“No, no, do not speak to him!” Hero said. “He has done harm enough, and he shall not come near poor Ruth again! I have thought of a scheme that will answer delightfully! She shall go to Melton, and you will let her live in the little empty cottage by the west gate, Sherry, won’t you? And she will help Mrs Goring at the hunting-box, because you know how Mrs Goring told me when we were there that she could not come by a respectable girl to assist her — oh no, perhaps you do not, but it was so indeed!”
“Hang it, Kitten, she isn’t a respectable girl!” expostulated Sherry. “And if I know Mrs Goring — ”
“No, but only consider!” begged Hero. “You may buy her a wedding ring, and we will say that her husband is dead, and no one need know the truth, and she can be comfortable! He was killed at Waterloo! No one could wonder at that!”
“Killed at Waterloo?” interpolated Mr Ringwood.
“Very good notion,” approved Ferdy. A doubt shook him. “At least, I’m not very sure, now I come to think of it.”
It was apparent that both he and Mr Ringwood were bending their minds to mathematical calculation. Mr Ringwood was the first to reach a conclusion. “No,” he said. “June of last year, wasn’t it? That’s eighteen months ago.”
“I make it that, too,” said Ferdy, pleased to find himself in agreement with his friend. “Have to think of something else. Very happy to assist you. Dare say I shall hit upon a good notion.”
“Oh, we will say he died of some illness!” Hero decided. “There can be no difficulty! And Ruth was used to be a chambermaid in an inn, so she will know how to go on, Sherry. And if you should not object, I think we should give her what we give to Maria. I know it is a little expensive, but we must consider the baby, you know.”
Sherry was so much relieved to find that Hero had no wish to keep her unfortunate protégée permanently in the spare bedroom that he agreed to this plan, even going so far as to hand over, upon demand, a bill to defray the cost of suitable baby-clothes for the destitute infant. Hero thanked him warmly and went away to set Ruth’s mind at rest, leaving Sherry to congratulate himself on having brushed through the business better than had at one time seemed possible, Mr Ringwood to wrap himself in apparently profound thought, and Ferdy to devise an artistic death for the hypothetical husband.
Chapter Sixteen
SINCE HE WAS NOT A YOUNG GENTLEMAN WHO was much given to reflection, it did not occur to the Viscount that his next meeting with his friend Revesby need necessarily be attended by constraint. He had been a good deal shaken by the disagreeable light cast on Revesby’s character, and by the time he had had a slightly difficult interview with Ruth Wimborne (which was thrust upon him by his wife on the following morning) he had no doubt that her story was true in all its essential features. But he was ready to believe that there might be another side to the story, and had Sir Montagu offered him an alternative version he might have accepted it. But he did not see Sir Montagu for several days, and when they did encounter one another again, Sir Montagu made no reference to the affair. He was at his most urbane; the fracas might never have taken place. Sherry was nettled. He was a generous young man, and he had raised no demur at being called upon to provide for another man’s mistress and child, but when he found Revesby apparently forgetful of the whole episode the notion, first put into his head by his cousin Ferdy, that it was not right of the fellow to leave the baby on his hands, began to take strong possession of him.
It began to dawn upon him, too — not quite at once, but very soon — that whatever Revesby’s attitude had been, there must be considerable awkwardness in continued intimacy with a man whom one could not, under the circumstances, permit to approach one’s wife. Hero had asked him shyly not to invite Sir Montagu to Half Moon Street when she was expected to be present at the party; he had replied that she need have no fears on that score.
“And if he should ask me to stand up with him at Almack’s, Sherry, you won’t be offended with me if I excuse myself? For, indeed — ”
“Make yourself easy: he will not do so! You need do no more than bow to him, should you meet him at any time. It will be better you should do so, you know, for it would cause a deal of talk if you were to cut him. And mind this, Kitten! Not a word of this business to a soul!”
“No, I will not mention it,” she promised. “That is — he is paying particular attentions to Isabella, Sherry. Do you not think that I ought to warn her that he is not a proper person for her to know?”
“On no account in the world!” he said emphatically. “Isabella has her mother to keep an eye on her, and you may depend upon it Mrs Milborne has a very good notion of what Monty is! I wish to God you had a mother too!”
“Oh, but you keep an eye on me, Sherry, so it is of no consequence!” she assured him.
“Yes, it is,” he said. “I’m not a female, so how the deuce should I guess what you will be up to next? It is a thousand pities my own mother don’t take a fancy to you!”
So far from taking a fancy to her daughter-in-law, the dowager had been solacing herself for the past two months with the task of collecting and brooding over all the indiscretions committed by Hero which were known to the world at large. By some mysterious means she had contrived to discover her son’s predeliction for deep play at unsavoury gaming hells, and had actually put herself to the trouble of visiting Hero for the purpose of impressing upon her that such excesses had been unknown to poor Anthony before his marriage had wrecked his life. Hero was quite overpowered, but the dowager arose from the session much refreshed and went away to tell her sympathetic brother that if the worst came to the worst, at least she had told Hero what she thought of her behaviour. After that, and finding that her friends were disinclined to listen to a repetition of her troubles, she withdrew again to Sheringham Place, and the house in Grosvenor Square was once more swathed in holland covers.
Hero, meanwhile, having spent an enjoyable morning buying clothes for Ruth’s baby, greatly exasperated her husband by electing to escort this unfortunate young female down to Melton for the purpose of installing her in her new home, and making her known to the Gorings. So the Viscount, returning to his house in good time to accompany his wife to a dinner-party, was met by the pleasing intelligence that her ladyship had gone into the country with Mrs Wimborne, and would not be back until the following evening. It was apparent, from the hurried note Hero had left him, that she had forgotten all about the dinner-party; so the Viscount was obliged to create on the spot an aged relative on the distaff side of Hero’s family, to endow this mythical person with the feeblest of health, to lay her low upon her deathbed, and thus to account for his wife’s precipitate departure from town.
It was more than a week later before he met Sir Montagu under circumstances which permitted of private conversation, and Sir Montagu did not avail himself of the opportunity to take his young friend into his confidence. He had, instead, an amusing history to recount, and a successful day at the races to describe. Sherry, for once impervious to his charm, heard him with rising impatience, and presently broke in on his talk to say bluntly: “Yes, I dare say, but about that affair the other night, Monty — !”
Sir Montagu’s brows rose. “What affair, my dear boy?”
“Outside Almack’s of course! You know — ”
“Good heavens, Sherry, I had forgotten all about it!” said Sir Montagu, amused. “If the poor young female was not mad, which I am persuaded she must be, it is one of the oldest tricks in the world, my dear fellow! Only she made a bad choice in her victim: I am a little too experienced to be caught by such an imposture, believe me!”
“Doing it rather too brown, Monty!” said Sherry, with quite unaccustomed dryness.