The Autumn Rose

by Fiona Hill

  “If Mockabee were a bit more well heeled, I should say you ought to forget it; but I have heard that he has suffered some losses recently—his holdings in the West Indies, or some such—and I suppose he may need the cash.” Her ladyship paused to think, wrinkling her broad brow with the effort. “I would tell you to play at brag with him again and make sure he wins it back, but I doubt if Romby and the others would cooperate. Who has the money, anyhow?”

  “Do you mean, who actually holds it?”

  “Just so.”

  “Lord Romby. He insisted upon it.”

  Lady Beatrice smiled oddly and made a clicking sound with her tongue. “Told you you would lose it no doubt, eh?”

  “Yes, exactly.” Caroline’s large green eyes surveyed her companion anxiously. “Was I foolish?” she asked finally.

  “Rather. I am afraid you may be obliged to pay the five hundred pounds out of your own pocket.”

  “Surely his lordship would not take advantage—”

  “Oh, nonsense; no such thing is sure with Romby. Quite the contrary in fact! Why do you suppose Seabury was obliged to allowance him?”

  “Was he obliged to?” she asked, with a sinking sensation.

  “Why of course, my dear,” said the other, in a matter-of-fact tone. “You do not suppose he would have done so capriciously, I hope! My nephew never does anything capriciously.”

  “Then you—” she faltered, “you approved of Lord Seabury’s actions?”

  “Absolutely,” said Beatrice at once. “I only wish he had done so sooner; as it is it will take five or six more years to unravel the tangle my brother made of his fortune. You never saw such a pile of notes of hand! He had scarcely a shilling in ready money, and was drawing against the most indispensable securities…I myself was frequently in the habit, before Seabury took over, of blessing the gods for allowing me to keep my money separate from Romby’s. As it was he borrowed a considerable sum from me; never paid it back, naturally.”

  Caroline’s mind had flown back to the first tête-à-tête she had had with Lord Romby—ages ago, it seemed. What a different colour his complaints took on, in the light of this information! Caro began to feel, not very pleasantly, that she had done nothing since her arrival in London save make mistakes. She had leapt from conclusion to conclusion as easily as a frog hopping lily pads, and embraced each wrong-headed point of view with increasing vigour. This inward volley of strictures was interrupted by Lady Beatrice, who had been struck by a new thought.

  “My dear girl, I should not be the least bit astonished to learn that Romby has been playing you for a fool all along! Indeed, the more I consider it, the more I am convinced he was. He never meant to give a penny of the money back, not to Mockabee and not to you! It is spent already, I can feel it in my bones. Oh what a scoundrel!”

  “Dear ma’am, can this indeed be true?”

  “We have only to ask him to be certain, but I would wager any amount that it is.” Lady Beatrice was at first too absorbed in her realization to feel anything about it, but after a moment she started to laugh, ending up in just such a tearful roar as she had displayed earlier in the interview. “I am sorry, my dear, for I know you will be the one to pay in the end,” she gasped out between whoops, “but the thought of his impudence makes me laugh; I cannot pretend otherwise.”

  “Frankly, my lady, I am just as pleased to be obliged to pay the money myself. It is the penance I was looking for,” Caro said, even as, in the back of her mind, a scheme to avenge herself on Romby was brewing. With a start she recognized this for the very sort of high-spirited error that had brought her so much trouble already. She forced her mind to drop the notion, therefore, and returned to the question of how she ought to restore Mockabee’s money to him.

  “Well you might simply leave it where he will find it,” the marchioness said, when again applied to. “It is a trifle crude, I admit, but it will answer.”

  “I had thought of losing a wager to him—laying a monkey on something occurring that I knew very well would not.”

  Beatrice considered this. “Sticky,” she concluded aloud. “Too sticky. The less to-do the better: that is my advice. Wrap it up and send it to him in the post.”

  “In a blank cover?”

  Lady Beatrice nodded.

  “Perhaps I might write, ‘From a friend.’”

  “It would be neither true nor illuminating.”

  Caroline thought again. “But if I write nothing, what will he think?”

