The Unknown Ajax Read online

  ‘The Admiralty, sir, is now in control of the coast blockade, and the force patrolling the Channel is under the command of a very able and zealous officer. I am happy to say that running the blockade is becoming every night a more dangerous enterprise.’

  ‘Lord, yes!’ said Richmond. ‘It’s getting to be dangerous to put out to sea at all! I was overhauled myself last week by one of the sloops. What the commander thought I was doing, God knows! For two pins, I daresay, he’d have fired a shot across my bows. He wanted to know who I was, where I came from, where I was bound for, why I didn’t heave-to at once – which I thought I had done, but it turned out that I hadn’t obeyed his signal. The only wonder is I wasn’t put in irons.’

  ‘A strict watch is being kept on all vessels, sir, and it is the duty of those engaged on the coastal guard to pay particular heed to any vessel that appears to be behaving suspiciously. Failing to obey a naval signal would naturally give rise to grave suspicion – though in your case, as I collect, the officer soon realized, this was groundless.’

  Having uttered this severe speech, the Lieutenant took his leave, punctiliously saluting, and then riding off without a word or a smile.

  ‘Did you ever see such a pompous whipstraw?’ said Richmond scornfully.

  The Major looked meditatively at him. ‘Happen he’s nattered,’ he drawled. ‘Seemingly, he doesn’t like you, lad.’

  ‘I don’t think he likes any of us,’ said Anthea. ‘That’s Grandpapa’s fault! He was odiously haughty to the poor man – and you may depend upon it that the Preventives have a pretty shrewd notion that all the brandy we have at the Place is run.’

  ‘It is, is it?’ said Hugo. ‘That would account for it, then.’

  Eight

  There was not very much time left for as minute an inspection of Richmond’s boat as its owner would have liked. He would certainly have made the whole party late for dinner had he found a kindred spirit in Hugo; but Hugo, although he uttered suitable comments when the vessel’s various perfections were pointed out to him, knew little about boats or sailing, and was quite ready to leave the shore as soon as Anthea grew impatient. Richmond was again disappointed. It would have been unreasonable to have expected a man brought up in an inland town to be as knowledgeable as he was himself, but he detected a lack of enthusiasm in his cousin which was hard to understand, until Hugo disclosed that whenever he went to sea he was sick. Richmond, like most excellent sailors, was much inclined to think sea-sickness largely imaginative: no one need be ill who did not think he would be. He responded with a sympathy as spurious as Hugo’s admiration of the Seamew’s lines, and tried not to think the worse of him.

  Hugo was not deceived. When he set off for home with Anthea, Richmond having left them to visit his boatman in Camber, he shook his head, saying sadly: ‘I’ve sunk myself beneath reproach.’

  Anthea laughed. ‘Yes, but you may easily make a recover, you know! You have only to unbutton a trifle, and tell him about your adventures in the Peninsula, to win his worship.’

  ‘Nay, I’m no figure for worship!’

  ‘You are a soldier, however, and he’s army-mad. Do you dislike talking about your campaigns? I wished you would have told us more, but it seemed as if you didn’t care to.’

  ‘I’d tell him anything he wants to know, but it wouldn’t be the right thing for me to do, when your mother and his lordship don’t wish it.’

  ‘I wondered if that was why you said so little. Grandpapa you need not heed; and Mama – well, I think you shouldn’t heed her either! Poor love, she would be quite dismayed if Richmond should succeed in winning Grandpapa over, but she would soon become reconciled, I promise you. She has the happiest disposition! For myself, I believe nothing else will do for Richmond. I wish it were not so, but we have none of us the right to push him into some occupation he doesn’t care for! You said that yourself, cousin!’

  ‘Ay, so I did, but that’s just my opinion. If his lordship asked me for it, I’d give it to him, but he won’t, and I’ve no business to encourage Richmond to go against him, nor to offer advice that’s not wanted.’ He smiled ruefully, and added: ‘It’s bad enough for him to have me foisted on to him without my meddling in what’s no concern of mine! A fine trimming he would give me, if I was to be so presumptuous, and small blame to him! From what I can see, Vincent is the only one he might listen to. If the lad wants someone to help him, why doesn’t he ask Vincent? Seemingly Vincent’s fond of him, so it’s likely he’d be willing to try what he could do.’

  ‘Nothing is more unlikely!’ replied Anthea. ‘Vincent, my dear Hugo, is fond of no one but himself. As for thinking that he would run the risk of offending Grandpapa, merely to oblige Richmond, he would stare at such a notion!’

