False Colours

2

There was a short silence. She met his look, and heaved a despairing sigh. “It is your Uncle Henry’s fault,” she disclosed. “And your father’s!” She paused, and then said sorrowfully: “And mine! Try as I will, I cannot deny that, Kit! To be sure, I thought that when your Papa died I should be able to discharge some of my debts, and be perfectly comfortable, but that was before I understood about jointures. Dearest, did you know that they are nothing but a take-in? No, how should you? But so it is! And, what is more,” she added impressively, “one’s creditors do know it! Which makes one wonder why they should take it into their heads to dun me now that I am a widow, in a much more disagreeable way than ever they did when Papa was alive. It seems quite idiotish to me, besides being so unfeeling!”

He had spent few of his adult years at home, but this disclosure came as no surprise to him. For as long as he could remember poor Mama’s financial difficulties had been the cause of discomfort in his home. There had been painful interludes which had left Lady Denville in great distress; these had led to coldness, and estrangement, and to a desperate policy of concealment.

The Earl had been a man of upright principles, but he was not a warm-hearted man, and his mind was neither lively nor elastic. He was fifteen years older than his wife, and he belonged as much by temperament as by age to a generation of rigid etiquette. He had only once allowed his feelings to overcome his judgement, when he had succumbed to the charm of the lovely Lady Amabel Cliffe, lately enlarged from the schoolroom to become the rage of the ton, and had offered for her hand in marriage. Her father, the Earl of Baverstock, was the possessor of impoverished estates and a numerous progeny, and he had accepted the offer thankfully. But the very qualities which had fascinated Denville in the girl offended him in the wife, and he set himself to the task of eradicating them. His efforts were unsuccessful, and resulted merely in imbuing her with a dread of incurring his displeasure. She remained the same loving, irresponsible creature with whom he had become infatuated; but she lavished her love on her twin sons, and did her best to conceal from her husband the results of her imprudence.

The twins adored her. Unable to detect beneath their father’s unbending formality his real, if temperate, affection, they became at an early age their mama’s champions. She played with them, laughed with them, sorrowed with them, forgave them their sins, and sympathized with them in their dilemmas: they could perceive no fault in her, and directed their energies, as they grew up, to the task of protecting her from the censure of their formidable father.

Mr Fancot, therefore, was neither surprised nor shocked to discover that his mother was encumbered by debt. He merely said: “Scorched, love? Just how does the land lie?”

“I don’t know. Well, dearest, how can one remember everything one has borrowed for years and years?”

That did startle him a little. “Years and years? But, Mama, when you were obliged to disclose to my father the fix you were in—three years ago, wasn’t it?—didn’t he ask you for the sum total of your debts, and promise that they should be discharged?”

“Yes, he did say that,” she answered. “And I didn’t tell him. Well, I didn’t know, but I’m not trying to excuse myself, and I own I shouldn’t have done so even if I had known. I can’t explain it to you, Kit, and if you mean to say that it was very wrong of me, and cowardly, don’t, because I am miserably aware of it! Only, when Adlestrop wrote down everything I said—”

“What?” exclaimed Kit. “Are you telling me he was present?”

“Yes—oh, yes! Well, your father reposed complete confidence in him, and it has always been he, you know, who managed everything, so—”

“Pretty well, for one who set so much store by propriety!” he interrupted, his eyes kindling. “To admit his man of business into such an interview—!”

“I own, I wished he had not, but I dare say he was obliged to. On account of its being Adlestrop who knew just what the estate could bear, and—”

“Adlestrop is a very good man in his way, and I don’t doubt he has our interests at heart, but he’s a purse-leech, and so my father should have known! If ever a grig was spent out of the way he always behaved as if we should all of us go home by beggar’s bush!”

“Yes, that’s what Evelyn says,” she agreed. “I might have been able to have told Papa the whole, if he hadn’t brought Adlestrop into it—that is, if I had known what it was. Indeed, I had the intention of being perfectly open with him! But whatever my faults I am not a—a mawworm, Kit, so I shan’t attempt to deceive you! I don’t think I could have been open with Papa. Well, you know how it was whenever he was displeased with one, don’t you? But if I had known that my wretched affairs would fall upon Evelyn I must have plucked up my courage to the sticking-point, and disclosed the whole to him.”

