Sprig Muslin

by Джорджетт Хейер

  “I?” he said. “What made the boy think me so strait-laced?”

  “Oh, he didn’t! The thing is that although he owns that we may purchase what you need with perfect propriety, he says that anything else is most improper: in fact, quite dishonest. We were obliged to steal your money, you see.”

  “How very dreadful!” he murmured. “Am I left destitute?”

  “No, indeed! And Hildebrand is keeping strict account of everypenny we spend. What a huge sum of money you carry on your person, Gareth! When we found that roll of bills in your pocket I thought we need have no scruples. You see, we were at a stand, because what with paying for the post-chaises, and stabling his horse, and buying the drugs we needed for you, Hildebrand was soon ruined. Amanda had a little money, but not nearly enough to pay our shot here, or the doctor; and I had nothing but what was in my purse. I do wish I were not so shatterbrained! I ought to have broken open Widmore’s strong-box, of course, but in the agitation of the moment I never thought of it.”

  The tone of self-censure which she used proved too much for Sir Gareth’s gravity. He began to laugh, which caused him to feel a twinge in his shoulder sharp enough to make him wince. Lady Hester apologized, but said that she thought it did people no harm to laugh, even if it did hurt them a trifle.

  It certainly seemed to do Sir Gareth no harm. The doctor, visiting him that evening, called upon Lady Hester to observe how famously he had responded to his treatment, and said that in less than no time he would be as right as a trivet; and although it was evident that it would, in fact, be some considerable while before he regained his strength, he began to improve so rapidly that on the following day Lady Hester permitted Amanda to visit him. She could only hope that he would not find her, in his present state, rather over-powering: perhaps, even, a little agitating. How great his interest in this turbulent beauty might be, she could not decide. Such intelligible utterances as he had made during his delirium had all concerned Amanda; she had been vaguely surprised that never once had she caught Clarissa’s name in his incoherent mutterings. That seemed to indicate that his mind, if not his heart, was obsessed by Amanda. The fever past, the only sign he had given of any extraordinary interest in her had been his immediate anxiety to know where she was. But Lady Hester knew that he was not the man to betray himself; and she feared that he was going to be hurt. Amazing through it might be (and to Hester it appeared incomprehensible), he had not made the smallest impression on Amanda’s heart. She liked him very well, she said he resembled all her favourite heroes of romance; and she remained unshaken in her devotion to her Brigade-Major. If Sir Gareth cherished hopes of winning her, he was doomed to disappointment; and although this would not be the tragedy that Clarissa’s death had been, it would be a hurt, and Hester would have happily immolated herself to have averted it. But there was nothing she could do. She allowed Amanda twenty minutes, and then, since Amanda had not emerged, she went up to the sickroom, to bring the session to an end.

  The sight which met her eyes held her frozen on the threshold, and the thought flashed across her mind that she knew now how it felt to die. If it had lain within her power to have given Sir Gareth his heart’s desire, she would have done it; but she had not known how sharp a pain she would suffer when she saw Amanda’s face buried in his sound shoulder, and his arm about her.

  He looked up, and the short agony was at an end. Never did a man more clearly signal an appeal for help than Sir Gareth at that moment. He did not look at all like a man in love; he looked extremely harassed. Then Hester perceived that Amanda was indulging in a hearty burst of tears, and the smile which held so much unexpected mischief suddenly danced in her eyes. “Good heavens, what is the matter?” she said, advancing into the room, and gently removing Amanda’s hand from about Sir Gareth’s neck. “Dear child, this is not at all the way to behave! Do, pray, stop crying!”

  She raised her brows at Sir Gareth, in mute enquiry, and he said ruefully: “She is enjoying an orgy of remorse. I never dreamed that there could be anything more exhausting than Amanda in high gig, but I have discovered my error. Now, do cheer up, you little goose! It served me right for not heeding your warning that you would make me sorry.”

  “Besides, she saved your life,” said Hester. “We have not liked to talk very much about the accident, but I do think you should know that if Amanda hadn’t acted with the greatest presence of mind, you would have bled to death, Gareth. And she had no one to turn to, either, because poor Hildebrand swooned from the shock, and the sight of the blood. Indeed, you are very much obliged to her.”