  He offered no comment on this, but said, after a short pause: ‘It queers me to know why Richmond’s so set on the army. I should have thought he’d be mad for the navy, with his liking for sailing.’

  ‘Yes, so should I,’ she agreed. ‘But it has always been the army with him, and if you ask him why he doesn’t wish to become a sailor he says that it’s a nonsensical question, and that being partial to sailing is not at all the same thing as wishing to embrace the navy as a profession.’

  ‘Happen he’s right. Though to hear him talk about that boat of his– What did he call it? a yawl?’

  ‘Yes, or a yacht, though she’s too big for a yacht, I think.’

  ‘What did he want with a boat that size?’ asked Hugo curiously. ‘I should have thought a little one he could handle himself would have been more to his taste.’

  ‘I daresay it would, in some ways, but it wouldn’t have been to Grandpapa’s taste,’ she explained. ‘And I must do him the justice to own that if he gave Richmond a yacht at all he was right to give him one he couldn’t handle alone! I don’t mean he doesn’t know how, but you can never tell when he will take it into his head to run some foolish risk. You see, he enjoys doing dangerous things. You can’t think what agonies of apprehension we have had to suffer!’

  ‘Ay, no doubt he’d be prime for any lark, and the more risk the better. It would be well if he were put into harness.’

  ‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘Yet sometimes I wonder – you see, he has never been in harness, as you call it. Papa died when he was very young, and Grandpapa has always indulged him so much that there has never been anyone to say him nay. He had two tutors, but only the first of them tried to make him obedient. His reign was consequently short, and his successor, speedily perceiving how things were, prudently acquiesced in all Grandpapa’s ideas. It was a fortunate circumstance that Richmond liked him well enough not to wish for another in his place, so he was never so naughty with him as he had been with Mr Crewe. I’m afraid he didn’t learn very much, however!’

  ‘Well, I was never bookish myself,’ Hugo said. ‘It’s a pity the lad wasn’t bridled when he was a little chap, but there’s no need that I can see for you to be much worried. His lordship may indulge him, but he snaps out his orders to him just as he does to everyone else. I’d say myself that the lad is remarkably docile: there’s many that would kick in his shoes.’

  ‘Richmond never argues with Grandpapa. He – yes, I suppose he is docile. He always does what Grandpapa wishes, and it is perfectly true, what Mama says: that he is sweet-tempered, never gets into a miff, or the sulks! Only – you may think he has yielded, but all the time, I believe, he means to have his own way, and, in general, he gets it!’

  ‘Then maybe he’ll get his way over this business of a pair of colours,’ said Hugo, in a comfortably matter-of-fact voice.

  She shook her head. ‘Not over that. He told me so himself. He said that there was nothing he could do or say to make Grandpapa change his mind. I wish –’ She stopped, surprised and a little vexed to find herself talking so unguardedly to one who was a stranger. ‘But I must not run on! If we don’t make haste, cousin, we shall have a peal run
g over us for being late for dinner!’

  She urged her mare into a canter, and the Major followed suit, saying, however: ‘Ay, so we shall. What’s more, there’s no knowing but what I might repeat what you say to me.’

  She blushed vividly. ‘Oh – ! No, I’m persuaded you would not!’

  ‘You can’t tell that. If I was to have a fit of gabbing –’

  ‘I should be much astonished!’ she retorted. ‘You are not precisely garrulous, you know!’

  ‘The thing is that I have to mind my tongue,’ he explained. ‘It’s what you might call a handicap to conversation.’

  ‘Ah, to be sure! How stupid of me! But you have been minding it so well that I must be forgiven for not remembering how hard it is for you to speak the King’s English!’

  ‘Ay!’ he said, with simple pride. ‘I have and-all, haven’t I? I was taking pains, you see.’

  They had reached one of the gates that led into the park, and she waited for him to open it for her, eyeing him with a little speculation and a good deal of amusement. ‘Just as you did when you first arrived! You managed beautifully, and for such a long time, too! You deserve the greatest credit, for, I assure you, no one would have guessed you came from Yorkshire until we were halfway through dinner, when you suffered a sudden relapse – and grew rapidly worse.’

  He heaved a dejected sigh. ‘Came all-a-bits, didn’t I? It’s that road with me when I’m scared.’

