“I am sorry,” she muttered.
“There is no need, child,” he answered. “And while we are on this, I may as well deal with another matter. I found your note and the jewel case on my table, and as you wish, so it shall be. I might prefer — indeed, I should prefer,” he continued prosaically, “to see my wife properly equipped when she goes into the world. But that’s a small matter. Lady Coke will always be Lady Coke, and if you will feel more free and more happy without them — —”
“I shall,” she muttered hurriedly, “if you please.”
“So be it. They shall be returned to my goldsmith’s as soon as a safe conveyance can be found. I wish, my dear,” he added good-naturedly, “I could rid you of all troubles as easily.”
“I am much obliged to you,” she muttered, and could have shrunk into the floor with shame. For on a sudden she saw herself a horrid creature, imposing all, taking nothing, casting all the burden and all the stress, and all the inconvenience of their strange relations on him. In town and on the road she had fancied that there was something fine, something of the nature of abnegation and dignity in the return of the jewels, and in her determination that she would not go decked in them. But the simplicity with which he had accepted her whim and waived his own wishes, tore away the veil of self-deception, and showed Sophia the childishness of her conduct. She would not wear his jewels; but his name and his title, his freedom and his home she had not scrupled to take from him with scarce a word of gratitude, with scarce one thought for him!
The very distress she was feeling gave her, she knew, a sullen air, and must set her in a worse light than ever. Yet she was tongue-tied. He yielded freely, handsomely, generously; and that bare, that cold “I am much obliged to you” was all she could force her tongue to utter. She was beginning to feel that she was growing afraid of him; and then he spoke.
“There is one other matter,” he said, “I wish to name. It touches Mrs. Stokes. She has been here a number of years, and I dare say like this room, smacks a little of good Queen Anne. If you think it necessary to discharge her — —”
Sophia started.
“I?” she said.
“WHY, BETTY,” SOPHIA CRIED IN ASTONISHMENT,
“WHAT IS IT?”
“To be sure. I should at the worse pension her. But she has served us faithfully, I believe — beginning, I think,” Sir Hervey continued with a slight touch of constraint, “by whipping me when I needed it; and she would be distressed, I fear, if she had to go. If you could contrive to do with her for a while, therefore, I should be much obliged to you.”
Sophia had risen and moved a little way from him.
“Did you think I should discharge her?” she said, without turning her head.
“Well,” he answered, “I did not know, my dear. Young housekeepers — —”
“Why did you think I should discharge her?” she cried, interrupting him sharply; and then, “Pray forgive me,” she continued hurriedly, yet stiffly, “I — you hurt me a little in what you said of — the tenants. I only ask you to believe that I am as incapable of dismissing an old servant for a trifle as you are of behaving unjustly to your tenants!”
He did not appear to notice her emotion.
“Thank you,” he said. “Then we understand one another. Of course, I don’t wish you to feel this an obligation. Mrs. Stokes is growing old — —”
“It is no obligation,” she said coldly. And then, “I think it will be more pleasant on the terrace,” she continued; and she moved towards the door.
He held it open that she might pass through; and he followed her into the hall. He little dreamt that, as she walked before him, she was wondering, almost with terror, whether he would go out with her or leave her; whether this was all she was to see of him, day by day. The doubt was not solved; for they were interrupted. As they entered the shady hall by one door Lady Betty darted into it from the terrace, her face scarlet, her hat crushed, her eyes sparkling with rage. They were so near her she could not escape them; nor could she hide her disorder. “Why, Betty,” Sophia cried in astonishment, “what is it? What in the world is the matter?”
“Don’t ask me,” Betty cried, almost weeping. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself. You — your brother has insulted me! He has held me and kissed me against my will! And he laughed at me! He laughed at me! Oh, I could kill him!”