  He was surprised, and a good deal touched, but Amanda would have none of his gratitude. She stopped crying, however, and raised her head from his shoulder. “Well, I had to do something, and, besides, it was very good practice, in case Neil should be wounded again. I didn’t mean to cry, and if only you had looked vexed when I came into the room, instead of smiling at me, and holding out your hand, I shouldn’t have.”

  “It was most inconsiderate of me, and I can only beg your pardon,” he responded gravely. He watched her dry her cheeks, and then said: “Will you do something to oblige me?”

  “Yes, to be sure I—at least, I might!”she said suspiciously. “What is it?”

  “Write immediately to your grandfather, telling him that you are here, and in Lady Hester’s care!”

  “I thought you were trying to trick me!” she exclaimed.

  “My child, it must be a week since you ran away, and all that time he has been in the greatest anxiety about you! Think! You cannot wish him—”

  “You are perfectly right!” she interrupted. “What a fortunate thing it is that you should have put me in mind of it, for so many things have happened that it went out of my head! Good gracious, he may have put the advertisement in the Morning Post days ago! I must find Hildebrand!”

  She jumped up from her knees, and sped forth, leaving the door opened. Lady Hester went to shut it, saying, with mild curiosity: “I wonder what she wants Hildebrand to do?”

  “Of all the heartless little wretches!” Sir Gareth said.

  She looked rather surprised. “Oh, no, not heartless! Only she is so passionately devoted to Neil, you see, that she doesn’t care a button for anyone else.”

  “Ruthless, then. Hester, can’t you prevail upon her to put that unfortunate old man out of his suspense?”

  “I am afraid I can’t,” she said. “Of course, one can’t help feeling sorry for him, but I do think she should be allowed to marry Neil. Don’t tease yourself about her, Gareth! After all, she is quite safe while she remains with us.”

  “You are as bad as she is,” said Sir Gareth severely.

  “Yes, but not so resourceful,” she agreed. “And you are very tired, so you will have a sleep now, and no more visitors.”

  There did not seem to be any more to be said. Until he was on his feet again, Sir Gareth knew that he was powerless to restore Amanda to her family; and since he was too weak to exert himself even in argument, he abandoned the struggle, and gave himself up to lazy convalescence, accepting the fantastic situation in which he found himself, and deriving a good deal of amusement from it. His adopted family cosseted him jealously, appealed to him to settle disputes, or decide knotty problems, and made his room, as he grew stronger, their headquarters. Amanda had from the outset regarded him much in the light of an uncle. Hildebrand had thought that, so far from doing the same, he would never be able to confront him without being crushed by a sense of guilt. Once Sir Gareth was himself again, it had taken much courage to enter his room. But as Hildebrand was his chief attendant, the awful moment had to be faced. He had gone in, braced to endure whatever might be in store for him. “Well nephew?” had said Sir Gareth. “And what have you to say for yourself?” He had had an abject apology all prepared but it had been cut short. “Only wait until I am on my feet again!” had said Sir Gareth. “I’ll teach you to brandish loaded pistols!”

  After that, there had been no difficulty at a
ll in looking upon Sir Gareth as an uncle. Indeed, it very soon seemed to Sir Gareth that neither Amanda nor Hildebrand remembered that he was not their uncle.

  Hildebrand’s chief preoccupation was how to regain possession of his horse, but since he could not bring himself to let some heavy-handed post-boy or ostler ride Prince, and spurned indignantly a suggestion that he should hire a chaise to carry him to St. Ives, so that he could himself bring Prince to Little Staughton, there seemed to be no solution to the problem. “As though I should think of leaving you for all those hours!” he said. “Besides, only consider what it would cost, sir!” j

  “What, is it low tide with us?”

  “Good God, no! But you can’t think I would first shoot you, Uncle Gary, and then make you pay for me to get my horse back! And in any event, I don’t think I should go, because if I don’t keep an eye on Amanda, the lord only knows what she’ll do next!”

  “Then for God’s sake do keep your eye on her!” said Sir Gareth. “What fiendish plot is she hatching now?”

