondering; then, observing the great seal, a little colour
crept into his cheeks. He spread the sheet, and read, under the
observing eyes of his friends and his hostess, and they were all alike
uneasy.
Twice he read that letter before he spoke. The unexpected had
happened, and it had happened at the eleventh hour, barely in time to
arrest him on the brink of what might well prove a precipice. Thus he
saw it now, his vision altering with his fortunes.
“Luck has stood your friend sooner than we could have hoped,” wrote
Albemarle. “A military post in the Indies has, as I learn from letters
just received, fallen vacant. It is an important command full worthy
of your abilities, and there, overseas, you will be safe from all
inquisitions. If you will wait upon me here at the Cockpit this
afternoon, you shall be further informed.”
He begged his friends to excuse him a moment, took pen, ink, and paper
from the sideboard and quickly wrote a few lines in answer.
When Mrs. Quinn had departed to convey that note to the messenger, and
the door had closed again, the two uneasy conspirators started up.
Questions broke simultaneously from both of them. For answer Holles
placed Albemarle’s letter on the table. Tucker snatched it up, and
conned it, whilst over his shoulder Rathbone read it, too.
At last Tucker lowered the sheet, and his grave eyes fell again upon
Holles.
“And you have answered--what?” he demanded.
“That I will wait upon his grace this afternoon as he requires of me.”
“But to what end?” asked Rathbone. “You can’t mean that you will accept
employment from a government that is doomed.”
The Colonel shrugged. “As I have told Tucker from the first, I serve
governments; I do not make them.”
“But just now....” Tucker was beginning.
“I wavered. It is true. But something else has been flung into the
scales.” And he held up Albemarle’s letter.
They argued with him after that; but they argued vainly.
“If I am of value to your government when you shall have established
it, you will know where to find me; and you will know from what has
happened now that I am trustworthy.”
“But your value to us is now, in the struggle that is coming. And it is
for this that we are prepared to reward you richly.”
He was not, however, to be moved. The letter from Albemarle had reached
him an hour too soon.
At parting he assured them that their secret was safe with him, and
that he would forget all that they had said. Since, still, they had
disclosed no vital facts whose betrayal could frustrate their purpose,
it was an almost unnecessary assurance.
They stalked out resentfully. But Tucker returned alone a moment later.
“Randal,” he said, “it may be that upon reflection you will come to
see the error of linking yourself to a government that cannot endure,
to the service of a king against whom the hand of Heaven is already
raised. You may come to prefer the greatness that we offer you in the
future to this crust that Albemarle throws you at the moment. If you
are wise, you will. If so, you know where to find me. Seek me there,
and be sure of my welcome as of my friendship.”
They shook hands and parted, and with a sigh and a smile Holles turned
to load himself a pipe. He was not, he thought, likely to see Tucker
again.
That afternoon he waited upon Albemarle, who gave him particulars of
the appointment he had to offer. It was an office of importance, the
pay was good, and so that Holles discharged his duties well, which the
Duke had no occasion to doubt, there would be even better things in
store for him before very long.
“The one thing to efface the past is a term of service now, wheresoever
it may be. Hereafter when I commend you for some other place, here at
home, perhaps, and I am asked what are your antecedents, I need but
point to the stout service you will have done us in the Indies, and men
will inquire no further. It is a temporary exile, but you may trust me
to see that it endures no longer than is necessary.”
No such advocacy was needed to induce Holles to accept an office that,
after all, was of an importance far beyond anything for which he could
reasonably have hoped. He said so frankly by way of expressing his deep
gratitude.
“In that case, you will seek me again here to-morrow morning. Your
commission shall be meanwhile made out.”
The Colonel departed jubilant. At last--at long last--after infinite
frowns, Fortune accorded him a smile. And she accorded it in the very
nick of time, just as he was touching the very depths of his despair
and ready to throw in his lot with a parcel of crazy fanatics who
dreamed of another revolution.
So back to the Paul’s Head he came with his soaring spirits, and called
for a bottle of the best Canary. Mrs. Quinn read the omens shrewdly.
“Your affairs at Whitehall have prospered, then?” said she between
question and assertion.
Holles reclined in an armchair, his legs, from which he had removed his
boots, stretched luxuriously upon a stool, his head thrown back, a pipe
between his lips.
