Naturally, Georgina and her husband were receiving the guests, so Roger and George gave one another only a distant bow. But as soon as he could Roger took Georgina aside for a moment and asked her with a frown, 'What is George Gunston doing here? I didn't know that he lived in the neighbourhood.'
For a moment Georgina did not answer; then, following Roger's glance, she said, 'Do you mean that red-faced, fair-haired Colonel?'
Roger nodded, 'That is he; look at his swagger. The conceited coxcomb.'
'At least he is a fine figure of a man,' Georgina remarked. 'I've not met him before, but he is staying with Lord and Lady Milford at Crossways Hall and Molly Milford asked if she might bring him. She is the tall, gawky, fair-haired woman with the long nose and great doe-like eyes, to whom he is talking at the moment.'
From the cattiness of Georgina's description it was evident that she disliked Lady Milford; so Roger tactfully refrained from saying that he thought her quite a beauty. Instead he said, 'I have known Gunston since my school days. He is a most loathsome cad: but the women seem to like him, and he has quite a reputation as a lady killer.'
'Has he now!' Georgina smiled. 'Then I'll let him try his art on me tonight. Molly Milford must be old enough to be my mother: but when I was young and new at the game she took away from me a beau with whom I was quite smitten. I've a long memory for old scores. It should amuse you to watch me pay her out.'
'Georgina.' Roger said quickly. 'Gunston and I are lifelong enemies. On that count I seek to make no capital with you; yet I beg you to desist from your intent. He is a lecher and a blackguard of the first order. At your dances you have always provided well-screened sitting out places where couples can enjoy a quiet flirtation unobserved. But do you let Gunston lead you to one of them you'll rue it. He is quite capable of pressing his suit so hotly that should you resist your dress will be reduced to such a state that you would be embarrassed to return to the ballroom.'
With a shrug of her fine shoulders, Georgina dismissed Roger's warnings. 'Since when have you found it necessary to talk to me as though I were a school miss? I'm capable of putting in his place any man who, against my will, attempts to maul me.'
At that moment a gentleman came up and asked her to partner him in a quadrille, so Roger stepped aside. Beefy had been in a very touchy mood all day and Roger, feeling that the sight of him dancing with Georgina might lead him to forget himself and make an unseemly scene, had refrained from asking her for a dance; so for the next three hours he had no further word with her.
He danced only twice with other women to whom he felt he owed that courtesy from having known them for several years. For the rest of the time he moved about exchanging small talk with men who were not dancing, and whenever he found himself on his own be went and had a drink at the buffet.
His naturally sunny temperament ensured his suffering from black moods only very occasionally, but that night one of the worst he had ever experienced was upon him. Everyone now had heard about peace having been signed and it was almost universally, the subject of conversation.
Yet few people to whom he talked seemed to realize its implications. To meet the cost of the war Pitt had had to impose a tax of ten per cent upon all incomes above £200 per annum. No such demand on men of property had ever before been inflicted, and the landed gentry had intensely resented this innovation. Now they were all rejoicing that they would soon be free of it and, knowing little about foreign affairs, cared nothing for the means by which Britain had, to Roger's mind, bought this disastrous peace. To his disgust, with raised glasses they toasted Lord Cornwallis, oblivious of the fact that Joseph Bonaparte and Talleyrand had made rings round the old man and must that night be laughing in Paris, having got everything from him except the clothes he stood up in.
Roger's mood was further soured by the knowledge that next winter, unless Beefy went away, he would be debarred from coming to stay at Stillwaters. His love for Georgina was so fundamental a thing that, faced with a crisis, he would without a second's hesitation have given his life in her defence. But, having had long experience of her forceful character, he intensely resented that she should have refrained from using it in his interests to dominate her mediocre husband and bring him to heel.
Still worse fuel was added to the fire by his seeing, nearly every time he entered the ballroom, that she was either dancing with or talking to Gunston. They were laughing together and showing every sign of getting on famously. Three times Roger turned away, seething with silent rage, to get himself another drink at the buffet.
