She agreed to it, but with a quivering lip. Sir Waldo, duly noting this circumstance, continued to expatiate on the advantages of adding a second gentleman to the expedition, producing several which made it quite impossible for Miss Trent to keep her countenance. He was interrupted in this unchivalrous assault upon her defences by the reappearance on the scene of Tiffany, who came dancing out on to the terrace with Julian and Courtenay at her heels, and disclosed that the party of four had become a party of six.
“We have settled it between us to go to Knaresborough on Friday!” she announced, sparkling with delight. “It is to be a regular cavalcade, which will be such good fun! Lizzie Colebatch is to go with us, and Courtenay too, of course. And you, Sir Waldo—if you please?”
It was said so prettily, and with such an appealing smile, that he thought it no wonder that Julian should watch her in blatant admiration. He replied: “Thank you: I do please!”
“Miss Colebatch!” Ancilla exclaimed, taken aback. “Tiffany, I don’t think Lady Colebatch will permit her to go!”
“Yes, yes, she will!” Tiffany asserted, with a trill of laughter. “Lindeth and Courtenay have persuaded her, promising that you will be with us, you dear dragon!”
“Yes, but that’s not what I mean,” said Ancilla. “Miss Cole-batch dislikes the hot weather so much that I should have thought her mama must have forbidden her to go on such an expedition. Does she perfectly understand where it is you mean to go?”
She was reassured on this point; but although Lady Cole-batch’s sanction made it improper for her to raise any further objection she could not feel at ease. Lady Colebatch was an indolent, good-natured woman who was much inclined to let her children overrule her judgment, but Ancilla knew how quickly Elizabeth wilted in the heat, and began to wish that the expedition had never been projected. Courtenay was confident that all would be well, for they meant to make an early start, so that they would have reached Knaresborough long before midday; and Tiffany said gaily that Lizzie only disliked the heat because it made her skin so red.
The three younger members of the party then began to discuss the route they should follow, the hour at which they should assemble, and the rival merits of the various inns in Knaresborough, Julian inviting the company to partake of a nuncheon at the Crown and Bell, and Courtenay asserting that the Bay Horse was superior.
“Well, as you wish!” Julian said. “You must know better than I do! Shall we ask Miss Chartley to go with us? Would she care for it?”
“Patience! Good gracious, no!” exclaimed Tiffany. “What put such a notion as that into your head?”
“You don’t think she would like it? But she’s an excellent horsewoman, and I know she loves exploring ancient places, for she told me so.”
“Told you so? When?” demanded Tiffany.
“At Kirkstall, when we were wandering about the ruins. She knows almost as much as her father—do let us invite her to go with us!”
Miss Trent found herself digging her nails into the palms of her hands. It was irrational, but little as she wanted Tiffany to captivate Lindeth she could not help dreading the threatened tantrum. Since Courtenay was the one marriageable man whose devotion Tiffany neither desired nor demanded she was perfectly happy to include Miss Colebatch in the party, but that any one of her admirers should betray even the smallest interest in another lady invariably roused a demon of jealousy in her breast. She said now, with a glittering smile, well-known to her family: “Why? Do you like her so much?”
He looked at her in a little surprise. “Yes—that is, I like her, of course! I should think everyone must.”
“Oh, if you have a fancy for insipid girls—!” she said, shrugging.
“Do you think her insipid?” he asked. “She doesn’t seem so to me. She is very gentle, and persuadable, I agree, but not insipid,surely! She doesn’t want for sense, you know.”
“Oh, she has every virtue and every amiable quality! For my part, I find her prosy propriety a dead bore—but that’s of no consequence! Do, pray, invite her! I daresay she will be able to recite you the whole history of the Dripping Well!”
Even Julian could not mistake the rancour behind the smile. Miss Trent saw the slight look of shock in his face, and decided that she could not bear to hear her charge expose herself any more. She said quietly: “I am afraid it would be useless to invite Miss Chartley, sir. I know that Mrs Chartley wouldn’t permit her to go with us on such a long, fatiguing expedition. Indeed, I begin to wonder whether we should any of us attempt it.”
