The Unknown Ajax

by Джорджетт Хейер

“I see I’ll have to make a clean breast of it,” said the Major, with every sign of shamefaced reluctance. “The thing is, love, that my grandfather tells me that the instant I show my front in town I’ll have all the matchmaking mothers hunting me down. I wouldn’t know what to do, for I’m not accustomed to that sort of thing, never having had lures cast out to me before, besides being a bashful kind of a man. It wouldn’t be cousinly of you to abandon me. In fact,” he added, rapidly developing a strong sense of ill usage, “it would be reet cruel, seeing how I put myself in your hands, just as I was bid.”

  “I would give much to see you fleeing in terror from a matchmaking mother,” remarked Anthea wistfully. “Or, indeed, from anyone. But as you are utterly brazen—”

  “Nay!”

  “—and much in need of a set-down—”

  “I’m not in need of that, lass, for I’m getting one,” he interpolated ruefully.

  “No, no!—At least—Oh, dear, I daresay it sounds foolish to you, and I know I told you I was mercenary, but I’m not, Hugo! Only think how it would appear to everyone! As though I had been determined before ever I saw you not to let your odious fortune slip through my hands!”

  He patted her consolingly. “You needn’t worry about that, love. When people see you wearing the same bonnet for years on end they’ll never think you married me for my fortune.”

  “As nothing would induce me to wear the same bonnet for years on end—”

  “You’ll have to,” he said simply. “I’m a terrible nipfarthing. Sare-baned, we call it. It’ll take a deal of coaxing to get as much as a groat out of me. I hadn’t meant to tell you, but I wouldn’t want to take advantage of you, and if you were thinking I’m not one to cut up stiff over the bills, or—”

  “If you knew what I was thinking, you’d never hold up your head again!” she told him. “You seem to forget that you wished to purchase the moon for me!”

  “Nay, I don’t forget that! The thing is I can’t purchase it, so there was no harm in saying it. Now, if I’d said I’d like to give you a diamond necklace, or some such thing, you might have taken me up on it. I remembered that just in time to stop myself,” he explained, apparently priding himself on his forethought.

  “I should like very much to have a diamond necklace,” said Anthea pensively.

  “Wouldn’t a paste one do as well?” he asked, in a voice of great uneasiness.

  She had been so sure that he would fall into the trap that she was taken, for an instant, off her guard, and looked up at him with such a startled expression on her face that his deep chuckle escaped him, and he lifted her quite to her feet, and kissed her.

  Scandalized by such impropriety, Miss Darracott commanded him to set her down immediately, on pain of never being spoken to by her again. This threat cowed him into obedience, and Miss Darracott, considerably flushed and ruffled, was just about to favour him with her opinion of his conduct when Claud walked into the room, thus saving his large cousin from annihilation.

  Claud had come in search of him, the news of his affluence having by this time reached him. He could scarcely have been more delighted had he himself suddenly inherited a fortune, for he instantly perceived that now more than ever would Hugo need a guiding hand, particularly in the choice of a suitable town residence, and its furnishings. He had a great turn for such matters, and had, indeed, so unerring an eye for colour, and such exquisite taste in decoration, that his advice was frequently sought by ladies of high fashion who desired to bestow a new touch on their drawing-rooms. Since he lived modestly in two rooms in Duke Street, there was little scope for his genius in his own abode: a circumstance which made him look forward with intense pleasure to the prospect of being able to lavish his skill not merely on a drawing-room or a saloon, but on an entire house, from attics to basement. “It’ll be something like!” he assured Hugo. “Just you leave it to me, old fellow! No need for you to worry yourself over it! You dub up the possibles, and I’ll lay ’em out to the best advantage. Yes, and don’t, on any account, enter into a treaty for a house behind my back! You’d be diddled, as sure as check, because it stands to reason you can’t know your way about in London. Anthea don’t know either, so it’s no use thinking you can leave it to her. As likely as not she’d land you in Russell Square, all among the Cits and the bankers, or Upper Grosvenor Street, miles from anywhere.”

  This was a little too much for Miss Darracott. “Have no fear!” she said coldly. “Indeed, I can’t conceive why you should suppose I should wish to choose a house for Hugo!”