CHAPTER XXIV
WHO PLAYS, PAYS
It must be confessed that the flicker of skirts with which Lady Betty ran down the steps when she started for her airing, still more a certain toss of the head that was its perfect complement, gave her mischievous soul huge delight; for she had watched a French maid, and knew them to be pure nature, and the very quintessence of the singing chambermaid’s art. It was not impossible that as she executed them she had a person in her eye and meant him to profit by them; for by-and-by she repeated the performance at a point where two paths diverged, and where it put the fitting close to a very pretty pause of indecision. Tom was so hard on her heels that ordinary ears must have detected his tread; but that my lady heard nothing was proved by the fact that she chose the more retired track and tripped along it, humming and darting from flower to flower like some dainty insect let loose among the bracken.
She plucked at will, and buried her shapely little nose in the blossoms; she went on, she stopped, she went on again, and Tom let her go; until the path, after winding round a low spreading oak that closed the view from the house, began to descend into a sunny dell where it ran, a green ribbon of sward, through waist-high fern, leapt the brook by a single plank, and scaled the steeper side by tiny zig-zags.
On the hither side of this summer hollow, sleepy with the warm hum of bees and scent of thyme, Tom overtook her, and never sure was any one so surprised and overwhelmed as this poor maid.
“La, sir, I declare you frightened my heart into my mouth,” she cried, pressing a white hand to her bodice and looking timidly at him from the shelter of her straw hat. “I’m sure I beg your pardon, sir,” with a curtsey. “I would not have come here, if I’d known, for the world.”
“No, child?”
“No, sir, indeed I would not!”
“And why not?” Tom asked pertinently. “Why should you not come here?”
“Why?” she retorted, properly scandalised. “What! Come where the family walk? I should hope I know my place better than that, sir. And to behave myself in it.”
“Very prettily, I am sure,” Tom declared, with a bold stare of admiration.
“As becomes me, sir, I hope,” Betty answered demurely, and to show that the stare had no effect upon her, primly turned her head away.
“Though you were brought up with your mistress? Or was it with your late mistress?” Tom asked slily. “Or have you forgotten which it was, Betty?”
“I hope I’ve never forgotten any one who was kind to me,” she whispered, her head drooping so that he could not see her face. “There’s not many think of a poor girl in service; though I come of some that ha’ seen better days.”
“Indeed, Betty. Is that so?”
“So I’ve heard, sir.”
“Well, will you count me among your friends, Betty?”
“La, no, sir!” with vivacity, and she shot him with an arch glance. “I should think not indeed! I should like to know why, sir?” and she tossed her head disdainfully. “But there, I’ve talked too long. I’m sure her ladyship would not like it, and asking your pardon, sir, I’ll go on.”
“But I’m coming your way.”
“No, sir.”
“But I am,” Tom persisted. “Why shouldn’t I? You are not afraid of me, child? You were not afraid of me in the dark on the hill, when we sat on the tree together, and you wore my coat.”
Betty sighed. “’Twas different then, sir,” she murmured, hanging her head, and tracing a pattern on the sward with the point of her toe.
“Why?”
“I’d no choice, sir.”
“Then you would choose
to leave me, would you?”
“And I didn’t know that you belonged to the family,” she continued, evading the question, “or I should not have made so free, sir. And besides, asking your pardon, you told me that you had seen enough of women to last you your life, sir. You know you did.”
“Oh, d —— n!” Tom cried. The reminder was not welcome.
Betty recoiled virtuously. “There, sir,” she cried, “now I know what you think of me! If I were a lady, you’d not have said that to me, I’ll be bound. Swearing, indeed? For shame, sir! But I’m for home, and none too soon!”
“No, no!” Tom cried. “Don’t be silly!”
“It’s yes, yes, sir, by your leave,” she retorted. “I’m none such a fool as you’d make me. That shows me what you think of me.”
And turning with an offended air, she began to retrace her steps. Tom called to her, but fruitlessly. She did not answer nor pause. He had to follow her, feeling small and smaller. A little farther, and they would be again within sight of the house.
The track was narrow, the fern on each side grew waist high; he could not intercept her without actual violence. At length, “See here, child,” he said humbly, “if you’ll turn and chat a bit, I’ll persuade you it was not meant. I’ll treat you every bit as if you were a lady. I swear I will!”