This alarming apostasy caused an instant throw-up. Miss Chartley was forgotten in the more urgent necessity of alternately abusing Miss Trent for chickenheartedness, and cajoling her into unsaying her words. But before he left Staples Julian had received from Tiffany an explanation of her spiteful outburst which quite cleared the cloud from his brow. She owned her fault so contritely that he longed to take her in his arms and kiss away her troubled look. He perfectly understood how provoking it must be to have Patience Chartley held up to her continually as a model; and he thought her penitence so candid and so humble that by the time he took his leave he had not only assured her that she was not in the least to be blamed for flying into a pet, but also that he didn’t care a rush whether or not Patience went with them to Knaresborough. Later, he tried to disabuse his cousin’s mind of whatever unjust thoughts it might harbour: not because Waldo referred to the matter, but because it seemed to him that he carefully avoided doing so. He said rather haltingly:
“I daresay it may have seemed odd to you that Miss Wield was—that she shouldn’t wish for Miss Chartley to accompany us on Friday.”
“What, after such a slip-slop as you made?” said Sir Waldo, laughing. “Not in the least odd! You did grass yourself, didn’t you? I hadn’t believed you could be such a greenhorn.”
Flushing, Julian said stiffly: “I don’t understand what you mean! If you imagine that Miss Wield was—was cross because I wished to invite Miss Chartley—it wasn’t so at all!”
“Wasn’t it?” said Sir Waldo, amusement lurking beneath his too-obviously assumed gravity. “Well, take my advice, you young cawker, and never praise one woman to another!”
“You are quite mistaken!” said Julian, more stiffly than ever.
“Yes, yes, of course I am—being so green myself!” agreed Sir Waldo soothingly. “So, for God’s sake, don’t stir any more coals to convince me of it! I am convinced—wholly!—and I detest brangles!”
Chapter 7
Mr Underhill’s optimistic plan of making an early start on Friday morning was not realized. He was certainly up betimes; but in spite of his having hammered on his cousin’s door at an early hour, warning her to make haste, since it was going to be a scorching day, the rest of the breakfast-party, which included Sir Waldo and Lord Lindeth, had finished the handsome repast provided for them before Tiffany came floating into the parlour, artlessly enquiring whether she was late.
“Yes, you are!” growled Courtenay. “We’ve been waiting for you this age! What the deuce have you been about? You have had time enough to rig yourself out a dozen times!”
“That’s just what she does,” said Charlotte impishly. “First she puts one dress on, and decides it don’t become her, and so then she tries another—don’t you, cousin?”
“Well, I’m sure you look very becoming in that habit, love,” interposed Mrs Underhill hastily. “Though if I was you I wouldn’t choose to wear velvet, not in this weather!”
By the time Tiffany had eaten her breakfast, put on her hat to her satisfaction, and found such unaccountably mislaid articles as her gloves, and her riding-whip, the hour was considerably advanced, and Courtenay in a fret of impatience, saying that Lizzie must be supposing by now that they had forgotten all about her. However, when they reached Colby Place they found the family just getting up from the breakfast-table, and Lizzie by no means ready to set out. There was thus a further delay while Lizzieran upstairs to complete her toilet, accompanied by
her two younger sisters, who were presently heard demanding of some apparently remote person what she had done with Miss Lizzie’s boots.
During this period Lindeth and Tiffany enjoyed a quiet flirtation, Sir Ralph gave the Nonesuch a long and involved account of his triumph over someone who had tried to get the better of him in a bargain, Courtenay fidgeted about the room, and Lady Colebatch prosed to Miss Trent with all the placidity of one to whom time meant nothing.
“Only two hours later than was planned,” remarked Sir Waldo, when the cavalcade at last set forth. “Very good!”
Miss Trent, who had been regretting for nearly as long that she had ever expressed a wish to see the Dripping Well, replied: “I suppose it might have been expected!”
“Yes, and I did expect it,” he said cheerfully.
“I wonder then that you should have lent yourself to this expedition.”
