‘And what did you see?’ asked Miss Trent.
Miss Docklow clasped her hands to her spare bosom, and cast up her eyes. ‘It gave me a Spasm, miss, my constitution being what it is, though far be it from me to utter any word of complaint, which anyone acquainted with me will testify!’
‘Oh, never mind that!’ said Courtenay angrily. ‘There’s no need for you to put on those die-away airs: no one is blaming you ! Tiffany has gone off with all her night-gear, and her trinket-box, ma’am!’
‘Packed in the box where I had her best hat put away!’ said Miss Docklow. ‘The one she wore to Harrogate, miss; the Waterloo hat, ornamented with feathers! And her China blue pelisette, with the silk cords and tassels! And her riding-habit – the velvet habit, miss! – left on the floor! Never will it be the same again, do what I will!’ Startled at last, yet incredulous, Miss Trent hurried up the stairs, Miss Docklow and Courtenay in her wake. She was brought up short on the threshold of Tiffany’s bedchamber, and stood blinking at a scene of the utmost disorder. It bore all the signs of a hasty packing, for drawers were pulled out, the wardrobe doors stood open, and garments had been tossed all over the room. ‘Good God!’ said Miss Trent, stunned.
‘Now, ma’am, perhaps you’ll believe me!’ said Courtenay. ‘Pretty, ain’t it? Rare goings-on! Just one of dear little Tiffany’s whisky-frisky pranks, eh? By God, it’s past all endurance! It ain’t enough for her to set us all at odds: oh, no! nothing will do for her but to kick up the most infamous scandal –’
‘Quiet!’ begged Miss Trent. ‘I do beg of you – !’
‘It’s all very well for you to say quiet,’ retorted Courtenay savagely, ‘I’m thinking of my mother! And when I consider the way she’s cosseted that little viper, and pandered to her –’
‘I perfectly understand your feelings,’ interrupted Miss Trent, ‘but railing won’t mend matters!’
‘Nothing can mend this matter!’
Looking round the disordered room, her spirit failed for a moment, and she was much inclined to agree with him. She pulled herself together, however, and said: ‘I can’t tell what may be the meaning of this, but I’m certain of one thing: she has not run off with Mr Calver.’
‘That’s where you’re out, ma’am! She did go with him! He was seen waiting for her in that carriage he hired from the Crown.’
‘True it is, miss, though I blush to say it! With his own eyes did Totton see him!’
‘He could hardly have seen him with anyone else’s eyes!’ snapped Miss Trent, her temper fraying. She controlled it, and said in a cooler tone: ‘You had better put all these garments away, Maria, and make the room tidy again. I am persuaded I need not tell you that we rely upon your discretion. Mr Underhill, pray come downstairs! We must try to think what is best for us to do.’
He followed her rather sulkily, saying, as he shut the door of the morning-parlour: ‘I know what I am going to do – and if you hadn’t come in just then I should be gone by now, for there’s no time to be wasted!’
She had sunk into a chair, her elbows on the table, and her hands pressed to her temples, but she raised her head at this: ‘Gone where?’
‘Harrogate, of course!’
‘Harrogate? For heaven’s sake, why?’
‘Lord, ma’am, the fellow can’t drive all the way to the Border in a whisky! Depend upon it, he’s hired a chaise, and where else could he do that but in Harrogate?’
‘Good God, are you suggesting that they are eloping to Gretna Green?’ she exclaimed incredulously.
‘Of course I am! It’s just the sort of thing Tiffany would do – you can’t deny that!’
‘It is not at all the sort of thing Mr Calver would do, however! Nor do I think that Tiffany could by any means be persuaded to elope with a mere commoner! She has far larger plans, I assure you! No, no: that’s not the answer to this riddle.’
‘Then what is the answer?’ he demanded. ‘Yes, and why didn’t she go with you to Nethersett? You told me at breakfast that you meant to take her along with you!’
‘She wished to visit Patience…’ Miss Trent’s voice faltered, and died.
Courtenay gave a scornful snort. ‘That’s a loud one! Wished to visit Patience, indeed! To beg her pardon, I daresay?’