Justerini's took care of Georgina's cellar, so the champagne was excellent; but. after a time he gave it up for cognac. He had always been capable of heavy drinking, but by midnight was half-seas over and so bloodyminded that if anyone had been in the least offensive to him he would have culled him out.
It was about half an hour after midnight that the strange psychic link that existed between him and Georgina suddenly began to function As clearly as though she had been speaking in his car, he heard her say, 'Roger, come quickly. I need your aid, lest there be a most horrid scene.'
Pushing unceremoniously aside the people among whom he was standing, guided by an unerring instinct he strode down to the main hall. On either side the great staircase there were deep alcoves with settees in them that Georgina that morning had screened with banks of flowers.
The hall was empty and, as Roger advanced on the nearest alcove, he heard Georgina's half-strangled cry, 'No. no! Desist, I beg! Enough, I say! No, I won't let you.'
Tearing aside the screen of daffodils and hyacinths, Roger stared down at the couple on the well-cushioned sofa. Georgina was lying full length upon it, her feet dangling on the ground. Gunston was on top of her. With one hand he was endeavouring to muffle her protests, the other he had thrust up under her skirts.
Without a thought that someone might come upon them, instead of simply demanding that Gunston should release Georgina and so put a swift end to this unpleasant scene, Roger lurched forward, seized him by the back of his stiff uniform collar, dragged him off her and shouted, 'You lecherous swine! I'll make you pay for this!'
Gunston was much the bigger man. Regaining his balance he squared up to Roger and cried, 'So 'tis you. Brook! My old schooldays' companion, the snivelling little bookworm Brook. How typical of you to come on the scene just as I was about to get to work on our lovely hostess. I've often heard of her as a game filly, and she was making no more than the usual demurs that well-bred women consider necessary as evidence of their modesty.'
'You lie,' snarled Roger. 'You were holding her down and about to force her.'
'Nonsense! 'Tis only your jealousy that makes you see things in that way. All the town knows that she has been your mistress on and off for years. You should not take it ill that she is now tired of you and would welcome a change.'
At one side of the hall stood a long sword rack, in which it was customary for officers to leave their swords on entering a house. In it, besides those of the officers attending the dance, were several rapiers that had belonged to Sir Humphrey Etheredge. Striding two paces, Roger snatched up the nearest. It happened to be only a Court sword with a slender blade and of less than a duelling sword's standard length. But, swishing it in the air, he advanced on Gunston and cried in a thick, husky voice:
'Arm yourself, you slandering bastard. For having traduced my Lady St. Ermins I intend to kill you here and now.'
'You're drunk,' retorted Gunston. 'Drunk as an owl. Put up that weapon and go douse your head under a cold tap.'
'Drunk I may be,' shouted Roger. 'But I'll not be drunk at dawn tomorrow. You shall face me then and I'll see to it that you never more lay your filthy hands on a decent woman.'
Gunston was sweating under his tight red uniform coat. His normally rubicund face had gone a deep puce and Ins blue eyes showed fear. Running a finger round his tight high collar to case it, he shook his head and gasped, 'No, no! I'll not do that. Everyone knows that when sob
er few men could meet you. I'll not let myself be cut to pieces to make for you a Roman holiday.'
'Poltroon!' Roger sneered at him. 'By refusing to meet mc you disgrace the uniform you wear. So be it then. I'll settle your business before you are five minutes older.' Then he made a lunge at Gunston with the fragile rapier.
Georgina had pulled herself to her feet, hurriedly rearranged her disordered dress, and was staring at them wide eyed.
'Stop!' she cried. 'For God's sake, stop! Not here! Not here!'
Ignoring her, Roger made another threatening feint at Gunston, driving him back against the sword rack. His eyes as desperate as those of a trapped animal, Gunston fumbled behind him; his hand fell upon the hilt of a cavalry sabre. Wrenching it from its scabbard he threw himself into a posture of defence.
With a drunken laugh Roger engaged him. The steel clashed but the combat was an uneven one. Gunston's heavy blade far outweighed Roger's slender rapier. Within a minute he found that he needed all his skill to avoid his frail weapon being cut off near the hilt or struck from his hand.