“If you had known what the whole was!” he interpolated irrepressibly.

“Yes, or if I could have brought myself to place my affairs in Adlestrop’s hands.”

“Good God, no! It should have been a matter between you and my father. But there’s no occasion for you to be blue-devilled because your affairs have fallen on Evelyn: he must always have been concerned in them, you know, and it makes no difference to him whether my father discharged your debts, or left it to him to do so.”

“But you are quite wrong!” she objected. “It makes a great deal of difference. Evelyn cannot discharge them!”

“Stuff!” he said. “He has no more notion of economy than you have, but don’t try to tell me that he has contrived, in little more than a year, to dissipate his inheritance! That’s coming it too strong!”

“Certainly not! It isn’t in his power to do so. Not that I mean to say he would wish to, for however volatile your father believed him to be, he has no such intention! And I must say, Kit, I consider it was most unjust of Papa to have left everything in that uncomfortable way, telling your uncle Henry that he had done so because Evelyn was as volatile as I am! For he never knew about the two worst scrapes Evelyn was in, because you brought him off from his entanglement with that dreadful harpy who got her claws into him when you both came down from Oxford—and how you did it, Kit, I have long wanted to know!—and it was I who paid his gaming debts when he was drawn into some Pall Mall hell when he was by far too green to know what he was doing! I sold my diamond necklace, and your papa knew nothing whatsoever about it! So why he should have told your uncle that—”

“You did what?” Kit interrupted, shaken for the first time during this session with his adored parent.

She smiled brilliantly upon him. “I had it copied, of course! I’m not such a goose that I didn’t think of that! It looks just as well, and what should I care for diamonds when one of my sons was on the rocks?”

“But it was an heirloom!”

“I have no opinion of heirlooms,” said her ladyship flatly. “If you mean to say that it belonged to Evelyn, I know it did, but, pray, what use was it to him, when what he needed, quite desperately, poor love, was the money to pay his gaming debts? I told him about it afterwards, and I assure you he made not the least objection!”

“I dare say! And what of his son?” demanded Kit.

“Dearest, you are too absurd! How should he raise an objection when he won’t know anything about it?”

“Have you—have you disposed of any more heirlooms?” he asked, regarding her with awe, and some reluctant amusement.

“No, I don’t think so. But you know what a wretched memory I have! In any event, it doesn’t signify, because what’s done is done, and I have more important things to think of than a lot of hideous family jewels. Dearest, do, pray, stop being frivolous!”

“I didn’t mean to be frivolous,” he said meekly.

“Well, don’t ask me stupid questions about heirlooms, or talk nonsense about it’s being as easy for Evelyn to pay my debts as it would have been for your papa. You must have read that hateful Will! Poor Evelyn has no more command over Papa’s fortune than you have! Everything was left to your uncle’s discretion!”

He frowned a little. “I remember that my father created some kind of Trust, but not that it extended to the income from the estate. My uncle has neither the power to withhold that, nor to question Evelyn’s expenditure. As I recall, Evelyn was prohibited from disposing of any part of his principal, except with my uncle’s consent, until he reaches the age of thirty, unless, at some time before that date, my uncle should judge him to have outgrown his—his volatility (don’t eat me, Mama!), when the Trust might be brought to an end, and Evelyn put in undisputed possession of his inheritance. I know I thought my father need not have fixed on thirty as the proper age: twenty-five would have been a great deal more reasonable, and in no way remarkable. Evelyn was vexed, of course—who wouldn’t have been?—but it made very little difference to him, after all. You’ve said yourself that he has no intention of wasting his principal. You know, Mama, the income is pretty considerable! What’s more, my uncle told him at the time that he was prepared to consent to the sale of certain stocks, to defray whatever large debts Evelyn had incurred—particularly any post-obit bonds—since he thought it not right that the income should perhaps be reduced to a monkey’s allowance until they had all been paid.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “He did say that, and it quite astonished me, for, in general, he’s as close as wax, Kit!”

