Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman

by Stanley J Weyman

  ‘Sho, if you wish it, child,’ he said lightly, taking out his snuff-box. ‘And to be sure there is time enough. But between us two, sweet—’

  ‘There is nothing between us!’ she cried, impetuously snatching at the word. ‘That is what I wanted to tell you. I made a mistake when I said that there should be. I was mad; I was wicked, if you like. Do you hear me, my lord?’ she continued passionately. ‘It was a mistake. I did not know what I was doing. And, now I do understand, I take it back.’

  Lord Almeric gasped. He heard the words, but the meaning seemed incredible, inconceivable; the misfortune, if he heard aright, was too terrible; the humiliation too overwhelming! He had brought listeners — and for this! ‘Understand?’ he cried, looking at her in a confused, chap-fallen way. ‘Hang me if I do understand! You don’t mean to say — Oh, it is impossible, stuff me! it is. You don’t mean that — that you’ll not have me? After all that has come and gone, ma’am?’

  She shook her head; pitying him, blaming herself, for the plight in which she had placed him. ‘I sent for you, my lord,’ she said humbly, ‘that I might tell you at once. I could not rest until I had told you. I did what I could. And, believe me, I am very, very sorry.’

  ‘But do you mean — that you — you jilt me?’ he cried, still fighting off the dreadful truth.

  ‘Not jilt!’ she said, shivering.

  ‘That you won’t have me?’

  She nodded.

  ‘After — after saying you would?’ he wailed.

  ‘I cannot,’ she answered. Then, ‘Cannot you understand?’ she cried, her face scarlet. ‘I did not know until — until you went to kiss me.’

  ‘But — oh, I say — but you love me?’ he protested.

  ‘No, my lord,’ she said firmly. ‘No. And there, you must do me the justice to acknowledge that I never said I did.’

  He dashed his hat on the floor: he was almost weeping. ‘Oh, damme!’ he cried, ‘a woman should not — should not treat a man like this. It’s low. It’s cruel! It’s—’

  A knock on the door stopped him. Recollection of the listeners, whom he had momentarily forgotten, revived, and overwhelmed him. With an oath he sprang to shut the door, but before he could intervene Mr. Pomeroy appeared smiling on the threshold; and behind him the reluctant tutor.

  Lord Almeric swore, and Julia, affronted by the presence of strangers at such a time, drew back, frowning. But Bully Pomeroy would see nothing. ‘A thousand pardons if I intrude,’ he said, bowing this way and that, that he might hide a lurking grin. ‘But his lordship was good enough to say a while ago, that he would present us to the lady who had consented to make him happy. We little thought last night, ma’am, that so much beauty and so much goodness were reserved for one of us.’

  Lord Almeric looked ready to cry. Julia, darkly red, was certain that they had overheard; she stood glaring at the intruders, her foot tapping the floor. No one answered, and Mr. Pomeroy, after looking from one to the other in assumed surprise, pretended to hit on the reason. ‘Oh, I see; I spoil sport!’ he cried with coarse joviality. ‘Curse me if I meant to! I fear we have come mal à propos, my lord, and the sooner we are gone the better.

  ‘And though she found his usage rough,

  Yet in a man ’twas well enough!’

  he hummed, with his head on one side and an impudent leer. ‘We are interrupting the turtledoves, Mr. Thomasson, and had better be gone.’

  ‘Curse you! Why did you ever come?’ my lord cried furiously. ‘But she won’t have me. So there! Now you know.’

  Mr. Pomeroy struck an attitude of astonishment.

  ‘Won’t have you?’ he cried, ‘Oh, stap me! you are biting us.’

  ‘I’m not! And you know it!’ the poor little blood answered, tears of vexation in his eyes. ‘You know it, and you are roasting me!’

  ‘Know it?’ Mr. Pomeroy answered in tones of righteous indignation. ‘I know it? So far from knowing it, my dear lord, I cannot believe it! I understood that the lady had given you her word.’

  ‘So she did.’

  ‘Then I cannot believe that a lady would anywhere, much less under my roof, take it back. Madam, there must be some mistake here,’ Mr. Pomeroy continued warmly. ‘It is intolerable that a man of his lordship’s rank should be so treated. I’m forsworn if he has not mistaken you.’

  ‘He does not mistake me now,’ she answered, trembling and blushing painfully. ‘What error there was I have explained to him.’