“Aye. They’ve prospered. Beyond my deserts,” said he, smiling at the
ceiling.
“Never that, Colonel. For that’s not possible.” She beamed upon him,
proffering the full stoup.
He sat up to take it, and looked at her, smiling.
“No doubt you’re right. But I’ve gone without my deserts so long that I
have lost all sense of them.”
“There’s others who haven’t,” said she; and timidly added a question
upon the nature of his prosperity.
He paused to drink a quarter of the wine. Then, as he set down the
vessel on the table at his elbow, he told her.
Her countenance grew overcast. He was touched to note it, inferring
from this manifest regret at his departure that he had made a friend in
Mrs. Quinn.
“And when do you go?” she asked him, oddly breathless.
“In a week’s time.”
She considered him, mournfully he thought; and he also thought that she
lost some of her bright colour.
“And to the Indies!” she ejaculated slowly. “Lord! Among savages and
heathen blacks! Why, you must be crazed to think of it.”
“Beggars may not choose, ma’am. I go where I can find employment.
Besides, it is not as bad as you imagine.”
“But where’s the need to go at all, when, as I’ve told you already,
such a man as yourself should be thinking of settling down at home and
taking a wife?”
She realized that the time had come to deliver battle. It was now or
never. And thus she sent out a preliminary skirmishing party.
“Why, look at yourself,” she ran on, before he could answer. “Look at
the condition of you.” And she pointed a denunciatory finger at the
great hole in the heel of his right stocking. “You should be seeking
a woman to take care of you, instead of letting your mind run on
soldiering in foreign parts.”
“Excellent advice,” he laughed. “There is one difficulty only. Who
takes a wife must keep a wife, and, if I stay in England, I shan’t have
enough to keep myself. So I think it’ll be the Indies, after all.”
She came to the table, and leaned upon it, facing him.
“You’re forgetting something. There’s many a woman well endowed, and
there’s many a man has taken a wife with a jointure who couldn’t ha’
taken a wife without.”
“You said something of the kind before.” Again he laughed. “You think I
should be hunting an heiress. You think I have the figure for the part.”
“I do,” said she, to his astonishment. “You’re a proper man, and you’ve
a name and a position to offer. There’s many a wealthy woman of modest
birth would be glad of you, as you should be glad of her, since each
would bring what the other lacks.”
“Faith! You think of everything. Carry your good offices further than
mere advice, Mrs. Quinn. Find me this wealthy and accommodating lady,
and I’ll consider the rejection of this Indian office. But you’ll need
to make haste, for there’s only a week left.”
It was a laughing challenge, made on the assumption that it would not
be taken up, and, as she looked away uncomfortably under his glance,
his laughter increased.
“That’s not quite so easy as advising, is it?” he rallied her.
She commanded herself, and looked him squarely in the eyes.
“Oh, yes, it is,” she assured him. “If you was serious I could soon
produce the lady--a comely enough woman of about your own age, mistress
of thirty thousand pounds and some property, besides.”
That sobered him. He stared at her a moment; the pipe between his
fingers.
“And she would marry a vagabond? Odds, my life! What ails her?”
“Naught ails her. If you was serious I’d present her.”
“’Sblood! you make me serious. Thirty thousand pounds! Faith, that is
serious enough. I could set up as a country squire on that.”
“Then why don’t you?”
Really, she was bewildering, he thought, with her calm assumptions that
it was for him to say the word.
“Because there’s no such woman.”
“And if there was?”
“But there isn’t.”
“I tell you there is.”
“Where is she, then?”
Mrs. Quinn moved away from the table, and round to his side of it.
“She is ... here.”
“Here?” he echoed.
She drew a step or two nearer, so that she was almost beside him.
“Here in this room,” she insisted, softly.
He looked up at her, still uncomprehending. Then, as he observed the
shy smile with which she sought to dissemble her agitation, the truth
broke upon him at last.
The clay stem of his pipe snapped between his fingers, and he dived
after the pieces, glad of any pretext to remove his eyes from her
face and give him a moment in which to consider how he should conduct
himself in this novel and surprising situation.
