Sylvester Page 9

  ‘Ugh!’ shuddered Phoebe, carefully shutting the door. ‘How horrid! Do put the book away!’

  ‘All in good time! If you don’t want to know how to preserve tripe, what about an Excellent Dish for six or seven Persons for the Expense of Sixpence? Just the thing for the ducal kitchens, I think! It’s made with calf’s lights, and bread, and fat, and some sheeps’ guts, and –’

  ‘How can you be so absurd? Stop reading that nonsense!’ scolded Phoebe.

  ‘Nicely cleaned,’ pursued Tom. ‘And if you don’t fancy sheeps’ guts you may take hogs’, or –’

  But at this point Phoebe seized the book, and after a slight struggle for possession he let her have it.

  ‘For heaven’s sake don’t laugh so loud!’ she begged him. ‘The children’s bedchamber is almost opposite this room! Oh, Tom, you can’t conceive what a shocking evening I’ve spent! I begged Papa to send the Duke away, but he wouldn’t, so I have made up my mind to go away myself.’

  He was conscious of a sinking feeling at the pit of his stomach, but replied staunchly: ‘Well, I told you I was game. I only hope we don’t find the roads snow-bound in the north. Gretna Green it shall be!’

  ‘Not so loud! Of course I’m not going to Gretna Green!’ she said in an indignant under-voice. ‘Keep your voice low, Tom! If Eliza were to wake and hear us talking she would tell Mama, as sure as check! Now listen! I thought it all out at dinner! I must go to London, to my grandmother. She told me once that I might depend on her to do all she could for me, and I think – oh, I am sure she would support me in this, if only she knew what was happening! The only thing is – Tom, you know Mama buys all my dresses, and lets me have very little pin-money! Could you – would you lend me the money for the coach-fare? I think it costs about five-and-thirty shillings for the ticket. And then there is the tip to the guard, and –’

  ‘Yes, of course I’ll lend you as much rhino as you want!’ Tom interrupted. ‘But you can’t mean to travel to London on the stage!’

  ‘Yes, I do. How could I go post, even I could afford to do so? There would be the hiring of the chaise, and then all the business of the changes – oh, no, it would be impossible! I haven’t an abigail to go with me, remember! I shall be much safer in the common stage. And if I could contrive to get a seat in one of the fast day coaches –’

  ‘Well, you couldn’t. They are always booked up as full as they can hold in Bath, and if you aren’t on the way-bill – Besides, if the snow is as deep beyond Reading as they say it is those coaches won’t run.’

  ‘Well, never mind! Any coach will serve, and I don’t doubt I shall be able to get a place, because people won’t care to travel in this weather, unless they are obliged. I have made up my mind to it that I must be gone from here before anyone can prevent me, very early in the morning. If I could reach Devizes – it is nearer than Calne, and I know some of the London coaches do take that road – only I shall have a portmanteau to carry, and perhaps a bandbox as well, so – Oh, Tom, could you, do you think, take me to Devizes in your gig?’

  ‘Will you stop fretting and fuming?’ he said severely. ‘I’ll take you anywhere you wish, but this scheme of yours – You know, I don’t wish to throw a rub in the way, but I’m afraid it may not hold. This curst weather! A pretty piece of business it would be if you were to get no farther than Reading! It might well turn out so, and then it would be all holiday with you.’

  ‘No, no, I have thought of that already! If the coach goes on, I shall stay with it, but if the snow is very bad I know just what I must do. Do you remember Jane, that used to be the maid who waited on the nursery? Well, she married a corn-chandler, in a very good way of business, I believe, and lives at Reading. So, you see, if I can’t travel beyond Reading I may go to her, and stay with her until the snow has melted!’

  ‘Stay in a corn-chandler’s house?’ he repeated, in accents of incredulity.

  ‘Good God, why should I not? He is a very respectable man, and as for Jane, she will take excellent care of me, I can assure you! I suppose you had rather I stayed in a public inn?’

  ‘No, that I wouldn’t! But –’ He paused, not liking the scheme, yet unable to think of a better.

