‘What very odd creatures they are! They should deal extremely together. As extremely as we shall!’
She sighed, and leaned her cheek against his shoulder. ‘How comfortable this is!’ she said. ‘And so delightfully vulgar! Does plain Mr Dash put his arm round ladies in hackney coaches?’
‘When not in gaol he does,’ the Duke responded.
Twenty-two
When Tom returned from his second visit to Sydney Gardens, he was relieved to find his parent in a subdued frame of mind. He had been half afraid that he might discover Mr Snape at the Pelican, but when he peeped cautiously into the private parlour he saw only the Duke and his father, seated on either side of a small coal fire, and drinking sherry. Mr Mamble had not imbibed enough to put him at his ease, and he was sitting rather on the edge of his chair, and treating his host with a deference which the Duke disliked even more than he had disliked his earlier manner. He had not neglected, however, to turn Mr Mamble’s reverence for a title to good account, but had lectured him with great authority on his mishandling of his son.
‘He’s my only one, your Grace,’ Mr Mamble explained. ‘I never had any advantages, not being one who came into the world hosed and shod, like you did, and by the time I was as you see me now – and I fancy I’m as well-equipped as anyone! – I doubt it was too late for me to be thinking of learning to be a fine gentleman. They say black will take no other hue, and black I’ll remain to the end of my days. But if it busts me I’ll see my boy a regular out-and-outer! I won’t deny I’ve been disappointed in Snape – though, mind you, he came to me out of a lord’s house, and he was mighty well spoken of, else I wouldn’t have hired him, for I’m one as likes good value for my money, ay, and gets it, what’s more! But a tutor he must have, like the nobs, for if he don’t, how will he learn to behave gentlemanly, and to speak the way you do?’
‘Send him to school,’ said the Duke.
Mr Mamble eyed him suspiciously. ‘Begging your Grace’s pardon, was that what your father did with you?’
‘My father died before I was born. I hope he would have, had he lived. As it was, my guardian had so great a care for me that he saddled me with a tutor. But I was very sickly, which Tom is not. Even so, I can assure you that it is wretched for a boy to be educated in such a way. I used to envy my cousins very much, for they were all at school.’
‘Ah, I daresay, your Grace!’ said Mr Mamble gloomily. ‘But the sort of school I want for Tom maybe wouldn’t have him, on account of me not being a gentleman-born.’
‘I expect,’ said the Duke diffidently, ‘I might be able to help you. I fancy I have an interest at one good school at least.’
Mr Mamble drew a breath. ‘By God!’ he said, with deep feeling, ‘if your Grace will speak for Tom there’s no saying where he won’t end!’
Thus it was that by the time Tom came in for his dinner, his parent greeted him with the tidings that if he would be a good boy, and mind his book, and abjure low company, he should go to a school of his Grace’s choosing.
Tom was at once amazed and overjoyed by this unexpected piece of good fortune, and as soon as he could master his tongue expressed his readiness to conform in every way to his sire’s wishes.
Mr Mamble grunted, regarding him with a fond but sceptical eye. ‘Ay, I daresay! Prate is prate, but it’s the duck lays the eggs,’ he observed. ‘You be off, and make yourself tidy! You ought to know better than to come into his Grace’s room looking like a clodpole!’
‘Oh, bother, he don’t give a fig for that!’ said Tom cheerfully. ‘Oh, sir, shan’t I go to London with you after all?’
‘Yes, indeed you shall, if your Papa will let you,’ the Duke said, smiling at him reassuringly. ‘Perhaps you might come to me after Christmas, and see the pantomime, and all the famous sights. I will invite two of my young cousins as well – only you must not lead them into mischief!’
‘Oh, no!’ Tom said earnestly. ‘I promise faithfully I will not!’ Another thought occurred to him; he said anxiously: ‘And shall I go shooting at your house here? You said I should!’
‘Yes, certainly, unless your Papa wishes to take you home directly.’
Mr Mamble, who was ecstatically rubbing his knees at the thought of his son’s approaching visit to a ducal mansion, said that he didn’t know but what he might not remain in Bath for a few days after all. The Duke mentally chid himself for the feeling of dismay which invaded his breast.
