by M C Beaton
“Excuse me!” called Mr. Jepps. “Forgot something. Back in a trice.” He slammed the door.
Why leave me here? thought Penelope, half-amused, half-exasperated. And why is it that the gentlemen always believe we females will fall into Gothic raptures at the very sight of a dirty old room? From the sound of lapping water, she gathered the room was under the level of the moat outside.
She put on her glasses and looked about her. There were piles of gardening implements and empty sacks.
After some minutes, she began to feel cold and went to the door and turned the handle, only to find it firmly locked.
“Silly man!” she said to herself. “Oh, well, he will be back soon enough.” She stowed her spectacles safely away and began to walk up and down the room.
Mr. Jepps hurried across the turf to where Lord Andrew was walking with Miss Worthy. He could see from the expressions on their faces that they had been having a row, which in fact they had. Miss Worthy had called Penelope a bold minx and had said she was flirting shamelessly with poor Mr. Jepps, and Lord Andrew had remarked acidly that she, Miss Worthy, was the one who had been flirting shamelessly. So when Mr. Jepps asked for a word in private with Lord Andrew, Miss Worthy turned sulkily away.
“What is it?” asked Lord Andrew testily.
“It is Miss Mortimer. She is desirous to speak to you.”
“I cannot think why. Where is she?”
“In a room in the basement of the tower.”
Lord Andrew gave a click of exasperation. He was beginning to dislike Mr. Jepps. He thought him a poor, fussy sort of fellow.
“Very well. Lead the way.”
Mr. Jepps ushered Lord Andrew down the stairs to the underground chamber. He unlocked the door, ignoring Lord Andrew’s startled question as to why Miss Mortimer was locked in. Penelope swung round. “Thank goodness you are come,” she said. “You locked me in, Mr. Jepps!”
“What is it you want to see me about?” asked Lord Andrew, striding forward. Mr. Jepps retreated swiftly and slammed and locked the door again. Ignoring the furious cries coming faintly from inside, he made his way upstairs and out into the warmth of the sunlight.
Now his biggest task lay ahead. He had to persuade the others to return to London, to persuade them that Lord Andrew and Penelope had already left. Clouds were rising up in the sky, and a blustery wind had rushed out of nowhere, hissing in the trees and ruffling the waters of the moat.
He was sure Ann Worthy, activated by jealousy, would readily believe him, but Ian Macdonald and Miss Tilney were going to be difficult.
He cocked his head to one side, but no shout or scream escaped from the thick walls of the underground room. If they could climb up to that barred window, they might make themselves heard. Better to move quickly.
He went straight to Ann Worthy.
“A most odd thing has happened,” he cried. “Lord Andrew and Miss Mortimer have gone off—walked off—declaring their intention of going to the inn. I think it very strange behavior in a man who is affianced to you, Miss Worthy. Very odd, and so I told him. He told me to mind my own business, and Miss Mortimer giggled. If we leave now, we can catch them up on the road, and you may demand an explanation.”
“And he shall give me one!” said Miss Worthy, quite beside herself with fury.
Ian Macdonald had already taken a strong dislike to Miss Worthy. He was also accustomed to his friend, The Perfect Gentleman, never putting a foot wrong. So if Lord Andrew had decided to walk back to the inn with Miss Mortimer, it followed he probably had some highly conventional and boring reason for doing so.
Mr. Jepps heaved a sigh of relief. It was all so much easier than he had imagined. He would send a messenger from London the following morning to let the couple out. By that time they would have spent the night together, and Lord Andrew would be obliged to marry Miss Mortimer. Mr. Jepps was sure that Lord Andrew would challenge him to a duel. But he was not afraid of that. He would accept the challenge and, since dueling was illegal, alert the authorities to arrest Lord Andrew.
Now one more obstacle lay ahead. Lord Andrew’s phaeton.
As soon as they reached the inn, Mr. Jepps urged the party to go inside. Then he ran round to the stables. He was in luck. An unsavory-looking idler, the type who hangs around horse fairs, was leaning against a post, chewing a straw. In a hurried whisper, he agreed to pay the man ten pounds to drive Lord Andrew’s horses and Phaeton to London and leave them in the Park Street mews. The fellow was paid five pounds in advance and was to call at Mr. Jepps’s London address that evening for the other half.
Then Mr. Jepps strolled back into the inn. Miss Worthy was wondering aloud why they had not overtaken the couple on the road. Mr. Jepps went off to see the landlord and explained that Miss Worthy’s fiancé had taken off with another lady. It would take time to break the news. The landlord was to wait an hour and then enter the coffee room and say someone had seen the couple driving off. As a matter of fact, Mr. Jepps said, handing over some guineas to the gratified landlord and drooping one eyelid in a vulgar wink, the couple were putting up with an accommodating friend in the vicinity and had sent their carriage back to London to throw dust in the eyes of the party. Flattered to be included in all this aristocratic intrigue, the landlord agreed to play his part.