“No: merely, he doesn’t live up to the door, and certainly not beyond it. But the thing is, Mama, that he didn’t wish Evelyn to succeed my father under a load of debt, and if you had but told him of the fix you were in I’m persuaded he would have settled your debts along with the rest.”

She gazed at him incredulously. “Henry? You must be out of your mind, Kit! When I think of the way he has always disapproved of me, and the rake-down he gave Evelyn, whose debts were nothing compared to mine—Oh, no, no! I had liefer by far put a period to my existence than cast myself on his mercy! He would have imposed the most humiliating conditions on me—condemned me to live the rest of my days in that horrid Dower House at Ravenhurst, very likely! Or worse!”

He was silent for a moment. Knowing that Henry, Lord Brumby, considered his charming sister-in-law incorrigible, he could not help feeling that there was some truth in what she said. His frown deepened; he said abruptly: “Why the devil didn’t Evelyn tell him? He could have handled my uncle so much more easily than you could!”

“Do you think so?” she said doubtfully. “He never has done so. Besides, he didn’t know just how things stood with me, because I never thought to tell him. Well, how was I to guess that nearly every soul I owed money to would suddenly start to dun me, and some of them in the rudest way, too? Not that I should have teased Evelyn with my difficulties when he was already in hot water with Henry on his own account. I hope you know me better than to suppose I should do such a selfish thing as that!”

A wry smile twisted his lips. “I’m beginning to, Mama! I wish you will tell me how you expected to settle matters, though, if you didn’t tell Evelyn?”

“Well, I didn’t know then that I should be obliged to,” she explained. “I mean, I never had done so, except now and then, in a gradual way, when I was particularly asked to, so you can imagine what a shock it was to me when Mr Child positively refused—though with perfect civility—to lend me £3000, which would have relieved my immediate difficulties, and even begged me not to overdraw the account by as much as a guinea more—just as if I hadn’t paid the interest, which, I promise you, I did!”

Mr Fancot, considerably bemused, interrupted, to demand: “But what’s this talk of Child, Mama? My father never banked with him!”

“Oh no, but my father did, and your Uncle Baverstock does, of course, now that Grandpapa is dead, so I have been acquainted with Mr Child for ever—a most superior man, Kit, who has always been so very kind to me!—and that is how I come to have an account with him!”

Mr Fancot, his hair lifting gently on his scalp, ventured to inquire more particularly into the nature of his mama’s account with Child’s Bank, As far as he could ascertain from her explanation, it had its sole origin in a substantial loan made to her by the clearly besotted Mr Child. Something in his expression, as he listened in gathering dismay, caused her to break off, laying a hand on his arm, and saying imploringly: “Surely you must know how it is when one finds oneself—what does Evelyn call it?—oh, in the basket!. I collect that has something to do with cock-fighting: so disgusting and vulgar! Kit, haven’t you got debts?”

He shook his head, a rueful gleam in his eyes. “No, I’m afraid I haven’t!”

“None?” she exclaimed.

“Well, none that I can’t discharge! I may owe a trifle here and there, but—oh, don’t look at me like that! I promise you I’m not a changeling, love!”

“How can you be so absurd? Only it seems so extraordinary—but I expect you haven’t had the opportunity to run into debt, living abroad as you do,” she said excusingly.

He gave a gasp, managed to utter: “J-just so, Mama!” and went into a fit of uncontrollable laughter, dropping his head in his hands, and clutching his chestnut locks.

She was not in the least offended, but chuckled responsively, and said: “Now you sound like yourself again! Do you know, for a moment—only for a moment!—you looked like your father? You can’t conceive the feel it gave me!”

He lifted his head, wiping his streaming eyes. “Oh, no, did I? Was it very bad? I’ll try not to do so again! But tell me! When Child would give you no credit didn’t you then tell Evelyn?”

“No, though I did think I might be obliged to, till it darted into my mind, in the middle of the night, to apply to Edgbaston for a loan. Isn’t it odd, dearest, how often the answer to a problem will flash upon one in the night?”

“Applied to Lord Edgbaston?” he ejaculated.

“Yes, and he agreed to lend me £5000—at interest, of course!—and so then I was in funds again. Oh, Kit, don’t frown like that! Are you thinking that I should rather have applied to Bonamy Ripple? I couldn’t, you see, because he had gone off to Paris, and the matter was—was a little urgent!”