  ‘But you contrived to conceal that from us,’ said Anthea encouragingly. ‘You didn’t look to be in the least scared.’

  ‘You don’t know how I looked: you never lifted your eyes from your plate!’ he retorted.

  ‘Nevertheless I was very well able to see how you looked,’ she said firmly. ‘I must tell you that you don’t look scared now, though I realize, of course, that you must be. You haven’t caught sight of a – a flay-boggard, have you?’

  ‘It’s not that,’ he said. ‘I’m thinking what a hirdum-durdum there’ll be if the old gentleman is kept waiting for his dinner. It has me in fair sweat, so just you leave quizzing me, lass, and come through this gate!’

  She obeyed, but said: ‘What did you call me?’

  ‘It slipped out!’ he said hastily. He shut the gate, and added, with all the air of one extricating himself neatly from a difficult situation: ‘We always call a cousin lass in Yorkshire – if she’s a female. Of course, it would be lad, if I was talking to Richmond.’

  ‘That,’ said Anthea, with severity, ‘is a shocking bouncer, sir!’

  ‘You’re reet: it is!’ he said, stricken.

  She could not help laughing, but she said, as they fell into a canter again: ‘Instead of trying to bamboozle me, cousin, you had better consider how to get out of the fix you’re in. You cannot talk broad Yorkshire for ever!’

  ‘Nay, it wouldn’t be seemly,’ he agreed. ‘I’ll have to get shut of it, won’t I?’

  ‘Exactly so!’

  ‘Happen our Claud will bring the thing off!’ he said hopefully.

  Since her feelings threatened to overcome her, it was perhaps fortunate that a peremptory hail at that moment interrupted them. Lord Darracott, accompanied by Vincent, was also riding home through the park. He came up at a brisk trot, as erect in the saddle as his grandson, and demanded to be told where Anthea and Hugo had been. His manner would not have led the uninitiated to suppose that his humour was benign, but Anthea saw at once that he was pleased; and whatever timidity assailed Hugo at having questions barked at him he seemed well able to conceal. Not all of his answers were satisfactory, since he knew very little about the subjects that were of paramount importance to landowners; but although his ignorance made Lord Darracott impatient, and he asked several questions which were naïve enough to exasperate his irascible progenitor, his lordship was not wholly dissatisfied. Indeed, it was generally felt, when he later announced that something might yet be made of Hugh, that he had begun to look upon his heir with an almost approving eye.

  Escaping from his rigorous grandparent, the Major went upstairs to change his dress. Sounds of altercation assailed his ears as he approached his bedchamber; and when he reached it, and stood in the open doorway, he found that it had suffered an invasion.

  Two gentlemen of the same calling, but of different cut, were confronting one another in a manner strongly suggestive of tomcats about to join battle. Each wore the habit of a private servant; but whereas the elder of the two, a middle-aged man of stocky build and rigid countenance, was meticulous in his avoidance of any ornament or touch of colour to relieve the sobriety of his raiment, the younger not only sported a pin in his neckcloth, but added an even more daring note to his appearance by wearing a striped waistcoat which only the most indulgent of masters would have tolerated. As the Major paused, in some astonishment, on the threshold, he said, in mincing accents: ‘Vastly obliging of you, Mr Crimplesham, I am sure! Quite a condescension indeed!’

  ‘Do not name it, Mr Polyphant!’ begged Crimplesham. ‘We are all put on this earth to help one another, and knowing as I do what a labour it is to you to get a gloss on to a pair of boots – something that passes for a gloss, I should say – it quite went to my heart to think of you wearing yourself out over a task that wouldn’t take up more than a couple of minutes of my time. It is just a knack, Mr Polyphant, which some of us have and others don’t.’

  ‘And very right you were to cultivate it, Mr Crimplesham! I vow and declare I would have done the same if I’d had only the one talent!’ said Polyphant. ‘For, as I have often and often remarked, an over-polished boot may present a flash appearance, but it does draw the eye away from badly got-up linen!’

  ‘As to that, Mr Polyphant, I’m sure I can’t say, but nothing, I do promise you, will distract the attention from a spot of iron-mould on a neckcloth!’

  ‘I will have you know, Mr Crimplesham,’ said Polyphant, trembling violently, ‘that it was a spot of soup!’

  ‘Well, Mr Polyphant, you should know best, and whatever it was no one feels for your mortification more than I do, for, as I said to Mr Chollacombe, when the matter was being talked of in the Room, if I had been so careless as to let Mr Vincent Darracott go down to dinner wearing a neckcloth that wasn’t perfectly fresh I could never have held up my head again.’