  She began to coax him, representing to him the advantages of her plan, and all the hopelessness of her situation if she were forced to remain at Austerby. He was easily convinced of this, for it did indeed seem to him that without her father’s support her case was desperate. Nor could he deny that her grandmother was the very person to shield her; but it took a little time to persuade him that neither danger nor impropriety would attend her journey to London in a stage-coach. It was not until she told him that if he would not lend her his aid she meant to trudge to Devizes alone that he at last capitulated. Nothing remained, after that, but to arrange the details of her escape, and this was soon accomplished. Tom promised to have his gig waiting in the lane outside one of the farm gates of Austerby at seven o’clock on the following morning; Phoebe pledged herself not to keep him waiting there; and they parted, one of them full of confidence, the other trying to smother his uneasiness.

  She was punctual at the rendezvous; he was not; and for twenty nerve-racking minutes she paced up and down the lane, in the lee of the hedge, her imagination running riot amongst the various disasters which might have overtaken him. The most likely of these was that he had overslept, a probability which added rage to her anxiety. It had been dark when she herself had dressed, and packed her night gear into the already bulging portmanteau, but by seven o’clock it was daylight, and at any moment, she felt, she might be discovered by some villager or farm-hand to whom she must be well known. The day was cheerless, the wind blowing from the north, and the clouds ominously thick. Anger and apprehension steadily mounted, but both were forgotten in surprise when Tom arrived on the scene, driving, instead of his gig, his father’s curricle, with those two tidy brown steppers, Trusty and True, harnessed to it.

  He pulled up beside her and commanded her, without preamble, to go to the horses’ heads. She obeyed, but said, as he cast off the rug wrapped about his legs and jumped down into the road: ‘But, Tom, how is this? Why have you brought the curricle? I am persuaded you ought not!’

  He had picked up her portmanteau, and was lashing it quickly in place. ‘Yes, I ought. Did you think I was never coming? I’m sorry to be so late, but, you see, I had to go back. We must put this bandbox under the seat.’ He stowed it away as he spoke, and came striding up to her. ‘I’ll take ’em. Do you jump up, and take the ribbons! Take care! They haven’t been out since my father went away, and they’re as lively as be-damned! You will find my father’s old driving-coat: put it on, and wrap that fur rug well round you! And don’t waste time disputing!’ he added.

  She did as he bade her, but she was considerably astonished, and demanded, as soon as he had climbed up beside her, and taken the reins from her competent hands, ‘Have you run mad, Tom? What in the world –’

  ‘No, of course I haven’t. The thing is I was the most complete gudgeon last night, not to have seen what I ought to do. Plain as a pikestaff, but it never occurred to me till I had actually set out to come to you. Mind you, I wasn’t easy in my mind! Kept on waking up all night, wondering what I should do. It only came to me when I was on my way here, driving the gig. So I turned sharp about, scribbled a note for my mother, got Jem to fig out Trusty and True –’

  ‘But why?’ she interrupted.

  ‘Going to take you to London myself,’ he replied briefly. Her first feeling was one of gratitude, but she was instantly assailed by qualms, and said: ‘No, no, you can’t do so, Tom!’

  ‘Nonsense, what could be easier? Trusty and True are good for two full stages, and very likely more, if I don’t press them. After that, of course, I must hire job-horses, but unless we learn at Reading that the road from there is too deep to make the attempt we shall be in London by tonight. I shan’t try it, mind, if we get
bad news at Reading! If that should be the case, I’ll take you to this corn-chandler of yours, and put up myself at the Crown. The only thing is that you may find it pretty cold.’

  ‘Oh, that doesn’t signify! But indeed, Tom, I think you ought not! Perhaps –’

  ‘Well, it makes no odds what you think,’ he returned. ‘I’m going to do it.’

  ‘But Mrs Orde – your father –’

  ‘I know my father would say I shouldn’t let you go alone; and as for Mama, she won’t be thrown into a pucker, because I dashed off a note to her, telling her she need not be. And don’t you fly into one of your fusses either! I didn’t say where I was taking you, but only that I was obliged to rescue you from that Duke, and very likely should be away from home for a little while. So that’s all right and tight.’

  She could not be perfectly satisfied, but since there was plainly no hope of turning Tom from his purpose, and she was besides thankful not to be obliged to journey alone to London, she said no more to dissuade him.

