So there it was — and, as she took her sideways glance at Fittleworth high up there in the air beside her, she was perfectly aware that she might be in for such a duel with him as had seldom yet fallen to her lot.
He had begun it by saying: “God damn it, Campion, ought Helen Lowther to be down there?” Then he had put it, as upon her, Sylvia’s information, that the cottage was in effect a disorderly house. But he had added: “If what you say is true?”
That of course was distinctly dangerous, for Fittleworth probably knew quite well that it had been at her, Sylvia’s instigation that Helen Lowther was down there. And he was letting her know that if it was at her instigation and if the house was really in her belief a brothel, his countess would be frightfully displeased. Frightfully!
Helen Lowther was of no particular importance, except to the Countess — and, of course, to Michael. She was one of those not unattractive Americans that drift over here and enjoy themselves with frightfully simple things. She liked visiting ruins and chattering about nothing in particular and galloping on the downs and talking to old servants and she liked the adoration of Michael. Probably she would have turned down the adoration of anyone older.
And the Countess liked to preserve the innocence of young American women. The Countess was fiftyish now and of a generation that preserved a certain stiffness along with a certain old-fashioned broadness of mind and outspokenness. She was of a class of American that had once seemed outrageously wealthy and who, if in the present stage of things they did not seem overwhelming, yet retained an aspect of impressive comfort and social authority and she moved in a set most of whose individuals, American, English, or even French, were of much the same class, at least by marriage, as herself. She tolerated — she even liked — Sylvia, but she might well get mad if from under her roof Helen Lowther, who was in her charge, should come into social contact with an irregular couple. You never knew when that point of view might not crop up in women of that date and class.
Sylvia, however, had chanced it. She had to — and in the end it could only be pulling the string of one more showerbath. It was a showerbath formidably charged — but that was her vocation in life and, if Campion had to lose India, she could always pursue her vocation in other countrysides. She was tired, but not as tired as all that!
So Sylvia had chanced saying that she supposed Helen Lowther could look after herself and had added a salacious quip to keep the speech in character. She knew nothing really of Helen Lowther’s husband, who was probably a lean man with some avocation in a rather dim West. But he could not be very impressionné or he would not let his attractive young wife roam for ever over Europe, alone.
His Lordship gave no further sign beyond repeating that if that fellow was the sort of fellow Mrs. Tietjens said he was, her Ladyship would properly curl his whiskers. And in face of that Sylvia simply had to make a concession to the extent of saying that she did not see why Helen Lowther could not visit a show cottage that was known, apparently, over half America. And perhaps buy some old sticks.
His Lordship removed his gaze from the distant hills and turned a long, cool, rather impertinent glance on her. He said:
“Ah, if it’s only that…” and nothing more. And, at that, she chanced it again:
“If,” she said slowly too, “you think Helen Lowther is in need of protection I don’t mind if I go down and look after her myself!”
The General, who had tried several interjections, now exclaimed:
“Surely you wouldn’t meet that fellow!”… And that rather spoilt it.
For Fittleworth could take the opportunity to leave her to do what he was at liberty to regard as the directions of her natural protector. Otherwise he must have said something to give away his attitude. So she had to give away more of her own with the words:
“Christopher is not down here. He has taken an aeroplane to York — to save Groby Great Tree. Your man Speeding saw him when he went to get your saddle. Getting into a plane.” She added: “But he’s too late. Mrs. de Bray Pape had a letter yesterday to say the tree had been cut down. At her orders!”
Fittleworth said: “Good God!” Nothing more!
The General regarded him as one fearing to be struck by lightning. Campion had already told her over and over again that Fittleworth would rage like a town bull at the bare idea that the tenant of a furnished house should interfere with its owner’s timber…. But Fittleworth merely continued to look away, communing with the handle of his crop. That called, Sylvia knew for another concession and she said:
“Now, Mrs. de Bray Pape has got cold feet. Horribly cold feet. That’s why she’s down there. She’s got the idea that Mark may have her put in prison!” She added further:
“She wanted to take my boy, Michael, with her to intercede. As the heir he has some right to a view!”
And from those speeches of hers Sylvia had the measure of her dread of that silent man. She was more tired than she thought and the idea of India more attractive.
At that point Fittleworth exclaimed:
“Damn it all, I’ve got to settle the hash of that fellow Gunning!”
He turned his horse’s head along the road and beckoned the General towards him with his crop-handle. The General gazed back at her appealingly, but Sylvia knew that she had to stop there and await Fittleworth’s verdict from the General’s lips. She wasn’t even to have any duel of sous-entendus with Fittleworth.
She clenched her fingers on her crop and looked towards Gunning…. If she was going to be asked by the Countess through old Campion to pack up, bag and baggage, and leave the house she would at least get what she could out of that fellow whom she had never yet managed to approach.
The horses of the General and Fittleworth, relieved to be out of the neighbourhood of Sylvia’s chestnut, minced friendlily along the road, the mare liking her companion.
“This fellow Gunning,” his Lordship began… He continued with great animation:
“About these gates… You are aware that my estate carpenter repairs….”
Those were the last words she heard and she imagined Fittleworth continuing for a long time about his bothering gates in order to put the General quite off his guard — and no doubt for the sake of manners. Then he would drop in some shot that would be terrible to the old General. He might even cross-question him as to facts, with sly, side questions, looking away over the country.
For that she cared very little. She did not pretend to be a historian: she entertained rather than instructed. And she had conceded enough to Fittleworth. Or perhaps it was to Cammie. Cammie was a great, fat, good-natured dark thing with pockets under her liquid eyes. But she had a will. And by telling Fittleworth that she had not incited Helen Lowther and the two others to make an incursion into the Tietjens’ household Sylvia was aware that she had made an important concession.
She hadn’t intended to weaken. It had happened. She had intended to chance conveying the idea that she wanted to worry Christopher and his companion into leaving that country.
The heavy man with the three horses approached slowly, with the air of a small army in the narrow road. He was grubby and unbuttoned, but he regarded her intently with eyes a little bloodshot. He said from a distance something that she did not altogether understand. It was about her chestnut. He was asking her to back that ’ere chestnut’s tail into the hedge. She was not used to being spoken to by the lower classes. She kept her horse along the road. In that way the fellow could not pass. She knew what was the matter. Her chestnut would lash out at Gunning’s charges if they got near its stern. In the hunting season it wore a large “K” on its tail.