Friday's Child Page 24

Mrs Hoby gave a little shriek of laughter.‘Oh,my dear, what will you say next, I wonder? Depend upon it, Mrs Gillingham does not come under that category! Why, she must be thirty-five, if she is a day, and very likely more!’

  So upon the following evening Hero was set down at a slip of a house in Curzon Street, and made a somewhat shy entrance into a saloon already full of guests. Her hostess came forward at once, and made her welcome in the kindest way, introducing her to one or two complete strangers, and pressing a glass of champagne upon her. Hero was a little surprised to find that she knew no one in the room, and after looking about her for a while she began to feel uneasy, and to fear that perhaps Sherry would not have wished her to have come. When Sir Matthew Brockenhurst arrived, with the Honourable Wilfrid Yarford, she wished it more than ever, and had she known how to excuse herself without giving offence to her hostess, or drawing upon herself the particular notice she wished to avoid, she would certainly have done so. She did not know, however, and when the company adjourned to a much larger apartment on the first floor, where card tables were set out, she meekly allowed herself to be shepherded up the stairs with the rest of the guests.

  She liked playing cards, and since she had been initiated into the mysteries of faro, rouge et noir, macao, and a number of other games of chance by Sherry himself, she naturally considered that she was well able to hold her own in any company. This proved, however, not to be the case. The stakes, too, were much higher than any she had yet played for, and she was soon put into a little confusion by finding herself without any more money to stake. Mrs Gillingham was kindness itself, smiling at her innocence, and explaining to her how everyone punted on tick until the luck turned for them, and showing her how to write a vowel. Hero remembered hearing Sherry talk of having given vowels, so she knew that this must be the accepted custom, and settled down to win back her losses. She became so absorbed in the game that she scarcely noticed anything beyond the turn of a card; and what with the excitement of the play, the heat of the room, and the champagne which was continually poured into her glass, she began to plunge more and more heavily, arising in the small hours a much greater loser than she had had any very clear idea of. Her vowels appeared, incredibly, to run into four figures, and how she was ever to pay such a sum until her next quarter’s allowance should be paid to her account she had not the least idea. But here again Mrs Gillingham was most understanding, assuring her that Jack Cranbourne, who had held the bank, would not dream of pressing for payment, and expressing her conviction that another evening’s play would see all the vowels redeemed, and a stream of guineas pouring into her young friend’s lap. Hero, effectually sobered by her losses, had no desire to spend another evening in this house, but she knew that what Mrs Gillingham said was true, because Sherry had said the same. One had only to have courage, to ignore one’s losses, and to continue playing, for the luck to change, and set all to rights.

  But the second night’s play was even more disastrous than the first; and some warning instinct in Hero told her that a third would be no more successful. Thoroughly frightened, shivering at the thought of the vast sums she had lost, and not knowing which way to turn in her extremity, she spent what was left of the night in tossing about in her bed, and racking her brains to find a way out of her difficulties. To present Sherry with the sum of her obligations seemed to her unthinkable, for poor Sherry had his own obligations, and had said only a week earlier that they must really try to practise economy. Hero wept into her pillow with grief to think that she should have added to Sherry’s embarrassments; and thought that her mother-in-law had spoken no less than the truth when she had accused her of having wrecked his life.

  He came home from Newmarket that day, to find a heavy-eyed wife, who explained nervously that she had the headache. He said that he had one himself, and had no hesitation in ascribing it to the malignant behaviour of four out of five of the horses he had backed. Hero turned pale, and faltered:‘Was your luck so very bad, Sherry?’

  ‘Devilish!’ he replied.‘If it goes on like this I shall find myself in the hands of some curst cent-per-cent, I can tell you!’ He broke the wafer of one of the letters which had been awaiting him, and ejaculated: ‘Bills! nothing but bills! There’s no end to it! What a damned homecoming for a man!’

  ‘What – what is a cent-per-cent, Sherry?’ asked his wife in a small voice.

  ‘Moneylender,’ he replied, consigning another bill to the fire, and breaking open a more promising-looking billet.

  ‘Do people lend one money?’ she asked anxiously.

  ‘Usurers do – at a devilish rate of interest, too! I know ’em all too well! Used to be for ever at Howard and Gibbs before the Trust was wound up.’

  ‘Howard and Gibbs, did you say, Sherry?’

