Richard Carvel — Complete

  CHAPTER XXXII. LADY TANKERVILLE'S DRUM-MAJOR

  The rising sun, as he came through the little panes of the windows,etched a picture of that room into my brain. I can see the twistedcandles with their wax smearing the sticks, the chairs awry, the tableslittered with blackened pipes, and bottles, and spilled wine and tobaccoamong the dice; and the few that were left of my companions, some withdark lines under their eyes, all pale, but all gay, unconcerned, witty,and cynical; smoothing their ruffles, and brushing the ashes and snufffrom the pattern of their waistcoats. As we went downstairs, singing asong Mr. Foote had put upon the stage that week, they were good enoughto declare that I should never be permitted to go back to Maryland. Thatmy grandfather should buy me a certain borough, which might be had forsix thousand pounds.

  The drawing-room made a dismal scene, too, after the riot and disorderof the night. Sleepy servants were cleaning up, but Fox vowed that theyshould bring us yet another bottle before going home. So down we satabout the famous old round table, Fox fingering the dents the gold hadmade in the board, and philosophizing; and reciting Orlando Furioso inthe Italian, and Herodotus in the original Greek. Suddenly casting hiseyes about, they fell upon an ungainly form stretched on a lounge, thatmade us all start.

  "Bully!" he cried; "I'll lay you fifty guineas that Mr. Carvel gets theBeauty, against Chartersea."

  This roused me.

  "Nay, Mr. Fox, I beg of you," I protested, with all the vehemence Icould muster. "Miss Manners must not be writ down in such a way."

  For answer he snapped his fingers at the drowsy Brooks, who brought thebetting book.

  "There!" says he; "and there, and there," turning over the pages; "hername adorns a dozen leaves, my fine buckskin. And it will be well tohave some truth about her. Enter the wager, Brooks."

  "Hold!" shouts Bolingbroke; "I haven't accepted."

  You may be sure I was in an agony over this desecration, which I was sopowerless to prevent. But as I was thanking my stars that the matter hadblown over with Bolingbroke's rejection, there occurred a most singularthing.

  The figure on the lounge, with vast difficulty, sat up. To our amazementwe beheld the bloated face of the Duke of Chartersea staring stupidly.

  "Damme, Bully, you refushe bet like tha'!" he said. "I'll take doshen of'em-doshen, egad. Gimme the book, Brooksh. Cursh Fox--lay thousand d--dprovinshial never getsh 'er--I know--"

  I sat very still, seized with a loathing beyond my power to describe tothick that this was the man Mr. Manners was forcing her to marry. Foxlaughed.

  "Help his Grace to his coach," he said to two of the footmen.

  "Kill fellow firsht!" cried his Grace, with his hand on his sword, andinstantly fell over, and went sound asleep.

  "His Grace has sent his coach home, your honour," said one of the men,respectfully. "The duke is very quarrelsome, sir."

  "Put him in a chair, then," said Charles.

  So they fearfully lifted his Grace, who was too far gone to resist, andcarried him to a chair. And Mr. Fox bribed the chairmen with two guineasapiece, which he borrowed from me, to set his Grace down amongst themarketwomen at Covent Garden.

  The next morning Banks found in my pockets something over seven hundredpounds more than I had had the day before.

  I rose late, my head swimming with mains and nicks, and combinationsof all the numbers under the dozen; debated whether or no I would go toArlington Street, and decided that I had not the courage. Comyn settledit by coming in his cabriolet, proposed that we should get the airin the park, dine at the Cocoa Tree, and go afterwards to LadyTankerville's drum-major, where Dolly would undoubtedly be.

  "Now you are here, Richard," said his Lordship, with his accustomedbluntness, "and your sea-captain has relieved your Quixotic conscience,what the deuce do you intend to do?

  "Win a thousand pounds every night at Brooks's, or improve your timeand do your duty, and get Miss Manners out of his Grace's clutches? I'llwarrant something will come of that matter this morning."

  "I hope so," I said shortly.

  Comyn looked at me sharply.

  "Would you fight him?" he asked.

  "If he gave me the chance."

  His Lordship whistled. "Egad, then," said he, "I shall want to be thereto see. In spite of his pudding-bag shape he handles the sword as wellas any man in England. I have crossed with him at Angelo's. And he has adevilish tricky record, Richard."

  I said nothing to that.

  "Hope you do--kill him," Comyn continued. "He deserves it richly.But that will be a cursed unpleasant way of settling thebusiness,--unpleasant for you, unpleasant for her, and cursed unpleasantfor him, too, I suppose. Can't you think of any other way of gettingher? Ask Charles to give you a plan of campaign. You haven't any sense,and neither have I."