“I don’t know,” she cried. “I don’t know that I can trust you.” But she went more slowly.
“‘Pon honour I will,” he protested. “I swear I will!”
She stopped at that, and turned to him. “You will?” she said doubtfully. “You really will? Then will you please — —” with a charming shyness, “pick me a nosegay to put in my tucker, as my lady’s beaux used to do? I should like to feel like a lady for once,” she continued eagerly. “’Twould be such a frolic as you gentlefolk have, sir, when you pretend to be poor milk-maids and make syllabub, and will not have a bandbox or a hoop-petticoat near you!”
“Your ladyship shall have a nosegay,” Tom answered gaily. “But I must first see the colour of your eyes that I may match them.”
She clapped her hands in a rapture. “Oh, how you act, to be sure!” she cried. “’Tis too charming. And for my eyes, sir, it’s no more than matching wools.” And she looked at him shyly, dropping a curtsey the while.
“Oh, isn’t it?” he retorted. “Matching wools indeed. Wool does not change, nor shift its hues. Nor glance, nor sparkle, nor ripple like water running now on the deeps, now on the shallows. Nor mirror the clouds, nor dance like wheat in the sunshine. Nor melt like summer,” he continued rapidly, “nor freeze like the Arctic. Nor say a thousand things in a thousand seconds.”
“La! And do my eyes do all that?” Betty cried, opening them very wide in her innocent astonishment. “What a thing it is, to be sure, to be a lady. I declare, sir, you are quite out of breath with the fine things you’ve said. All the same they are blue in the main, and I’ll have forget-me-nots, if you please, sir. There’s plenty in the brook, and while your honour fetches them I’ll sit here and do nothing, like the gentlefolks.”
The brook ran a hundred paces below them, and the sun was hot in the dell, but Tom had no fair excuse. He ran down with a good grace, and in five minutes was back again, his hands full of tiny blossoms.
“They’re like a bit of the sky,” said Betty, as he pinned them in her bodice.
“Then they are like your eyes, sweet,” he answered, and he stooped to pay himself for the compliment with a kiss.
But Betty slipped from him without betraying, save by a sudden blush, that she understood.
“DO YOU SIT, AND I’LL MAKE YOU A POSY”
“Now, it’s my turn,” she cried gaily. “Do you sit, and I’ll make you a posy!” And humming an air she floated through the fern to a tree of wild cherry that hung low boughs to meet the fern and fox-gloves. She began to pluck the blossom while Tom watched her and told himself that never was sweeter idyll than this, nor a maid more entrancingly fair, nor eyes more blue, nor lips more inviting, nor manners more daintily sweet and naïve. He sighed prodigiously, for he swore that not for the world would he hurt her, though it was pretty plain how it would go if he chose, and he knew that
Pride lures the little warbler from the skies!
The light-enamoured bird eluded dies.
And — and then, while his thoughts were full of this, he saw her coming back, her arms full of blossom.
“Lord, child!” he cried, “you’ve plucked enough for a Jack o’ the Green.”
She shot an arch glance at him. “It is for my Jack o’ the Green,” she murmured.
He ogled her and she blushed. But he had his misgivings when he saw that she was making a nosegay as big as his head. Present it was done, and she found a pin and advanced upon him.
“But you’re not going to put that on me!” he cried. He had a boy’s horror of the ridiculous.
She stopped, offended. “Oh,” she said, “if you don’t wish it?” and with lips pouting and tears ill-repressed, she turned away.
He sprang up. “My dear child, I do wish it!” he cried. “‘Pon honour I do! But it’s — it’s immense.”
She did not answer. Already she was some way up the slope. He ran after her, and told her he would wear it, begged her to pin it for him.
She stood looking at him languidly.
“Are you sure?” she said.
