He stared at her. “You do not mean to go, ma’am!”
“Of course I mean to go!” she replied impatiently. “How in the world do you think you could manage without me? You are quite unrelated to Emily; you cannot compel her to return with you! All that would happen, I dare swear, is that you and Gerard would be fighting it out, with the post-boys as seconds, and then there would be the devil to pay!”
He was too much surprised to hear such an expression on her lips to smile at the absurdity of the picture she conjured up. “But you will not ride,ma’am? You cannot have considered! They must be many miles ahead of us already! It would not do for you: you would be fatigued to death!”
“Mr Goring, have you ever hunted with the Cottesmore?” she demanded.
“No, ma’am, I have not, but—”
“Well, I have done so every year!” she said. “There is no country like it for long and fast runs. It is said to be the wildest and the roughest of the Shires, you know. So don’t waste solicitude on me, I beg of you! My mare was bred to stay, and she’s as fresh as she can stare. The only difficulty will be your mount.”
His sense of decorum, which was strong, was shocked by the thought of a lady’s setting out, quite unchaperoned, on a chase that might lead her many miles from Bath, but he attempted no further remonstrance. He was conscious of the same sensation which had more than once assailed Major Kirkby, of being swept along irresistibly by an impetuous, vigorous will, against which it was impossible to fight. It was plain to him that the Lady Serena was going to assume the control of the chase. He wondered whether she had considered the possibility of finding herself, at nightfall, out of reach of her home, unprovided with so much as a hairbrush, and escorted by a single gentleman, but he did not venture to put the question to her. He said instead: “I know where I may procure a good horse. Lady Serena.”
“Excellent! Then will you go now, and see what you can discover? Inform my groom, if you please, that my plans have been altered. I am going with Miss Laleham to join a picnic party, and since we do not set out immediately he must walk the mare a little, till I am ready for her.”
“You will not take him with you?” he suggested tentatively.
“No, certainly not: he would be a confounded nuisance, for ever trying to persuade me to turn back! I had rather have your escort Mr Goring!” she replied, with the flash of a smile.
He stammered that he would be honoured to serve her, and went away to obey her various commands.
Mrs Floore, who had been sitting limply on the sofa, listening to this exchange, a gleam of hope in her eyes, but the lines on her face deeply carven all at once, said, with an effort: “I ought not to let you go, my lady. I know I ought not. Whatever will Lady Spenborough say to me?”
Serena laughed. “Why, nothing, ma’am! I am going to write to her, and Fobbing shall take the letter to her. I must tell her what has taken me away, I am afraid, but you may rest assured the story is safe with her. May I write at your desk?”
“Oh, yes, my lady!” Mrs Floore answered mechanically. She sat plucking restlessly at a fold of her dressing-gown, and suddenly demanded: “What did he do to her? Why did he scare her out of her senses? Why did he want to offer for her, if he didn’t love her?”
“Exactly!” said Serena dryly. “An unanswerable question, is it not? I believe the truth is, ma’am, that he is more in love with her than she can as yet understand. She is very young—quite childish, in fact!—and not, I think, of a passionate disposition. It is otherwise with him, and that, unless I much mistake the matter, is what alarmed her. What can she have known of love, after all? A few discreet flirtations, the homage of a boy like Gerard, protestations, compliments, respectful hand-kissings! She would not get such tepid stuff from Rotherham! No doubt her shrinking provoked him! I can believe that he let her see that he is not a man to be trifled with, but as for giving her cause to fly from him, in this outrageous fashion, stuff and nonsense! Of course he should have guessed that it would be necessary to handle her at first with the greatest gentleness! It is unfortunate that he did not, but we may suppose that he has learnt his lesson. He has been careful to keep away from her: another mistake, but from what she has told me I collect he has allowed himself to be ruled in this by Lady Laleham. He would have done better to have visited Emily long since. She would not then have built up this ridiculous picture of him! However, if he is indeed coming here, he will very soon set matters to rights. He has only to show her tenderness, and she will wonder how she came to be such a goose.”
“There’s a great deal in what you say, my dear,” agreed Mrs Floore. “But it’s as plain as a pikestaff she don’t love him!”
“She loves no one else,” Serena replied. “It is not unusual, ma’am, for a bride to start with no more than liking.”
“Well, it don’t appear she likes him either!” said Mrs Floore, reviving a little. “What’s more, my dear, those ways may do very well for tonnish people, but they don’t do for me! If Emma don’t love him, she shan’t marry him!”
Serena looked up from the letter she was writing. “It would not be well for her to cry off, ma’am, believe me!”
“You did so!” Mrs Floore pointed out.
“Yes, I did,” agreed Serena, dipping the pen in the standish again.
Mrs Floore digested this. “Sukey and her dratted ambition!” she said, suddenly and bitterly, “You needn’t tell me, my dear! I know the world! You could cry off, and no one to say more than that you were rid of a bad bargain; but if Emma did it, there’d be plenty to say that, if the truth was known, it was him, and not her, that really did the crying off!”
“I did not say it was well for me either, ma’am,” Serena replied quietly.
Mrs Floore heaved a large sigh. “I don’t know what to do for the best, and that’s a fact! If you’re right, my lady, and Emma finds she likes him after all, I wouldn’t want to spoil her chances, because there’s no doubt she has got a fancy to be a Marchioness. At the same time—Well, one thing is certain, and that’s that I’m not letting the Marquis into the house until I have Emma safe and sound here again! The servants shall tell him she’s gone off for a picnic, and very likely won’t be home till late—Oh, lor’, whatever’s to be done if you and Ned don’t find them today? If they go putting up at a posting-house for the night, it’ll be no use finding them at all!”
“If I know Gerard,” retorted Serena, “he will insist on driving through the night, ma’am! He will wish to put as much ground as possible between himself and Rotherham—and with good reason! But if Mr Goring can discover the road they took, I have no doubt we shall catch them long before nightfall.”
Mr Goring returned to Beaufort Square just before twelve o’clock, and came running up the stairs, with a look of triumph on his face. Serena said, as soon as he entered the drawing-room: “You have found out where they went! My compliments, Mr Goring! You have been very much quicker than I had dared to hope.”
“It was just a piece of good luck,” he said, colouring. “I might as well have gone to half a dozen houses before hitting upon the right one. As it chanced, I got certain news at the second one I visited. There seems to be no doubt that it was Monksleigh who hired a post-chaise early this morning, and ordered it to be in Queen’s Square at ten o’clock. A yellow-bodied chaise, drawn by a single pair of horses.”
“Well, I must say!” exclaimed Mrs Floore indignantly. “If he had to make off with poor little Emma, he might have done it stylishly! One pair of horses only! I call it downright shabby!”