  "Hang you, Jack, I have no hopes of getting her," I replied, for I wasout of humour with myself that day. "In spite of what you say, I knowshe doesn't care a brass farthing to marry me. So let's drop that."

  Comyn made a comic gesture of deprecation. I went on: "But I am goingto stay here and find out the truth, though it may be a foolishundertaking. And if he is intimidating Mr. Manners--"

  "You may count on me, and on Charles," said my Lord, generously; "andthere are some others I know of. Gad! You made a dozen of friends andadmirers by what you said last night, Richard. And his Grace has a fewenemies. You will not lack support."

  We dined very comfortably at the Cocoa Tree, where Comyn had made anappointment for me with two as diverting gentlemen as had ever been mylot to meet. My Lord Carlisle was the poet and scholar of the littleclique which had been to Eton with Charles Fox, any member of which (so'twas said) would have died for him. His Lordship, be it remarked inpassing, was as lively a poet and scholar as can well be imagined.He had been recently sobered, so Comyn confided; which I afterwardsdiscovered meant married. Charles Fox's word for the same was fallen.And I remembered that Jack had told me it was to visit Lady Carlisle atCastle Howard that Dorothy was going when she heard of my disappearance.Comyn's other guest was Mr. Topham Beauclerk, the macaroni friend ofDr. Johnson. He, too, had been recently married, but appeared no moresobered than his Lordship. Mr. Beauclerk's wife, by the way, wasthe beautiful Lady Diana Spencer, who had been divorced from LordBolingbroke, the Bully I had met the night before. These gentlemenseemed both well acquainted with Miss Manners, and vowed that none butAmerican beauties would ever be the fashion in London more. Then we alldrove to Lady Tankerville's drum-major near Chesterfield House.

  "You will be wanting a word with her when she comes in," said Comyn,slyly divining. Poor fellow! I fear that I scarcely appreciated hisfeelings as to Dorothy, or the noble unselfishness of his friendship forme.

  We sat aside in a recess of the lower hall, watching the throng as theypassed: haughty dowagers, distorted in lead and disfigured in silk andfeathers nodding at the ceiling; accomplished beaus of threescore ormore, carefully mended for the night by their Frenchmen at home; youngladies in gay brocades with round skirts and stiff, pear-shaped bodices;and youngsters just learning to ogle and to handle their snuff-boxes.One by one their names were sent up and solemnly mouthed by the footmanon the landing. At length, when we had all but given her up, Dorothyarrived. A hood of lavender silk heightened the oval of her face, andout from under it crept rebellious wisps of her dark hair. But she wasvery pale, and I noticed for the first time a worn expression that gaveme a twinge of uneasiness. 'Twas then I caught sight of the duke, asurly stamp on his leaden features. And after him danced Mr. Manners.Dolly gave a little cry when she saw me.

  "Oh! Richard, I am so glad you are here. I was wondering what had becomeof you. And Comyn, too." Whispering to me, "Mamma has had a letter fromMrs. Brice; your grandfather has been to walk in the garden."

  "And Grafton?"

  "She said nothing of your uncle," she replied, with a little shudder atthe name; "but wrote that Mr. Carvel was said to be better. So there!your conscience need not trouble you for remaining. I am sure he wouldwish
you to pay a visit home.

  "And I have to scold you, sir. You have not been to Arlington Street forthree whole days."

  It struck me suddenly that her gayety was the same as that she had wornto my birthday party, scarce a year agone.

  "Dolly, you are not well!" I said anxiously.

  She flung her head saucily for answer. In the meantime his Grace,talking coldly to Comyn, had been looking unutterable thunders at me.I thought of him awaking in the dew at Covent Garden, and could scarcekeep from laughing in his face. Mr. Marmaduke squirmed to the front.

  "Morning, Richard," he said, with a marked cordiality. "Have you metthe Duke of Chartersea? No! Your Grace, this is Mr. Richard Carvel. Hisfamily are dear friends of ours in the colonies."

  To my great surprise, the duke saluted me quite civilly. But I had thefeeling of facing a treacherous bull which would gore me as soon as evermy back was turned. He was always putting me in mind of a bull, with hisshort neck and heavy, hunched shoulders,--and with the ugly tinge of redin the whites of his eyes.

  "Mr. Manners tells me you are to remain awhile in London, Mr. Carvel,"he said, in his thick voice.

