The Grand Sophy

Chapter 17

LADY OMBERSLEY and her daughters, driving soberly home from Richmond in the late afternoon, reached Berkeley Square to find Miss Wraxton awaiting their return. After affectionately embracing Lady Ombersley, she explained that she had ventured to sit down to wait for her, since she was the bearer of a message from her mama. Lady Ombersley, feeling a little anxious about Amabel, who was looking tired and had complained of a slight headache on the way home, answered absently, “Thank your mama so much, my dear. Amabel, come up to my dressing room, and I will bathe your forehead with vinegar! You will be better directly, my love!”

“Poor little dear!” said Miss Wraxton. “She looks sadly peaked still! You must know, ma’am, that we have put off our black gloves. Mama is desirous of holding a dress party in honor of the approaching event — quite a small affair, for so many people of consequence are out of town! But she would not for the world fix upon a day that will not suit your arrangements. You behold in me her envoy!”

“So kind of her!” murmured her ladyship. “We shall be most happy — any day that your mother likes to appoint. We have very few engagements at present! Excuse me, I must not stay! Amabel is not quite well yet, you know! Cecilia will arrange it with you. Say everything from me to your mama which is proper! Come, dearest!”

She led her youngest daughter to the stairs as she spoke, quite failing to perceive that Cecilia, to whom Dassett had silently handed Sophy’s note, was not attending to a word she said. Under the butler’s interested gaze, Cecilia, reading the letter in the blankest amazement, had turned alarmingly pale. She looked up as she reached the end, and started forward, her lips parted, as though she would have recalled her mother. She recollected herself in a moment and tried to be calm. But the hands with which she folded Sophy’s letter shook perceptibly, and her whole appearance was that of one who had sustained a severe shock. Miss Wraxton observed it and moved toward her, saying solicitously, “You are not quite well, I am afraid! You have not received bad news?”

Dassett, whose fingers had itched to break open the wafer that sealed Sophy’s letter, coughed, and said disinterestedly, “Will Miss Stanton-Lacy be returning to town this evening, miss? Her abigail is in quite a taking, miss, not having had any notion that miss was going into the country.”

Cecilia looked at him in rather a dazed way, but pulled herself together sufficiently to reply with tolerable composure, “Yes, I think so. Oh, yes, certainly she will come back tonight!”

If this answer failed to gratify Dassett’s thirst for knowledge, it at least made Miss Wraxton prick up her ears. Taking Cecilia’s arm, she led her toward the library, saying in her well-modulated voice, “The drive has fatigued you. Be so good, Dassett, as to bring a glass of water to the library, and some smelling salts! Miss Rivenhall is feeling a trifle faint.”

Cecilia, whose constitution was not strong, was indeed feeling faint, and could only be grateful when obliged to lie down upon the sofa in the library. Miss Wraxton deftly removed her pretty bonnet and began to chafe her hands, abstracting from one of them the note which Cecilia was feebly clutching. Dassett soon came in with the desired requirements, which Miss Wraxton took from him with a calm word of thanks and of dismissal. The faintness, which had only been momentary, was already passing off, and Cecilia was able to sit up, to sip the water, and to refresh herself with a few sniffs at the pungent smelling bottle. Miss Wraxton, meanwhile, in the most assured manner possible, had picked up Sophy’s letter, and was making herself mistress of its contents.

“You wondered, dearest Cecy, why, at the last, I would not accompany you to Richmond. Let this note be my explanation! I have thought long over the unfortunate situation in which you are placed, and I see only one way to put an end to the distress you have been made to suffer through my uncle’s implacable determination to see you married to C. I believe him to have been strengthened in this resolve by C. himself, but I will not pain you by writing more on this subject. Were C. removed I cannot but believe that my uncle must soon relent toward F.