  “It hardly matters, dear girl,” Lady Beatrice replied, smiling. “I promise you he will keep and use it; possibly it will even make a religious man of him, if he can find no explanation.”

  Caro was not deeply satisfied with this plan, but as she could propose no other she assented to it. She still felt uncomfortably guilty about it when, having obtained on Monday morning the needed sum in cash, she directed the packet to Lord Mockabee. It seemed cowardly to her, even if it was wisest. Her guilt and all traces of remorse were effectively removed, however, for better or for worse, by a poem in The Times on Tuesday. Indeed, the opening of that newspaper had, for Lady Caroline Wythe, nearly as many consequences as the opening of Pandora’s box itself.

  Chapter VII

  It was Amy Meredith, in the event, who first set eyes on the extraordinary poem that fateful Tuesday morning. She sat at the breakfast table, flanked by Mrs. Henry and Miss Windle, and opposite to her cousin. Lady Caroline was at the end of the table, for it had become her habit to do the honours of the tea-tray at Rucke House each morning, and also in the drawing-room at night. Lord Romby’s place lay undisturbed amid the clutter of cups half-full of tepid tea, dishes smeared with butter and dusted with crumbs, and salvers still laden with superfluous delicacies. Though it was not uncommon for the earl to breakfast in bed, the cause of his absence this particular morning was that Caroline’s informing him of her withdrawal from the brag scheme had sent him into a passion, and he had been awake all night drinking and swearing and abusing the servants. Lady Beatrice had been quite correct, as Caro discovered during her colloquy with Romby: the old man had already lost the money entrusted to him by wagering the whole sum on the wrong side of a cock-fight. It consoled Caro a good deal to think of this betrayal, since it justified her abandonment of the proposed revenge on Mockabee. She was sorry, though, for the servants.

  Seabury, who of course knew nothing of all this, had pushed his chair back from the table and sat frowning over a letter just delivered to him. In spite of his evident absorption in this document, it was chiefly to her cousin that Amy addressed herself when she said mildly over the open Times, “What a curious poem!”

  Seabury answered nothing at first, but soon looked up for courtesy’s sake and asked her to repeat herself. “I say, what a curious poem in The Times! Listen to it,” she added, and she read aloud:

  First of all the chariot she drives in t’other Park;

  Next the naught she cares for airs, sith candour is her mark.

  Last of first, the ancestry, quite clear of any taint:

  Where birth is high, behaviour low admits of no complaint.

  We may remark, ere we proceed, that last may be suppressed;

  Not so the girl, nor yet the hue in which she still is dressed.

  First of last, the question on the tongues of great and small;

  Last of last, sith commonest, is like her most of all.

  “It’s got Lord M. below it. I suppose a Lord M. wrote it,” Amy went on when she had finished reading. “How awfully strange!”

  “Actually, my dear,” Seabury told her kindly, “such poems are very commonly printed in London newspapers. It is a riddle, you see: each line refers to part of a name, and the whole is the subject of the verse. Have you never seen one before?”

  “Indeed I have,” Amy cried, stung at being supposed ignorant. “It is not the form which intrigues me, but the matter. It sounds just like Caroline!”

  The lady mentioned, who had come to this same conclusi
on some time before, was seen by all the eyes now turned upon her to be excessively rosy-cheeked. In fact, the flush was visible all over her face, and even on her neck; but she only said, “What a silly notion, dear Amy; how could it be?”

  “Well it certainly is,” Amy averred, setting about to prove her surmise. “Look—a chariot. He must mean car, an ancient chariot. The Romans had them,” she appended, for Caroline did not look convinced. “Anyhow, who else wears only one colour—‘the hue in which she still is dressed?’”

  “The Green Man,” Caro said rather weakly.

  “I never saw such a stubborn girl!” exclaimed Miss Meredith. “What do you make of the next line, then? A naught is an O. That makes Car-O. That is you, Caro.” She paused to stare rather spitefully at her ladyship.

  “There are other Carolines in London,” Caroline pointed out, with scarcely even a semblance of conviction.

  “Oh faugh,” Amy ejaculated, full of disgust. “If I must I shall go through it completely. Last of first is the last of the first name, the Christian name that is. Surely it signifies line. Line is another word for ancestry. Besides which, it goes on to say that the ‘line’ may be suppressed. That means that one may say Caro instead of Caroline.”