  “Dash it, you’re going to marry him, aren’t you?” said Claud. “We all know that!”

  “You know nothing of the sort!” she declared hotly. “The only thing you know is that Grandpapa desires it, and if you imagine that I care a rush for—”

  “No, dash it!” interrupted Claud. “Never thought about the old gentleman at all! Well, what I mean is, it’s as plain as a pikestaff! You can’t go about smelling of April and May, the pair of you, and then expect to gull people into thinking you don’t mean to get riveted! A pretty set of gudgeons you must think we are!”

  “That’s dished me!” said the Major fatalistically.

  “I’ll tell you what!” said Claud, engrossed in his vicarious schemes, “we’ll take a bolt to the village next week, and see what’s to be had! No reason why you and my Aunt Elvira shouldn’t come too, Anthea. You can put up at—”

  “Nay, we’ll do no such thing!” intervened Hugo, in some haste. “I’m off to Huddersfield next week.”

  Anthea, making a dignified exit, looked back involuntarily. “Going away! Oh—oh, are you? Will you be making a long stay at Yorkshire?”

  “Not a day longer than I must,” replied Hugo, smiling at her so warmly that she felt herself blushing, and retired in shaken order.

  In all but one quarter, the news of Hugo’s wealth was very well received, Ferring, in particular, becoming so puffed-up that his uncle felt obliged to snub him severely. My lord came to dinner in a mood of unprecedented amiability; and Mrs. Darracott told her affronted daughter that fortune was the one thing needed to make dear Hugo wholly acceptable.

  “Mama, how can you!” exclaimed Anthea.

  “Well, my love, it is a great piece of nonsense to pretend that life is not very much more comfortable when one can command its elegancies, and always be beforehand with the world, because it is!” replied Mrs. Darracott, with one of her disconcerting flashes of common-sense. “I liked Hugo from the outset, but although I very soon perceived that he was just the man to make you happy, I could not wish you to marry him when I believed it meant that you would be obliged to live here, dependent on your grandfather! But he has been telling me about his scheme to refurbish up the Dower House, if you should not dislike it—and I can’t think why you should, dearest, for he says the ghost is nothing more than Spurstow, trying to keep everyone away, which wouldn’t surprise me in the least, for I always disliked that man, and even if there is a ghost it cannot possibly be more disagreeable to live with than your grandfather! I should not find it so, at all events, and only think, Anthea! dear Hugo wishes me to live there too! Of course I said I should not, but I was very much affected: indeed, I cried a little!” She paused to dry the tears that were again rolling down her cheeks. “He couldn’t have been kinder if he had been my own son!” she disclosed. “You must not suppose I wasn’t devoted to your poor Papa, my dear, but no one could call him a dependable man, and oh, what a comfort it is to one to have a creature like Hugo to turn to! Say what you will, my love, there is something about very big, quiet men! So ridiculous, too!” she added, with a rather shaky laugh. “He says if you won’t marry him he will want me more than ever to live at the Dower House, to keep house for him! I was obliged to laugh, though naturally I gave him a scold for talking such nonsense. And although I wouldn’t press you for the world, my dearest child, I did tell him that nothing could make me happier than to see you married to him—and it is of no use to take a pet, because
if you are not in love with him, all I can say is that you are a most shocking flirt, which I should be sorry to think of any child of mine! And as for not marrying him because he is much wealthier than we knew, I never heard anything so absurd in my life!”

  Miss Darracott made no attempt to defend herself; but, revolted by the knowledge that the better part of her family was apparently waiting in hourly expectation of receiving the news of her betrothal, she roundly informed her suitor next day that nothing would induce her to gratify a set of persons whom she very improperly described as vulgar, prying busybodies.

  The Major received this declaration with perfect equanimity, even going so far as to say that he would be very well suited to postpone the announcement of the engagement until (as he phrased it) they were shut of his Uncle Matthew’s family. “That won’t be long after I get back from Huddersfield, from what my Aunt Aurelia was saying t’other evening. I’ll have to go there, love, because when I was recalled, before Waterloo, I’d no time to do more than pitch all my affairs back into Jonas Henry’s lap, as you might say. Ay, and that puts me in mind of another thing! He hired Axby House from me when my grandfather died, and I’ve a notion he’d be glad if I’d sell it to him outright. Now, tell me, love: shall I do it, or have you a fancy for it?”