  ‘Yes, they’re about the best of the blood-suckers, and that ain’t saying much.’ He looked up from his letter.‘What the deuce do you want to know about moneylenders for, Kitten?’

  ‘I – only that I did not perfectly understand what a cent-percent is!’ she said quickly.

  ‘Well, don’t go talking of ’em!’ he warned her. ‘It ain’t a genteel expression!’

  That highly successful firm of philanthropists, Messrs. Howard and Gibbs, received upon the following morning a visit from a closely-veiled lady, who drove up in a hackney, and was plainly ignorant of the principles which governed the particular form of finance practised by the firm. The respectable gentleman who interviewed this lady seemed at first strangely disinclined to accommodate her. He bewildered her by talking suavely of securities and credentials, but when she disclosed to him her identity his manner underwent a gratifying change, and he not only explained the terms on which the firm would be ready to advance a loan, but expressed his willingness to serve her in any way possible. He seemed to have no difficulty in understanding how it came about that she had lost such a sum in only two nights’ play, and showed himself in general to be so sympathetic that his client presently left the building with a high opinion of the whole race of moneylenders.

  But while his wife was happily redeeming vowels with the money so generously advanced to her by Messrs. Howard and Gibbs, Sherry had received a billet on gilt-edged, scented notepaper from a lady with whom he had had no dealings since his marriage. He frowned over this missive, for he was not in the mood to embark on the kind of intrigue its mysterious wording seemed to promise. The writer said that she did not like to ask him to visit her, but she had something to say to him which was of vast importance, and which he would regret not hearing. Sherry read this through twice, decided that Nancy had never been one to play tricks on a fellow, and took himself off to the street in which she had her lodging.

  He found her at home, and was received by her with her merriest smile and most welcoming manner. ‘Sherry, I hoped you would come!’ she said.‘I oughtn’t to ask it of you, I dare say, but give me a kiss for old times’ sake!’

  He obeyed this behest willingly enough, for if she was growing to be a little faded she was still a cosy armful, and he had a fondness for her quite apart from his amorous dealings with her.‘Yes, this is all very well, Nancy, but I’m a married man now! Turned over a new leaf !’ he said, giving her plump shoulders a hug.

  ‘Lord bless you, Sherry, don’t I know that? And you need not be thinking that I’ve sent for you to make trouble, for that’s what I would never do, and so you should know! It’s because we’ve had some delightful times together, and I always liked you, that I asked you to come. Yes, and I like the look of that little wife of yours, Sherry – and that’s the root of the matter!’

  ‘What the deuce has my wife to do with it?’ he demanded.

  ‘Sit down,my dear, and take that ugly frown off your face, do! You’ve been at Newmarket, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes, but –’

  ‘Well, now, Sherry, if I’m telling you something you don’t care to hear from me, just you remember that I wouldn’t breathe a word if I weren’t fond of you, and if I didn’t happen to have
heard – never mind where! – that that little wife of yours is only a baby who ain’t up to snuff like half the fine ladies that hold their noses so high in the air!’

  The Viscount’s blue eyes were fixed intently on her face.‘Go on!’ he said briefly.

  She smiled at him. ‘Well, my dearie, I saw your wife where she’d no business to be, and how she came there is what I can’t tell you, for try as I will I can’t discover who put her in the way of meeting Charlotte Gillingham.’

  ‘What?’ exclaimed his lordship incredulously.

  ‘Yes, my dear, that’s where I saw her, and mighty ill-at-ease she looked, poor little creature, not knowing a soul, and wishing she had not come, if I know anything of the matter! And the long and the short of it is, Sherry, that there were some deep doings, and your wife was badly dipped. Now, maybe I wouldn’t have said anything about it to you if I hadn’t discovered that she went again, the very next night, but she did, and you know as well as I do that if she gets into the hands of that set she will be ruined in more ways than one.’

  ‘My God!’ Sherry said.‘Oh,my God, what next will she do?’

  Nancy patted his hand.‘Now, don’t put yourself in a pucker, for there’s very little harm done yet! And don’t fly into one of your tantrums with the poor child, for she looked frightened to death when I saw her, and I don’t doubt she’s had her lesson without your scaring her worse than ever.’