  “Many,” Miss Windle murmured suddenly, though very faintly, “many many Carolines in London.”

  “Oh, dear, this is most vexatious. You are doing this on purpose, are you not? Both of you, I am persuaded you are! Seabury, you see it must be Caro, do you not? Who else is frank and drives in the Green Park? That is the other one, of course, since everybody in the world drives in Hyde Park, except Caro.”

  Lord Seabury not answering, save by a long, interrogative look at Lady Caroline, Amy Meredith continued her argument alone. “Here is the second name, the surname. The question must be why; you see that, I hope. Why does she wear rose all the time, and drive in the Green Park? You see? And the last line, the last of the last name, is—what is it?” she checked herself all at once, a little puzzled.

  “I hardly think it matters,” Windle announced in a loud voice, “since it is beyond imagining that our Caro could be named in a poem in a public newspaper. Absolutely beyond imag—” she was repeating when Amy abruptly shouted out.

  “Oh! It is the! The last word is the! Caroline Wythe, there you have it,” she said triumphantly. “Now I wonder who Lord M. can be.”

  Mrs. Henry was distinctly heard to murmur, “I do not,” at this juncture, but no one paid her any attention.

  “I am sure I have no notion how you arrive at your conclusion,” Miss Windle fairly shrieked. “I am sure you are very rash, Miss Meredith. There must be an hundred solutions to the puzzle. For example, chariot might be coach, or wagon. Then naught—that is nothing, or…or nil! There, you see? Wagonilla! The last is A, not The. Wagonilla must be her name; now let me see, that sounds so very familiar!”

  “Miss Windle, I appreciate your loyalty—” Caro began to say, but Windle cut her off.

  “Now as to the question on the tongues of great and small, that is just as easily read as How. Probably her name is Howe, Wagonilla Howe,” she persisted. “A shocking girl, Wagonilla Howe; I remember her very clearly. No wonder her name appears in such a context!”

  This time it was Amy Meredith who prevented Miss Windle’s continuing. “Lord Mockabee!” she exclaimed suddenly. “Caro, is it Lord Mockabee?”

  But Caroline could no longer sit still. She jumped up from the table and began stalking the length of the breakfast-room, too furious to take any heed of Amy or the others, muttering all the while in an edgy undertone. “The dolt! The scoundrel! How dare he, after all—” She stopped, came to the end of the room, turned on her heel and continued, “He could not even make proper verses. The idea of such long dangling things! All different sizes too; most impossible, most ridiculous…Well I will not sit still for it, I will not, I will not! Do you hear me?” she demanded savagely of the firescreen.

  “The child is not in her right mind,” Miss Windle said desperately. “She responds dreadfully to heat; it is the heat which agitates her. Really, my lord, you ought to send her back to Hampstead, the poor girl!” With these words she rushed over to Caroline and attempted to lend her an arm to lean on. Since Caroline was travelling up and down the room at breakneck speed however, Miss Windle found herself unable not only to assist her, but even to keep up with her.

  “Lady Caroline, I should very much appreciate the honour of a word with you this morning,” Lord Seabury said, his letter now quite forgot. “Perhaps in the Gilt Saloon?”

  Caro gave a sharp nod of assent. Even as she did so, Miss Meredith cried out vehemently, “What have you done to Lord Mockabee? You monster! Can you not let him be? He is my friend, mine! Henry, support me; I feel I shall faint,” she added in the dramatical manner she assumed whenever she fancied herself wronged.

  “Amy, this is not becoming behaviour,” Lord Seabury said, quietly and firmly. In the same breath he dismissed the servants from the room.

  “You side with Caro all the time,” Amy accused him. “I am your cousin; she is nothing to us! Why do you persecute me?” she demanded, more hysterical every moment. Mrs. Henry did nothing all this while but encourage her by looking anxious and standing back, as if to leave more space for the tantrum.

  “Amy, I beg you will sit down [for she had jumped up the better to stamp her foot] and make yourself tranquil,” said the helpless viscount, pinched uncomfortably between his duty as a gentleman and his chosen role as Amy’s guardian.