  ‘That’s a good girl!’ he said, correctly interpreting her silence. ‘Lord, I call it a famous lark, don’t you? If only we don’t run into snow, and I must own I don’t like the look of the sky above half.’

  ‘No, nor I, but if we can reach Reading I shan’t care for anything else, for even if it was discovered which way we were gone I don’t think I should be looked for there.’

  ‘Oh, we shall reach Reading!’ Tom said cheerfully.

  She drew a long breath, and said in a thankful tone: ‘Tom, I can’t tell you how much I’m obliged to you! To own the truth, I didn’t at all want to go all by myself, but now – oh, now I can be easy!’

  Seven

  Breakfast was served at Austerby, on all but hunting-days, at ten o’clock, which, in Sylvester’s opinion, was at least an hour too early. In general, the custom obtaining at country-house parties was for guests to breakfast at eleven, or even twelve o’clock. Lady Marlow knew it, but she told Sylvester that she disapproved of such hours. Sylvester, to whom the imperative summons of the bell had been an offence, received this information with a slight smile, and a polite inclination of the head, but offered no comment.

  It was not long before Lord Marlow, noticing the absence of his daughter, wondered aloud where she could be. Her ladyship, speaking with careful restraint, replied that she fancied she must have gone out for a walk.

  ‘Gone out for a walk!’ repeated Lord Marlow, chuckling. ‘Not she! Gone down to the stables, more like. You must know, Salford, that there is no keeping that girl of mine away from the horses. I wish you might have seen her in the field. A capital seat, good, even hands, and the most bruising little rider you ever saw! Never any need to tell her to throw her heart over! Anything her horse can take she will too: stake-and-bound, a double, an in-and-out, a ridge and furrow – all one to Phoebe! I’ve seen her laid on her back in a ditch, but much she cared!’

  Oblivious to his wife’s attempts to catch his eye, he would have continued talking in this strain had Firbank not come into the parlour just then, with the intelligence that Mrs Orde wished to speak to him.

  He was surprised, and Lady Marlow still more so. She thought it an extraordinary circumstance, and said: ‘Depend upon it, she wishes to see me, Marlow. I do not know why she should disturb us at such an hour. It is not at all the thing. Inform Mrs Orde, Firbank, that I am at breakfast, but will come to her presently.’

  He withdrew, but came back again almost immediately, looking harassed, and with a plump, bright-eyed lady hard on his heels.

  ‘I regret, ma’am, to be obliged to break in on you with so little ceremony,’ announced Mrs Orde, who appeared to be labouring under strong emotion, ‘but my business will not await your pleasure!’

  ‘Not at all! Delighted to welcome you, ma’am!’ said Lord Marlow hastily. ‘Always happy to be of service! You wish to see me – precisely, yes!’

  ‘On a matter of the utmost urgency!’ she said. ‘Your daughter, sir, has run away with my son!’

  The company was not unnaturally startled into silence by this announcement. Without giving her hosts time to recover from the shock Mrs Orde loosed the vials of her pent-up wrath upon them. ‘I don’t know why you should look amazed!’ she declared, her eyes snapping at Lady Marlow. ‘You have left no stone unturned to achieve this result! I guessed how it would be from the instant my son told me what his reception has been in this house for the past ten days! I pass over the insulting nature of your conduct, ma’am, but I shall take leave to inform you that nothing is further from the wishes of his parents than an alliance between Tom and your family! I am excessively attached to Phoebe, poor child, but his father and I have other plans for Tom, and they don’t, let me assure you, include his marriage at the age of nineteen!’

  ‘Nonsense! Such a thought was never in either of their heads!’ exclaimed Lord Marlow, in an attempt to stem this blistering eloquence.

  He was promptly demolished. ‘No! Never until her ladyship planted it there!’ Mrs Orde said fiercely. ‘If I had viewed their friendship with apprehension I should have thought myself a ninnyhammer to have acted as she has! And what has been the result? Exactly what might have been foreseen!’

  ‘Upon my word!’ broke in Lady Marlow. ‘I could almost believe you to have taken leave of your senses, ma’am! A very odd rage you have flown into, and all because my daughter-in-law (as I do not doubt!) has gone out riding with Mr Thomas Orde!’