Mr. Jepps had no fear of the repercussions that would arise from his machinations. He was a very wealthy man and was confident of bribing his way out of any situation. He might even have to travel abroad for a time but, without Lord Andrew, he was confident that Miss Worthy would wait for him. In fact, flight, rather than waiting around to be challenged to a duel, might be the wisest course.
Ian Macdonald began to assume long before the landlord put in an appearance that his friend, Lord Andrew, had finally come to his senses and decided to do something wrong for once in his life—namely, ditching a sour-faced fiancée for that blond charmer. He decided to play along, only remarking that the weather had changed and they had better set out before the rain came. But Miss Worthy hung on until the landlord finally removed any hope from her angry breast. She drove back to London with Mr. Jepps, breathing fire and vengeance and breaches of promise. Mr. Jepps listened sympathetically to this tirade and insisted on entering her house so he could support her as she told her parents of Lord Andrew’s perfidy.
Mr. and Mrs. Worthy listened in horror. There was only one thing to be done. They called for their carriage and set out for Park Street to complain to the duchess about her son’s behavior.
The duchess laughed at them. Lord Andrew had never behaved badly in his life, she said, and was not likely to start now. There would be some very conventional explanation. Much reassured, the Worthys left, not knowing that as soon as they were out of the ducal town house, the duchess went into a fit of hysterics, threatening to string Penelope Mortimer up by the thumbs should she ever see her again.
Meanwhile, in the underground chamber, Penelope Mortimer was standing on top of Lord Andrew’s shoulders sawing desperately at the bars at the window with a saw they had found buried under the pile of gardening tools. “Cannot you try a little harder?” he called up.
“I am trying as hard as I can,” said Penelope crossly. “You do it if you think you can do any better.”
“Don’t be silly. How can I stand on your shoulders? Keep sawing.”
“I’ve done two bars already,” sighed Penelope, squinting at the window. “It looks very dark outside.”
“I do not care if there is a blizzard raging. That cur Jepps planned to make us spend the night together so that he could marry Miss Worthy. What a flat I was to be so taken in! But we must get out of here. I’m damned if I’ll be made to marry you.”
“Who would want to marry you, of all people?” said Penelope furiously.
“Shut up. Keep sawing and just shut up.”
Penelope sawed and sawed. The bars were old and rusty, but she was exhausted when the last bar broke and fell into the moat.
“Don’t come down
,” said Lord Andrew. “Do you know how to swim?”
“Yes.”
“Then jump through the window and swim across the moat.”
“Have you no feeling, sir? I shall be soaked to the skin. Furthermore, it has started to rain.”
“If you do not go through that window of your own accord, then I shall throw you through,” said Lord Andrew. “Get a move on; there’s a good girl. My shoulders are aching, and you are not making things easier by jumping about on them and putting up missish arguments.”
Penelope threw the white blur of his face a baleful look. She hauled herself up by the remaining stumps of the sawn bars, tore her gown dragging her body across them, and tumbled headlong into the moat. Something heavy underwater brushed against her body. Penelope immediately thought of large carp with large teeth and frantically swam to the surface and struck out for where she believed the far side of the moat to be.
“I declare you are as blind as a bat,” said Lord Andrew’s voice from somewhere above her head. “The other way, girl.”
Penelope turned around and struck out away from the tower again and this time reached the opposite side of the moat. She clambered out, long trails of green, slimy weed hanging from her torn and soaking dress. Clouds were boiling black in the sky above, and cold, driving rain pounded down on her head. Her frivolous little bonnet floated on the surface of the moat.
The great wave resulting from Lord Andrew diving into the moat from the window submerged the bonnet, which disappeared completely from view. Penelope began to cry. All at once it seemed the most tragic thing in the world to lose that pretty bonnet.
Had the circumstances been more civilized, then Lord Andrew would have soothed Penelope and dried her tears. But the increasing storm raging above made him behave as if he were still in the army.
“Why are you crying?” he demanded harshly.
“I’ve lost my bonnet. You drowned it,” said Penelope pathetically.
“Of all the idiotish girls. Pull yourself together this instant, Miss Mortimer!”
Penelope gave a defiant sob and looked down at the ruin of her dress. “There is not much left to pull together. It is so dark. What time is it?”
He pulled out his watch and looked at it. “I suppose it must have stopped when I hit the water. It is about nine in the evening.”
“Nine!”
“It is all your fault, you know. You took hours sawing those bars.”
“It may amaze you to know that bar sawing is not a ladylike accomplishment. But who knows? They may even begin to teach it in the seminaries and dame schools along with the art of lock picking.”
“Come along. I do not suppose it is of any use looking for my carriage. I am sure Jepps found a way to get rid of it. What I fail to understand is why Ian Macdonald did not stay around to find us. Well, it is of no use standing here wondering. We must find shelter.”
Had Lord Andrew turned right on the road outside the ruined castle instead of to the left, they would have found themselves back in the village where he had left his carriage, the landlord would have recognized them, and they would have been made welcome. But the blackness of the night as they scurried along under the trees was bewildering. They half ran, half stumbled along the road under the increasing ferocity of the storm.