When he came up again, his face was flushed, which may have been from
the lowering of his head. He wanted to laugh; but he realized that
this would be utterly unpardonable. He rose, and set the pieces of the
broken pipe on the table. Standing thus, his shoulder to her, he spoke
gently, horribly embarrassed.
“I ... I had no notion of ... of your meaning....” And there he broke
down.
But his embarrassment encouraged her. Again she came close.
“And now that you know it, Colonel?” she whispered.
“I ... I don’t know what to say.”
His mind was beginning to recover its functions. He understood at last
why a person of his shabby exterior and obvious neediness should have
been given unlimited credit in this house.
“Then say nothing at all, Colonel dear,” she was purring. “Save that
you’ll put from you all notion of sailing to the Indies.”
“But ... but my word is pledged already.” It was a straw at which he
clutched, desperately. And it was not a very fortunate one, for it
suggested that his pledged word was the only obstacle.
The effect was to bring her closer still. She was almost touching
him, as he stood there, still half averted, and she actually leaned
against him, and set a hand upon his shoulder as she spoke, coaxingly,
persuasively.
“But it was pledged before ... before you knew of this. His grace will
understand. He’ll never hold you to it. You’ve but to explain.”
“I ... I couldn’t. I couldn’t,” he cried weakly.
“Then I can.”
“You?” He looked at her.
She was pale, but resolute. “Yes, me,” she answered him. “If your
pledge is all that holds you, I’ll take coach at once and go to
Whitehall. George Monk’ll see me, or if he won’t his Duchess will. I
knew her well in the old days, when I was a young girl, and she was a
sempstress glad to earn a groat where she could. Nan Clarges’ll never
deny herself to an old friend. So if you but say the word, I’ll soon
deliver you from this pledge of yours.”
His face lengthened. He looked away again.
“That is not all, Mrs. Quinn,” he said, very gently. “The truth is ...
I am not of a ... a nature to make a woman happy.”
This she deemed mere coyness, and swept it briskly aside. “I’d take the
risk of that.”
“But ... but ... you see I’ve lived this roving life of mine so long,
that I do not think I could ever settle. Besides, ma’am, what have I to
offer?”
“If I am satisfied with my bargain, why take thought for that?”
“I must. The fact is, I am touched, deeply touched. I did not think I
had it in me to arouse the affection, or even the regard, of any woman.
Even so, ma’am, whilst it moves me, it does not change my purpose. I am
not a marrying man.”
“But....”
He raised a hand, dominantly, to check her. He had found the correct
formula at last, and he meant to keep to it.
“Useless to argue, ma’am. I know my mind. My reasons are as I have
said, and so is the fact. I am touched; I am prodigiously touched, and
grateful. But there it is.”
His firmness turned her white with mortification. To have offered
herself, and to have been refused! To have this beggar turn his
shoulder upon her, finding her so little to his taste that not even
her thirty thousand pounds could gild her into attractiveness! It was
a bitter draught, and it called up bitterness from the depths of her
soul. As she considered him now with her vivid blue eyes, her face
grew mottled. She was moved to sudden hatred of him. Nothing short of
killing him could, she felt, extinguish that tormenting hate.
She felt impelled to break into violent recriminations, yet could find
nothing upon which to recriminate. If only she could have thrown it
in his face that he had afforded her encouragement, trifled with her
affections, lured her on, to put this terrible affront upon her, she
might have eased herself of some of the gall within her. But she could
charge him with nothing that would bear the form of words.
And so she considered him in silence, her abundant bosom heaving, her
eyes growing almost baleful in their glance, whilst he stood awkwardly
before her, his gaze averted, staring through the open window, and
making no attempt to add anything to what already he had said.
At last on a long indrawn breath she moved.
“I see,” she said quietly. “I am sorry to have....”
“Please!” he exclaimed, throwing up his hand again to arrest her, an
infinite pity stirring in him.
She walked to the door, moving a little heavily. She opened it, and
then paused under the lintel. Over her shoulder she spoke to him again.
“Seeing that things is like this, perhaps you’ll make it convenient to
find another lodging not later than to-morrow.”
He inclined his head a little in agreement.
“Naturally....” he was beginning, when the door closed after her with a
bang and he was left alone.
“Phew!” he breathed, as he sank limply into his chair again. He passed
a hand wearily across his brow, and found it moist.