Georgina wasted no more breath in pleading with these two life-long enemies to cease from their attempts to kill one another. Gathering up her skirts she ran from the hall into the dining room.
The two antagonists now circled round one another. Roger pinked Gunston's shoulder, but he dared not parry the swipes from the heavy sabre and only by the agility that made him such a formidable swordsman did he succeed in jumping aside in time to save his head from being sliced in half.
Short as their combat was they were both breathing heavily when Georgina came running back with Beefy, whom she had found in the dining room talking to some other men. He shouted to Roger and Gunston to put up their weapons, but they ignored him. Finding his pleas useless, he ran to another rack that held a variety of walking sticks and canes. Grasping a heavy blackthorn, he ran forward brandishing it and attempted to beat down the clashing blades.
Only too glad to see an end to this murderous encounter, Gunston lowered his sabre and gave back. Roger, furious at Beefy's interference, berserk with accumulated rage and determined not to let his old enemy escape without at least a nasty gash that would be a lesson to him, yelled at Beefy to get out of the way, sidestepped and made another thrust.
Beefy was standing between them and sideways on to both, but looking towards Gunston. At Roger's shout he swerved half round and brought up his blackthorn, to strike Roger's rapier down. Roger's thrust had been aimed to pass behind Beefy's back, but the quantity of brandy he had drunk had slightly impaired his timing and, at the same moment, Beefy's swerve had altered his position a little. The slender blade failed to clear him. It ripped through the silk of his coat near the base of his spine.
He suddenly stiffened. His eyes started from their sockets. He gave an awful groan and fell to the ground.
For a moment Roger, Gunston and Georgina all remained as though paralysed, staring with horrified eyes at the squirming figure. Then throwing herself on her knees beside her husband Georgina took his head in her lap. His eyes rolled, froth bubbled from his lips and his body jerked spasmodically, so that she had difficulty in holding him.
Suddenly a prolonged bubbling sound began to issue from Beefy's throat. It was not the first time that Roger had heard a dying man give vent to the death rattle and it confirmed his worst fears. His rapier must have passed through Beefy's liver.
By this time, attracted by the sounds of strife a small crowd of people had come out into the hall. Some of them began to shout, 'Get a doctor!' 'Fetch some water!' 'Give him brandy!', while others violently upbraided Roger and Gunston as being the evident cause of the tragedy.
Ignoring them, Roger threw his rapier on the floor and stared down at Georgina. Letting fall her dead husband's head, she rose and faced him. Then, her black eyes as yet tearless but hard as stones, she said in a low tense voice:
'I always knew you to be unscrupulous towards your enemies. But to have done this thing to me almost passes belief. Seeing an opportunity to gain your ends you put them before all thought of my happiness.' Suddenly her voice rose almost to a scream:
'Go from here! Go! I hate you! I never want to set eyes on you again!'
No more awful thing could have happened to Roger than that Georgina, his life-long love, should drive him from her. Yet even that was not the full price he was to pay for this terrible occurrence. For this was not France, where Napoleon's officers fought one another on the slightest provocation and counted it no more than good practice for using their swords against France's enemies. This was England, where to kill a man was manslaughter—or might be accounted murder.
12
On Trial for His Life
For the five weeks that followed Beefy's death Roger felt as though he was living through a nightmare. In deference to Georgina's dismissal of him, and feeling it to be certainly more fitting, he had begged a lift in a carriage, had himself driven in to Ripley and there secured a room at the Talbot Inn.
Next morning he woke with a furred tongue and an aching head. It was not often that he felt the effects on the morning after of what he had drunk the night before; but on this occasion he had punished the cognac very severely—so’ severely that he had no very clear recollection of what had happened, apart from the salient facts that Georgina had been mauled and insulted by Gunston, with whom he had then fought, Beefy had sought to intervene and, by a misdirected thrust, had then been killed by him. Yet Georgia's last words rang as clear as crystal through his aching head:
'Go! Go from here! I hate you! I never want to set eyes on you again.'