  ‘When Mr Claud Darracott left my hands, Mr Crimplesham, that neckcloth was spotless!’ declared Polyphant, pale with fury. ‘If Mr Chollacombe says other, which I do not credit, being as only a perjured snake would utter those lying words –’

  ‘What the devil are you doing in my quarters?’ demanded the Major, bringing the altercation to an abrupt end.

  This deep-voiced interruption was productive of a sudden transformation. The disputants turned quickly towards the door, guilt and dismay in their countenances, but only for an instant was the Major permitted a glimpse of these, or any other, emotions. Before he had advanced one step into the room, all trace of human passion had vanished, and he was confronted by two very correct gentlemen’s gentlemen, who received him with calm and dignity, and, after bowing in a manner that paid deference to his quality without diminishing their own consequence, deftly relieved him of his hat, his whip, and his gloves.

  ‘If you will permit me, sir!’ said Crimplesham, nipping the hat from the Major’s hand. ‘Having been informed that you have not brought your man with you, I ventured, sir, to give your boots a touch, young Wellow, though a painstaking lad, being but a rustic, and quite ignorant of the requirements of military gentlemen.’

  ‘If you will permit me, sir!’ said Polyphant, possessing himself of the whip and the gloves. ‘You will pardon the intrusion, sir, I trust, being as my master, Mr Claud Darracott, desired me to offer my services to you.’

  ‘I’m much obliged to you both, but I don’t need either of you,’ said the Major, pleasantly, but in a tone that was unmistakeably dismissive.

  There was n
othing for his would-be attendants to do but to bow in acceptance of his decree, and leave the room. Crimplesham held the door, and made a polite gesture to his rival to precede him. Before he had time to consider what devilish stratagem might lie beneath this courtesy from one whose position in the hierarchy of the servants’ hall was superior to his own, Polyphant had tripped out of the room, bestowing on Crimplesham, as he passed him, a gracious bow, and a smile of such condescension as was calculated to arouse the bitterest passions in his breast.

  But herein he showed himself to be of lesser calibre than Crimplesham, who returned his smile with one of quiet triumph, and gently closed the door on his heels.

  ‘Shall I pull off your boots before I go, sir?’ he asked, coming back into the centre of the room, and drawing forward a chair for the Major to sit in. ‘Wellow, I fancy, is laying out Mr Richmond’s evening-dress, and you would hardly wish to make use of the jack.’

  The Major, having, indeed, no desire to use the jack, submitted, wondering, as he watched Crimplesham take a pair of gloves from his pocket and put them on, what was at the back of this very superior valet’s determination to wait on him.

  Two circumstances had in fact combined to overcome Crimplesham’s regard for his own dignity: he had a score to pay off, and a nephew to establish suitably. Of these, the first operated the more powerfully upon him, but it was only the second which he disclosed to the Major. Whatever might be the differences between himself and his master, no living soul would ever learn from his lips that the smallest disharmony marred their relationship. To complain, as less lofty valets might, that his employer was exacting, impatient, often impossible to please, and always inconsiderate, would serve only to lower his own consequence. The truth was that he was frequently at silent loggerheads with Vincent, who neither tried nor wished to endear himself to his servants. When a suitable opportunity offered, Crimplesham had every intention of changing masters; but this was not a step to be taken lightly. Vacancies in the ranks of those who ministered to the leaders of high fashion occurred infrequently, and nothing could more fatally damage a valet’s reputation than to leave the service of a noted Corinthian for that of a kinder but less worthy master. Vincent was as thankless as he was exacting, but he did Crimplesham great credit, and through him Crimplesham was steadily acquiring the renown he craved. He had not yet attained the ultimate peak, when (he allowed himself to hope) aspirants to fashion would employ every sort of wile to lure him away from his master; but he was already well-known for his unequalled skill with a boot. The fantasies Vincent performed on his neckcloths sprang from his own genius, but the high gloss on his Hessians that excited the envy of his acquaintance he owed to Crimplesham, and not willingly would he part with him. Crimplesham was perfectly well-aware of that, so when any serious affront was offered to him he was able to punish Vincent without fear of dismissal. He was not in Vincent’s confidence, but he had no doubt at all that it would very much annoy him to learn that his cousin’s footwear had received treatment at the hands of his own expert.