“Charles will tell you that we have quarreled. While the original fault I must own to have been mine, his manner to me, the language he held — so violent, so uncontrolled! — make it impossible for me to remain any longer under this roof. I am removing immediately to Lacy Manor and have prevailed upon C. to be my escort. Trust me to make it impossible for him to leave Lacy Manor tonight! He is a gentleman, and although his heart can never be mine, his hand I am persuaded he must offer me, and you may be easy at last.

“Do not fear for me! You are aware of my wish to establish myself, and although my affections are no more engaged than C.’s, and I must shrink from the means his indifference forces me to employ, I daresay we shall contrive to rub along tolerably together. If I can be of assistance to you in this way, my dearest Cousin, I shall have my reward. Ever your devoted Sophy.”

“Good God!” exclaimed Miss Wraxton, startled out of her calm. “Is this possible? Bad though I have thought her conduct, I would not have believed that she could have gone to such lengths as this! Unhappy girl! There is not a word of contrition! No breath of shame! My poor Cecilia, I do not wonder that you should find yourself overcome! You have been wretchedly deceived!”

“Oh, what are you about?” Cecilia cried, starting up. “Eugenia, you had no right to read my letter! Give it to me at once, if you please, and never dare to mention its contents to a living soul!”

Miss Wraxton handed it to her, but said, “Rather than have me summon Lady Ombersley to you I thought you would prefer that I should discover what had so much upset you. As for not mentioning the contents, I imagine this news must be all over London by tomorrow! I do not know when I have been so much shocked!”

“All over London! No, that it shall not be!” Cecilia said vehemently. “Sophy — Charlbury! It cannot, must not be! I shall set out for Ashtead immediately. How could she do such a thing? How could she? It is all her goodness — her wish to help me, but how dare she go off with Charlbury?” She tried to read the letter again, but crumpled it in her hand, shuddering. “A quarrel with Charles! Oh, but she must know he does not mean the things he says when he is in a rage! She does know it! He shall go with me to fetch her home! Where is he? Someone must go at once to White’s!”

Miss Wraxton, who had been thinking, laid a detaining hand on her arm. “Pray calm yourself, Cecilia! Consider a little! If your unfortunate cousin has quarreled so bitterly with Charles, very likely his going could only do more harm than good. I believe you are right in this, however, that it will not do to let matters take their course. The scandal that must result would be such as none of us could contemplate without revulsion. I dread the effect it may have upon dear Lady Ombersley above everything. The wretched girl must be rescued from herself!”

“And Charlbury!” Cecilia interjected, wringing her hands. “It is all my folly! I must set out at once!”

“You shall do so, and I will go with you,” said Miss Wraxton nobly. “Only permit me sufficient time, while you order your papa’s chaise to be got ready, to write a note for my mother. I daresay one of the servants would carry it round to Brook Street for me. I shall inform her merely that I have been persuaded to pass the evening with you here, and she will not find it remarkable.”

“You?” exclaimed Cecilia, staring at her. “Oh, no, no! I mean, it is excessively kind in you, dear Eugenia, but I had rather you did not come!”

“You will scarcely go alone,” Miss Wraxton reminded her.

“Sophy’s maid shall accompany me. I beg of you, do not let a word of this pass your lips!”

“My dear Cecilia, surely you will not admit a servant into your confidence? As well tell the town crier! If you will not accept my company, I must think myself obliged to divulge the whole to Lady Ombersley. I consider it my duty to go with you, and I am persuaded it is what Charles would desire me to do. My being at Lacy Manor must lend propriety to the whole, for an engaged woman, you know, stands upon a different footing from an unattached girl.”

“Oh, I do not know what to say! I wish to heaven you had never set eyes on Sophy’s letter!”

“I think it may be as well for all of us that I did set eyes on it,” replied Miss Wraxton, with a smile. “You are scarcely in a fit state, dear Cecilia, to conduct this delicate affair with any degree of composure, let me tell you. Which is it to be? Shall I go with you, or do you prefer me to lay the whole before your mama!”

“Very well, come, then!” Cecilia said, almost pettishly. “Though why you should wish to, when I know very well that you dislike Sophy amazingly, I am at a loss to understand!”

