Part 16 (1/2)

”Yes, indeed, and I see Mr. Hadley is one of them.”

”You're a fool for your pains, Charles,” John shouted. ”What's sense to a wench? Now, miss, I'll have an end of this. You're old Tom Lambourne's daughter for all your folly, and I'll not have his flesh and blood the sport of any greedy rogue from the kennel.”

There was a moment of silence. Then Alison, whose colour was grown high, said quietly, ”Pray, Sir John, will you go or shall I? I do not desire to see you again in my house.”

”Go?” The old gentleman struggled to his feet. ”Damme, Charles, the girl's mad. Yes, miss, I'll go--and go straight to my Lady Waverton. Od burn it, we'll have your fellow out of the county in an hour. Egad, miss, you're besotted. Why, what is he?--a trickster, a knight of the road.

'Stand and deliver,' that's my gentleman's trade. He's for your father's money, you fool.”

”Good-bye, Sir John,” Alison said, and turned away.

With unwonted agility, Mr. Hadley came between her and the door. ”You are not fair to us, Alison,” he said. ”Prithee, be fair to yourself.” She pa.s.sed him without a word. Mr. Hadley turned and showed Sir John a rueful face. ”We have made a bad business of it, sir.”

Sir John swore. ”Brazen impudence, damme, brazen, I say.”

”Oh Lord! Don't make bad worse.”

Sir John swore again. Upon his rage came Alison's voice singing:

”When daffodils begin to peer With heigh! the doxy, over the dale, Why, then comes in the sweet o' the year, For the red blood reigns in the winter's pale.”

Sir John spluttered, and went out roaring for his horse.

CHAPTER X

YOUNG BLOOD

There is reason to believe that from the first Mr. Hadley suspected he was making a fool of himself. This sensation, the common accompaniment of an attempt to do your duty, was just of the right strength to ensure that all his actions should be disastrous. It was, as you see, not strong enough to restrain him from exciting the dull and choleric mind of Sir John Burford; it did not avail to direct the ensuing storm. And then, having first failed to be sufficient check, it developed into a very paralysis.

Startled by the furies he had roused in Alison, Mr. Hadley found that suspicion of his own folly develop into a gruesome conviction. It compelled him to labour with Sir John vehemently until that blundering knight consented to wait before exploding his alarms upon Lady Waverton.

Even as the first blundering remonstrances had irritated Alison's wanton will into pa.s.sionate resolution, so this ensuing vacillation and delay gave it opportunity.

If the tale had been told to Lady Waverton, no doubt but Harry would have been banished from Tetherdown that night. It is likely, indeed, that the ultimate fates of Alison and Harry would have been the same. But many antecedent adventures must have been different or superfluous.

Mr. Hadley was now full of common sense. Mr. Hadley sagely argued with his uncle that they would do more harm than good by carrying their tale to Lady Waverton. The woman was a fool in grain, and whatever she did would surely do it in the silliest way. Tell her a word, and she would swiftly give birth to a scandal which the world would not willingly let die, in which Mr. Harry Boyce, if he were indeed the knave of their hypothesis, might easily find a means to strengthen his grip of Alison.

It was better to wait and (so Mr. Hadley with a sour smile) ”see which way the cat jumped.”

Perhaps Madame Alison, who was no kitten, might not be altogether infatuated. The shock of the afternoon, for all her heroics, might have waked in her some doubt of the charms of Mr. Boyce. The girl was shrewd enough. She had dealt with fortune-hunters before--remember the Scottish lord's son--and shown a humorous appreciation of the tribe. She was not a chit with the green sickness; she was neither so young nor so old that she must needs fall into the arms of any man who made eyes at her. After all, likely enough she was but amusing herself with Mr. Boyce. Not a very delicate business, but they were full-blooded folk, the Lambournes.

Remember old Tom, her father: there was a jolly bluff rogue. Well, if miss was but having her fling, it would do no good to tease her.

Thus Mr. Hadley, cautiously recoiling, doubting or hoping he was making the best of things, brought Sir John, in spite of some boilings over, safe back to his home and his jovial daughter.

When Harry and his father rode away from Alison, for once in a while Harry found his father's mood in tune with his own. Colonel Boyce suddenly relapsed from hilarity into a perfect silence. He soon reined his horse to a walk, and his wonted alert, soldierly bearing suffered eclipse. He gave at the back, he was thoughtful, he was melancholy--a very comfortable companion.

”Pray, sir, when do we start for France?” said Harry at length.

”What's that? Egad, you're in a hurry, ain't you? Not to-night nor yet to-morrow. Time enough, time enough. Make the best of it, Harry.” It occurred to Harry that his father was preoccupied.

But with that he did not concern himself. He was in too much tumult. It appeared that he would be able to meet Alison in the morning. He did not know whether he was glad. He had been telling himself that he would have s.n.a.t.c.hed at the excuse to fail her, and yet was not sure that if his father had announced instant departure he would not have bidden his father to the devil. But still in a fas.h.i.+on he was angry, in a degree he was frightened. He knew that he would go meet the girl now; he could not help himself--an exasperating state. And when he was with her--her presence now set all his nature rioting--with other folk by, it was hard enough to be sane; when he was alone with her in the wood, what would the wild wench be to him before they parted? There was no love in him. He had no tenderness for her, he did not want to cherish her, serve her, glorify her. Only she made him mad with pa.s.sion. But, according to his private lights, he was honest, and wished to be, and was therefore commanded to try to save the girl from his wicked will and hers. He despised himself for the gleam of cautious duty. What in the world was worth so much as the rose petals of her face, the round swell of her breast?