“One becomes inured to the unpunctuality of your sex, ma’am,” he responded.
Incensed by this unjust animadversion, she said tartly: “Let me inform you, sir, that I kept no one waiting!”
“But you are a very exceptional female,” he pointed out.
“I assure you, I am nothing of the sort.”
“I shall not allow you to be a judge of that. Oh, no, don’t look at me so crossly! What can I possibly have said to vex you?”
“I beg your pardon! Nothing, of course: merely, I’m not in the mood for nonsense, Sir Waldo!”
“That’s no reason for scowling at me!” he objected. “I haven’t been boring you to death for the past half-hour! Of course, I may bore you before the day is out, but it won’t be with vapid commonplaces, I promise you.”
“Take care!” she warned him, glancing significantly towards Miss Colebatch, who was riding ahead of them, with Courtenay.
“Neither of them is paying the least heed to us. Do you always ride that straight-shouldered cocktail?”
“Yes—Mrs Underhill having bought him for my use. He does very well for me.”
“I wish I had the mounting of you. Do you hunt?”
“No. When Tiffany goes out with the hounds she is her cousin’s responsibility, not mine.”
“Thank God for that! You would certainly come to grief if you attempted to hunt that animal. I only hope you may not be saddle-sick before ever we reach Knaresborough.”
“Indeed, so do I! I don’t know why you should think me such a poor creature!”
“I don’t: I think your horse a poor creature, and a most uncomfortable ride.”
“Oh, no, I assure you—” She broke off, checked by a lifted eyebrow. “Well, perhaps he is not very—very easy-paced! In any event, I don’t mean to argue with you about him, for I am persuaded it would be very stupid in me to do so.”
“It would,” he agreed. “I collect it didn’t occur to your amiable charge to lend you her other hack? By the bye, what made your resolution fail the other day?”
She did not pretend to misunderstand him, but answered frankly: “I couldn’t allow her to expose herself!”
He smiled. “Couldn’t you? Never mind! I fancy she contrived to charm Lindeth out of his disapproval, but the image became just a trifle smudged, nevertheless. I added my mite later in the day—which is why I am being treated with a little reserve.”
“Are you? Oh, dear, how horrid it is, and how very difficult to know what my duty is! Odious to be scheming against the child!”
“Is that what you are doing? I had no notion of it, and thought the scheming was all on my side.”
“Not precisely scheming, but—but conniving,by allowing you to bamboozle her!”
“My dear girl, how do you imagine you could stop me?”
Miss Trent toyed with the idea of objecting to this mode of address, and then decided that it would be wiser to ignore it.
“I don’t know, but—”
“Nor anyone else. Don’t tease yourself to no purpose! You are really quite helpless in the matter, you know.”
She turned her head, gravely regarding him. “Don’t you feel some compunction, Sir Waldo?”
“None at all. I should feel much more than compunction if I did not do my utmost to prevent Lindeth’s falling a victim to as vain and heartless a minx as I have yet had the ill-fortune to encounter. Do I seem to you a villain? I promise you I am not!”
“No, no! But you do make her show her worst side!”
“True! Does it occur to you that if I employed such tactics against—oh, Miss Chartley—Miss Colebatch there—yourself—I should be taken completely at fault? You would none of you show a side you don’t possess. What’s more, ma’am, I don’t make the chit coquet with me, or boast of her looks and her conquests to impress me: I merely offer her the opportunity to do so—and much good that would do me if she had as much elegance of mind as of person! All I should win by casting out such lures to a girl of character would be a well-deserved set-down.”
She could not deny it, and rode on in silence. He saw that she was still looking rather troubled, and said: “Take comfort, you over-anxious creature! I may encourage her to betray her tantrums and her selfishness but I would no more create a situation to conjure up these faults than I would compromise her.” He laughed suddenly. “A work of supererogation! If she could fly into a passion merely because Julian expressed a mild desire to include Miss Chartley in this party we shan’t suffer from a want of such situations! Who knows! He may feel it incumbent upon him to pay a little attention to Miss Colebatch presently, in which case we shall find ourselves in the centre of a vortex!”