“Whatever my sentiments toward your cousin may be,” pronounced Miss Wraxton, looking quite saintly, “I trust that I may never forget my duty as a Christian.”

The ready color flooded Cecilia’s cheeks. She was a gentle girl, but this speech made her so cross that she said waspishly. “Well, I daresay Sophy will contrive to make you look foolish, because she always does, and it will serve you right, Eugenia, for meddling in what does not concern you!”

But Miss Wraxton, knowing that her hour of triumph had arrived, merely smiled in an irritating way, and recommended her to think what would be best to say to her mama.

Cecilia replied with dignity that she knew just what she should say, and moved toward the door. Before she had reached it, it was opened, and Dassett came in again, this time to inform her that Lord Bromford had called and desired the favor of a word with her.

“You should have denied me!” Cecilia said. “I cannot see Lord Bromford now!”

“No, miss,” said Dassett. “But his lordship seems quite set on seeing either you, or her ladyship, miss, and her ladyship is with Miss Amabel, and does not wish to be disturbed.” He gave his deprecating cough. “I should perhaps mention that his lordship, knowing that Miss Sophy has gone out of town, is extremely wishful to learn of her direction.”

“Who told him that Miss Sophy is gone out of town?” Cecilia said sharply.

“That I could not take it upon myself to say, miss. Not having received any orders to the contrary, I did not consider it my place to deny the fact, when his lordship condescended to inquire of me if it was true.”

Cecilia cast rather a helpless glance at Miss Wraxton, who at once took the conduct of affairs into her capable hands.

“Pray desire his lordship to step into this room!” she said.

Dassett bowed and withdrew.

“Eugenia! Take care what you are about! What do you mean to say to him?”

Miss Wraxton replied gravely, “That must depend upon circumstance. We do not know how much he is aware of, and we ought not to forget that he has as much interest in your cousin as any of us.”

“No such thing!” Cecilia said. “Sophy would never marry him!”

“She has certainly shown herself unworthy of his devotion. I hope she may not have cause to be thankful to marry any respectable man who offers for her.”

Since Lord Bromford was ushered into the room at that moment, Cecilia was spared the necessity of answering her.

His lordship was looking extremely anxious, but no anxiety could suffice to make him abate the formality of his greetings. These were performed with great punctilio, nor did he forget to make civil inquiry after the state of Amabel’s health. He then begged pardon for importuning Miss Rivenhall to grant him an audience, and, after only a little circumlocution, came to the point of his visit. He had seen Miss Stanton-Lacy driving along Piccadilly in a hack chaise and four, Lord Charlbury beside her, and baggage tied on behind the chaise.

“My cousin has been called suddenly out of town,” said Cecilia, in a cool tone that might have been expected to have damped pretension.

“With only that fellow for her companion!” he exclaimed, very much shocked. “Besides — and this is a circumstance which makes it appear the more extraordinary — I was engaged to drive out with her this afternoon!”

“She had forgotten,” Cecilia said. “She will be so sorry! You must forgive her.”

He regarded her intently for a moment, and what he saw in her face caused him to turn toward her companion., and to say earnestly, “Miss Wraxton, I appeal to you! It is useless to tell me that Miss Stanton-Lacy has not left London clandestinely! How should Rivenhall have permitted her to go off in such a fashion? Pardon me, but Charlbury’s attentions — marked, you will agree, beyond the bounds of propriety — have given rise to the most dreadful suspicions in my mind. It cannot be unknown to you that I have an interest there myself! I had flattered myself that upon Sir Horace Stanton-Lacy’s return to England — But this sudden departure — baggage strapped on behind, too!” He stopped, apparently overcome.

Miss Wraxton said smoothly, “Miss Stanton-Lacy is at all times impatient of convention. She has driven down to her home at Ashtead, but I am confident that the persuasions of Miss Rivenhall and myself must weigh with her, and she will return to London with us tonight. We are about to set forth for Ashtead immediately.”