  ‘But, damme—’

  ‘Sir!’ she said with awakening spirit, her eyes sparkling. ‘What has happened is between his lordship and myself. Interference on the part of any one else is an intrusion, and I shall treat it as such. His lordship understood—’

  ‘Curse me! He does not look as if he understood,’ Mr. Pomeroy cried, allowing his native coarseness to peep through. ‘Sink me, ma’am, there is a limit to prudishness. Fine words butter no parsnips. You plighted your troth to my guest, and I’ll not see him thrown over i’ this fashion. These airs and graces are out of place. I suppose a man has some rights under his own roof, and when his guest is jilted before his eyes’ — here Mr. Pomeroy frowned like Jove— ‘it is well you should know, ma’am, that a woman no more than a man can play fast and loose at pleasure.’

  She looked at him with disdain. ‘Then the sooner I leave your roof the better, sir,’ she said.

  ‘Not so fast there, either,’ he answered with an unpleasant smile. ‘You came to it when you chose, and you will leave it when we choose; and that is flat, my girl. This morning, when my lord did you the honour to ask you, you gave him your word. Perhaps to-morrow morning you’ll be of the same mind again. Any way, you will wait until to-morrow and see.’

  ‘I shall not wait on your pleasure,’ she cried, stung to rage.

  ‘You will wait on it, ma’am! Or ‘twill be the worse for you.’

  Burning with indignation she turned to the other two, her breath coming quick. But Mr. Thomasson gazed gloomily at the floor, and would not meet her eyes; and Lord Almeric, who had thrown himself into a chair, was glowering sulkily at his shoes. ‘Do you mean,’ she cried, ‘that you will dare to detain me, sir?’

  ‘If you put it so,’ Pomeroy answered, grinning, ‘I think I dare take it on myself.’

  His voice full of mockery, his insolent eyes, stung her to the quick. ‘I will see if that be so,’ she cried, fearlessly advancing on him. ‘Lay a finger on me if you dare! I am going out. Make way, sir.’

  ‘You are not going out!’ he cried between his teeth. And held his ground in front of her.

  She advanced until she was within touch of him, then her courage failed her; they stood a second or two gazing at one another, the girl with heaving breast and cheeks burning with indignation, the man with cynical watchfulness. Suddenly, shrinking from actual contact with him, she sprang aside, and was at the door before he could intercept her. But with a rapid movement he turned on his heel, seized her round the waist before she could open the door, dragged her shrieking from it, and with an oath — and not without an effort — flung her panting and breathless into the window-seat. ‘There!’ he cried ferociously, his blood fired by the struggle; ‘lie there! And behave yourself, my lady, or I’ll find means to quiet you. For you,’ he continued, turning fiercely on the tutor, whose face the sudden scuffle and the girl’s screams had blanched to the hue of paper, ‘did you never hear a woman squeak before? And you, my lord? Are you so dainty? But, to be sure, ’tis your lordship’s mistress,’ he continued ironically. ‘Your pardon. I forgot that. I should not have handled her so roughly. However, she is none the worse, and ‘twill bring her to reason.’

  But the struggle and the girl’s cries had shaken my lord’s nerves. ‘D — n you!’ he cried hysterically, and with a stamp of the foot, ‘you should not have done that.’

  ‘Pooh, pooh,’ Mr. Pomeroy answered lightly. ‘Do you leave it to me, my lord. She does not know her own mind. ‘Twill help her to find it. And now, if you’ll take my advice,
you’ll leave her to a night’s reflection.’

  But Lord Almeric only repeated, ‘You should not have done that.’

  Mr. Pomeroy’s face showed his scorn for the man whom a cry or two and a struggling woman had frightened. Yet he affected to see art in it. ‘I understand. And it is the right line to take,’ he said; and he laughed unpleasantly. ‘No doubt it will be put to your lordship’s credit. But now, my lord,’ he continued, ‘let us go. You will see she will have come to her senses by to-morrow.’

  The girl had remained passive since her defeat. But at this she rose from the window-seat where she had crouched, slaying them with furious glances. ‘My lord,’ she cried passionately, ‘if you are a man, if you are a gentleman — you’ll not suffer this.’

  But Lord Almeric, who had recovered from his temporary panic, and was as angry with her as with Pomeroy, shrugged his shoulders. ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ he said resentfully. ‘It has naught to do with me, ma’am. I don’t want you kept, but you have behaved uncommon low to me; uncommon low. And ‘twill do you good to think on it. Stap me, it will!’

