Cotillion

Chapter XIX

It was not a very long distance from London to the Reverend Hugh Rattray’s parish of Garsfield, but the time spent on the road was more than enough to reduce Lord Dolphinton’s nerves to ribbons, and to place a great strain upon Miss Charing’s patience. Not all her representations served to convince him that his mother was not hard on his heels; and when a broken trace necessitated a wait of several minutes it really seemed as though any further check would wholly overset his slender reason. As for pausing to partake of refreshment, when the horses were changed, he would not hear of it. Neither Finglass nor the coachman showed any surprise at his twittering impatience, so Kitty could only suppose that such moods were not uncommon in him. She herself had not been prepared to find him so much tortured by apprehension, but after travelling only five miles in his company she could readily understand why Miss Plymstock had so unhesitatingly stated that a journey all the way to Gretna Green would not have done for him.

Miss Plymstock, to Kitty’s abiding admiration, maintained throughout her air of stolid calm, talking to his lordship in a matter-of-fact way which seemed to soothe him, and never for an instant betraying a hint of exasperation. Indeed, Kitty was tempted to believe that she felt none, and was quite ashamed of herself for wishing on several occasions to speak sharply to him.

Garsfield, a very respectable parish, was situated less than ten miles from Arnside, and comprised, besides the village, several farms, one or two handsome houses, perhaps a dozen smaller ones, occupied by the lesser gentry, and a number of picturesque cottages. The Rectory, whose garden abutted on to the Churchyard, was a comfortable, squarely-built house, situated at one end of the village street. Everything about it, from its front-door, set precisely between two pairs of sash-windows, to its tidy flower-beds, was neat and symmetrical. Miss Plymstock admired it very much, and said, as she alighted from the carriage, that it was just such a house as she would like to live in herself. This observation momentarily diverted his lordship’s mind from its cares, but also caused him to feel an added anxiety. He said, looking earnestly into her face: “Like Dolphinton House better!”

“Yes, I am persuaded I shall,” she replied.

“Not like this,” said his lordship, closely watching for the effect of his words upon her. “Bigger. Much bigger. Bigger than George’s place. Bigger than Arnside.” He reflected, and added, with a certain amount of dissatisfaction: “Not as big as Legerwood.”

“Legerwood would be too big for me, and Arnside too small,” said Miss Plymstock, never having visited either house.

He was much pleased with this answer, and turned back to inform Kitty, who had stayed to direct the coachman to drive the carriage round to the stables, that Hannah preferred Dolphinton to either Legerwood or Arnside. He then perceived that his carriage was driving away, and was at once attacked by a dread that Finglass, suspecting that he had been hoaxed, would, by means unknown, hasten back to London to carry the news to Lady Dolphinton. He seemed to think that it was by no means impossible that Finglass should have the effrontery to ride off on the Rector’s hack; and was much inclined to summon the man back.

“No, no, that would make him suspicious!” said Kitty. “Depend upon it, he is thinking of nothing but going off to the Green Man! I told him that we should remain for at least an hour.”

“Come, Foster!” said Miss Plymstock, putting a hand in his arm. “You know he believes Miss Charing has a message to give your cousin from Lady Buckhaven! You may be sure he sees nothing odd in our having come here before going to Arnside. Now, haven’t you told me how often you have been visiting the Reverend in the past?”

He admitted it, and consented to be drawn on towards the house. But here a stunning disappointment awaited them. Hugh’s housekeeper, who herself opened the door to the visitors, exclaimed in dismay that the Reverend was away from home.

A moan broke from Lord Dolphinton, and, for once, Miss Plymstock was at a loss. She looked at Kitty, her eyes round with horror.

“Away!” said Kitty. “Oh, dear, what a—Is he at Arnside, perhaps, Mrs. Armathwaite?”

“No, miss. He has gone to Biddenden for two nights,” replied the housekeeper. “He will be put out to think he was away, when you and his lordship came to visit him!”

“We must send for him!” said Kitty resolutely. “It is most important that I should see him. Someone must ride to Biddenden with a letter!”

Mrs. Armathwaite looked very much astonished; and ventured to point out to her that since Biddenden Manor was situated quite fifteen miles distant from Garsfield the Rector could scarcely be fetched in time to reach his home before dusk.

“Must be fetched!” said Dolphinton urgently. “Important!”

“Well, of course, my lord, if you say so,” replied Mrs. Armathwaite doubtfully. “I suppose Peter could take the cob.”

“Peter take the cob,” nodded his lordship.

