“Reeth, what the devil are you doing here?” demanded Sylvester, as though he had only just become aware of him. “Good God, you don’t mean to say my mother is here?”
“In her own sitting-room, your grace, waiting for you to come in,” beamed Reeth. “And stood the journey very well, I am happy to be able to assure your grace.”
“I’ll go to her at once!” Sylvester said, walking quickly to the great stair.
She was alone, seated on one side of the fireplace. She looked up as Sylvester came in, and smiled mischievously.
“Mama!”
“Sylvester! Now, I won’t be scolded! You are to tell me that you are delighted to find me here, if you please!”
“I don’t have to tell you that,” he said, bending over her. “But to have set out without me—! I ought never to have written to tell you what had happened! I did so only because I was afraid you might hear of it from some other source. My dear, have you been so anxious?”
“Not a bit! I knew you would bring him back safely. But it was a little too much to expect me to stay at Chance when such stirring events were taking place in London. Now, sit down and tell me all about it! Edmund’s confidences have given rise to the wildest conjectures in my mind, and that delightful boy you have brought home with you thinks that perhaps I shall like to hear the story better from your lips. My dear, who is he?”
He had turned aside to pull forward a chair, and as he seated himself the Duchess saw him for the first time in the full light of the candles burning near her chair. Like Reeth, she suffered a shock; like Reeth, she recognized the look on Sylvester’s face. He had worn it for many months after Harry’s death; and she had prayed she might never see it again. She was obliged to clasp her hands together in her lap, so urgent was her impulse to stretch them out to him.
“Thomas Orde,” he replied, smiling, as it seemed to her, with an effort. “A nice lad, isn’t he? I’ve invited him to stay here for as long as he cares to: his father thinks it time he acquired a little town bronze.” He hesitated, and then said:
“I daresay he may have told you—or Edmund has—that he is a friend of Miss Marlow’s. An adopted brother, as it were.”
“Oh, Edmund was very full of Tom and Phoebe! But how they came to be mixed up in that imbroglio I can’t imagine! Phoebe seems to have been very kind to Edmund.”
“Most kind. It is rather a long story, Mama.”
“And you are tired, and would rather tell it to me presently. I won’t tease you, then. But tell me about Phoebe! You know I have a particular interest in her. To own the truth, it was to see her that I came to London.”
He looked up quickly. “To see her? I don’t understand, Mama! Why should you—?”
“Well, Louisa wrote to tell me that everyone believed her to be the author of that absurd novel, and that she was having a very unhappy time, poor child. I hoped I might be able to put a stop to such nonsense, but I reached London only to discover that Lady Ingham had taken her to Paris. I can’t think why she shouldn’t have written to me, for she must have known I would help Verena’s daughter.”
“It’s too late!” he said, “I could have scotched the scandal! Instead—” He broke off, and looked keenly at her. “I can’t recall. Was my busy aunt Louisa at the Castlereaghs’ ball?”
“Yes, dearest.”
“I see.” He got up jerkily, and moved to the fireplace, standing with his head turned a little away from the Duchess. “I am sure she told you what happened there.”
“An unfortunate affair,” said the Duchess calmly. “You were naturally very angry.”
“There was no excuse for what I did. I knew her dread of—I can see her face now!”
“What is she like, Sylvester?” She waited, and then prompted: “Is she pretty?”
He shook his head. “No. Not a beauty, Mama. When she is animated, I believe you would consider her taking.”
“I collect, from all I have heard, that she is unusual?”
“Oh, yes, she’s unusual!” he said bitterly. “She blurts out whatever may come into her head; she tumbles from one outrageous escapade into another; she’s happier grooming horses and hobnobbing with stable-hands than going to parties; she’s impertinent; you daren’t catch her eye for fear she should start to giggle; she hasn’t any accomplishments; I never saw anyone with less dignity; she’s abominable, and damnably hot at hand, frank to a fault, and—a darling!”
“Should I like her, Sylvester?” said the Duchess her eyes on his profile.
“I don’t know,” he said, a suggestion of impatience in his voice. “I daresay—I hope so—but you might not. How can I possibly tell? It’s of no consequence: she won’t have me.” He paused, and then said, as though the words were wrung out of him: “O God, Mama, I’ve made such a mull of it! What am I to do?”
28
After a troubled night, during which she was haunted, waking or dreaming, by all the appalling events of the previous day, which had culminated in a shattering scene with Lady Ingham, Phoebe awoke to find the second housemaid pulling back the blinds, and learned from her that the letter lying on her breakfast-tray had been brought round by hand from Salford House not ten minutes earlier. The housemaid was naturally agog with curiosity, but any expectation she had of being made the recipient of an interesting confidence faded before the seeming apathy with which Miss Phoebe greeted her disclosure. All Miss Phoebe wanted was a cup of tea; and the housemaid, after lingering with diminishing hope for a few minutes, left her sitting up in bed, and sipping this restorative.
Once alone, Phoebe snatched up the letter, and tore it open. She looked first at the signature. Elizabeth Salford was what met her eyes, and drew from her a gasp of fright.
But there was nothing in the letter to make her tremble. It was quite short, and it contained no hint of menace. The Duchess wished very much not only to make the acquaintance of a loved friend’s daughter, but also to thank her for the care she had taken of her grandson. She hoped that Phoebe would be able, perhaps, to visit her that day, at noon, when she would be quite alone, and they could talk without fear of interruption.
Rather a gratifying letter for a modest damsel to receive, one would have supposed, but the expression on Phoebe’s face might have led an observer to conclude that she was reading a tale of horror. Having perused it three times, and failing to detect in it any hidden threat, Phoebe fixed her attention on the words: I shall be quite alone, and carefully considered them. If they were meant to convey a message it was hard to see how this could be anything but one of reassurance; but if this were so, Sylvester must have told his mother—what?
Thrusting back the bedclothes Phoebe scrambled out of bed and into her dressing-gown, and pattered down the stairs to her grandmother’s room. She found the afflicted Dowager alone, and held out the letter to her, asking her in a tense voice to read it.
The Dowager had viewed her unceremonious entrance with disfavour, and she at once said in feeble accents: “Oh, heaven! what now?” But this ejaculation was not wholly devoid of hope, since she too had been told whence had come Miss Phoebe’s letter. Poor Lady Ingham had slept quite as badly as her granddaughter, for she had had much to puzzle her. At first determined to send Phoebe packing back to Somerset, she had been considerably mollified by the interesting intelligence conveyed to her (as Sylvester had known it would be) by Horwich. She had thought it promising, but further reflection had sent her spirits down again: whatever might be Sylvester’s sentiments, Phoebe bore none of the appearance of a young female who had either received, or expected to receive, a flattering offer for her hand. Hope reared its head again when a letter from Salford House was thrust upon her; like Phoebe, she looked first at the signature, and was at once dashed down. “Elizabeth!” she exclaimed, in a flattened voice. “Extraordinary! She must have come on the child’s account, I suppose. I only trust it may not be the death of her!”