“Not I!”
“Cecilia,” suddenly pronounced Mr. Fawnhope, who had been studying the phaeton intently, “must never ride in that vehicle!”
He spoke with such unaccustomed decision that everyone looked at him in surprise, and Cecilia turned quite pink with gratification at his solicitude.
“I assure you, I shan’t overturn it,” said Sophy.
“Every feeling would be outraged by the sight of so exquisite a creature in such a turnout as that!” pursued Mr. Fawnhope. “Its proportions are absurd! It was, moreover, built for excessive speed, and should be driven, if driven it must be, by some down-the-road man with fifteen capes and a spotted neckcloth. It is not for Cecilia!”
“Well!” exclaimed Sophy. “I thought you were afraid I might overturn her in it!”
“I am afraid of that,” replied Mr. Fawnhope. “The very thought of so ungraceful a happening must offend! It does offend! It intrudes its grossness upon the sensibilities; it blurs my vision of a porcelain nymph! Let us immediately leave this place!”
Cecilia, wavering between pleasure at hearing herself likened to a porcelain nymph and affront at having her safety so little regarded, merely said that they could not leave until Sophy had concluded her purchase; but Sophy, a good deal amused, suggested that she should withdraw with her swain to await her in the barouche.
“Y’know,” Hubert said confidentially, when the pair had departed, “I don’t know that I blame Charles for not being able to stomach that fellow! He is quite paltry!”
Within three days of this transaction, Mr. Rivenhall, exercising his grays in the Park, paused by the Riding House to take up his friend, Mr. Wychbold, sauntering along in all the glory of pale yellow pantaloons, shining hessians, and a coat of extravagant cut and delicate hue. “Good God!” he ejaculated. “What a devilish sight! Get up, Cyprian, and stop ogling all the females! Where have you been hiding yourself this age?”
Mr. Wychbold mounted into the curricle, disposing his shapely limbs with rare grace, and replied, with a sigh, “The call of duty, dear boy! Visiting the ancestral home! I do what I may with lavender water, but the aroma of the stables and the cow byres is hard to overcome. Charles, much as I love you, if I had seen that neckcloth before I consented to let you drive me round the Park!”
“Don’t waste that stuff on me!” recommended his friend. “What’s wrong with your chestnuts?”
Mr. Wychbold, one of the shining lights of the Four-Horse Club, sighed mournfully. “Dead lame! No, not both, but one, which is quite as bad. Would you believe it? I let my sister drive them! Take it as a maxim, Charles, that no woman is to be trusted to handle the ribbons!”
“You haven’t yet met my cousin,” replied Mr. Rivenhall, with a twisted smile.
“You are mistaken,” said Mr. Wychbold calmly. “I met her at the Gala night at Almack’s, which, dear boy, you might have known, had you not absented yourself from that gathering.”
“Oh, you did, did you? I have no turn for that form of insipidity.”
“Wouldn’t have done you any good if you had,” said Mr. Wychbold. “There was not getting near your cousin; at least, there wouldn’t have been for you. I managed it, but I have a great deal of address. Danced the boulanger with her. Devilish fine girl!”
“Well, it’s time you were thinking of getting married. Offer for her! I shall be much obliged to you.”
“Almost anything else for you sake, dear boy, but I ain’t a marrying man!” said Mr. Wychbold firmly.
“I wasn’t serious. To be honest with you, if you took such a notion into your head I should do my utmost to dissuade you. She is the most tiresome girl I ever hope to meet. The only thing I know to her credit is that she can drive to an inch. She had the damned impertinence to steal my curricle when my back was turned for five minutes.”
“She drove these grays?” demanded Mr. Wychbold.
“She did. Well up to their bits, too. All to force me into buying a phaeton and pair for her to lionize in! I shan’t do it, but I should rather like to see how she would handle such a turnout.”
“No wish to raise false hopes,” said Mr. Wychbold, who had been watching the approach of a dashing perch phaeton, “but can’t help thinking that that’s just what you’re about to do, dear fellow! Though why your cousin should be driving Manningtree’s bays beats me!”
“What?” ejaculated Mr. Rivenhall sharply. His incredulous gaze fell upon the phaeton coming toward him at a smart trot. Very much at home in the perilous vehicle, seated high above her horses, with her groom beside her, and holding her whip at exactly the correct angle, was Miss Stanton-Lacy, and if the sight afforded Mr. Rivenhall pleasure, he vouchsafed no sign whatever of this. He looked at first thunderstruck and then more than usually grim. As the pace of the bays slackened and dropped to a walk, he reined in his own pair. The two carriages came to a halt abreast of each other.
“Cousin Charles!” said Sophy. “And Mr. Wychbold! How do you do? Tell me, Cousin, what do you think of them? I am persuaded I have a bargain in them.”
“Where,” demanded Mr. Rivenhall, “did you get those horses?”
“Now, Charles, for the Lord’s sake don’t be birdwitted!” implored Mr. Wychbold, preparing to descend from the curricle. “You must see she has Manningtree’s match geldings there! Besides, I told you so a minute ago. But how is this, Miss Stanton-Lacy? Is Manningtree selling up?”
“So I believe,” she smiled.
“By Jove, you have stolen a march on me, then, for I have had my eye on that pair ever since Manningtree sprang ’em on the town! How did you get wind of it, ma’am?”
“To own the truth, I knew nothing about the matter,” she confessed. “It was Sir Vincent Talgarth who put me in the way of buying them.”
“That fellow!” interpolated Mr. Rivenhall explosively. “I might have known!”
“Yes, so you might,” she agreed. “He is quite famous for knowing all the news before others have heard even a rumor. May I take you up, Mr. Wychbold? If I have stolen a march on you the least amends I can make is to off to let you drive my pair.”
“Don’t hesitate to tell me which of my mother’s or my horses you would like me to remove from the stables to make room for these!” begged Mr. Rivenhall, with savage civility. “Unless, of course, you are setting up your own stables!”
“Dear Cousin Charles, I hope I know better than to put you to such shocking inconvenience! John Potton here has seen to all that. You are not to be troubled with my horses! Get down, John. You need not fear to let Mr. Wychbold have your place, for if the horses should bolt with me he is better fitted to get them under control again than either of us.”
The middle-aged groom, having favored Mr. Wychbold with a long scrutiny, appeared to be satisfied, for he obeyed without making any comment. Mr. Wychbold leaped up lightly into the phaeton; Sophy nodded farewell to her, cousin; and the bays moved forward. Mr. Rivenhall watched the phaeton smolderingly for a moment or two, and then lowered his gaze to the groom’s countenance. “What the devil were you about to let your mistress buy a damned dangerous carriage like that?” he demanded.
“Don’t you put yourself in a pucker of Miss Sophy, sir!” said John, in a fatherly way. “Sir Horace himself couldn’t stop her, not when she’s got the bit between her teeth! Many’s the time I’ve told Sir Horace he should have broke her to bridle, but he never done it, nor tried to.”
“Well, if I have much more — ” Mr. Rivenhall pulled himself up short, realizing how improper was this interchange. “Damn your impudence!” he said, and set his grays in motion with a plunge that betrayed the state of his temper.
Mr. Wychbold, meanwhile, was most gallantly refusing to take the reins from Miss Stanton-Lacy. “Dashed if I ever thought I should say so, but it’s a pleasure to be driven by a lady who handles ’em as well as you do, ma’am! Very sweet goers, too; shouldn’t be surprised if Charles has had his eye on ’em, which would account for his flying into one of his miffs.”