For as long as Kit could remember, this elderly and extremely wealthy dandy had run tame about his home, regarded by himself and Evelyn as a fit subject for ridicule, and by their father with indifference. He had been one of Lady Denville’s many suitors, and when she had married Lord Denville he had become her most faithful cicisbeo. He was generally supposed to have remained a bachelor for her sake; but since his figure resembled nothing so much as an over-ripe pear, and his countenance was distinguished only by an expression of vacuous amiability and the snuff-stains on his fat cheeks, not even the more determined brewers of scandal-broth could detect anything in his devotion but food for mockery. The twins, inured to his frequent appearances in Hill Street, accepted him with much the same contemptuous tolerance as they would have felt for an over-fed lap-dog which their mama chose to encourage. But although Kit would have hooted with ribald laughter at the suggestion that any impropriety attached to Sir Bonamy’s fidelity he was far from thinking it desirable that his mother should apply to him for help in her financial difficulties, and he said so.

“Good gracious, Kit, as though I hadn’t often done so!” she exclaimed. “It is by far the most comfortable arrangement, because he is so rich that he doesn’t care how many of my bonds he holds, and never does he demand the interest on the loans he makes me! As for dunning me to repay him, I am persuaded such a notion never entered his head. He may be absurd, and growing fatter every day, but I have been used to depend on him for years, in all manner of ways! It was he who sold my jewels for me, and had them copied, for instance, besides—” She stopped abruptly. “Oh, I wish I had never mentioned him! It has brought it all back to me! That was what made Evelyn go away!”

“Ripple?” he asked, wholly at sea.

“No, Lord Silverdale,” she replied.

“For the lord’s sake, Mama—!” he expostulated. “What are you talking about? What the deuce has Silverdale to say to anything?”

“He has a brooch of mine,” she said, sunk suddenly into gloom. “I staked it, when he wouldn’t accept my vowels, and continue playing. Something told me the luck was about to turn, and so it might have, if Silverdale would but have played on. Not that I cared for losing the brooch, for I never liked it above half, and can’t conceive why I should have purchased it. I expect it must have taken my fancy, but I don’t recall why.”

“Has Evelyn gone off to redeem it?” he interrupted. “Where is Silverdale?”

“At Brighton. Evelyn said there was no time to be lost in buying the brooch back, so off he posted—at least, he drove himself, in his phaeton, with his new team of grays, and he said that he meant to go first to Ravenhurst, which, indeed, he did—”

“Just a moment, Mama!” Kit intervened, the frown returning to his brow. “Why did Evelyn feel it necessary to go to Brighton? Of course he was obliged to redeem your brooch—Silverdale must have expected him to do so!—but I should have supposed that a letter to Silverdale, with a draft on his bank for whatever sum the brooch represented, would have answered the purpose.”

Lady Denville raised large, stricken eyes to his face. “Yes, but you don’t perfectly understand how it was, dearest. I can’t think how I came to be so addlebrained, but when I staked it I had quite forgotten that it was one of the pieces I had had copied! For my part, I consider Silverdale was very well served for having been so quizzy and disobliging about accepting my vowels, but Evelyn said that it was of the first importance to recover the wretched thing before Silverdale discovered that it was only a copy.”

Mr Fancot drew an audible breath. “I should rather think he might say so!”

“But, Kit!” said her ladyship earnestly, “that is much more improvident than anything I should dream of doing! I set its value at £500, which was the value of the real brooch, but the copy isn’t worth a tithe of that! It seems to be quite wickedly extravagant of Evelyn to be squandering such a sum on mere trumpery!”

Mr Fancot toyed for a moment with the idea of explaining to his erratic parent that her view of the matter was, to put it mildly, incorrect. But only for a moment. He was an intelligent young man, and he almost instantly realized that any such attempt would be a waste of breath. So he merely said, as soon as he could command his voice to say anything: “Yes, well, never mind that! When did Evelyn set forth on this errand?”

“Dear one, you cannot have been attending! I told you! Ten days ago!”