  ‘No,’ he said.‘No, I won’t. Charlotte Gillingham! Who in the devil’s name –’ He broke off, and got up abruptly.‘By God, if I thought – Nancy, I’m off ! You’re a deuced good friend,my girl, and I’m devilish grateful to you!’

  ‘Well, give me another kiss, then!’ she said, laughing.

  The Viscount reached home again to find that his wife had gone out driving in the Park. It said much for his new-found sense of responsibility that, after a glance at the ormolu clock on the drawing-room mantelpiece, he sent round a note to Stratton Street, briefly excusing himself from accompanying Mr Ringwood on an expedition to Richmond.

  When Hero presently returned to the house, she ran lightly upstairs, and the Viscount heard her moving about in the room behind the drawing-room. She did not sound to be in dejected spirits, which surprised him a little, and when she at last entered the drawing-room the start she gave upon seeing him there was one of unadulterated gladness. ‘Sherry! I had not thought you were at home! Do you not go with Gil, after all?’

  ‘No. I’m dining at home. Come over here, Kitten: I want to talk to you.’

  She blushed rosily.‘Do you, Sherry? How comfortable that sounds!’

  ‘That’s just what it ain’t in the least likely to be!’muttered his lordship.

  She came to the fire.‘What did you say, Sherry?’

  ‘Nothing. Sit down! Oh, the devil take that bird!’ He strode over to the canary, and covered its cage, and turned back to Hero. ‘Now, brat, out with it! How badly were you dipped at Charlotte Gillingham’s house while I was away?’

  The colour fled from her cheeks, and the look of trustful expectancy from her eyes.‘Oh, Sherry, who told you?’ she said, in a frightened voice.

  ‘Never mind that! How much, Kitten?’

  She shuddered.‘Oh, don’t ask me! It was so shocking!’

  ‘Not ask you!’ he exclaimed. ‘How the deuce am I to settle your debts if I don’t know what they are? Don’t be nonsensical!’

  ‘Oh, Sherry, Sherry, I am so very sorry! Indeed, I never meant to be such a bad wife! And you are not to settle for me at all, because I am going to pay it myself, and I shall do so, Sherry, because you give me such a big allowance for my pin-money, and I won’t purchase any more new gowns, or anything! I promise!’

  ‘That’s fudge, brat. Besides, you must pay your gaming-debts at once, you know. Can’t expect people to wait for what you owe ’em. Shocking bad ton, my girl!’

  ‘Yes, yes, I know that, and indeed I have redeemed all my vowels, though at first I did not know how in the world I could do so, and I felt as though I would rather die than –’

  ‘Just a moment!’ Sherry said, catching her unquiet hands, and holding them in a hard grasp. ‘How did you contrive to come by the money to redeem your vowels? I’ll swear you’d little enough left of this quarter’s allowance! Kitten, you haven’t sold the emeralds?’

  ‘Oh, no, Sherry! Of course I have not done such a wicked thing! Why, they are not mine to sell! How could you think I would dream of doing so?’

  ‘Then how the devil did you raise the wind?’

  ‘I borrowed the money!’ she replied triumphantly.

  ‘Borrowed it? Good God, I had rather you had sold the emeralds! Who – Kitten, don’t tell me you came down on poor old Gil to lend you money!’

  ‘No, no! I knew that would not do! I went to those people you told me about, and they were very obliging, and –’

  ‘What people?’ he interrupted, turning a little pale.

  ‘I do not recall their names, but you will know, Sherry! you called them cents-per-cent, and they live –’

  ‘Howard and Gibbs!’ he ejaculated, in a stunned tone.

  ‘Yes, those are their names,’ she nodded.‘And as soon as I told them I was your wife they – at least, it was just one man – he was most civil, and he said he was perfectly willing to lend me the money, and I need not fear that he would press me for an early settlement.’

  ‘I’ll warrant he did!’ Sherry said. He released her hands. ‘Howard and Gibbs! Kitten, how could you?’

  ‘You are angry!’ she faltered.‘Was it wrong of me? I did not know. You said you had had dealings with them, and I thought –’

  He groaned.‘The devil! I said! I said! For God’s sake, girl, did I ever say that you were to have dealings with them?’

  ‘No, Sherry,’ she replied, in a small voice. ‘But you did not tell me I must not, and what else could I do, when I owed all that money?’

  He said sharply:‘In the devil’s name, why could you not have told me? Hang it, I may have boxed your ears once or twice, and I dare say I might have done so again, but you can’t have been afraid of me!’