  “I think you should do exactly as you wish.”

  “Nay, love!” expostulated the Major.

  “I only meant that—well, how could I have a fancy for a house I’ve never seen?” said Anthea. “Though I own I should like to see that place where you were born.”

  “Well, I wasn’t born at Axby House, so that settles it,” said the Major cheerfully. “Tell me another thing! Do you think Richmond would care to go with me?”

  She looked quickly at him. “Richmond! Why, Hugo?”

  He said, with one of his most innocent stares: “Just for company. Happen he’d be interested to see something more of the country than he’s yet had the chance to.”

  “I should think he would like very much to go, but I do not think that that’s what you have in your head,” she said shrewdly. “I know you don’t mean to tell me what it is, so I shan’t waste my breath in trying to persuade you to do so. I only wish you may prevail upon Grandpapa to let Richmond go with you, but I very much doubt that you will. He is suspicious of you, Hugo: did you know that? He is afraid you may foster Richmond’s military ambition.”

  He nodded. “Yes, I know that, and he’s in the right of it, think on! I’m going to do more than that, odd-come-shortly—and that’s another reason, love, why you should marry me!”

  This was an opening not to be ignored. “You mean, I collect,” said Anthea thoughtfully, “that you won’t help Richmond unless I do marry you.”

  “No, love,” responded the Major gently, “I’m not holding a pistol to your head. I’ll do what I can for Richmond in any event, but I’d be standing in a far better position if I were his brother-in-law, and not merely one of his cousins.”

  She drew an audible breath. “What a delightful thing it is to know that if I’m such a wet-goose as to marry you I shall be able to depend on having a husband who won’t hesitate to take the wind out of my eye every time I try to get a point the better of him!” she remarked. “And let me tell you,”—she added, with strong indignation, “that that wounded look doesn’t move me in the least, because nothing will make me believe you didn’t know very well that I was trying to roast you!”

  Chapter 17

  Richmond’s first reaction to the invitation to accompany his cousin to Yorkshire was a sparkling look of surprised pleasure. This was followed almost immediately, however, by a slight withdrawal. He said, stammering a little: “Thank you! I should be very happy—I should like to—but—I don’t know! It might not be possible: Grandpapa ...”

  “Nay, that won’t fadge!” said Hugo, with a grin. “You can bring Grandpapa round your thumb if you wish to!”

  Richmond laughed, but shook his head. “Not always! When do you mean to set out?”

  “On Wednesday next, but if that doesn’t do for you I could change the date,” replied Hugo obligingly.

  “Not till Wednesday! Oh!” Richmond said. He glanced up, feeling his cousin’s inscrutable blue gaze to be fixed on him, and coloured, saying quickly: “That should give me time to bring him round my thumb! Thank you! I’d like to go with you—if I can do it.”

  It seemed to Hugo that his hesitation had its root in something other than doubt of winning Lord Darracott’s consent, but what this could be was difficult to guess. Had the moon been on the wane, Hugo would have suspected that he had engaged himself to pick up, from the Seamew, a dropped cargo, but smuggling craft did not put to sea on moonlit nights, and it would be several days yet before the moon reached the full. If there was a run cargo lying concealed in the Dower House, it seemed improbable that Richmond should consider it necessary to take any part in its removal. The possibility that he might prefer the excitement of such a venture to an expedition into Yorkshire did occur to the Major, but he discarded it: Richmond had been within ames-ace of jumping at the chance offered him, and his subsequent hesitation had clearly been due to an undisclosed afterthought.

  The Major knew better than to question him. Richmond had made it plain that he was not going to confide in him; and to persist in interrogating him would serve no other purpose than to arouse his hostility. Hostility had certainly flickered for a minute in his eyes during the session in his bedchamber, and it seemed unpleasantly probable that Richmond, regarding his cousin as a foe to beware of, was only waiting until he should be out of the way to prosecute whatever illicit undertaking it was that he had on hand.