Mr Mamble became more loquacious over dinner, and by far more natural. He even ventured to ask the Duke why he had elected to wander round the country under a false name.
‘Because I was tired of being a Duke,’ replied his host. ‘I wanted to see how it would be to be a nobody.’
Mr Mamble laughed heartily at this, and said he warranted some people didn’t know when they were well-off.
‘Oh, Pa!’ exclaimed Tom, looking up from his plate. ‘He isn’t! But I told him you would pay him back for all the money he spent on me, and you will, won’t you?’
Mr Mamble said that he would certainly do so, and showed an embarrassing tendency to produce his purse then and there. The Duke hastily assured him that his difficulties were only of a temporary nature.
Mr Mamble begged him not to be shy of mentioning it if he would like the loan of a few bills. He said that he knew that the nobs were often at low tide through gaming and racing and such, which, though he did not hold with them himself, were very genteel pastimes. He then said in a very lavish way that he hoped that the Duke would not trouble himself about his shot at the inn, but hang it up, since he would count himself honoured to be allowed to stand huff, and would question no expense.
‘No, no, indeed I am only awaiting a draft from London!’ the Duke said, in acute discomfort. ‘And pray do not try to reimburse me on Tom’s account! I should dislike it excessively!’
Mr Mamble, fortified by several glasses of burgundy, then set himself to discover the extent of the Duke’s fortune. The Duke, who had not previously encountered his kind, gazed at him quite blankly, and wondered of what interest his fortune could be to anyone but himself. Mr Mamble said that he supposed it was derived mostly from rents, and asked him a great many questions about the management of large estates, which, while they certainly showed considerable shrewdness, reduced the Duke to weary boredom. The covers were removed, the port had sunk low in the bottle, and still Mr Mamble seemed to have no intention of taking his leave. A horrible suspicion that he had brought his baggage from the White Horse to the Pelican, and meant to take up his quarters there, had just entered the Duke’s head when the door was opened and he looked up to see his cousin Gideon standing upon the threshold. The expression of gentle resignation was wiped from his face. He sprang up, exclaiming: ‘Gideon!’
Captain Ware grinned at him, but stepping across the room grasped him urgently by the shoulders, and shook him, saying: ‘Adolphus, I think I will murder you!’
The Duke laughed, wrenching the big hands from his shoulders, and holding them hard. ‘I’m told you’re already thought to have done so! Oh, but I am glad to see you, Gideon! How the devil did you know where I was?’
‘I have tracked you all the way from Arlesey, my abominable cousin – and a rare dance you have led me!’
‘From Arlesey!’ The Duke stared up at him, the liveliest astonishment in his face. ‘Good God, how comes this about? You cannot have known that I was there!’
‘But I did know it. Your amiable friend Liversedge very handsomely offered to sell you to me. He thought I might like to succeed to your dignities. I don’t know what mischief you have been brewing, Adolphus, but if ever you cause me to lose so much sleep on your account again I will make you sorry you were ever born!’
‘No, that you won’t!’ suddenly interjected Tom, who had been gazing upon this scene with strong disapprobation. He doubled his fists, and eyed Captain Ware
belligerently. ‘I won’t let anybody touch him, and so I warn you!’
Gideon was amused. ‘Famous! Now, had I known you had such a stout bodyguard, Adolphus, I need not have worried about you!’
‘Well, you let him alone, for I mean it!’ said Tom.
The Duke laughed. ‘No, no, Tom, you must not pick a quarrel with my big cousin, for he takes very good care of me, I promise you! Gideon, I must make you known to Mr Mamble, who is Tom’s father. Mr Mamble, Captain Ware!’
Mr Mamble got up ponderously from his chair, and executed a bow. Tom, a fanatical light in his eye, demanded: ‘Is he a soldier?’
‘Yes, he is,’ said the Duke.
‘Cavalry?’ said Tom anxiously.
‘Life Guards!’ said the Duke, in thrilling accents.
Tom drew a deep, worshipful breath, and uttered: ‘And you never told me! Sir, were you ever in a battle?’