Roger did not for one moment believe that she really meant them. Their lives were so closely interwoven that, whatever he had done, she could not possibly cast him off for good at a moment's notice. That John Beefy should stupidly have got himself in the way of a sword thrust was regrettable. He had been a very decent fellow and it was hard on him that his life should have been cut short when he was only a little over forty. But for a man of his position he had been fortunate—incredibly fortunate—in that for two years he had had Georgina as his wife: and, Roger now recalled, she had read in Beefy's hand before she married him that his life would not be a long one.
Two nights earlier she had made it clear that he meant a lot to her. because he had brought into her life a background of quiet happiness and peaceful regularity; and when a woman had turned thirty she felt a need for a man with whom she could settle down. But Roger felt confident that she would soon get over her loss and forget Beefy in much less timi than she had her second husband, Charles St. Ermins, for whom she had cared deeply.
The only thing that really worried him was that she appeared to have thought that he had taken advantage of the melee to kill Beefy deliberately,.and so rid himself of the prohibition again.;’ coming to Still waters whenever he wished. But he could not believe that she would long continue to harbour a suspicion that he had acted so basely; and he decided that, for the time being, it would be wiser not to force his presence on her, either to express his sorrow at having killed her husband or to assure her that the tragedy had been an entirely unforeseeable accident
When he rang for the chambermaid and ordered up a bottle of Madeira, as a tonic to pull himself together, she told him that his things had been sent across from Stillwaters, but no message had come with them. An hour later he dressed with the intention of riding post back to London. But when he went downstairs be found a tipstaff awaiting him. The man touched him with a paper and caused him to stiffen with sudden shock by saying:
'Mister Brook, I 'av horders to take ye into custerdy on o'count o' what 'appened lars night Ye'll 'ave to answer ter a charge o' manslaughter; so be pleased ter come along o' me.'
Roger's mind had been so occupied with distress at his breach with Georgina that he had not given a thought to other possible consequences of the tragedy. Now, with sudden alarm, he recalled that there were very severe penalties in England for duelling, and it coul
d not be denied that Beefy had met his end as a result of what would certainly be regarded as a duel. Putting the best face he could on the matter, he had his things carried out of the inn and accompanied the tipstaff in a stuffy, closed carriage to Guildford.
There, after having been formally charged, he obtained permission to write to Droopy Ned and, an hour later, had sent off a full account of what had happened the previous night, with a request for his friend's help. The remainder of the day he spent gloomily in a cold and narrow cell.
Next morning he was taken from his cell to a sparsely furnished room in which Droopy, accompanied by an enormously fat man who waddled on two short legs, was awaiting him. The fat man was wearing a lawyer's wig and flowing gown, wheezed badly and had a pair of alarmingly protuberant brown eyes. Droopy introduced him as Sergeant Burnfurze. After a quarter of an hour's conversation the Sergeant said in a deep, sonorous voice:
'Mr. Brook, it cannot be contested that it was by your act that the deceased met his death. My advice to you therefore is to plead guilty, and we will use such arguments as offer themselves in the hope of getting you off with as light a sentence as possible. Today, of course, we shall reserve our defence as the proceedings will be only formal.'
An hour or so later Roger stood in the dock. Georgina was said to be too ill to attend, but Gunston was in Court. Without displaying malice he gave evidence that Roger had forced a fight upon him and of what had then occurred. He was followed by Georgina's doctor who testified that John Beefy had died as a result of a weapon penetrating his liver. The still-bloodstained rapier that Roger had used was produced and the doctor agreed that it tallied with the wound of the deceased. The magistrates did not even withdraw to deliberate. After the Chairman of the Bench had collected nods from his colleagues, he committed Roger for trial at the Guildford Assizes. Sergeant Burnfurze applied for bail and it was granted in two sureties of £2,000 each. Droopy Ned making himself responsible for one and Roger's bond being accepted for the other. Roger was released and, after a gloomy lunch at the Angel Inn. he returned with Droopy and the Sergeant to London.
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