  “Well, you know how she disappeared yesterday, and was gone for hours?—Oh, no, Aunt Hester thought we shouldn’t tell you! I beg your pardon, Aunt Hester, but it don’t signify, because she hadn’t run away after all! Well, do you know what she did? She went to Eaton Socon in Farmer Upwood’s gig, just to discover where she could get her hands on the Morning Post!”

  “But I think that was such a sensible thing to do!” said Lady Hester. “And she did discover it, too, which I’m sure I should never have done.”

  “Yes, you would, ma’am! She discovered it at the receiving-office, and anyone would have known that was the place to go to!”

  “Not Aunt Hester,” said Sir Gareth, his eyes quizzing her. “Who does take the Morning Post in these rural parts?”

  “Oh, some old fellow, who lives near Colmworth, which is about four miles from here! He is an invalid, and never stirs out of his house, so Chicklade says. The thing is that if I don’t go for her, Amanda swears she will go herself, to ask the old man to let her look at every Morning Post he has received this week!”

  “You know, I have suddenly thought of something very discouraging!” said Hester. “I shouldn’t wonder at it if they had been used for lighting the kitchen-fire! Now, that would be too bad, but exactly the sort of thing that is bound to happen!”

  “If you think there is any chance that Amanda’s grandfather may have yielded, we had better send to the office of the Morning Post immediately,” said Sir Gareth. “In his place, I had rather have gone to Bow Street, but one never knows.”

  “Well, do you think I should try first at this old fellow’s house, sir?” Hildebrand asked.

  “By all means—if you can think of a sufficiently plausible excuse for wishing to see so many copies of his newspaper. I daresay you will be thought insane, but if you don’t regard that, why should I?”

  “No, why? I shall say that I want them for you, because you are laid by the heels here, and have nothing to read.”

  “I wonder why I shouldn’t have guessed that you would drag me into it?” observed Sir Gareth, in a musing tone.

  Hildebrand grinned, but assured him that he need have no fear.

  “I must own, Gareth,” said Hester thoughtfully, after Hildebrand had departed, “that I can’t help hoping you may be wrong about Bow Street. What shall we do, if we have Runners after us?”

  “Emigrate!” he replied promptly.

  She smiled, but said: “You know, it would be very exciting, but not, I think, quite comfortable, because, although we have done nothing wrong, the Runners might not perfectly understand just how it all came about. Unless, of course, Amanda is able to think of another splendid story.”

  “Any story of Amanda’s will infallibly land us all in Newgate. I see nothing for it but emigration.”

  “Not all of us, Gareth: only you!” she said, with a gleam of humour. “She will certainly tell them that you abducted her, because nothing will persuade her that an abduction is something quite different. Oh, well, we must just hope that there may be a notice in one of the papers! And I should think that there would be, for the grandfather must wish to get Amanda back as soon as ever he may.”

  But when Hildebrand returned, later in the day, from his errand, she was found to have been wrong. Hildebrand came into Sir Gareth’s room, laden with periodicals, which he dumped on the floor, saying breathlessly: “All for you, Uncle Gary! He would have me bring them, because he says he knows you! Lord I thought we were in a fix then, but I don’t fancy any harm will come of it.”

  “Oh, my God!” exclaimed Sir Gareth. “I suppose you had to tell him my name? Who is he?”

  “Well, I never thought it would signify. And, in any event, everyone knows who you are, because the post-boy told Chicklade what your name was, when you were carried in, that day.”

  Amanda, who was seated on the floor, scanning, and discarding, copy after copy of the Morning Post,looked up to say: “I told you you would only make a muff of it! If I had gone myself, I should have made up a very good name for Uncle Gary, only you have no ingenuity, and can think of nothing!”

  “Yes!” retorted Hildebrand. “You would have said he was Lancelot du Lake, or something so silly that no one would have believed it!”

  “Don’t imagine you are going to quarrel over me!” interposed Sir Gareth. “What I want to know is not what name of unequalled splendour Amanda would have bestowed on me, but what is the name of this recluse, who says he knows me?”

  Amanda, uninterested, retired again into the advertisement columns of the Morning Post. Hildebrand said: “Vinehall, sir: Barnabas Vinehall.”

  “Well, I should never have made up as silly a name as that!” interpolated Amanda scornfully.