“Yes, my lord. If you will come into the parlour, I’ll have a taper put to the fire immediately.”

She looked a little curiously at Miss Plymstock as she ushered the party into the parlour on the left of the front-door, so Kitty, perceiving this, at once made Hannah known to her, describing her as a friend who had been kind enough to bear her company on the journey. This explanation seemed perfectly to satisfy Mrs. Armathwaite, and she curtseyed, and went away to procure refreshment for the uninvited guests.

The two ladies then held a consultation in under-voices, as a result of which Miss Plymstock begged Lord Dolphinton to show her more of the Rector’s garden, and Miss Charing went off to his study to find pens, ink, and paper.

The composition of a letter to Hugh she soon found to present her with certain difficulties. After writing My dear Hugh, she sat for some time tickling her chin with the end of the quill, wondering how best to phrase her need. A very little earnest cogitation was enough to convince her that the story of his cousin Dolphinton’s love-affair would be better conveyed to him by word of mouth, since she could place no dependence on his withholding it from Biddenden, who, she felt sure, would heartily disapprove of such an alliance. In the end, the letter which Hugh’s man, Peter, was instructed to carry to his master with all speed was extremely brief, containing nothing more than the intelligence that his affectionate Kitty was at the Rectory and in urgent need of his help. It seemed probable that this communication would bring him home as fast as his horse could carry him.

In the meantime, Mrs. Armathwaite had been busy. By the time Peter had been sent off on his errand, a cold collation had been set out in the dining-parlour at the back of the house, and a fire kindled in the front parlour. Miss Plymstock having diverted his thoughts successfully, Dolphinton was able to attack the remains of a sirloin of beef with gusto. He and Kitty made hearty meals; it was, curiously enough, Miss Plymstock who seemed not to fancy more than a mouthful of any dish offered to her. She disclosed to Kitty at the earliest opportunity the reason for her lack of appetite.

“I don’t know how it is, Miss Charing,” she said, “for you may believe I am not in general a vapourish creature, but I won’t deny that I can’t be easy in my mind. It ain’t only this mischance of finding your cousin away from home, but it came to me when Foster was showing me the orchard that in all the bustle and the excitement not one of us took the least thought to where him and me was to go once the knot has been tied between us. What’s more, I daresay it won’t be possible for this Reverend to marry us now until tomorrow.”

Such a mundane consideration as this had not crossed Kitty’s mind, but she instantly perceived the force of it, and was inclined to blame herself severely for her lack of practical foresight.

“However, there can be no difficulty about tonight, for this house is very commodious, you know, and you may be sure Hugh will be pleased to have beds made up for you,” she said. “Of course, I could take you to Arnside, but I fear you might not be quite comfortable there, on account of my Uncle Matthew’s disliking strangers excessively. But afterwards! I own I had not thought of that. Oh, dear, I wish it had been possible for me to have consulted Freddy, for it is just the thing he could have advised us on! You will not like to stay at some respectable hostelry?”

“Lord, it ain’t that!” said Miss Plymstock. “But until I can settle things betwixt Foster and that mother of his we shan’t have more than a few guineas between the pair of us, for I daren’t take him back to London, you know, and if I don’t do that, how is he to reach his bank?”

“He must borrow some money from Hugh,” said Kitty. “Oh dear, how stupid it was of me not to tell him to draw a large sum out yesterday!”

“It wouldn’t have answered. Let me tell you, Miss Charing,” said Hannah grimly, “that it’s his Mama that draws the money, and doles it out to him as she chooses! I don’t doubt she’s gone beyond her rights, but what I say is, things won’t be put in the way they should be in a trice. However, I don’t mean to be teasing you with such matters. The chief thing is for us to be married as soon as may be. It won’t do to be keeping Foster in the suspense he’s in now. He’s sensible enough if he’s kept happy and quiet, but all this botheration and excitement ain’t good for him, and I don’t doubt I shall have a rare task to keep him occupied until his cousin, returns.”