“Well, it wouldn’t have taken him ten days to accomplish it, if Silverdale was in Brighton, so it seems that he can’t have been there. Evelyn must have discovered where he was gone to, and decided to follow him.”

She brightened. “Oh, do you think that is what happened? I have been a prey to the most hideous forebodings! But if Silverdale has gone to that place of his in Yorkshire it is very understandable that Evelyn shouldn’t have returned yet.” She paused, considering the matter, and then shook her head. “No. Evelyn didn’t go to Yorkshire. He spent one night at Ravenhurst, just as he told me he would; and then he drove to Brighton. That I do know, for his groom accompanied him; but whether he found Silverdale there or not I can’t tell, because, naturally, Challow doesn’t know. But he returned to Ravenhurst the same day, and stayed the night there. I thought he would do that—in fact, I thought he must have stayed for several days, for he told me that he had matters to attend to at home, and might be absent from London for perhaps as much as a sennight. But he left Ravenhurst the very next morning, and under the most peculiar circumstances!”

“In what way peculiar, Mama?”

“He took only his night-bag with him, and he sent Challow back to London with the rest of his gear, saying that he had no need of him.”

“Oh!” said Kit. His tone was thoughtful, but not astonished. “Did he tell Challow where he was going?”

“No, and that is another circumstance which makes me very uneasy.”

“It need not,” he said, amusement flickering in his eyes. “Did he send his valet back to London too? I take it that Fimber is still with him?”

“Yes, and that is another thing that cuts up my peace! He wouldn’t take Fimber to Sussex: he said there was no room for him in the phaeton, which is true, of course, though it set up all Fimber’s bristles. I must own that I wished he might have found room for him., because I know Fimber will never let him come to harm. Challow is very good too, but not—not as firm! It is the greatest comfort to know that they are both with Evelyn when he goes off on one of his starts.”

“I’m sure it is, Mama,” he said gravely.

“But that’s just it!” she pointed out. “Neither is with him! Kit, it’s no laughing matter! I’m persuaded that some accident has befallen him, or that he’s in some dreadful scrape! How can you laugh?”

“I couldn’t, if I thought it was true. Now, come out of the dismals, Mama! I never knew you to be such a goose! What do you imagine could have happened to Evelyn?”.

“You don’t think—you don’t think that he did see Silverdale, and quarrelled with him, and—and went off alone that day to meet him?”

“Taking his night-bag with him in place of a second! Good God, no! You have put yourself into the hips, love! If I know Evelyn, he’s gone off on a private affair which he don’t want you to know anything about! You would, if he had taken Fimber or Challow with him, and he’s well aware of that. They may be a comfort to you, my dear, but they’re often a curst embarrassment to him! As for accidents—fudge! You’d have been apprised of anything of that nature: depend upon it, he didn’t set out to visit Silverdale without his card-case!”

“No, very true!” she agreed. “I never thought of that!” Her spirits revived momentarily, only to sink again. Her beautiful eyes clouded; she said: “But at such a moment, Kit! When so much hinges upon his presenting himself in Mount Street tomorrow! Oh, no, he could not have gone off on one of his adventures!”

“Couldn’t he?” said Kit. “I wonder! I wish you will tell me a little more about this engagement of his, Mama. You’ve said that there has been no time for him to tell me about it himself, but that’s doing it very much too brown, my dear! There might have been no time for a letter to have reached me, telling me that he had come to the point of offering for this girl; but he never mentioned her name to me in the last letter I had from him, far less the possibility that he would shortly be married; and that, you know, is so unlike him that if anyone but you had broken this news to me I should have thought it a Banbury story. Now, I know of only one reason which would make Evelyn withhold his confidence from me.” He paused, his eyelids puckering, as though he were trying to bring some remote object into focus. “If he were in some fix from which I couldn’t help him to escape—if he were forced into doing something repugnant to him—”

“Oh, no, no, no!” cried Lady Denville distressfully. “It is not repugnant to him, and he was not forced into it! He discussed it with me in the most reasonable manner, saying that while he was resolved on matrimony, he believed it would suit him best to—to enter upon a contract in the old-fashioned way, without violence of feeling on either side. And I must say, Kit, that I think he is very right, for the females he falls in love with are never eligible—in fact, excessively ineligible! Moreover, he is so very prone to fall in love, poor boy, that it is of the first importance to arrange a match for him with a sensible, well-bred girl who won’t break her heart, or come to points with him, every time she discovers that he has a chère amie.”