  She got up, quickly, colour surging into her cheeks.‘Afraid of you, Sherry! Oh, never, never! But I felt so dreadfully! You do not understand! You have had such a shocking run of luck, and then those horrid horses behaved so badly at Newmarket – I would have done anything rather than ask you to pay my gaming-debts!’

  He stared at her. ‘Hero, you could not suppose that I would permit you to fall into the hands of those blood-suckers?’

  ‘But, Sherry, I am persuaded they are no such things! I am to pay back the principal out of my allowance, and –’

  ‘You little fool, they know very well you will do no such thing! They hope you will become more deeply dipped than ever, and fall more securely into their talons, until – Oh, the devil, where’s the use? Listen, brat! – Never, whatever happens, have anything to do with moneylenders! It’s the surest road to ruin of them all!Yes, yes, I know I’ve been in their hands myself, but that’s another thing altogether – at least, it isn’t! I can tell you this: I’ll take precious good care I don’t fall into ’em again. Promise me, now!’

  ‘I promise. I am very sorry! If I had known you would not like it –’

  ‘I fancy you did know, Kitten,’ he said shrewdly. ‘It ain’t like you not to tell me what tricks you’ve been playing.’

  She hung her head. ‘Well, I – well, I did not feel quite comfortable,’ she confessed. ‘But that was mostly because I feared you would be cross with me for going to that house, and gaming for such high stakes.’

  ‘So I am,’ he said.‘What were the stakes?’

  ‘F-fifty pounds, Sherry,’ she whispered.

  He gave a whistle. ‘Were they, by God! What’s the figure?’ He glanced down at the bowed head. ‘Come along, brat! I won’t eat you!’

  ‘Oh,Sherry, I lost over five thousand pounds!’Hero blurted out.

  His lordship preserved his control over
himself with a strong effort. After a moment of inward struggle, he said:‘Drawing the bustle with a vengeance, weren’t you? No, don’t cry! It might have been worse. But what possessed you, you little simpleton, to throw good money after bad? For I know very well you went a second night to that curst hell! Had you no more sense than to allow yourself to be plucked again? Good God! is gaming in your blood?’

  ‘Oh, no, no, I am sure it is not, for I was never more uncomfortable in my life! Indeed, I wish I had not gone back, but I did it for the best, Sherry, and truly I thought you would have told me to if I could but have asked you!’

  ‘Thought I – thought I – ?’ gasped his lordship. ‘Have you gone mad, Hero?’

  ‘But, Sherry, you told me yourself, when your uncle Prosper had been teasing you, that the only thing to be done was to continue playing, because a run of bad luck could not last for ever, and –’ She broke off, alarmed by the expression on his face. ‘Oh, what have I said?’ she cried.

  ‘It’s what I have said!’ replied Sherry.‘No, no, don’t look like ‘It’s what I have said!’ replied Sherry.‘No, no, don’t look like that, Kitten! It’s all my curst fault! Only I never dreamed you’d pay the least heed – Lord, I might have known, though! Kitten, don’t listen to me when I talk such nonsense!’

  Her eyes were fixed on his face enquiringly.‘But is it not true, after all, Sherry?’ she asked.‘I must say, it did not seem to be true, for I lost more heavily than ever, but I thought perhaps I had not persevered for long enough. Only I disliked it so very much that I gave it up in despair.’

  ‘Well, thank God for that!’ he said. ‘No, it’s not true – at least – dash it, I mean –’

  ‘I see!’ she said helpfully, clasping his hand, and giving it a squeeze.‘You mean it is the same as going to the Royal Saloon: you may do so, but I must not, on account of being a female.’

  ‘Yes, that’s it. No, it ain’t, though!’ said Sherry, his natural honesty asserting itself. ‘It ain’t true for either of us, brat, and if we don’t care we shall find ourselves in the basket. Lord, I couldn’t tell you the fortunes which have changed hands over the gaming-table! It’s what finished Brummell, and poor Tallerton, and that fellow Stoke prosed on about – fellow who hanged himself from a lamp-post, or some such flummery!’ He laughed, as Hero instinctively clutched his arm. ‘No, I don’t mean to follow his example, never fear! I’ll see Stoke tomorrow, and settle with Howard and Gibbs, and you need not think any more about it.’