  “Good God!” ejaculated Sir Gareth. “I thought he was dead! You don’t mean to say he lives here?”

  “Yes, but there’s no need for any of us to be in a quake, because he never goes out now: he told me so!” said Hildebrand reassuringly. “He is the fattest man I ever laid eyes on!”

  “I fail to see—”

  “No, but only listen, Uncle Gary! It’s dropsy!”

  “Poor man!” said Hester sympathetically. “Who is he, Gareth?”

  “He was a crony of my father’s. I haven’t seen him for years. Dropsy, eh? Poor old Vinehall! What did you tell him, Hildebrand?”

  “Well, only that you had had an accident, and were laid up here. The mischief was that I had previously said I was your nephew, because as soon as he knew your name he said I must be Trixie’s eldest son. I didn’t know who Trixie was—”

  “—so, of course,you said you were not!” put in Amanda.

  “No, I did not! You are not the only person who can tell untruths!” retorted Hildebrand. “I said I was!”

  “Who did you say I was?” demanded Amanda.

  “Nobody. You were not mentioned,” replied Hildebrand, depressing pretension. “The only thing that put me in a fright, sir, was Mr. Vinehall’s supposing that Aunt Hester must be this Trixie. Because I had said that your sister was nursing you, and I collect that Trixie is your sister.”

  “My only sister!” said Sir Gareth, covering his eyes with his hand. “What I have ever done to deserve being saddled with such a nephew as you—! Go on! Let me know the worst!”

  “There is no worst! He did say that he hoped Trixie—your sister, I mean, sir—would visit him, but I made that right immediately, by saying that she might not leave you while you were ill, and that as soon as you were better she would be obliged to hurry back to her own home. Then I said that I was sure you would wait on him, as soon as you were able, which seemed to please him very much. Then he talked about your father, and at last he made his butler tie up a great bundle of papers and periodicals for you to read, and so I made my escape. Now tell me if I did wrong, sir?”

  “Well!”The word burst from Amanda, sitting back on her heels in a welter of newspapers, her eyes flashing. “Would you have believed it? He has n
ot done it! Why—why—one would almost think he did not wish to have me back!”

  “Impossible!” murmured Sir Gareth.

  “Of course it is impossible!” said Hester, casting a reproving glance at him. “I daresay there had not been yet time for the advertisement to be inserted. Wait a few days longer!”

  “Is Hildebrand to visit Vinehall every day?” enquired Sir Gareth, “courting disaster—but far be it from me to complain!”

  “No, for he said he would send his groom over with the newspaper,” said Hildebrand. “No harm can come of that, surely, sir?”

  “None at all-provided he doesn’t take it into his head to come himself.”

  “Oh, no fear of that!” Hildebrand said cheerfully. “He told me that he finds it hard to get about, and was only sorry that he was unable to drive over to see you.”

  He had underrated Mr. Vinehall’s spirit. On the following afternoon, when both the ladies of the party were in the parlour, Amanda standing in the middle of the room, and Lady Hester kneeling at her feet to stitch up a torn flounce on her dress, a vehicle was heard to drive up. Neither paid much heed, since this was no unusual circumstance; but after a minute, Amanda, craning her neck, managed to catch a glimpse of it, and exclaimed: “Good gracious, it’s a carriage! The most oldfashioned thing! Whoever can it be?”

  They were not left above a couple of minutes in suspense. Whoever it was had already entered the inn, and the arrival seemed to have thrown the Chicklades into strange confusion. A babel of voices sounded, Chicklade’s deep one sharpened by surprise, and a still deeper one wheezing an answer.

  “Good God!” uttered Hester, in a panic. “Could it be Mr. Vinehall? Amanda, what are we to do? If he sees me—”

  The words died on her lips, for the door had been flung open, and she heard Chicklade say: “If your honour will be pleased to step into the parlour! You’ll find Sir Gareth’s sister and niece, and very glad to see you, sir, I’ll be bound.”

  Gladness was not the predominant expression in either lady’s face. Hester, hurriedly breaking off her thread, and getting up, was looking perfectly distracted; and Amanda’s eyes, fixed on the doorway, were growing rounder and rounder in astonishment.