‘To make amends. When you told her that Mr Edward Banningham had spread the true story of what happened in Leeds – Oh, how much I wish you’d kept your tongue! You might have known she would do something outrageous! But so should I have known! I should never have left her: I am shockingly to blame! But she seemed so quiet this morning, scheming how to overcome her set-back –’
‘Ay, the sly cat! Scheming how to be rid of you, ma’am, so that she could run off with Calver!’
She was silent, staring with knitted brows straight before her. She said suddenly: ‘No. She did go to the Rectory: recollect that her riding-habit was lying on the floor, with her whip, and her gloves! Something must have happened there. Patience – no, Patience wouldn’t rebuff her! But if Mrs Chartley gave her a scold? But what could she have said to drive the child into running away? Mr Underhill, I think I should go to the Rectory immediately; and discover –’
‘No! ’ he interrupted forcefully. ‘I won’t have our affairs blabbed all round the district!’
‘It’s bound to be talked of. And I’m persuaded Mrs Chartley –’
‘Not if I fetch her back! Which I promise you I mean to do, for my mother’s sake!’ He added rather grandly: ‘I shall be obliged to call that fellow out, of course, but I shall think of some pretext for it.’
At any other time she must have laughed, but she was too busy racking her brains to pay much heed to him. ‘Something must have happened,’ she repeated. ‘Something that made her feel she couldn’t remain here another instant. Oh, good God, Lindeth! He must have offered for Patience – and she told Tiffany!’
Courtenay gave a whistle of surprise. ‘So that’s serious, is it? Well, by Jove, if ever I expected to see her given her own again! Lord, she’d be as mad as fire! No wonder she ran off with Calver! Trying to hoax everyone into thinking it was him she wanted all along!’
She was momentarily daunted, but she came about again. ‘Yes, she might do that, in one of her wild fits, but he would not. Wait! Only let me think!’ She pressed her hands over her eyes, trying to cast her mind back.
‘Well, if she isn’t going to Gretna Green, where else can she be going?’ he argued.
Her hands dropped. ‘What a fool I am! To London, of course! That’s what she wanted – she begged me to take her back to the Burfords! Of course that’s the answer! She must have persuaded Mr Calver to take her to Leeds – perhaps even to escort her to London!’ She read disbelief in Courtenay’s face, and said: ‘If she made him believe that she was being hardly used here – you know how she always fancies herself to be ill-treated as soon as her will is crossed! Recollect that he doesn’t know her as we do! She has shown him her prettiest side, too – and she can be very engaging when she chooses! Or – or perhaps he has done no more than put her on the stage, in charge of the guard.’
‘Stage!’ exclaimed Courtenay contemptuously. ‘I wish I may see Tiffany condescending to a stage-coach! A post-chaise-and-four is what she’d demand! And much hope I have of catching it!’
‘She couldn’t go post,’ said Miss Trent decidedly. ‘She spent all her pin-money in Harrogate. And I must think it extremely unlikely that Mr Calver could have been able to oblige her with a loan. She would need as much as £25, you know, and how should he be carrying such a sum upon him when all he meant to do was to take her out for a driving-lesson? And I fancy he’s not at all beforehand with the world.’ She thought for a moment, and then said, in a constricted voice: ‘Mr Underhill, I think – I think you should drive over to Broom Hall, to consult Sir Waldo. He is Mr Calver’s cousin, and – and I think he is the p
erson best fitted to handle this matter.’
‘Well, I won’t!’ declared Courtenay, reddening. ‘I’m not a schoolboy, ma’am, and I don’t need him to tell me what I should do, or to do it for me, I thank you! I’m going to tell ’em to bring the phaeton up to the house immediately. If that precious pair went to Leeds they must have passed through the village, and someone is bound to have seen them. And if they did, trust me to have Tiffany back by nightfall! If you ask me, I’d say good riddance to her, but I’ll be damned – begging your pardon! – if I’ll let her shab off to the Burfords as if we had made her miserable here!’
Miss Trent had no great faith in his ability to overtake a truant who had had three hours’ start; but since she felt quite as strongly as he did that every effort must be made to do it, and realized that to persist in urging that Sir Waldo should be consulted would be a waste of breath and time, she resigned herself to the prospect of an uncomfortable, and possibly nerve-racking drive. He was relieved to learn that she meant to accompany him, but he warned her that he was going to put ’em along. That he would do better to be content with putting his horses well together was an opinion which she kept to herself.