She had not understated the case. During the hours which followed, the task of keeping Dolphinton occupied taxed their ingenuity to snapping-point. Garsfield village was intersected by a busy cross-country road, and during the course of the afternoon a great many vehicles passed the Rectory. Every time the sound of approaching hoof-beats penetrated to the parlour, Dolphinton became obsessed by the idea that his mother had discovered his clandestine intentions and would, in another instant, descend upon him. Happily, there was a large cupboard in the parlour, filling the recess on one side of the fireplace. His lordship remembered its existence when a vehicle was heard to draw up outside the gate, and with rare presence of mind dived into it. The vehicle, which turned out to be a sporting curricle, belonged to one of the younger Churchwardens, who called at the Rectory merely to leave a note for the Reverend Hugh: but nothing would induce Dolphinton to leave his hiding-place until the ladies could assure him that the visitor had driven away. A backgammon board being discovered., he was persuaded to sit down to play this mild game with Miss Plymstock. It served, in some measure, to restore the balance of his mind, but any unexpected noise outside the house had the effect of making him take precipitate refuge in his hiding-place, until he began to remind Kitty of nothing so much as a jack-in-the-box. Miss Plymstock made no attempt to dissuade him from bolting into the cupboard, saying very sensibly to Kitty that if it made him happier to do so she was sure he was doing no harm to anyone.

When Hugh arrived, it was past five o’clock, and he took his uninvited guests by surprise, walking up from the stables through the garden, and entering the house by a side-door. The sound of a firm footstep approaching the parlour so much alarmed Dolphinton that he forgot the existence of the cupboard, and sought refuge instead under the table. So the Rector, standing transfixed upon the threshold, was confronted by the unusual spectacle of two ladies on their knees, trying to coax something or somebody to emerge from behind the screen of a fringed tablecloth. One of the ladies looked over her shoulder towards him, and he recognized, not without difficulty, his great-uncle’s demure ward, Kitty Charing. When he had last seen her, she had worn a sober green gown, and het hair had been arranged in neat bands. He beheld her now in what seemed to him a very much too dashing driving-dress, which was not only of a frivolous shade of pink, but was also embellished with mannish epaulettes. The dark locks, of whose neatness he had formerly approved, had been cut and curled and arranged in a style which, however becoming it might be, could scarcely have been called demure; and he could not doubt that the high-crowned bonnet with two curled ostrich feather plumes, and very long satin strings, which reposed upon a chair against the wall, belonged to her.

“My dear Kitty!” he said, surprise and disapproval blended in his voice.

“Thank goodness you have come at last!” she returned. “Now, Dolph, don’t be so foolish! It is only Hugh!”

The Rector now perceived that his somewhat feeble-minded cousin was peeping at him from under the tablecloth. His astonishment grew. “Dolphinton! You here? I hope you mean to explain to me what this means, Kitty!”

“Well, of course I do!” she replied. “Only first, do, pray, persuade Dolph to come out!”

“Come, Foster!” said Hugh, with grave authority. “You must not sit under the table, you know. You are not a child.”

His lordship crawled out of cover, and rose sheepishly to his feet. “Had a fright,” he explained. “Frightened of my mother. She’ll bring Foulstone after me. I know she will. Shut me up.”

Miss Plymstock took his hand, and patted it. “No, she will not, Foster. Now, didn’t you tell me you would be safe with your cousin? Besides, she believes you to be at Arnside, and very well pleased she is. You tell him, sir, that he’s safe here!”

The Rector, who had been looking at Miss Plymstock with a good deal of surprise and no very marked degree of approbation, said rather frigidly: “Foster knows that he has nothing to be afraid of under rny roof, ma’am. Come, Foster, sit down in this chair, and straighten your neckcloth! This will not do at all, my dear fellow! Such foolish conduct is not suited to your position, you know.”

“I wish I wasn’t an Earl,” said his lordship wistfully. “I could do a lot of things if I wasn’t. I could breed horses. Sit under the table, if I wanted to. But I don’t want to sit under the table. I don’t want to hide in the cupboard either.”

“Certainly not!” said his cousin.

“If I wasn’t an Earl, I shouldn’t have to. Shouldn’t have to offer for Kitty, either.”

Hugh patted him kindly on the shoulder, but said to Kitty, with some severity: “I do not know what you can have been about to have upset the poor fellow like this! It was wrong, and thoughtless in you, my dear Kitty.”

“It was not I who upset him, but that wicked, cruel mother of his!” cried Kitty, stung by this unmerited reproof. “I should have supposed you must have known that, for you are very well aware how she uses him!”

He said, in a voice of still graver censure: “Whatever may be my aunt’s faults, such language is quite improper, and, indeed, uncalled-for.”

“Well, it certainly ain’t that!” interposed Miss Plymstock, in her downright way. “I was never one for mealy-mouthed talk: don’t believe in it! What Miss Charing says is the plain truth: wicked and cruel she is, and so I shall tell her, when I meet her ladyship!”

