It was perhaps fortunate that the entrance of Alice at this moment obliged Sylvester to swallow the retort that sprang to his lips. By the time she had withdrawn again he had realized (with far less incredulity than he would have felt a week earlier) that Miss Marlow was being deliberately provoking; and he merely said. “Though I may not be obliged to conciliate, you should reflect, ma’am, that it is otherwise with you! I rose at this unseasonable hour wholly on your behalf, but I might yet decide not to go to Newbury after all.”
“Oh, are you capricious as well?” asked Phoebe, raising eyes of innocent inquiry to his face.
“As well as what?” demanded Sylvester. He saw her lips part, and added hastily: “No, don’t tell me! I can hazard a tolerably accurate conjecture, I imagine!”
She laughed, and began to pour out the coffee. “I won’t say another word till you’ve come out of the sullens,” she promised.
Though strongly tempted to reply in kind, Sylvester decided, upon reflection, to hold his peace. Silence prevailed until, looking up from his plate a few minutes later, he found that she was watching him, with so much the air of a bird hopeful of crumbs that he burst out laughing, and exclaimed: “Oh, you—Sparrow! What an abominable girl you are!”
“Yes, I am afraid I am,” she said, quite seriously. “And nothing seems to cure me of saying things I ought not!”
“Perhaps you don’t try to overcome the fault?” he suggested, quizzing her.
“But, in general, I do try!” she assured him. “It is only when I am with persons such as you and Tom—I mean—”
“Ah, just so!” he interrupted. “When you are with persons whose opinions are of no particular consequence to you, you allow rein to your tongue?”
“Yes,” she agreed, pleased to find him of so ready an understanding. “That is the matter in a nutshell! Will you have some more bread-and-butter, sir?”
“No, thank you,” he responded. “I find I have quite lost my appetite.”
“It would be wonderful if you had not,” she said cheerfully. “Cooped up in the house as you have been all this while!
Will you set out for Newbury soon? I daresay it is foolish of me, but I can’t be easy! Whatever should I do if Mama were to arrive while you are gone?”
“Hide in the hay-loft!” he recommended. “But if she has a particle of commonsense she won’t make the smallest push to recover you!”
12
Having watched Sylvester depart, Phoebe sat down to play piquet with Tom. The sound of wheels outside made her once or twice look up apprehensively, but the approach of a ridden horse along the road caused her no alarm. She heard, but paid no heed; and so it was that Mr. Orde, walking into the room without ceremony, took her entirely by surprise. She gave a gasp, and dropped the cards she was holding. Tom turned his head, and exclaimed in dismay: “Father!”
The Squire, having surveyed the truants with the air of one who had known all along how it would be, shut the door, and said: “Ay! Now, what the devil do you mean by this, either of you?”
“It was my fault! Oh, pray don’t be vexed with Tom!” begged Phoebe.
“No, it was not!” asserted Tom. “It was mine, and I made a mull of it, and broke my leg!”
“Ay, so I know!” said his fond parent. “I may think myself fortunate you didn’t break your neck, I suppose. Young cawker! And what did my horses break?”
“No, no, only a strained hock!” Phoebe assured him. “And I have taken the greatest care—Oh, pray let me help you out of your coat, dear sir!”
“It’s no use trying to flummery me, girl!” said the Squire severely, but accepting her aid. “A pretty riot and rumpus you’ve caused, the pair of you! Let alone being the death of your father!”
“Oh, no!” cried Phoebe, blenching.
He relented, seeing that he had really frightened her, and patted her whitened cheek. “No, it ain’t as bad as that, but you know what he is when anything ails him!”
“Father, we were not eloping!” Tom interrupted.
The Squire threw him a glance of affectionate scorn. “A tinker’s budget, Tom: I never supposed you was. Perhaps you’ll tell me what the devil you were doing—besides driving my new curricle into the ditch, and smashing two of its wheels?”
“I was taking Phoebe to London, to her grandmother. She would have gone on the common stage if I had not, sir!”
“And indeed it wasn’t Tom’s fault that we ended in a ditch, sir!” interpolated Phoebe. “He was driving to an inch until we met that evil donkey!”
“Met a donkey, did you? Oh!” said the Squire. “Well, there was some excuse for you, if that was the case.”
“No, there wasn’t,” said Tom frankly. “I ought to have managed better, and I had rather I had broke both my legs than have let True strain his hock!”
“Well, well!” said his father, visibly mollified. “Thank the lord you didn’t! I’ll take a look at that hock presently. I was afraid I should find it to be a case of broken knees.”
“Mr. Orde,” Phoebe said anxiously, “pray tell me!—Does Papa know where I am?”
“Well, of course he does!” replied the Squire. “You couldn’t expect I wouldn’t tell him, now, could you?”
“Who told you, Father?” Tom demanded. “I collect it must have been Upsall, but I never saw him before in my life, and none of us disclosed my name to him! And Phoebe he didn’t set eyes on!”
But the news had come from the doctor, of course. He had not discovered the identity of his patient, but he knew who was the elegant young man who had commanded his attendance at the Blue Boar; and it was rather too much to expect of a humble country practitioner that he would refrain from letting it be known as widely as possible that he had lately been called by His Grace of Salford. The news had spread, in the mysterious country-fashion; and if, by the time it reached the Squire’s ears, it had become garbled almost out of recognition it still retained enough of the truth to convince that shrewd gentleman that the supposed scion of the house of Rayne, who had overturned some vehicle on the Bath Road, was none other than his own son.
No, he had not been much surprised. Reaching the Manor not many hours after Tom had left it, he had been met by a distracted helpmate, who poured horrifying tidings into his incredulous ears. But he hoped he knew Tom well enough to be sure he had not eloped. A pretty gudgeon he had thought Marlow, to be hoaxed by such a tale! He had assumed his heir to be well able to take care of himself, as the lord knew (with an ironical eyebrow cocked at Tom) he ought to have been! He had awaited events. The first of these had been the return of Marlow to Austerby with a bad chill, and no news of the fugitives. If her ladyship were to be believed, the chill had developed into a congestion of the lung: at all events, his lordship was feeling devilish sorry for himself, and no wonder, lying in a room so hot as to make him sweat like a gamecock. So far as the Squire had been able to discover, Phoebe had run away to escape a proposal from the Duke of Salford. Well, he had thought that an unlikely tale at the outset; and since he had ascertained that he had been right in thinking that it was on Tom’s behalf Salford had called in the sawbones he knew it for a Banbury story. And now he would be obliged to them if they would explain to him what the devil had made them go off in such a crackbrained style.
It was really very difficult to explain it to him; and not surprising that he should presently declare himself unable to make head or tail of the story. First, this Duke of Phoebe’s was a monster from whose advances she had been obliged to fly; next, he was transformed without cause into a charming fellow with whom she had been consorting on terms of amity for the best part of a se’enight.