“Of the first importance—!” he exclaimed. “For Evelyn, of all men! I collect that if she is sufficiently indifferent and well-bred nothing else is of consequence! She may be bran-faced or swivel-eyed or—”

“On the contrary! It goes without saying that there must be nothing in her appearance to give Evelyn a disgust of her; and also that each of them should be ready to like the other.”

He sprang up, ejaculating: “Oh, good God!” He glanced down at her, his eyes very bright, but not with laughter. “You made such a marriage, Mama! Is that what you wish Evelyn to do? Is it?”

She did not answer for a moment; and when she did speak it was with a little constriction. “I didn’t make such a marriage, Kit. Your father fell in love with me. The Fancots said he was besotted, but nothing would turn him from his determination to marry me. And I—well, I was just seventeen, and he was so handsome, so exactly like the heroes schoolgirls dream of—! But the Fancots were right: we were very ill-suited.”

He said, in an altered tone: “I didn’t know—I beg your pardon, Mama!—I shouldn’t have spoken to you so. But you haven’t told me the truth. All this talk of Evelyn’s being resolved on matrimony, as though he were four-and-thirty rather than four-and-twenty—! Flummery!”

“I have told you the truth!” she declared indignantly. She read disbelief in his face, and amended this statement. “Well, some of it, anyway!”

He could not help smiling at this. “Tell me all the truth! A little while ago you said it was my uncle’s fault—also your fault—but in what conceivable way could either of you make it necessary for Evelyn to contract a marriage of convenience? Evelyn doesn’t depend on my uncle for his livelihood, nor is he answerable to him for anything he may choose to do! The only power my uncle has is to refuse to permit him to spend any part of his principal—if he should wish to do so!”

“But that is just what he does wish to do!” she replied. “At least, I can’t suppose that he wishes to do it precisely—except that it would be a great relief to him to be rid of all the worry and bother of my debts.”

“Your debts! But—Is Miss Stavely an heiress? and is Evelyn crazy enough to imagine that he will be able to dispose of her fortune as he pleases? It isn’t possible!”

“No, and he wouldn’t dream of doing such a thing, if it were! He means to settle my debts out of his own fortune.

He says—and you did too, Kit!—that Papa should have done so, and that it is just the same as if he had. And also he says that he is determined your uncle shall know nothing about it. So he went to see him, to try if he couldn’t prevail upon him to end the Trust—putting it on the score of his age, and how much he dislikes being treated as though he were a schoolboy. Which is true, Kit!”

“Yes, I know it is. What had my uncle to say to that?”

“Well, he didn’t say very much to Evelyn—only that he would be glad to be rid of the Trust, and would willingly end it the instant Evelyn had finished sowing his wild oats. But afterwards he came to see me, and although he was very stiff, I do him the justice to acknowledge that he discussed the matter with far less of that reserve of his which I find so daunting! He spoke very kindly of Evelyn, saying that he has many excellent qualities, and that in spite of being far too heedless and rackety he doesn’t commit horrid excesses, or frequent low company, which (Henry says) has become the fashion amongst a certain set of young men. And then he said he would be happy to see him married to some female of character, since he had been brought to believe that marriage would be the making of him, and cause him to become more settled and responsible—though not, he fears, such a pattern-card as you!”

“Much obliged to him! What can have possessed him to say anything so foolhardy? Did you give him snuff?”

She laughed. “No, I was more inclined to embrace him for holding you in esteem. Besides, I know it to be true. Oh, I don’t mean that you are a pattern-card of virtue, so you needn’t look so—so—”

“Dog-sick?” suggested her ungrateful offspring.