  And he turned on his heel and sneaked out.

  Mr. Pomeroy laughed insolently. ‘There is still Tommy,’ he said. ‘Try him. See what he’ll say to you. It amuses me to hear you plead, my dear; you put so much spirit into it. As my lord said, before we came in, ’tis as good as a play.’

  She flung him a look of scorn, but did not answer. For Mr. Thomasson, he shuffled his feet uncomfortably. ‘There are no horses,’ he faltered, cursing his indiscreet companion. ‘Mr. Pomeroy means well, I know. And as there are no horses, even if nothing prevented you, you could not go to-night, you see.’

  Mr. Pomeroy burst into a shout of laughter and clapped the stammering tutor (fallen miserably between two stools) on the back. ‘There’s a champion for you!’ he cried. ‘Beauty in distress! Lord! how it fires his blood and turns his look to flame! What! going, Tommy?’ he continued, as Mr. Thomasson, unable to bear his raillery or the girl’s fiery scorn, turned and fled ignobly. ‘Well, my pretty dear, I see we are to be left alone. And, damme! quite right too, for we are the only man and the only woman of the party, and should come to an understanding.’

  Julia looked at him with shuddering abhorrence. They were alone; the sound of the tutor’s retreating footsteps was growing faint. She pointed to the door. ‘If you do not go,’ she cried, her voice shaking with rage, ‘I will rouse the house! I will call your people! Do you hear me? I will so cry to your servants that you shall not for shame dare to keep me! I will break this window and cry for help?’

  ‘And what do you think I should be doing meanwhile?’ he retorted with an ugly leer. ‘I thought I had shown you that two could play at that game. But there, child, I like your spirit! I love you for it! You are a girl after my own heart, and, damme! we’ll live to laugh at those two old women yet!’

  She shrank farther from him with an expression of loathing. He saw the look, and scowled, but for the moment he kept his temper. ‘Fie! the Little Masterson playing the grand lady!’ he said. ‘But there, you are too handsome to be crossed, my dear. You shall have your own way to-night, and I’ll come and talk to you to-morrow, when your head is cooler and those two fools are out of the way. And if we quarrel then, my beauty, we can but kiss and make it up. Look on me as your friend,’ he added, with a leer from which she shrank, ‘and I vow you’ll not repent it.’

  She did not answer, she only pointed to the door, and finding that he could draw nothing from her, he went at last. On the threshold he turned, met her eyes with a grin of meaning, and took the key from the inside of the lock. She heard him insert it on the outside, and turn it, and had to grip one hand with the other to stay the scream that arose in her throat. She was brave beyond most women; but the ease with which he had mastered her, the humiliation of contact with him, the conviction of her helplessness in his grasp lay on her still. They filled her with fear; which grew more definite as the light, already low in the corners of the room, began to fail, and the shadows thickened about the dingy furniture, and she crouched alone against the barred window, listening for the first tread of a coming foot — and dreading the night.

  CHAPTER XXIX

  MR. POMEROY’S PLAN

  Mr. Pomeroy chuckled as he went down the stairs. Things had gone so well for him, he owed it to himself to see that they went better, he had mounted with a firm determination to effect a breach even if it cost him my lord’s enmity. He descended, the breach made, the prize open to competition, and my lord obliged by friendly offices and unselfish service.

  Mr. Pomeroy smiled. ‘She is a saucy baggage,’ he muttered, ‘but I’ve tamed worse. ’Tis the first step is hard, and I have taken that. Now to deal with Mother Olney. If she were not such a fool, or if I could be rid of her and Jarvey, and put in the Tamplins, all’s done. But she’d talk! The kitchen wench need know nothing; for visitors, there are none in this damp old hole. Win over Mother Olney and the Parson — and I don’t see where I can fail. The wench is here, safe and tight, and bread and water, damp and loneliness will do a great deal. She don’t deserve better treatment, hang her impudence!’

  But when he appeared in the hall an hour later, his gloomy face told a different story. ‘Where’s Doyley?’ he growled; and stumbled over a dog, kicked it howling into a corner. ‘Has he gone to bed?’

  The tutor, brooding sulkily over his wine, looked up. ‘Yes,’ he said, as rudely as he dared — he was sick with disappointment. ‘He is going in the morning.’

  ‘And a good riddance!’ Pomeroy cried with an oath. ‘He’s off it, is he? He gives up?’