  ‘Gone out riding!’ Mrs Orde exclaimed contemptuously. ‘She has run away from this house, and for that, Lady Marlow, you are to blame, with your Turkish treatment of her, poor little soul! Oh, I have no patience to talk to you! My errand is not to you, but to Phoebe’s father! Read that, my lord!’

  With these peremptory words she thrust a single sheet of paper into Lord Marlow’s hand. While he perused the few lines Tom had scrawled to allay any anxiety his mother might feel, Lady Marlow commanded him to show her the note, and Sylvester retired discreetly into the window embrasure. A man of delicacy, he knew, would seize this opportunity to withdraw from the parlour. He accepted with fortitude the realization that he was lacking in delicacy, and wondered whether there was any chance of his being allowed a glimpse of a missive which was exercising so powerful an effect upon his host.

  My dear Mama, Tom had scribbled, I am obliged to go away without taking leave of you, but do not be in a worry. I have taken my father’s curricle, and may be absent for some few days, I cannot say precisely how many. Things have come to such a pass at Austerby that there is no bearing it. I must rescue Phoebe, and am persuaded you and my father will understand how it is when you know the whole, and think I did right, for you have always held her in affection.

  As he read these lines Lord Marlow’s cheeks lost some of their ruddy colour. He allowed his wife to twitch the paper out of his hand, stammering: ‘Impossible! I do not credit it! P-pray, where could they have gone?’

  ‘Exactly! Where?’ demanded Mrs Orde. ‘That question is what brings me here! If my husband were not in Bristol at this moment – but so it is always! Whenever a man is most needed he is never to be found!’

  ‘I do not know what this message means,’ announced Lady Marlow. ‘I do not pretend to understand it. For my part I strongly suspect Mr Thomas Orde to have been inebriated when he wrote it.’

  ‘How dare you?’ flashed Mrs Orde, her eyes sparkling dangerously.

  ‘No, no, of course he was not!’ interposed Lord Marlow hurriedly. ‘My love, let me beg of you – Not but what it is so extraordinary that – Though far be it from me to suggest –’

  ‘Oh!’ cried Mrs Orde, stamping her foot, ‘don’t stand there in that addle-brained fashion, saying nothing to the purpose, my lord! Is it nothing to you that your daughter is at this very moment eloping? You must go after her! Discover where she meant to go! Surely Susan might know! Or Miss Battery! She may have let fall a hint – or one
of them, better acquainted with her than you, might guess!’

  Lady Marlow was inclined to brush this suggestion aside, but her lord, the memory of his overnight interview with Phoebe lively in his mind, was by this time seriously alarmed. He said at once that Susan and Miss Battery should be sent for, and hastened to the door, shouting to Firbank. While a message was carried up to the schoolroom, Mrs Orde at once relieved her overcharged nerves and paid off every arrear of a debt of rancour that had been mounting in her bosom for years by telling Lady Marlow exactly what she thought of her manners, conduct, insensibility, and gross stupidity. Lord Marlow was inevitably drawn into the altercation; and in the heat of battle Sylvester’s presence was forgotten. He did nothing to attract attention to himself. The moment for that had not yet come, though he had every hope that it was not far distant. Meanwhile he listened to Mrs Orde’s masterly indictment of his hostess, gratefully storing up in his memory the several anecdotes illustrative of Lady Marlow’s depravity, every detail of which Mrs Orde had faithfully carried in her mind for years past.

  She was silenced at last by the entrance into the room of Miss Battery, accompanied not only by Susan but by Eliza as well. To this circumstance Lady Marlow took instant and pardonable exception; but when she would have dismissed her Miss Battery said grimly: ‘I thought it my duty to bring her to your ladyship. She says she knows where her sister has gone. Don’t think it, myself.’

  ‘Phoebe would never tell Eliza!’ asserted Susan. ‘And particularly when she never breathed a word to me!’

  ‘I do know where she has gone!’ said Eliza. ‘And I was going to tell Mama, because it is my duty to do so.’

  ‘Yes, well, never mind that!’ said Lord Marlow testily. ‘If you know, tell me at once!’