She was obliged to laugh, but she shuddered too, begging him not to raise such hideous spectres. “Though I’ve no real apprehension in this instance,” she added, “Miss Colebatch is the one girl with whom Tiffany has struck up a friendship.”
“Yes, I have observed that the redhead regards her with enormous admiration.”
“I shall take leave to tell you, Sir Waldo,” said Miss Trent severely, “that remark had better have been left unspoken!”
“It would have been, had I been talking to anyone but yourself.”
Fortunately, since she could not think what to say in reply to this, Courtenay came trotting back to them at that moment, to inform them of a slight change of plan. By skirting the cornfield that lay beyond the hedge to their right they could cut a corner, and so be the sooner out of the lane, and on to open ground, he said. The only thing was that there was no gate on the farther side: did Miss Trent feel she could jump the hedge?
“What, on that collection of bad points? Certainly not!” said Sir Waldo.
Courtenay grinned, but said: “I know, but there’s nothing to it, sir! He’ll brush through it easily enough—or she could pull him through it, if she chooses!”
“Oh, could she?” said Miss Trent, her eye kindling. “Well, she don’t choose! By all means let us escape as soon as we may from this stuffy lane!”
“I knew you were a right one!” said Courtenay. “There is a gate on this side, where the others are waiting, and I’ll have it open in a trice.”
He wheeled his hack, and trotted off again. Miss Trent turned her fulminating gaze upon the Nonesuch, but he disarmed her by throwing up his hand in the gesture of a fencer acknowledging a hit, saying hastily: “No, no, don’t snap my nose off! I cry craven!”
“So I should hope, sir!” she said, moving off in Courtenay’s wake. She said over her shoulder, sudden mischief in her face: “I wish that handsome thoroughbred of yours may not make you look no-how by refusing!”
An answering gleam shone in his eyes. “You mean you wish he may! But I’m on my guard, and shall wait for you to show me the way!”
The hedge proved, however, to be much as Courtenay had described it, presenting no particular difficulty to even the sorriest steed, but Tiffany, who was leading the procession round the side of the field, approached it at a slapping pace, and soared over it with inches to spare. Miss Colebatch exclaimed: “Oh, one would think that lovely mare had wings!
I wish I could ride like that!”
“I’m glad you don’t ride like that!” said Courtenay, “Wings! She’s more like to end with a broken leg!” He reined his horse aside, saying politely to Sir Waldo: “Will you go, sir?”
“Yes, if you wish—but rather more tamely! Your cousin is an intrepid horsewoman, and might become an accomplished one, but you should teach her not to ride at a hedge as if she had a stretch of water to clear. She’ll take a rattling fall one of these days.”
“Lord, sir, I’ve told her over and over again to ride fast at water, and slow at timber, but she never pays the least heed to what anyone says! She’s a show-off—though I’ll say this for her!!—she don’t care a rush for a tumble!”
“And rides with a light hand,” said Julian, with a challenging look at Sir Waldo.
“Yes, and such a picture as she presents!” said Miss Colebatch.
Miss Trent, following Sir Waldo over the hedge, observed, as she reined in beside him, that that at least was true. He shrugged, but did not reply. The rest of the party joined them; and as they were now upon uncultivated ground they rode on in a body for some way, and the opportunity for private conversation was lost.
It was when they had covered perhaps half the distance to Knaresborough that Miss Trent, herself uncomfortably hot, noticed that Miss Colebatch, who had started out in tearing spirits, had become unusually silent. Watching her, she saw her sag in the saddle, and then jerk herself upright again; and she edged her horse alongside her, saying quietly: “Are you feeling quite the thing, Miss Colebatch?”
A rather piteous glance was cast at her, but Elizabeth, trying to smile, replied: “Oh yes! That is, I—I have the headache a little, but pray don’t regard it! I shall be better directly, and I would not for the world—It is just the excessive heat!”
Miss Trent now perceived that under the sun’s scorch she was looking very sickly. She said: “No wonder! I find it insufferably hot myself, and shall be thankful to call a halt to this expedition.”
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