“Odious creature! All I meant to say—and your uncle too!—was that you are more—more dependable than Evelyn. You always were. I wish you will stop funning: this is a serious matter!” She looked up at him, smiling ruefully. “I know I’m lightminded, Kit, but not when it is a question of my sons’ welfare, I promise you! I would make any sacrifice—indeed, I have been wondering whether I ought not to change this room again, and make it all blue, or pink, or straw-coloured, no matter how commonplace it would be. They say that green is an unlucky colour, you know, and there’s no denying that my luck has been quite out for months, which is not the least helpful to poor Evelyn. I thought that if only I could win a fortune all his troubles would be over. Well, they would have been, but the luck hardly ever runs my way. Yes, and that puts me in mind of something that has me in a puzzle! One is for ever hearing of persons who have lost their fortunes at gaming, but one never hears of anyone who has won a fortune. It seems very odd to me. Where do all the lost fortunes go to?”

“Never into your pocket, love—that’s all I know! So don’t, I implore you, change this room! I dare say that would cost a fortune.”

“Yes, but I shouldn’t grudge a penny of it!” she said earnestly. She added, with a touch of asperity: “And I am quite at a loss to understand why you should go into whoops!”

“Never mind, Mama!” he said unsteadily. “Only don’t—don’t m-make sacrifices for Evelyn! I’m persuaded he won’t appreciate them as—as he ought!”

“I don’t care for that. But it’s of no consequence! I wasn’t thinking of fortunes and debts when I told you it was a serious matter: indeed, I can’t imagine how we come to be talking of such trivial things! Kit, I would not say so to your uncle, but from you I need conceal nothing! You think it is mercenary of me to arrange an eligible marriage for Evelyn, but it isn’t! It can’t be mercenary to wish him to be comfortable, which he will be, because Henry says the Trust shall be wound up as soon as he is safely married. He disclosed to me that he had never thought it right of Denville to create it, but considered himself bound in honour to abide by his expressed wish. Well, it would be nonsensical to deny that it is of the greatest importance for Evelyn to be free to do as he chooses with his inheritance, but that wouldn’t have weighed with me if I hadn’t felt the force of Henry’s words. Indeed, I wasn’t even thinking about it!” She hesitated, a crease between her arched brows. “No one understands Evelyn as well as you, Kit, but you have been abroad for so long that I fancy you don’t know—are not quite aware—Oh, dear, it is so very difficult to explain it to you!”

All trace of laughter had vanished from his eyes. They became suddenly intent, searching her face. He sat down again beside her, and took one of her hands in a reassuring clasp. “I know. I find myself unable to explain to you the feeling I’ve had—oh, for a long time now!—that something is amiss. But what it may be I’ve never discovered, which has made me think it could be nothing of a serious nature.”

“Oh, no!” she said quickly. “But he’s so restless, Kit, and so wild! No, that’s not the word. He calls it being always ripe for a spree, but it has sometimes seemed to me that he commits extravagant follies because he is bored, and can find nothing else to do. And when Henry spoke of his becoming settled, and responsible, I suddenly knew that he was perfectly right. I mean, if he were suitably married, and had the estates to manage, besides setting up his nursery—and however disagreeable the thought of being a grandmother may be I am determined to bear it—he would be more—more content. He would have things to occupy him, and you know what he is, Kit!—he can never be happy unless he is doing something! And, situated as he is, he has nothing to do but get into mischief, which I shouldn’t care a straw for, if only it amused him! But I don’t think it does, except for a very little while, do you, Kit?”

“No. That is, I don’t know, but I understand what you mean!”

She squeezed his hand gratefully. “I knew you must! And you will understand that when Harry said that, about marriage being the making of Evelyn, I began instantly to cast about in my mind, and naturally hit upon Cressy.”

“Cressy?”

“Cressida—Miss Stavely! In every respect what one would wish for, Kit! A young woman of the first consideration—not a schoolroom chit, full of romantic notions! She has what Henry calls a well-regulated mind, though she is not, I assure you, a blue-stocking. I don’t say she is a beauty, but I think her very pretty, and with a good deal of countenance, besides having a well-formed figure, and truly exquisite taste! She will fill her position to admiration— better by far than I ever did!—for she conducts herself with perfect propriety, and will never give Evelyn cause to blush for her!”

“And how comes it about that this highly finished piece of nature is on the shelf?” he asked sceptically.