The Rector stiffened. “May I request you, Kitty, to present me to your friend? I fancy I have not the pleasure of her acquaintance.”

“Good gracious, what can I have been thinking about?” exclaimed Kitty. “Pray forgive me, Hannah! This, as you have guessed, is Mr. Rattray. And, Hugh, this is Miss Plymstock, who is betrothed to Dolph!”

He bowed, but said: “Indeed! I must suppose that the engagement is of very recent date, since this is the first intimation I have received of it,”

“No, it is of long-standing date, but secret.”

“Secret,” repeated Dolphinton, nodding his head, and looking anxiously at the Rector. “Going to marry Hannah. Kitty says I shall. Kitty said I should hoax my mother, and I did. I got the carriage, too. Did it well, didn’t I, Hannah?”

“To be sure you did, my dear,” she told him, sitting down beside him.

“Do you tell me that you have contracted an engagement without my aunt’s knowledge?” demanded Hugh sternly.

Dolphinton looked frightened; Kitty said impatiently: “Of course he has! How can you be so absurd, Hugh? As though you were not very well aware that she wishes him to marry me! You know how it is with him! He has been obliged to keep his engagement a secret. And that is why I have brought him and Miss Plymstock to you, so that you may marry them!”

He looked quite thunderstruck. “Are you telling me, Kitty, that this is why you are here, and sent me so urgent a message that I found myself constrained to respond to it, in spite of the fact that my leaving Biddenden in such haste put my brother and his wife to considerable inconvenience? I went to Biddenden upon family affairs of some moment, and all must be at a stand until I return there.”

“Well, I am sure I am very sorry, Hugh, but you may return as soon as you have performed your part here, you know!” said Kitty reasonably.

“That,” he said, “I am by no means inclined to do! I do not know under what circumstances Dolphinton has contracted his engagement, but it is plain to me that it is not one of which my aunt would approve. You would not else be here! I cannot lend myself to anything that savours of the clandestine.”

“Hugh!” gasped Kitty. “I had thought you poor Dolph’s friend!”

“I am his friend, as I hope he knows.”

“You cannot be, for you would not stand there talking in that heartless way if you were! Dolph and Miss Plymstock love one another!”

Miss Plymstock, who had been stolidly staring at the Rector, interposed, to say bluntly: “Seems to me it ain’t in your power to refuse to marry us, sir, for all this fine talking. Foster’s of age, and so am I. You’re thinking, I daresay, that I ain’t good enough for your cousin. Well, I don’t pretend to be any better born than what I am, but what I do say is that I shall make Foster a better wife than many a one that has a title.”

“Yes, you are good enough for me!” said Dolphinton. “I won’t let you say you ain’t. Won’t let anyone say it!”

“That’s right, Dolph!” said Kitty approvingly.

Emboldened by this encouragement, his lordship went further. “I won’t let Freddy say it, and I like Freddy. Like him better than Hugh. If Hugh says it, I’ll draw his cork. Do you think I should do that, Kitty?”

“Well, I don’t precisely understand what it means, Dolph, but I daresay it would be an excellent thing to do.”

“Lord, my dear, it don’t matter to me what anyone says of me!” said Miss Plymstock. “Let ’em say what they choose, for it won’t vex us. Don’t you start picking a quarrel with the Reverend! He’s bound to think you’re marrying beneath you, for I can see he’s a proud kind of a man; but maybe, if he likes to come and visit us in Ireland, he’ll own he was mistaken.”

Dolphinton’s face brightened. “I should like Hugh to visit us. Like Kitty to visit us. Like Freddy to visit us too. I shall show them my horses.”

Kitty took advantage of this interlude to pull the Rector over to the window, and to say to him in an urgent under’ voice: “Hugh, upon my word I promise you that you cannot do Dolph a greater service than to marry him to Hannah! She is the kindest, most practical creature! She means to take him to Ireland, and let him breed horses, so that he may be perfectly happy and busy. You must own it would be the very thing for him!”

“Certainly, I have always been an advocate for his living quietly in the country. It is noticeable that whenever he has been staying here with me he is perfectly rational. I do not say that his intellect is strong, but he is by no means an imbecile.”

“Indeed, he is not! But are you aware, Hugh, that his Mama threatens to have him locked up?”

He cast a quick glance over his shoulder, but Dolphinton was engaged in enumerating to Miss Plymstock the various attractions of his Irish house. “You must be mistaken! She could not do such a thing. It is quite unnecessary.”