He seemed to be much struck, and said at once, “This is like you! I understand you, I believe! I have known that fellow for a libertine these many weeks! Depend upon it; he has quite taken her in! Does Rivenhall accompany you?”

“We go alone,” Miss Wraxton said, “You have guessed the truth and will readily appreciate that our endeavors now must be fixed on keeping this unhappy event from the ears of the world.”

“Yes, indeed!” he said eagerly. “But it is not to be thought of that two delicately nurtured females should undertake such a mission, unsupported by the firmness of a man! I think I should escort you. I think it is what I should do. I shall call Charlbury to book. His conduct in this affair has shown me what he is. He has grossly deceived Miss Stanton-Lacy, and shall answer for it!”

An indignant protest rose to Cecilia’s lips, but Miss Wraxton intervened swiftly, to say, “Your sentiments do you honor, and, for my own part, I must say that I shall be grateful to you for the protection of your escort. Only the most stringent necessity could prevail upon me to undertake such a mission, without the support of a responsible gentleman!”

“I will have my horse saddled at once!” he announced, in a voice of stern resolution. “I can tell you, it will be wonderful if I do not call Charlbury out! I am not, in general, an advocate of the barbarous custom of dueling, but circumstances, you know, alter cases, and such conduct must not go unpunished! I will be off home on the instant and shall be with you again in the least time possible!”

He barely stayed to grasp both their hands before hurrying from the room. Cecilia, fairly weeping with annoyance, began to upbraid Miss Wraxton, but this lady, losing not a jot of her self-possession, replied, “It was unfortunate that he should have been aware of Miss Stanton-Lacy’s elopement, perhaps, but it could do no good to leave that suspicion in his mind. I own, the presence of a man of sense will be a comfort to me, and if, my dear Cecilia, his chivalrous nature should prompt him to renew his offer for your cousin’s hand, it would be a solution to all our difficulties, and, I must add, a great deal more than she deserves!”

“That prosy bore!” Cecilia exclaimed.

“I am aware that Lord Bromford’s merits have consistently been undervalued in this house. For my part, I have found him a sensible man, feeling just as he ought upon serious subjects, and having a great deal of interesting information to impart to those who are not too frivolous to attend to him.”

Unable to control her swelling emotions, Cecilia ran out of the room, more than half inclined to take her mother fully into her confidence.

But Lady Ombersley, finding that Amabel’s pulse was too rapid, was so wholly absorbed in the sufferer as to have little attention to spare for anyone else. Knowing the delicate state of her parent’s nerves, Cecilia forbore to add to her anxieties. She told her merely that a message from Lacy Manor had taken Sophy posthaste into Surrey, but that since she felt it to be unfitting for her cousin to remain in a deserted house alone, she was setting out, either to bear her company or to persuade her to return to London. Upon Lady Ombersley’s showing some astonishment, she divulged that Sophy had quarreled with Charles. This distressed Lady Ombersley but scarcely surprised her. Too well did she know her son’s bitter tongue! She would not have had such a thing happen for the world, and must, she said, have gone after Sophy herself had not Amabel seemed so unwell. She did not like to think of her daughter’s traveling alone, but upon hearing of Miss Wraxton’s resolve to go with her was able to be tranquil again, and to give her permission for the journey.

Meanwhile, Miss Wraxton, busily writing in the library, was unable to resist the temptation of inscribing a note to her betrothed as well as to her mama. Now, at last, Charles should be brought to acknowledge the moral turpitude of his cousin, and her own magnanimity! She gave both notes to Dassett with instructions for their immediate delivery, and was presently able to climb into the Ombersley traveling chaise in the happy consciousness of having punctiliously performed her duty. Not even Cecilia’s pettishness had the power to allay her self-satisfaction. Never had Cecilia shown herself so out of temper! She replied to her companion’s moralizings with the briefest of monosyllables, and was even so unfeeling, when the rain began to fall, as to refuse point-blank to have the third seat in the chaise pulled out to accommodate Lord Bromford, riding unhappily behind the vehicle, with his coat collar turned up and an expression on his face of the most acute misery. Miss Wraxton represented to her the propriety of desiring one of the outriders to lead his lordship’s horse, while his lordship traveled in comfort within the chaise; but all Cecilia could find to say was that she hoped the odious man would contract an inflammation of the lungs and die of it.