  “Why do you not beg Caro to sit down?” she shrilled. “Why do you torture me? You are in love with her!” she brought out suddenly, quite in a scream. “Admit it, admit it! I shall tell Lady Susan about this, see if I do not!”

  Seabury, who had also risen to his feet, sank back into his chair without a word.

  “Amy, sit down or I shall strangle you,” Caroline finally told her, having first come sufficiently near to do so. Caro’s tone was so fierce, though carefully controlled, that Miss Meredith obeyed her at once, meekly falling into silence as well. Through all this Miss Windle had stood by the door watching closely but poised as if for flight; indeed, she had been planning to summon Lord Romby if nothing else availed. Lord Romby, she had persuaded herself, was omnipotent. Mrs. Henry had shrunk back into a corner; she came forward only as Amy seated herself, full of solicitude and offers of hartshorn. Disgusted though she was with Miss Meredith’s ridiculous display of temper, Lady Caroline could not help reflecting that it was hardly the girl’s fault that she was still so childish. She had been hideously spoiled, it seemed, accustomed always to be felt sorry for, cosseted and petted. Mrs. Henry, solid and dignified as she appeared, Lady Caroline now perceived to be actually frightened of her charge. The whole business was pitiful, Caroline thought; however, it was a more comfortable subject to reflect upon than the one which really concerned her: Amy Meredith had just screamed that Seabury was in love with Caro, and Seabury had said nothing in answer. In fact, save for Henry’s murmurs to Amy (now weeping copiously), the breakfast-parlour was silent as a tomb.

  The meeting in the Gilt Saloon that Seabury had applied for took place in due course after Amy, still shaken by her own fit, had been returned to bed to rest. Lord Seabury was excruciatingly conscious of her last words in the breakfast-parlour, nor was Lady Caroline less so. Neither, as might have been expected, said a word about it however; they merely allowed it to hang very awkwardly over them, and colour all their words to one another. “I am desolate,” were Caro’s first words to the viscount, “to find that despite your warning to me, and my assurances to you, and my real and honest efforts to avert this calamity—I hope you will believe me—that despite all that I have made my name, and therefore yours, an object of ridicule and censure by the public.” His lordship fancied he saw tears in her eyes, or something very much like them, as she continued, “I can only beg you to forgive me, and accept a truly abject apology—” here her voice broke, and she swallowed hard, “from a
person who was too foolish to see the value of your cautions from the first, and take them to heart then. If you think I ought to leave London I shall abide by your decision willingly.”

  “Good Heavens, no!” he exclaimed at once, with an absence of deliberation not at all like him. “I am certain you have done nothing to merit such an attack as this poem—I am certain you could not,” he went on, while Caroline fairly squirmed at the thought, impossible to mention, of how easily indeed she had been able to earn it, “and I pray you will not suppose I asked you to meet me here in order to exact an apology from you. On the contrary, I should like quite simply to hear what you know of the poem, and its origins, so that I may consider what ought to be done. It was written by Mockabee, was it not? There can be no other Lord M?”

  “I am sure it was he,” she answered, too full of tears—from gratitude now at his last speech—to say more.

  “Well, you told me your interview with him in Hampstead had not succeeded,” Seabury returned, turning his eyes away from her face with instinctive gallantry, since she could not, momentarily, prevent her features from expressing the grateful, tearful sensations she experienced, “but I had no idea it went off this poorly.”

  “I had no idea of it myself, my lord,” she returned, still struggling against her unruly emotions. “Indeed, I considered it was I who was insulted during that encounter; I am astonished to find the baron retaliating, since I considered myself the loser already.”

  This interested his lordship very much. “How did he insult you, dear ma’am? I may remind you that it is not mere curiosity that provokes the question, but also my obligation to you as a guest in my house. Therefore I beg you will answer me fully.”

  Caroline felt remarkably foolish and regretted her rash mention of an insult. “Since you ask…” she faltered; “since I think of it, I suppose there was no insult to me after all. I merely—I referred to the fact that Lord Mockabee did not chuse to honour my request. That is all.”