When she found that he had had a team harnessed to the phaeton her heart sank. His leaders were new acquisitions, and he was not yet very expert in pointing them, or, indeed of sticking to them, as she very soon discovered. Observing that there was not a moment to be lost, Courtenay sprang his horses down the avenue to the lodge-gates. Since it was not only rather narrow, but had several bends in it as well, Miss Trent was forced to hold on for dear life. The sharp turn out of the gates was negotiated safely, though not, perhaps, in style, and they were soon bowling along the lane that led to the village. Courtenay, exhilarated by his success in negotiating the difficult turn out of the gate, confided to Miss Trent that he had been practising the use of the whip, and rather thought he could back himself to take a fly off the leader’s ear.
‘I beg you won’t do any such thing!’ she replied. ‘I have no wish to be thrown out into the ditch!’
Nettled, he determined to show her that he was at home to a peg, and it was not long before her worst fears were realized. Within less than a quarter of a mile from Oversett, feather-edging a bend in the lane, his front-wheel came into sharp collision with a milestone, partially hidden by rank grass, and the inevitable happened. Miss Trent, picking herself up, more angry than hurt, found that one wheel of the phaeton was lying, a dismal wreck, at some distance from the carriage, that one of the wheelers was down, a trace broken, and both the leaders plunging wildly in a concerted effort to bolt. Blistering words were on the tip of her tongue, but she was a sensible woman, and she realized that there were more urgent things to do than to favour Courtenay with an exact and pithy opinion of his driving-skill. She hurried to his assistance. Between them, they managed to quieten the frightened leaders, backing them gently to relieve the drag on the crippled phaeton from the remaining trace. ‘Cut it!’ she commanded. ‘I can hold this pair now. Do you get that wheeler on his feet!’
Speechless with rage and chagrin, he had just freed the leaders when, sweeping round the bend towards them, came the Nonesuch, his team of chestnuts well in hand, and his groom seated beside him. The team was pulled up swiftly, every rein holding as true as if it had been single, the groom jumped down, and ran to the wheelers’ heads; and the Nonesuch, his amused gaze travelling from Courtenay, beside his struggling wheeler, to Miss Trent, who had led the two sweating leaders to the side of the lane, said: ‘Dear me! Do what you can, Blyth!’
The groom touched his hat, and went to Courtenay, who was suffering such agonies of mortification at being found in such a situation that he would have been hard put to it to decide whether he wished himself dead or the Nonesuch. He blurted out, scarlet-faced: ‘It was that curst milestone! I never saw it!’
‘Very understandable,’ agreed Sir Waldo. ‘But if I were you I would attend to my horses! You really need not explain the circumstances to me.’ He looked smilingly at Miss Trent. ‘How do you do, ma’am? Quite a fortunate encounter! I was on my way to visit you – to invite you to go with me to Leeds.’
‘To Leeds!’ The exclamation was surprised out of her; she stood staring up at him, her embarrassment forgotten.
‘Yes: on an errand of mercy!’ He glanced towards the phaeton, and saw that the fallen wheeler was up. ‘Very good, Blyth! Now take those leaders in hand!’
The groom, who had been running a hand down one of the unfortunate wheeler’s legs, straightened himself, saying: ‘Yes, sir. Badly strained hock here.’
‘So I should imagine. Render Mr Underhill all the assistance you can!’
‘Sir!’ uttered Courtenay, between gritted teeth. ‘I – we – were on our way to Leeds too! That was how it came about that I – I mean, it is a matter of – of great urgency! I must get there! I can’t tell you why, but if you are going there yourself, would you be so very obliging as to take me with you?’
‘Well, no!’ said the Nonesuch apologetically. ‘Phaetons, you know, were not built to carry three persons, and I have been particularly requested to bring Miss Trent with me. Oh, don’t look so distressed! Believe me, the matter is not of such great urgency as you think! You may also believe that Miss Trent is far more necessary to the success of my mission than you could hope to be.’
Miss Trent, having relinquished the reins she had been holding into Blyth’s hands, stepped quickly up to the phaeton, and said, in an undervoice: ‘You know, then? But how? Where are they?’
‘In Leeds, at the King’s Head.’ He leaned across the empty seat beside him, and held down his hand to her. ‘Come!’