Scarcely an hour later, Dassett was as nearly put out of countenance as it was possible for a person of his dignity and experience to be by the arrival in Berkeley Square of a second post chaise. This, also a hack vehicle, was drawn by four sweating horses, and was caked in mud up to the axles. A number of trunks and portmanteaus were piled on the back, and on the roof. A soberly dressed individual first jumped down and ran up the steps of the Ombersley mansion to set the bell pealing. By the time the door had been opened by a footman, and Dassett stood ready to receive guests upon the threshold, a much larger figure had descended in a leisurely way from the chaise, and, after tossing a couple of guineas to the postilions, and exchanging a jovial word with them, trod unhurriedly up the steps to the door.

Dassett, who afterward described his condition to the housekeeper as fairly flummoxed, found himself unable to do more than stammer, “G — good evening, sir! We — we were not expecting you, sir!”

“Wasn’t expecting myself,” said Sir Horace, stripping off his gloves. “Devilish good voyage! Not a day above two months at sea! Tell your people to see all that lumber of mine carried into the house! Her ladyship well?”

Dassett, helping him to struggle out of his caped greatcoat, said that her ladyship was as well as could be looked for.

“That’s good,” said Sir Horace, walking over to a large mirror, and bestowing an expert touch or two upon his cravat. “How’s my daughter?”

“I — I believe Miss Sophy to be enjoying excellent health, sir!”

“Ay, she always does. Where is she?”

“I regret to inform you, sir, that Miss Sophy has gone out of town,” replied Dassett, who would have been pleased to have discussed the mystery of Sophy’s disappearance with almost anyone else.

“Oh? Well, I’ll see her ladyship,” said Sir Horace, displaying, in the butler’s opinion, an unnatural want of interest in his only child’s whereabouts.

Dassett took him up to the drawing room and left him there while he went in search of her ladyship’s maid. Amabel having just dropped off to sleep it was not many minutes before Lady Ombersley came hurrying into the drawing room and almost cast herself upon her brother’s manly bosom. “Oh, my dear Horace!” she exclaimed. “How glad I am to see you! How sorry to think — But you are safely home!”

“Well there’s no need for you to ruin my necktie, just because of that, Lizzie!” said her undemonstrative relative, disengaging himself from her embrace. “Never been in any danger that I knew of! You don’t look very stout! In fact, you look quite knocked out! What’s amiss? If it’s stomach trouble, I knew a fellow once, ten times worse than ever you were, who got himself cured by magnetism and warm ale. Fact!”

Lady Ombersley made haste to assure him that if she looked knocked out it was only through anxiety and began at once to tell him about Amabel’s illness, dwelling fondly on Sophy’s goodness through this trying period.

“Oh, Sophy’s a capital nurse!” he said. “How do you go on with her? Where is the girl?”

This question flustered Lady Ombersley quite as much as it had flustered Dassett. She faltered that Sophy would be so sorry! If only she had guessed that her papa was on his way to London she would surely not have gone!

“Yes, Dassett said she was gone out of town,” responded Sir Horace, disposing his large limbs in an easy chair and crossing one shapely leg over the other. “Never expected to find any of you here at this season, but, of course, if one of the children is ill, that explains it. Where’s Sophy gone to?”

“I think — I was busy with Amabel when Cecilia told me, but I think she said that dearest Sophy had gone down to Lacy Manor!”

He looked surprised. “What the deuce should take her there? The place ain’t fit to live in! Don’t tell me Sophy’s putting it to rights, because I’m by no means sure — However, never mind that!”

“No, no, I don’t think she had any such idea! At least — Oh, Horace, I don’t know what you will say to me, but I very much fear that Sophy has run away from us because of something that happened today!”