“I don’t know what she is wicked enough to do, but I do know that that is what terrifies poor Dolph so. As for that doctor of hers, Dolph is thrown into a quake whenever he thinks about him. Why, she even sets his servants to spy on him! He told me so himself, and how they tell her all he does, and where he goes!”

“You shock me very much!” he said. “I had not believed it to have been possible. But to be eloping in this fashion, and to expect me to abet him in conduct which is quite improper—”

“I see what it is!” she interrupted, a sparkle in her eye. “You are afraid to do it! You are afraid of your aunt, and of what people may say! I think it very poor-spirited of you, Hugh, but I am very sure it is not in your power to refuse to marry two persons, when there is no—no impediment!”

He said, flushing a little: “There is no occasion for you to speak with such unbecoming heat. I am certainly not afraid to do what I conceive to be my duty. But in this instance there are considerations of family involved, which—”

“If Freddy does not regard such considerations, I am sure you need not!” she interrupted.

He looked rather taken aback. “Does Freddy, then, know of this affair?”

“Yes, indeed he does!”

“I can only say that I am surprised. However, I cannot allow Freddy to be a guide to my conduct.”

She was stung by his tone of superiority into retorting: “I do not know why you should not, for he is a Standen, after all!”

At this moment, Miss Plymstock touched Kitty’s arm. “Beg pardon, but I’ll be glad to know what you have decided,” she said. Sinking her voice, she added: “It won’t do to be keeping Foster in suspense, for he’s had a very exciting day, which ain’t good for him.” She glanced from Hugh’s rigid countenance to Kitty’s angry one. “I collect you don’t mean to oblige us, sir,” she said. “Well, if you won’t you won’t, but I’ll tell you to your head I’ll not let Foster go back to be driven crazy by his mother. If I’m driven to it—though I own it ain’t what I like, partly because I was reared to be respectable, and partly because it don’t put me in a strong position when it comes to dealing with her ladyship—I’ll take Foster away, and live with him as his mistress until I can find a parson that will marry us.”

The Rector looked down from his impressive height into her homely but resolute countenance, and said stiffly, and after a moment’s pause: “In that event, ma’am, I am left with no alternative. I cannot perform the ceremony at this hour, but if you will have the goodness to show me the licence, I will marry you to my cousin tomorrow morning.”

A stricken silence greeted these words. Both ladies stood staring up at him. “L-licence?” Kitty faltered at last.

“The special licence to enable persons to be joined in wedlock without the calling of banns,” explained the Rector. “Surely, my dear Kitty, you were aware that this is necessary for what you propose I should do?”

“I have heard of special licences,” she said. “I didn’t know—I thought—Oh, what have I done? Hannah, I am so very sorry! I ought to have asked Freddy! He would have known! I have ruined everything!”

“It’s my blame,” said Miss Plymstock gruffly. “The thing is we’ve never had anything but banns in my family, and it slipped my mind.”

Kitty turned, laying a hand on the Rector’s arm. “Hugh, it can’t signify! You would not stick at such a trifle as that!”

“If you have not obtained the necessary licence, it is quite out of my power to perform the ceremony,” he said.

Lord Dolphinton, who had been trying to follow this, now joined the group by the window, plucking at Miss Plymstock’s sleeve, and demanding: “What’s this? Does he say I cannot be married? Is that what he says?”

“I am sorry, Foster, but unless you have with you a special licence it is impossible for me to marry you.”

His lordship uttered a moan of despair. Miss Plymstock drew his hand through her arm. “Don’t you fly into a pucker, my dear!” she said calmly. “We shall find a way to brush through it, don’t fear! We—”

She broke off, for the door had opened, and a beam of lamplight shone into the darkening room. Mrs. Armathwaite came in, carrying a lamp, which she set down upon the table, saying: “I’ve brought the lamp, sir, and there’s no need for you to worrit yourself about dinner, for it happens that we have a nice shoulder of mutton, which I’ve had popped into the oven, and a couple of spring chickens, which will be on the spit in another ten minutes. Good gracious, what ails his lordship?”

Dolphinton, in the act of disappearing into the cupboard beside the fireplace, paused to say in anguished tones: “Not here! Not seen me!”

Kitty, who had also heard the sound of a vehicle drawing up, peered out into the dusk. “Dolph, don’t be afraid! It is not your Mama! It is only some gentleman—why—why, I do believe—It is Jack! Good God, what can have brought him here? Oh, I am persuaded he will be able to help us! What a fortunate circumstance! Come out, Dolph! it is only Jack!”