She looked at it, thinking how strong and shapely it was; and then up, meeting his eyes, smiling into hers. She felt helpless, knowing it was her duty to go to Tiffany, longing to be with Sir Waldo, dreading to be with him, afraid, not of his strength but of her own weakness. Before she had made up her mind what to do, Courtenay, whose worshipful regard for the Nonesuch was rapidly diminishing, broke in, saying in a furious voice: ‘Your pardon, sir! But Miss Trent can’t discharge my errand, which is of immediate urgency, I promise you! I don’t care if he is your cousin – I – I have a very ardent desire to meet Mr Calver!’
‘Yes, yes!’ said the Nonesuch soothingly. ‘But you can express your gratitude to him at a more convenient time. Your immediate duty is to your horses.’
‘My gratitude ?’ ejaculated Courtenay, so far forgetful of his immediate duty as to abandon his wheelers, and to stride up to Sir Waldo’s phaeton. ‘That – that damned rip makes off with my cousin, and you expect me to be grateful ? Well, let me tell you, Sir Waldo, –’
‘My amiable young cawker,’ interrupted Sir Waldo, looking down at him in considerable amusement, ‘you are fair and far off ! To whom, do you suppose, do I owe my information?’
Nonplussed, Courtenay glared up at him. ‘I don’t know! I –’
‘Well, think!’ Sir Waldo advised him. He looked again at Miss Trent, his brows lifting enquiringly.
‘Is Tiffany with Mr Calver?’ she demanded.
‘Well, I trust she may be. She was with him when he sent off his impassioned plea for help, but he seemed to entertain some doubt of his ability to hold her in – er – check for any considerable period. I don’t wish to be importunate, ma’am, but are you coming with me, or are you not?’
‘I must come!’ she said, gathering up her skirt in one hand, and holding the other up to him.
He grasped it, drawing her up into the phaeton, and saying softly: ‘Good girl! Pluck to the backbone! Were you tumbled into the ditch?’
‘I collect you’ve guessed as much from my appearance!’ she said, with asperity, and putting up her hands to straighten her bonnet.
‘Not a bit of it! A mere knowledge of cause and effect: you are, as ever, precise to a pin – and an enduring delight to me!?
?? He turned his head to address Courtenay once more. ‘I’ll leave Blyth to assist you, Underhill. Indulge no apprehensions! just look to your horses! Miss Wield will very soon be restored to you.’
As he spoke, he drew his leaders back gently, and gave the would-be top-sawyer an effortless demonstration of how to turn to the rightabout in a constricted space a sporting vehicle drawn by four high-bred lively ones.
Miss Trent, deeply appreciative of his skill, was moved to say: ‘You do drive to an inch! I wish I could turn a one-horse carriage as easily!’
‘You will: I’ll teach you,’ he said. ‘You shall take the shine out of all our fair whips!’
She had no particular desire to take the shine out of anyone, but the implication of these words conjured up a vision of the future so agreeable that it was with great difficulty that she wrenched her mind away from it. Rigidly confining it to the matter in hand, she said: ‘I hope you mean to explain to me, sir, how it comes about that you are so exactly informed of Tiffany’s whereabouts. I could only guess what must be her intention, for I have been away from Staples for the better part of the day, and she left no message for me.’
‘What an abominable girl she is!’ he remarked. ‘My information came, as I told you, from Laurie. He sent off one of the post-boys with a note for me, from the King’s Head. As far as I understand the matter – but he wrote in haste, and, to judge from the manner of it, in an extremely harassed state of mind! – Tiffany induced him to drive her to Leeds, by some fetch or wheedle, and only on arrival there divulged her intention of travelling to London. I can’t tell you why she should have suddenly taken this notion into her head. All I know is that Laurie has hoaxed her into believing that there is not a place to be had in any of the stage-coaches, and that the Mail doesn’t reach Leeds until four o’clock. I should have thought that rather too improbable an hour to have chosen, but Tiffany seems to have accepted it without question.’
‘Of course it’s perfectly ridiculous! But Tiffany knows nothing about Mails or stages. Well! it’s some comfort to know that I was right. Mr Underhill would have it that she and your cousin had gone off in a post-chaise-and-four, but I couldn’t suppose that Mr Calver would be carrying a large enough sum of money on his person.’