“Shouldn’t think so at all,” said Sir Horace coolly. “Not like my little Sophy to enact you a Cheltenham tragedy. What did happen?”

“I do not properly understand it. I was not here! But Cecilia seemed to think that — that Sophy and Charles had fallen out! Of course, I know he has a dreadful temper, but I am persuaded he cannot have meant — And Sophy has never before taken the least notice when he — Because it is not the first time they have quarreled!”

“Well, don’t put yourself in a taking, Lizzie,” recommended Sir Horace, maintaining his placidity without effort. “Fallen out with Charles, eh? Well, I thought she would. Daresay it will do him good. How’s Ombersley?”

“Really, Horace!” said his sister indignantly. “One would suppose you not to have a scrap of affection for dear Sophy!”

“You’re out there, old lady, for I’m devilish fond of her,” he returned. “That don’t mean I’m going to make a cake of myself over her tricks, though. Daresay she wouldn’t thank me for meddling. You may depend upon it she’s up to some mischief!”

As Dassett came in at this moment, with suitable refreshment for the traveler, the conversation had to be suspended. When he had withdrawn, Lady Ombersley resumed it, saying, “At least I am able to assure you that you will see Sophy tonight, for Cecilia has gone with Miss Wraxton to bring her back!”

“Who’s Miss Wraxton?” enquired Sir Horace, pouring himself out a glass of Madeira.

“If you ever listened to a word anyone says to you, Horace, you would know that Miss Wraxton is the lady Charles is about to marry!”

“Well, why didn’t you say so?” said Sir Horace, sipping his wine. “Can’t expect me to carry a lot of names in my head! I remember now, though; girl you said was a dead bore.”

“I never said any such thing!” retorted Lady Ombersley. “To be sure, I cannot quite like — But it was you who said she sounded to you like a dead bore!”

“If I said it, you may depend upon it I was right. Quite a tolerable wine, this. Now I come to think of it, you told me Cecilia was in a way to be married too — Charlbury, ain’t it?”

Lady Ombersley sighed. “Alas, it went off! Cecilia could not be brought to accept him. And now Charles has ceased to object so very much to Augustus Fawnhope, and although Ombersley says he will never countenance it, I daresay he will. You may as well know, Horace, that Lord Charlbury has been showing Sophy a great deal of most distinguishing attention.”

“Has he, by Jupiter?”

They were interrupted by the sound of an impatient step on the stair, to be followed an instant later by the hasty entrance into the room of Mr. Rivenhall, who held an open sheet of letter paper in one hand and had not stayed even to divest himself of his driving coat before dashing upstairs in search of his mother.

Mr. Rivenhall was looking extremely forbidding and also a little pale. After stabling the chestnut that afternoon, he had first gone off to Bond Street to work off some of his fury in a sparring bout with Gentleman Jackson and had then repaired to White’s, where he had spent an hour playing billiards and fighting an impulse to go back to Berkeley Square to tell his provoking cousin that he had not meant a word of it. It was when he left the billiard room that he encountered his friend Mr. Wychbold. Mr. Wychbold, obedient to his orders, asked him whither Miss Stanton-Lacy was bound, and upon his replying curtly, “Nowhere, to my knowledge,” said, not without an inward qualm, “Yes, she is, dear boy! Saw her driving off in a post chaise and four. What’s more, she had Charlbury with her.”

Mr. Rivenhall stared at him. “Driving off in a post chaise and four? You are certainly mistaken!”

“Couldn’t have been!” said Mr. Wychbold, sustaining his role manfully.

“Foxed, then. My cousin is at home!” He added, as his friend seemed inclined to argue the matter, “What’s more, Cyprian, I’ll thank you not to spread such a tale about the town!”

“On, no, shouldn’t dream of doing so!” Mr. Wychbold made haste to assure him.