  The tutor nodded gloomily. ‘His lordship is not the man,’ he said, with an attempt at his former manner, ‘to — to—’

  ‘To win the odd trick unless he holds six trumps,’ Mr. Pomeroy cried. ‘No, by God! he is not. You are right, Parson. But so much the better for you and me!’

  Mr. Thomasson sniffed. ‘I don’t follow you,’ he said stiffly.

  ‘Don’t you? You weren’t so dull years ago,’ Mr. Pomeroy answered, filling a glass as he stood. He held it in his hand and looked over it at the other, who, ill at ease, fidgeted in his chair, ‘You could put two and two together then, Parson, and you can put five and five together now. They make ten — thousand.’

  ‘I don’t follow you,’ the tutor repeated, steadfastly looking away from him.

  ‘Why? Nothing is changed since we talked — except that he is out of it! And that that is done for me for nothing, which I offered you five thousand to do. But I am generous, Tommy. I am generous.’

  ‘The next chance is mine,’ Mr. Thomasson cried, with a glance of spite.

  Mr. Pomeroy, looking down at him, laughed — a galling laugh. ‘Lord! Tommy, that was a hundred years ago,’ he said contemptuously.

  ‘You said nothing was changed!’

  ‘Nothing is changed in my case,’ Mr. Pomeroy answered confidently, ‘except for the better. In your case everything is changed — for the worse. Did you take her part upstairs? Are your hands clean now? Does she see through you or does she not? Or, put it in another way, my friend. It is your turn; what are you going to do?’

  ‘Go,’ the tutor answered viciously. ‘And glad to be quit.’

  Mr. Pomeroy sat down opposite him. ‘No, you’ll not go,’ he said in a low voice; and drinking off half his wine, set down the glass and regarded the other over it. ‘Five and five are ten, Tommy. You are no fool, and I am no fool.’

  ‘I am not such a fool as to put my neck in a noose,’ the tutor retorted. ‘And there is no other way of coming at what you want, Mr. Pomeroy.’

  ‘There are twenty,’ Pomeroy returned coolly. ‘And, mark you, if I fail, you are spun, whether you help rue or no. You are blown on, or I can blow on you! You’ll get nothing for your cut on the head.’

  ‘And what shall I get if I stay?’

  ‘I have told you.’

  ‘The gallows.’

  ‘No, Tommy. Eight hundred a year.�
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  Mr. Thomasson sneered incredulously, and having made it plain that he refused to think — thought! He had risked so much in this enterprise, gone through so much; and to lose it all! He cursed the girl’s fickleness, her coyness, her obstinacy! He hated her. And do what he might for her now, he doubted if he could cozen her or get much from her. Yet in that lay his only chance, apart from Mr. Pomeroy. His eye was cunning and his tone sly when he spoke.

  ‘You forget one thing,’ he said. ‘I have only to open my lips after I leave.’

  ‘And I am nicked?’ Mr. Pomeroy answered. ‘True. And you will get a hundred guineas, and have a worse than Dunborough at your heels.’

  The tutor wiped his brow. ‘What do you want?’ he whispered.

  ‘That old hag of a housekeeper has turned rusty,’ Pomeroy answered. ‘She has got it into her head something is going to be done to the girl. I sounded her and I cannot trust her. I could send her packing, but Jarvey is not much better, and talks when he is drunk. The girl must be got from here.’

  Mr. Thomasson raised his eyebrows scornfully.

  ‘You need not sneer, you fool!’ Pomeroy cried with a little spirt of rage.’ ’Tis no harder than to get her here.’

  ‘Where will you take her?’

  ‘To Tamplin’s farm by the river. There, you are no wiser, but you may trust me. I can hang the man, and the woman is no better. They have done this sort of thing before. Once get her there, and, sink me! she’ll be glad to see the parson!’

  The tutor shuddered. The water was growing very deep. ‘I’ll have no part in it!’ he said hoarsely. ‘No part in it, so help me God!’

  ‘There’s no part for you!’ Mr. Pomeroy answered with grim patience. ‘Your part is to thwart me.’

  Mr. Thomasson, half risen from his chair, sat down again. ‘What do you mean?’ he muttered.

  ‘You are her friend. Your part is to help her to escape. You’re to sneak to her room to-morrow, and tell her that you’ll steal the key when I’m drunk after dinner. You’ll bid her be ready at eleven, and you’ll let her out, and have a chaise waiting at the end of the avenue. The chaise will be there, you’ll put her in, you’ll go back to the house. I suppose you see it now?’