  This unwelcome suspicion was not quite laid to rest by the discovery that Richmond had at least told Lord Darracott of the offered treat. Telling his lordship and coaxing him were two very different things: Richmond was bound to tell him, but in what manner he had done it Hugo could not know. If he had used any cajolery his efforts had not so far met with success. When his lordship was alone with his elder grandsons that evening, the ladies of the party, and also Richmond, who rarely kept late hours, having retired to bed, he bent one of his more intimidating stares upon the Major and demanded to be told what the devil he meant by inviting Richmond to go with him on a tedious journey that was certain to knock him up.

  “I don’t think it would knock him up, sir,” replied Hugo, with the imperturbability which had by this time ceased to surprise his cousins.

  “Much you know!” barked his lordship. “Your way of travel won’t do for Richmond, let me tell you!”

  “Never fear!” said Hugo, an appreciative twinkle in his eye. “I’ll be travelling post, and it’s no matter to me how many times I break the journey: I won’t let the lad be knocked-up!”

  Balked at this point, his lordship delivered himself of a diatribe against posting-houses, all of which, he appeared to believe made it their invariable custom to seek, by every means at their disposal, to render their patrons’ visit not only uncomfortable, but generally fatal.

  Listening in great astonishment to these strictures, Claud was moved to protest. “No, no, sir!” he said earnestly. “Assure you—! Not a word of truth in it! Daresay it may have been like that in your day, but it ain’t so now! Ask anyone! No reason at all to think young Richmond would be put between damp sheets, or given bad fish to eat! What’s more, if you ask me, it would take more than a journey by stagecoach, let alone one in a post-chaise-and-four, to knock him up!”

  “I don’t ask you—fribble!” snapped his lordship, rounding on him, with the speed of a whiplash. “You may keep your tongue between your teeth!”

  “Yes, sir—happy to!” uttered Claud dismayed. “No wish to offend you! Thought you might like to be set right!”

  “Thought I might like to be set right?”

  “No, no! Spoke without thinking!” said Claud hastily. “I know you don’t!”

  “There’s no need for any fratching about it,” interposed Hugo. “I’
d be glad of the lad’s company, I’ll see he takes no harm, I think he’d enjoy it, and that’s all there is to it.”

  His deep, unperturbed voice seemed to exercise a soothing effect upon Lord Darracott. After glaring at Claud for a moment he turned away from him, to inform Hugo, disagreeably, but in a milder tone, that Richmond would find nothing whatsoever to interest him in such a place as Huddersfield. Driven out of this position, as he very soon was, he once more lost his temper, and said, gripping the arms of his chair: “Very well, sir, if you will have it, you may! The less Richmond sees of you the better I shall be pleased! I’ve had trouble enough with him without wishing for more! Before you came here, to set him off again, he was in a fair way to forgetting a crack-brained notion he took into his head that nothing would do for him but to join the army. I knew it was merely a silly, boy’s fancy he’d soon recover from, but I’m not running the risk of letting you stir him up, so don’t think it!”

  Hugo stood looking down at him impassively; but it was Vincent who spoke. He had been listening with an expression on his face of sardonic amusement, but at this point he said, unexpectedly: “I fear, sir, that such an attempt on my cousin’s part would be a work of supererogation. To judge by the confidences made to me when I took Richmond to Sevenoaks he has by no means forgotten that crack-brained notion. He was, in fact, a dead bore on the subject.”

  Lord Darracott stared at him. “He was, was he? Well, if he hasn’t recovered yet, he will presently! I’ll never give my consent, do you hear me? Good God, that weakly boy? As well kill him outright!”

  Forgetting caution, Claud said incredulously: “What, is Richmond weakly? I’d never have thought it! Well, what I mean is, he don’t seem to me to be happy unless he’s careering all over the county on one of his wild horses, or walking for miles after a few wretched pigeons, or tossing about in that boat of his! I should think the army would suit him down to the ground, for they always seem to be drilling, or manoeuvring, or doing something dashed unrestful, and that’s just what Richmond is—unrestful!”