‘I was in a skirmish at Genappe, and in a battle at Waterloo,’ replied Gideon.
‘Wounded?’ Tom asked hopefully.
‘Just a scratch,’ said Gideon.
‘Tell me all about it, sir, please!’
‘Yes, some other time he will,’ said the Duke, recklessly committing his cousin. ‘But not, I think, to-night, for it is growing late, and –’ He broke off suddenly, catching sight of his valet, standing in the doorway, and dumbly regarding him. ‘Nettlebed! But, good God, how in the world – ?’
‘I brought him along with me,’ explained Gideon. ‘Found him with Matt, in Baldock, hunting for you.’
‘My lord!’ said Nettlebed, in a queer voice. ‘My lord! I thank God I’ve found your Grace! I shall never forgive myself, never!’
‘Oh, no, no, no!’ said the Duke, laying a hand on his arm, and shaking it playfully. ‘Now, Nettlebed, pray don’t be upset for nothing! You see I am very well! Yes, and extremely glad to have you with me again, for I have missed you very much, I assure you. But I do wish you had not left London! I sent an express to Scriven last night, desiring him to tell you to come to me, with all my gear!’
‘My lord, I had to do it!’ Nettlebed said. ‘But I will never do anything your Grace does not wish again, if only your Grace will forgive me!’
‘But I have nothing in the world to forgive,’ the Duke said gently. ‘Oh, are you thinking how cross you were with me on the morning I ran away from you all? Well, I meant you to be cross, so perhaps it is I who should be begging your pardon. Now, do pray go and set all to rights in my room, Nettlebed! I am not the least hand at keeping my traps in order, and I shall be very glad to have them tidied for me again.’
This request had the desired effect of making Nettlebed pull himself together. His eye brightened, and he assured the Duke that he had no longer any need to trouble his head over such matters. Before he left the room, he swept the cloth from the table, which the waiter had neglected to do, made up the fire, and straightened the cushions on the sofa, as though in the performance of these acts of service his wounded soul found balm. After that, he withdrew, but saw to it that his presence should still be felt by sending up the waiter with another bottle of port, and one of brandy.
The Duke, who wanted to be alone with his cousin, was then guilty of a piece of strategy. He told Tom that it was time he went off to bed. This aroused Mr Mamble from some dream of grandeur, and he not only endorsed the command, but said that it was time he went back to the White Horse. He seemed undecided whether to remove from this house to the Pelican on the morrow, or to wrest the unwilling Tom from the Duke. The possibility of having Mr Mamble as a fellow-guest wrought so powerfully on the Duke’s mind that the first thing he said to his cousin, when he returned from seeing one Mamble off, and the other to his bedchamber, was: ‘There’s only one thing to be done! I’ll send them both to Cheyney! I promised Tom he should go there to shoot, and I expect his father would like of all things to stay in a Duke’s house.’
Gideon grinned. ‘No doubt he would! What very queer company you are keeping, Adolphus! I wonder how Mamble and Liversedge will deal together?’
The Duke stared at him. ‘Liversedge?’
‘Not knowing what else to do with him,’ explained Gideon, ‘I have left him at Cheyney, in Wragby’s care.’
‘Gideon, you have not brought that fat rogue here with you?’ the Duke said incredulously.
‘But I have,’ replied Gideon. ‘He awaits your judgment, my little one.’
‘But I don’t want him!’ objected the Duke, looking harassed. ‘Really, Gideon, it is quite absurd of you! I have enough on my hands without your adding Liversedge to the rest!’
Gideon was amused. ‘Are you aware that he not only kidnapped you, but would have been prepared to murder you, for a suitable recompense?’
‘Yes, you told me so. I am glad I did not know it while I lay in that cellar! I should have been frightened out of my wits! I supposed that ransom was what was wanted of me, but now I come to think of it the other fellow did utter a number of dark threats, which I set no store by. Did Liversedge really think you would pay him to murder me? He is the most amusing villain!’
Gideon regarded him with a flickering smile. ‘Am I to understand that you are going to condone his villainy?’