He vowed he was by all his gods, and still pouting she pinned the flowers to the breast of his coat. Now, if ever, he thought was his opportunity. Alas, the nosegay was so large, the cherry twigs of which it was composed were so stiff and sharp, he might as well have kissed her over a hedge! It was provoking in the last degree, and so were her smiling lips. And yet — he could not be angry with her. The very artlessness with which she had made up this huge cabbage and fixed it on him was one charm the more.
“There,” she said, stepping back and viewing him with innocent satisfaction, “I’m sure a real lady could not have managed that better. It does not prick your chin, does it?”
“No, child.”
“And it isn’t in your way? Of course, if it is in your way, sir?”
“No, no!”
“That’s well. I’m so glad.” And with a final nod of approval — with that, and no more — Betty turned, actually turned, and began to walk back towards the Hall.
Tom stood, looking after her in astonishment. “But you are not going?” he cried.
“To be sure, sir,” she answered, looking back and smiling, “my lady’ll be waiting for me.”
“What? This minute?”
“Indeed, sir, and indeed, sir, yes, it is late already,” she said. “But you can come with me a little way, if you like,” she added modestly. And she looked back at him.
He was angry. He had even a suspicion, a small, but growing suspicion, that she was amusing herself with him! But he could not withstand her glance; and as she turned for the last time, he made after her. He overtook her in a few strides, and fell in beside her. But he sulked. His vanity was touched, and willing to show her that he was offended, he maintained a cold silence.
On a sudden he caught the tail of her eye fixed on him, saw that she was shaking with secret laughter; and felt his cheeks begin to burn. The conviction that the little hussy was making fun of him, that she had dared to put this great cabbage upon him for a purpose, burst on him in a flash. It pricked his vanity to the very quick. His heart burned as well as his face; but if she thought to have all the laughing on her side he would teach her better! He lagged a step or two behind, and stealthily tore off the hateful nosegay. The next moment his hot breath was on her neck, his arm was round her; and despite her scream of rage, despite her frantic, furious attempt to push him away, he held her to him while he kissed her twice.
“There, my girl,” he cried, as he released her with a laugh of triumph. “That’s for making fun of me.”
For answer she struck him a sounding slap on the cheek; and as he recoiled, surprised by her rage, she dealt h
im another on his ear.
Tom’s head rung. “You cat!” he cried. “I’ve a good mind to take another! And I will if you don’t behave yourself!”
But the little madcap’s face of scarlet fury, her eyes blazing with passion, daunted him. “How dare you?” she hissed. “How dare you touch me? You creature! You — —” And then, even in the same breath and while he stared, she turned and was gone, leaving the sentence unfinished; and he watched her flee across the sward, a tumultuous raging little figure, with hanging hat, and hair half down, and ribbons that flew out and spoke her passion.
Tom was so taken by surprise he did not attempt to follow, much less to detain her. His sister’s maid to take a kiss so? A waiting-woman? A chit of a servant? And after she had played for it, as it seemed to him, aye, and earned it and over-earned it by her impudent trick and her confounded laughter. He had never been so astonished in his life. The world was near its end, indeed, if there was to be this bother about a kiss. Why, his head hummed, and his cheek would show the mark for an hour to come. Nor was that the worst. If she went to the house in that state and published the thing, he would have an awkward five minutes with his sister. Hang the prude! And yet what a charming little vixen it was.
He stood awhile in the sunshine, boring the turf with his heel, uncertain what to do. At length, feeling that anything was better than sneaking there, like a boy who had played truant and feared to go home, he started for the Hall. He would not allow that he was afraid, but as he approached the terrace he had an uneasy feeling; first of the house’s many windows, and then of an unnatural silence that prevailed about it, as if something had happened or was preparing. To prove his independence he whistled, but he whistled flat, and stopped.
Outside he met no one, and he plucked up a spirit. After all the girl would not be such a fool as to tell. And what was there to tell? A kiss? What was a kiss? But the moment he was out of the glare and over the threshold of the Hall, he knew that she had told. For there in the cool shadow stood Sophia waiting for him, and behind her Sir Hervey, seated on a corner of the great oak table and whistling softly.
Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman Page 364