They had been hurrying along like this for over an hour when the flickering lights of a village appeared out of the blackness.
At the edge of the village was a small inn called The Green Man, its sign swinging in the wind.
Lord Andrew strode up to the inn with Penelope tottering behind him, and pushed open the door.
He found himself in a small hall. He rang a brass bell on a side table. Penelope came in and stood, shivering.
“Shut the door behind you,” snapped Lord Andrew. “Or are you not cold enough?”
A small, stocky landlord appeared from the tap and eyed the bedraggled couple warily.
“And what would you two be wanting?” he asked.
“I am Lord Andrew Childe,” said Lord Andrew haughtily, “and, as you can see, we have been caught in the storm. We wish rooms where we can dry ourselves, and we need dinner, for I am sharp-set.”
“It’s a fine lord you make,” said the landlord. “Where is your carriage? Your servants?”
“I went for an outing and was tricked. I do not know where my carriage is.” Penelope gave a dismal sneeze.
The landlord’s wife came out to join him, demanding to know what was up.
“This here gent,” said the landlord, his voice laden with sarcasm, “says as how he’s a lord and he’s asking for rooms and dinner.”
“This is a respectable inn….” began the landlady. Penelope coughed and sneezed and shivered. The landlord’s wife looked at her, and her face softened. “But the poor lady is mortal wet. We have only one room, and you’re welcome to that if you pay your shot in advance. But only if you are married, mind.”
Lord Andrew suddenly caught a glimpse of himself in an old, greenish mirror over the hall table. His black hair was plastered down on his forehead, his cravat to his coat. He looked at Penelope. She had not only lost her bonnet in the moat, but her shawl as well. Her filmy muslin gown clung to her shivering body.
“Yes, we are married,” he said. He fished in the pocket in his tails, relieved to find a rouleau of guineas still there. He pulled it out and began to shake gold coins out into his hand. “How much?” he asked curtly. “We will need to hire a carriage after we have dined.”
The landlord’s jaw dropped when he saw the gold. “I don’t know as there’s a spare gig around here at this time of night, my lord. Why don’t you and your lady go upstairs, and we’ll call you when dinner is ready. There’s a couple o’ gents in the private parlor, but they’re nigh finished.”
“Good,” said Lord Andrew. “How much?”
But the sight of that gold had worked wonders on the landlord. “You may pay your shot when you leave, my lord,” he said, bowing low. “I am Mr. Carter, and this is my wife, Abigail. Mrs. Carter, do take my lord and my lady to their room.”
“But I’m not—” Penelope began weakly, and then let out a scream as Lord Andrew stamped on her foot.
“I am so sorry, my love,” said Lord Andrew, taking her arm in a firm grip. “An accident. Come along. You are in no fit state to talk,” he added in a threatening tone of voice. “Mrs. Carter, we would be obliged if you could find us dressing gowns of some sort. We cannot dine in our wet clothes, and I fear we have no others.”
“I’m sure I can find you something,” said Mrs. Carter, made as cheerful and obsequious as her husband by the sight of that gold.
They followed the landlord’s wife up a crooked staircase and along a short corridor. “It’s our best bedroom,” said Mrs. Carter proudly.
Lord Andrew and Penelope stood shivering while Mr. Carter and a waiter entered with a coal and logs and proceeded to build up a roaring fire. Mrs. Carter disappeared only to reappear shortly with flannel nightgowns and two dressing gowns, both men’s and both made of coarse wool, and two red Kilmarnock nightcaps.
A maidservant came in with cans of hot water and rough huckaback towels. The landlord then delivered a tray with a bottle of white brandy and two glasses and a kettle of boiling water.
“We will leave you to change, my lord. My wife will take your wet clothes down to the kitchen to be cleaned and dried. The private parlor is next door to your room, so you may dine in your night rail without disturbing any of the other guests.”
Lord Andrew wanted to say that they planned to set out for London as soon as their clothes were dried, but Penelope looked white and exhausted, and he felt he would tackle further explanations when they had dined.
Finally Penelope and Lord Andrew were left alone.
“If you will go out into the corridor, my lord,” said Penelope weakly, “I will change my clothes.”
“There is no need for that,” he said. “I will draw the bed hangings to form a screen. You undress
on this side in front of the fire, and I will change on the other. First, have something to drink.”
“Later,” said Penelope.
“No, now!”
He poured her a stiff glass of brandy and topped it up with hot water and stood over her until she had drunk it.
Then he picked up his nightclothes and went to the other side of the bed, drawing the chintz hangings closed to form a screen.
Penelope looked dizzily about her. The room had an odd way of moving up and down. It was like being on board ship, or rather, like the descriptions she had read about life on a sailing ship. She removed her thin, sopping clothes, those summer clothes which had been so beautiful earlier that day, and pulled on the nightgown, and then wrapped the man’s dressing gown tightly around her. She was leaning over the fire, trying to dry her hair, when Lord Andrew came round to join her. He seized a towel and rubbed her hair with it and then opened her reticule to look for a comb.