“She is not on the shelf! To be sure, she is twenty, which might lead you to suppose that she had never received any eligible offers, but that is not the case at all! She received several offers when her grandmama brought her out, but she refused them all, because she thought it her duty to remain with her papa. She said she had met no one she liked better than Stavely, but the fact is that she is his only child, and she has kept house for him since she was sixteen. He was used to dote on her, too.”

“What caused him to stop doting on her?”

“Oh, I daresay he still does so, but he would be afraid for his life to betray it! What must he do, when one would have supposed him to be past the age of such folly, but form an attachment for a female not very much older than Cressy, and marry her! Well, I never had a very high idea of his understanding—he formed a passion for me, you know, when I was first out, and behaved like a perfect moonling—but I thought he had grown to be quite rational! But to have allowed himself to be caught by Albinia Gillifoot—! He must be about in his head! She keeps him dancing attendance on her, which will very soon make him regret his imprudence; and she’s as jealous as a cat, particularly of poor Cressy.”

“Oh, so that’s why poor Cressy is willing to accept Evelyn, is it?”

“Of course it is! Really, nothing could have been more providential!”

“I hope she thinks so!”

“No, but I do, and so does your uncle! When I mentioned Cressy to him he almost approved of me!” Her eyes danced. “He said he had never looked for so much good sense in me! Unexceptionable, he called her, and one with strength of character!”

“And what does Evelyn call her?” inquired Kit, in a voice of polite interest.

“Evelyn told me that he believed she might be the very thing he had in mind. You mustn’t think I urged him in any way, Kit! Indeed, I begged him not to make her an offer if he felt he could not like her; but he assured me that he does like her. He is not very well acquainted with her, for although she has frequently visited me, and I have chaperoned her to balls now and then, because I am her godmother, her mama having been a particular friend of mine, he has never paid her any extraordinary attention.”

“Not his style, eh?”

“If you mean she is not in the style of the girls he tumbles in and out of love with, no, and a very good thing too! He believes they may deal very comfortably together, and so do I. He won’t feel leg-shackled, and she won’t fall into a grand fuss over his little affaires. She must be accustomed to such things. I could furnish you with the names of at least three of Stavely’s mistresses, and you may depend upon it that Cressy is well aware of his being quite a man of the town. Kit, I know you don’t like it, but I must tell you that Evelyn’s mind is made up: he is determined to marry. I needn’t tell you how impossible it is to turn him from his purpose when he gets that obstinate look in his face. I don’t know what passed between him and Cressy, when he popped the question, but he told me afterwards he thought himself very fortunate. Nothing was farther from his intention than to cry off! Why, he even said that he meant to return from Ravenhurst in good time to adonize himself for the encounter with old Lady Stavely! And if he doesn’t return tomorrow his tale will be told, for Lady Stavely is bound to take a pet—and small blame to her! Only think how brass-faced it would be of him! And then he would offer for some girl not nearly as suitable, and be wretchedly uncomfortable for the rest of his life! Oh, Kit, what am I to do? If he hasn’t suffered an accident, I have the most lowering fear that something has happened to put his engagement in Mount Street out of his mind. You can’t deny that he does forget things!”

Since very much the same explanation of his twin’s continued absence had long since occurred to him Mr Fancot made no attempt to deny it, merely saying, in a heartening tone: “Well, if he doesn’t return in time to attend this party you must inform Stavely that he has been taken ill suddenly.”

“I thought of that myself, but it won’t do, Kit! If Evelyn could send me a message, he could send one to Mount Street as well.”

“Too ill to write!” he said promptly. “One of the servants brought the news to you!”

“Well, of all the bird-witted suggestions!” she exclaimed. “If that were the case I should be compelled to post off to Ravenhurst immediately, and I don’t mean to do any such thing! What’s more, Kit, if I were to set that story about, Evelyn would drive into London the very next day, as sure as check! Looking as bright as a button, and exchanging greetings with half-a-dozen persons, and very likely more!”

He grinned. “Yes, very true! That would make mice-feet of the whole business, wouldn’t it?”

“Oh, Kit, don’t joke me! I am going distracted!”

He put his arm round her. “No, no, don’t go distracted, Mama! If the worst comes to the worst I can always take Evelyn’s place, can’t I?”