'Quite ridiculous! I never promise what I know I can't perform!
'Odious creature!'
He grinned at her. 'Should I be less odious if I humbugged you with court-promises? Of course we shall quarrel, for I have a naggy temper, and you, I thank God, are not one of those meek women who say yes and amen to everything! Which reminds me that I have hit on a solution to the problem of what to do with Lucilla to which I do expect you to say yes and amen!'
'But when we are married she will naturally live with us!'
'Oh, no, she will not!' he said. 'If you imagine, my loved one, that I am prepared to stand by complacently while my bride devotes herself to my niece, rid yourself of that idiotic notion! Think for a moment! Do you really wish to include a third person – and one who must be chaperoned wherever she goes! – into our household? If you do, I do not! I want a wife, not a chaperon for my niece!' He took her hands, and held them in a compelling grasp. 'A companion, Annis! Someone who may say, if I suggest to her that we should jaunt over to Paris, that she doesn't feel inclined to go to Paris, but who won't say: "But how can I leave Lucilla?" Do you understand what I mean?'
'Oh, my dear, of course I do! I don't wish to include a third person in our household, and I must own that fond though I am of Lucilla I do find that the task of looking after her is heavier than I had supposed it would be. But how unkind it would be to send her to live with someone else, for no fault of hers, but merely because we didn't wish to be bothered with her! If she knew, and liked, any of her paternal aunts, or cousins, the case would be different, but she doesn't, and thanks to that miserable aunt the only friends the poor child has are those she has made here, in Bath!'
'Yes, exactly so! What do you say to giving her into Mrs Stinchcombe's charge until it is time for her to make her comeout?'
Miss Wychwood sat up with a jerk. 'Oliver! Of course it would be the very thing for her, and what she would like best, I am very sure. But would Mrs Stinchcombe be willing to take her?'
'Perfectly willing. In fact, it was settled between us this morning! I came here straight from Laura Place. It was Mrs Stinchcombe who told me that you had been ill, and – Oh, lord, now what?'
But the timid tap on the door merely heralded the reappearance of Lizzy, who came in carrying a silver salver, on which stood a decanter, two of Miss Wychwood's best Waterford wineglasses, and a wooden biscuit tub with a silver lid. Mr Carleton, perceiving that the decanter was in imminent danger of sliding off the salver, got up quickly, and went to take the tray into his own hands, saying: 'That's a good girl! Run along now!'
'Yes, sir! Thank you, sir!' said Lizzy, and slid out of the room in a manner strongly suggestive of one escaping from a tiger's cage.
Miss Wychwood, observing with some surprise her cherished Waterford glasses, said: 'What in the world possessed Limbury to send up the best glasses? I only use them for parties! I collect you frightened him out of his wits, just as you frightened poor Lizzy!'
'No such thing!' said Mr Carleton, pouring Burgundy into one of the best glasses. 'Limbury is doing justice to this occasion. Good butlers are always awake upon every suit! Here you are, love: see if my prescription doesn't pluck you up!'
Miss Wychwood took the glass, but refused to drink the Burgundy unless Mr Carleton joined her. So he poured out a glass for himself, and was just raising it to toast her when Miss Farlow burst into the room, powerfully agitated, stopped dead on the threshold, and exclaimed: 'Well!'
Miss Wychwood was startled into spilling some of the Burgundy. She set her glass down, and tried to rub away the stains from the skirt of her gown with her handkerchief, saying crossly: 'Really, Maria, it is too bad of you! Look what you have made me do! What do you want?'
'I am here, Annis, to preserve you from the consequences of your own folly!' said Miss Farlow. 'How could you receive a member of the Male Sex in your bedchamber, and in your dressing-gown? Sir, I must request you to leave immediately!'
'You don't mean to tell me that's a dressing-gown?' interrupted Mr Carleton, a dangerous gleam in his eyes. 'Well, it's by far the most elegant one I've ever been privileged to see, and I suppose I must have seen scores of 'em in my time – paid for them too!'
'For goodness' sake, Oliver – !' Miss Wychwood said, in an imploring whisper.