Mr. Rivenhall then went off to the subscription room, with the intention of playing a rubber or two of whist. The tables were all made up, and it was while he stood watching the play of a hand, his eyes on the cards and his mind dwelling obstinately and uneasily on Mr. Wychbold’s ridiculous delusion, that Miss Wraxton’s note was brought to him. The perusal of it had the effect of instantly killing any desire to play whist and of sending him off to Berkeley Square without one word of excuse to those who had invited him to take part in the next rubber. He let himself into the house, found Sophy’s letter to him laid upon the table in the hall, read it, and straightway went up the stairs two at a time in search of Lady Ombersley.

“Perhaps, Mama, you may be able to explain to me — ” he began to say, in a furious voice, and then broke off short, perceiving that she was not alone. “I beg your pardon! I did not know — ” Again he broke off, as Sir Horace raised his quizzing-glass, the better to observe him. “Oh!” he said, a wealth of sinister meaning in his voice. “So it’s you, is it, sir? Famous! You could not have come at a better moment!”

Shocked at the most unrespectful tone he had adopted, Lady Ombersley ventured on a feeble protest. “Charles! Pray — !”

He paid no heed to her but strode forward into the room. “You will no doubt like to know, sir, that your precious daughter has gone off with Everard Charlbury!” he announced.

“Has she?” said Sir Horace. “What has she done that for, I wonder? I’ve no objection to her marrying Charlbury! Good family, handsome property!”

“She did it,” said Mr. Rivenhall, “to infuriate me! And as for her marrying Charlbury, she will do no such thing!”

“Oh, won’t she?” said Sir Horace, keeping his glass leveled on his nephew’s face. “Who says so?”

“I say so!” snapped Mr. Rivenhall. “What is more, she has not the smallest intention of such a thing! If you do not know your daughter, I do!”

Lady Ombersley, who had listened in speechless dismay to this interchange, now found enough voice to say faintly, “No, no, she would not run away with Charlbury! You must be mistaken! Alas, Charles, I fear this is your doing! You must have been dreadfully unkind to poor Sophy!”

“Oh, dreadfully unkind, ma’am! I actually had the brutality to take exception to her stealing the young chestnut from my stables, and, without one word to me, driving him in the Park! That she is not lying with a broken neck at this moment is no fault of hers!”

“Now, that,” said Sir Horace fair-mindedly, “was wrong of her! In fact, I’m surprised to hear of her behaving so improperly, for it is not at all like her. What should have got into her to make her do such a thing?”

“Merely her damnable desire to pick a quarrel with me!” said Mr. Rivenhall bitterly. “I see it all now, clearly enough, and if she is not careful she will find she had succeeded better than she bargained for!”

“I am afraid, my boy,” said his uncle, an irrepressible twinkle in his eye, “that you do not like my little Sophy!”

“Your little Sophy, sir, has not allowed me — us! — one moment’s peace or comfort since she descended upon this house!” said Mr. Rivenhall roundly.

“Charles, you shall not say so!” cried his mother, flushing. “It is unjust! How can you — how can you, when you recall her goodness, her devotion — !” Her voice failed; she groped blindly for her handkerchief.

The color rose also to Mr. Rivenhall’s cheeks. “I do not forget that, ma’am. But this exploit — !”

“I cannot think where you can have had such a notion! It is untrue! Sophy went away because of the intemperate language you used toward her, and as for imagining that Charlbury was with her — ”

“I know he was with her!” he interrupted. “If I needed proof, I have it in this note she was so obliging as to leave for me! She makes no secret of it!”

“In that case,” said Sir Horace, refilling his glass, “she is certainly up to some mischief. Try this Madeira, my boy. I’ll say this for your father, he’s a capital judge of a wine!”

“But, Charles, this is terrible!” gasped Lady Ombersley. “Thank heaven I did not forbid Cecilia to go after her! Only think what a scandal! Oh, Horace, pray believe I had no suspicion!”

“Lord, I’m not blaming you, Elizabeth! I told you not to let Sophy worry you! Well able to take care of herself; always was!”