‘Well, what else can I do?’ asked the Duke reasonably. ‘If I hand him over to justice, what a stir there would be! Now, Gideon, if you had been captured by a veritable child’s trick, and stowed away in a cellar, would you wish the whole world to know of it?’
‘I would not, I own. At the same time, I should desire to discourage any more such attempts.’
‘Oh, I am not so green as to fall a victim twice! And I burned down his house, or, at any rate, the only lodging he seemed to have – and took Belinda away from him, so I think he has been pretty well punished, don’t you?’
‘I must have a more vengeful disposition than you, Adolphus. No.’
The Duke smiled. ‘Well, he did you no service, after all. But I cannot but feel that he did me a great deal of service. Only wait until I have told you the sum of my adventures! You will be bound to agree that but for Liversedge nothing in the least out of the way would ever have happened to me. No, no, it would be the shabbiest thing to hand him over to the Law! Besides, he made me laugh!’ He looked speculatively at his cousin. ‘And if you forced him to lead you to my prison, Gideon, I will hazard a guess that you used him very roughly first.’
‘Yes, was it not odd of me?’ retorted Gideon. ‘But this will not do, my child! He is not less villainous for making us laugh. If you had not written to me from Baldock, I should not have known where to look for you, and all might have gone very ill indeed with you.’
‘Nothing of the sort!’ said the Duke, with one of his impish smiles. ‘You did not rescue me from my cellar, Gideon! I rescued myself! You can have no notion of how much I am set up in my own esteem! Liversedge shall go free. I have more important things to think about.’
Gideon poured himself out a glass of port, and sat down, stretching his long legs before him. ‘Very well, let it be as you please! But what is to be done with him? He appears to be penniless, and has informed me, with his engaging candour, that of all towns in the world Bath is the one where he least desires to show his face. It would not surprise me if you found it hard to be rid of him. He has effrontery enough for anything!’
‘Oh, let him make himself useful at Cheyney, until I have time to consider what must be done with him!’ said the Duke carelessly. ‘If I can induce Mamble to take Tom there, they will be glad of an extra servant in the house. I daresay he may make an excellent butler.’
This made Gideon choke over his port, but when he had recovered he admitted that there was much in what his cousin said, as well he knew, since, from the moment of his reaching Reading on the previous evening, Liversedge had taken it upon himself to act as a major-domo. ‘I have no doubt he was inten
t only on softening my hard heart, but I will own that no one could have been more zealous to discover some trace of you, Adolphus. In fact, I owe it to him that we did at last pick up the scent, for when no one could be brought to remember a little fellow in an olive-green coat, he enquired for your inamorata, describing her in terms which have given me an over-mastering desire to meet her. There was no difficulty then: no one, it seems, could fail to remember the lady!’
‘No, very true! She is the most dazzling girl! You shall certainly see her, but mind, Gideon! you are not to seduce her with promises of a purple silk gown!’
‘Good God, could I?’
‘Yes, she will go off with anyone who does so. Oh, Gideon, I am glad you have come! I have so much to tell you!’ He refilled the glasses, and sat down opposite his cousin. ‘No sooner am I clear of one scrape than I fall into another! Harriet had to rescue me from the Round-house here only this afternoon, and you would not believe what an odious reputation I have in Hertfordshire!’
‘Would I not? You forget that I sought for you in Hitchin! But begin at the beginning, Gilly! By the by, I sent that young fool, Matt, back to Oxford with a flea in his ear. He ought to be flogged for embroiling you in his silly starts!’
‘Poor Matt, he did not embroil me: I embroiled myself. But how came he into the business?’
‘Nettlebed recalled that he had been closeted with you the night before you disappeared, and went after him. I met the pair of them in Baldock. Never mind that now! Proceed with your story!’
Thus adjured, the Duke settled down to regale his cousin with the entire history of his adventures. Gideon interpolated so many questions, and laughed so much that the candles were burning low in their sockets before the Duke had ended the tale. Then he demanded to know Gideon’s share in it, and this amused him quite as much as his own part had amused Gideon. When he heard of Lord Lionel’s discovery of his ring in Gideon’s desk, he gave such a crack of mirth that a fellow-guest in the adjoining room thumped indignantly on the wall.