Trembling with outraged propriety, Miss Farlow uttered a terrible indictment of Mr Carleton's manners, morals, and shameless disregard of the rules of conduct governing any man venturing to call himself a gentleman. A shattering retort rose to his lips, but he bit it back, because he saw that Miss Wychwood was by no means enjoying this encounter, and merely said: 'Well, now that you have convinced me, ma'am, that I am so far sunk in moral turpitude as to be past praying for, may I suggest that you withdraw from this scene of vice?'
'Nothing,' declared Miss Farlow, 'will prevail upon me to leave this room while you remain in it, sir! I do not know by what means you forced yourself into it –'
'Oh, do, pray, Maria, stop talking such fustian nonsense, and go away!' begged Miss Wychwood. 'Mr Carleton did not force his way into my room! He came at my invitation, and if I have to listen to any more ranting from you I shall go into strong hysterics!'
'Sir Geoffrey entrusted you to my care, Annis, and never shall it be said of me that I betrayed the confidence he reposed in me! Since Jurby has been so unmindful of her duty – not that that surprises me, for I have always considered that you permitted her far too much license, so that she has grown to be
so big in her own esteem that –'
'Oh, cut line, woman!' said Mr Carleton, striding to the door, and opening it. 'Miss Wychwood has asked you to go away, and I have every intention of seeing to it that you do go away! Don't keep me waiting!'
'And leave my sacred charge unprotected? Never!' declared Miss Farlow heroically.
'Oh, for God's sake – !' snapped Mr Carleton, at the end of his patience. 'What the devil do you suppose I'm going to do to her? Rape her? I will give you thirty seconds to leave this room, and if you are not on the other side of the door by that time I shall eject you forcibly!'
'Brute!' ejaculated Miss Farlow, bursting into tears. 'Offering violence to a defenceless female! Only wait until Sir Geoffrey knows of this!'
He paid no heed, but kept his eyes on his watch. Miss Farlow hesitated between heroism and fright. He shut his watch with a snap, restored it to his pocket, and advanced purposefully towards her. Miss Farlow's courage failed. She uttered a shriek, and ran out of the room.
Mr Carleton shut the door, and applied himself to the more agreeable task of soothing Miss Wychwood's lacerated nerves, in which he succeeded so well that in a very short space of time her racing pulses had steadied to a normal rate, and she not only allowed herself to be coaxed to swallow the rest of the Burgundy in her glass, but even to nibble a biscuit.
Miss Farlow's state was less happy. The intelligence, conveyed to her by Jurby, who was hovering on the landing, that Miss Wychwood had a visitor with her, and did not wish to be disturbed, had aroused all her smouldering jealousy. She had told Jurby that she had had no business to introduce a visitor into Miss Wychwood's room, and was unwise enough to say: 'You should have asked leave to do so from me, or from her ladyship! Who
is this visitor?'
'One that will do her more good than you ever will, miss!' had said Jurby, goaded into retort. 'It is Mr Carleton!'
Miss Farlow had been at first incredulous, and then sincerely shocked. In her chaste mind, every man – except, of course, doctors, fathers, and brothers – figured as a potential menace to a maiden's virtue. Even had it been Lord Beckenham who was closeted with Miss Wychwood she would have felt it to be her duty to have pointed out to him the impropriety of his visiting a lady in her bedchamber, who was wearing nothing but a dressinggown over her nightdress. But Lord Beckenham – such a perfect gentleman! – would never have dreamt of compromising a lady in such a scandalous fashion. As for Annis, not only tolerating, but actually encouraging Mr Carleton i
n his nefarious conduct, she could only suppose that her poor dear cousin had taken leave of her senses. Since she (a defenceless female) had been unable to prevail upon this Brute to withdraw from Miss Wychwood's room, there was only one thing to be done, and that was to pour the whole story into Sir Geoffrey's ears the instant he returned from his walk with Lady Wychwood. With this intention, she hurried downstairs, mentally rehearsing her rôle in the forthcoming drama, and working herself up into a hysterical state. She encountered Sir Geoffrey just as he was about to enter the drawing-room.