“I declare, Horace, you pass all bounds! Is it nothing to you that your daughter is in a fair way to ruining herself?”

“Ruining herself!” said Mr. Rivenhall contemptuously. “Do you indeed believe in such a fairy tale, ma’am? Have you lived with my cousin for six months without getting her measure? If that Spanish woman is not also at Lacy Manor at this moment I give you leave to call me a blockhead!”

“Oh, Charles, I pray you may be right!”

Sir Horace began to polish his eyeglass with considerable assiduity. “Sancia, eh? I was meaning to speak to you about her, Lizzie. Is she still at Merton?”

“Pray, where else should she be, Horace?”

“I just wondered,” he said, studying the result of his labors. “I daresay Sophy may have told you of my intentions in that direction.”

“Of course she did, and I paid her a visit, as I suppose you must have wished me to do! But I must say, my dear Horace, that I cannot conceive what should possess you to offer for her!”

“That’s the trouble,” he replied. “One gets carried away, Lizzie! And there’s no denying she’s a devilish fine woman. In fact, it wouldn’t have surprised me to have heard she had someone else dangling after her. Pity I settled her out at Merton! But there it is! One does these things on the spur of the moment, and it is not until one has had leisure to reflect — However, I don’t mean to complain!”

“Plenty of beauties in Brazil, sir?” inquired his nephew sardonically.

“I don’t want any of your impudence, my boy,” said Sir Horace genially. “Fact of the matter is, I doubt if I’m a marrying man!”

“Well, if it’s any consolation to you,” said Mr. Rivenhall, “you may know that my cousin has been doing her possible to hold Talgarth off from the Marquesa!”

“Now, why the devil,” demanded Sir Horace, roused to irritability, “must Sophy meddle? Talgarth, eh? Didn’t know he was in England! Well, well! He has a great deal of address, has Vincent, and, what’s more, I’ll wager he has an eye to Sancia’s fortune!”

Lady Ombersley, quite affronted, broke in on this, exclaiming, “I think you are quite shameless! And what has all this to do with poor Sophy’s escapade? You sit there, as though you had no concern in her affairs, while all the time she is trying to ruin herself! And you may say what you choose, Charles, but if it is true that she has gone off with Charlbury, it is the most shocking thing imaginable, and she must be brought back at once!”

“She will be!” said Mr. Rivenhall. “Can you doubt it, when you have sent off Cecilia and Eugenia, in the highest style of romance, to rescue her, ma’am?”

“I did no such thing! I knew nothing of this, but naturally I would not let your sister go alone, so when she told me that Eugenia had been kind enough to offer to accompany her, what could I do but be grateful?” She paused, struck by an unexplained circumstance. “But how do you know that they went to rescue her, Charles? If Dassett is so lost to all sense of his position as to gossip to you — ”

“No such thing! I am indebted to Eugenia herself for my information! And I must take leave to say, ma’am, that if you and my sister had been so obliging as to have kept this news to yourselves, I might have been spared a damned impertinent letter from Eugenia! What can have possessed you to have confided such a tale to her is something I can never cease to marvel at! Good God, don’t you know that she will spread it all over town that my cousin has behaved outrageously?”

“But I did not!” almost wailed his mother. “Charles, I did not!”

“One of you must have done so!” he said impatiently. He turned to his uncle. “Well, sir, do you mean to remain there, commending my father’s taste in wine, or do you mean to accompany me to Ashtead?”

“Set off for Ashtead at this hour, when I have been traveling for two days?” said Sir Horace. “Now, do, my boy, have a little common sense! Why should I?”

“I imagine that your parental feeling, sir, must provide you with the answer! If it does not, so be it! I am leaving immediately!”

“What do you mean to do when you reach Lacy Manor?” asked Sir Horace, regarding him in some amusement.

“Wring Sophy’s neck!” said Mr. Rivenhall savagely.

“Well, you don’t need my help for that, my dear boy!” said Sir Horace, settling himself more comfortably in his chair.