He and Lady Wychwood had returned to the house some minutes earlier. Fortunately for Lady Wychwood, she had gone up immediately to the nursery, to assure herself that Tom had taken no harm from his first expedition, since his illness, into the garden, so she was spared the horrid news Miss Farlow was only too anxious to recount to her.
Sir Geoffrey was not so fortunate. Having regaled himself with a glass of sherry, he mounted the stairs to the first floor, and was instantly assailed by Miss Farlow, who came stumbling down the stairs, uttering in a hysterical voice: 'Cousin Geoffrey! Oh, Cousin Geoffrey! Thank God you are come!'
Sir Geoffrey eyed her with disfavour. He was unaccustomed to females who flew into distempered freaks, and he had already taken Miss Farlow in dislike. He said: 'What the deuce is the matter with you, Maria?'
'Oh, nothing, nothing – except that I have never been so shocked in my life! It is Annis! You must go up to her room immediately!'
'Eh?' said Sir Geoffrey, startled. 'Annis? Why, what's amiss with her?'
'I do not know how to tell you! If it were not my duty to do so, I could not bring myself to disclose to you what will curl your liver!' said Miss Farlow, extracting the last ounce of drama from the situation.
Sir Geoffrey was incensed. 'For God's sake, Maria, stop talking as if you were taking part in a Cheltenham tragedy, and tell me what has put you into this taking! Curl my liver indeed! With-out any more ado, answer me this! – Is there anything wrong with my sister?'
'Everything!' declared Miss Farlow, clinging to the most important rôle of her life.
'Balderdash!' said Sir Geoffrey. 'It's my belief you're getting to be queer in your attic, Maria! Never mind my liver! What has happened to my sister ?'
'That Man,' disclosed Miss Farlow, 'has been closeted with her since you and dear Lady Wychwood left the house! And he is still with her! Had I known that he had forced his way into the house, and that Jurby was so lost to all sense of her duty as to admit him into Annis's bedchamber – but no doubt he bribed her to do it! – I should have summoned James to cast him out of the house! But I was with Tom, in the garden, and I knew nothing until I came in, and was just about to pop into Annis's room, when Jurby stopped me, saying that Annis was engaged. "Engaged?" I said. "She has a visitor with her, and she don't wish to be disturbed," she said. You may depend upon it that I insisted on her telling me who had come to visit Annis without so much as a by your leave! And then Jurby told me that it was That Man!'
'What man?' demanded Sir Geoffrey.
'Mr Carleton!' said Miss Farlow, shuddering.
'Carleton? What the devil is he doing in my sister's room?'
'Carousing!' said Miss Farlow, reaching her grand climax.
It fell sadly flat. Sir Geoffrey said testily: 'I wish to God you wouldn't talk such nonsense, Maria! Next I suppose you'll tell me my sister was carousing too!'
'Alas, yes!'
'It seems to me that it's you who have been carousing!' said Sir Geoffrey severely. 'You had best go and sleep it off !'
With this he went on up the stairs to the second floor, paying no heed whatsoever to the protests, the assurances that she never touched strong liquor; or the impassioned entreaties to listen to her, which Miss Farlow addressed to him.
He entered Miss Wychwood's room without ceremony, and was confronted by the spectacle of his sister seated beside Mr Carleton on the sofa, supported by his arm, and with her head on his shoulder.
'Upon my word!' he ejaculated thunderously. 'What the devil does this mean?'
'Oh, pray don't shout!' said Miss Wychwood, straightening herself.
Mr Carleton rose. 'How do you do, Wychwood? I've been waiting for you! I imagine you must know what the devil it means, but before we go into that, I want to know what the devil you mean by planting that atrocious woman on your sister! Never in the whole of my existence have I encountered any one who talked more infernal twaddle, or who had less notion of how to look after sick persons! She burst in on us, just as I had succeeded in getting Annis to drink a glass of Burgundy – which, if I may say so, will do her far more good than barley-water! See to it that she has a glass with her dinner, will you? – and had the damned impudence to say that nothing would prevail upon her to leave the room while I remained in it! I can only assume that she thought Annis was in danger of being raped! If I hadn't threatened to throw her out, she'd be here still, upsetting Annis with all her ravings and rantings, and I-will-not permit her, or anyone else, to upset Annis!'
Sir Geoffrey disliked Mr Carleton, but he found himself so much in sympathy with him that instead of requesting him, with cold dignity, to leave the house, which he had meant to do, he said: 'I didn't plant her on Annis! All I did was to suggest to Annis that she would be a suitable person to act as her companion!'
'Suitable?' interpolated Mr Carleton scathingly.
Sir Geoffrey glared at him, but being a just man he felt himself obliged to say: 'No, of course she's not suitable, but I didn't know then that she was such an infernal gabster, and I didn't know until today that she's touched in her upper works! I shall certainly take care she don't come near Annis again – though what right you have to interfere I'm quite at a loss to understand! What's more, I'll thank you to leave me to look after my sister!'
'That,' said Mr Carleton, 'brings us back to the start of our conversation. Your sister, Wychwood, has done me the honour to accept my hand in marriage. That's what the devil this means, and it also explains the right I have to concern myself with her welfare!'
'Well, I won't have it!' said Sir Geoffrey. 'I refuse to give my consent to a marriage of which I utterly disapprove!'
'Oh, Geoffrey, don't! Pray don't get into a quarrel!' begged Miss Wychwood, pressing her hands against her throbbing temples. 'You are making my head ache again, both of you! I am very sorry to displease you, Geoffrey, but I am not a silly schoolgirl, and I haven't decided to marry Oliver on an impulse! And as for giving your consent, your consent isn't necessary! I'm not under age, I'm not your ward, and never was your ward, and there is nothing you can do to stop me marrying Oliver!'
'We'll see to that!' he said ominously. 'Let me make it plain to you –'
'No, don't try to do that!' intervened Mr Carleton. 'She's far too exhausted to talk any more! Make it plain to me instead! I suggest we go down to the book-room, and discuss the matter in private. We shall do much better without female interference, you know!'
This made Miss Wychwood lift her head from between her hands, and say indignantly: 'This has nothing to do with Geoffrey! And if you think I am going to sit meekly here while you and he –'
'Come, come!' said Mr Carleton. 'Where is your sense of decorum? Your brother, very properly, wishes to discover what my circumstances are, what settlement I mean to make on you –'
'No, I do not!' interrupted Sir Geoffrey angrily. 'Everyone knows you're swimming in lard, and settlements don't come into it, because if I have anything to say to it there will be no marriage!'
'You have nothing to say to it, Geoffrey, and no right to meddle in my affairs!'
'Oh, that's going too far!' said Mr Carleton. 'He may not have the right to meddle, but he has every right to try to dissuade you from making what he believes would be a disastrous marriage. A poor sort of brother be would be if he didn't!'
Taken aback, Sir Geoffrey blinked at him. 'Well – well, I'm glad that you at least realize that!' he said lamely.
'Well, I do not realize it!'
struck in Miss Wychwood.
'Of course you don't!' said Mr Carleton soothingly. 'In another moment you'll be saying that the marriage has nothing to do with me either, my lovely wet-goose! So we will postpone this discussion until tomorrow. Oh, no! don't look daggers at me! I never come to cuffs with females who are too knocked-up to be a match for me!'
She gave a choke of laughter. 'Oh, how detestable you are!' she sighed.
'That sounds more like you,' he approved. He bent over her, and kissed her. 'You are worn out, and must go back to bed, my sweet. Promise me you won't get up again today!'
'I doubt if I could,' she said ruefully. 'But if you and Geoffrey mean to quarrel over me –'
'It takes two to make a quarrel. I can't answer for Wychwood, but I have no intention of quarrelling, so you may be easy on that head!'
'Easy? When you spend your life quarrelling, and being dis agreeable to people for no reason at all? I am not in the least easy!'
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