  I took his meaning instantly, and replied in kind.

  "Yes, your Grace, I have some business to attend to here."

  "Ah," he answered; "then I shall see you again."

  "Probably, sir," said I.

  His Lordship watched this thrust and parry with an ill-concealeddelight. Dorothy's face was impassive, expressionless. As the duketurned to mount the stairs, he stumbled clumsily across a young mancoming to pay his respects to Miss Manners, and his Grace went sprawlingagainst the wall.

  "Confound you, sir!" he cried.

  For the ducal temper was no respecter of presences. Then a title was atitle to those born lower, and the young man plainly had a vast honourfor a coronet.

  "I beg your Grace's pardon," said he.

  "Who the deuce is he?" demanded the duke petulantly of Mr. Manners,thereby setting the poor little man all a-tremble.

  "Why, why,--" he replied, searching for his spyglass.

  For an instant Dolly's eyes shot scorn. Chartersea had clearly seen andheeded that signal before.

  "The gentleman is a friend of mine," she said.

  Tho' I were put out of the Garden of Eden as a consequence, I itched tohave it out with his Grace then and there. I knew that I was boundto come into collision with him sooner or later. Such, indeed, was mymission in London. But Dorothy led the way upstairs, a spot of colourburning each of her cheeks. The stream of guests had been arrested untilthe hall was packed, and the curious were peering over the rail above.

  "Lord, wasn't she superb!" exclaimed Comyn, exultingly, as we followed.In the drawing-room the buzzing about the card tables was hushed amoment as she went in. But I soon lost sight of her, thanks to Comyn. Hedrew me on from group to group, and I was duly presented to a scoreof Lady So-and-sos and honourable misses, most of whom had titles, butlittle else. Mammas searched their memories, and suddenly discoveredthat they had heard their parents speak of my grandfather. But, as itwas a fair presumption that most colonial gentlemen made a visit home atleast once in their lives, I did not allow the dust to get into my eyes.I was invited to dinners, and fairly showered with invitations to ballsand drums and garden parties. I was twitted about the Beauty, most oftenwith only a thin coating of amiability covering the spite of the remark.In short, if my head had not been so heavily laden with other matters,it might well have become light under the strain. Had I been ambitiousto enter the arena I should have had but little trouble, sinceeligibility then might be reduced to guineas and another element notmoral. I was the only heir of one of the richest men in the colony,vouched for by the Manners and taken up by Mr. Fox and my Lord Comyn.Inquiries are not pushed farther. I could not help seeing the hardnessof it all, or refrain from contrasting my situation with that of thepenniless outcast I had been but a little time before. The gilded rooms,the hundred yellow candles multiplied by the mirrors, the powder, theperfume, the jewels,--all put me in mind of the poor devils I had leftwasting away their lives in Castle Yard. They, too, had had their timesof prosperity, their friends who had faded with the first waning offortune. Some of them had known what it was to be fawned over. And howmany of these careless, flitting men of fashion I looked upon could feelthe ground firm beneath their feet; or could say with certainty whata change of ministers, or one wild night at White's or Almack's, wouldbring forth? Verily, one must have seen the under side of life to knowthe upper!

  Presently I was sought out by Mr. Topham Beauclerk, who had heard of theepisode below and wished to hear more. He swore at the duke.

  "He will be run through some day, and serve him jolly right," said he."Bet you twenty pounds Charles Fox does it! His Grace knows he has thecourage to fight him."

  "The courage!" I repeated.

  "Yes. Angelo says the duke has diabolical skill. And then he won't fightfair. He killed young Atwater on a foul, you know. Slipped on the wetgrass, and Chartersea had him pinned before he caught his guard. Butthere is Lady Di a-calling, a-calling."

  "Do all the women cheat in America too?" asked Topham, as we approached.

  I thought of my Aunt Caroline, and laughed.

  "Some," I answered.

  "They will game, d--n 'em," said Topham, as tho' he had never gamed inhis life. "And they will cheat, till a man has to close his eyes tokeep from seeing their pretty hands. And they will cry, egad, oh sotouchingly, if the luck goes against them in spite of it all. Only lastweek I had to forgive Mrs Farnham an hundred guineas. She said she'dlost her pin-money twice over, and was like to have wept her eyes out."

  Thus primed in Topham's frank terms, I knew what to expect. And I foundto my amusement he had not overrun the truth. I lost like a stoic, sawnothing, and discovered the straight road to popularity.

  "The dear things expect us to make it up at the clubs," whispered he.

  I discovered how he had fallen in love with his wife, Lady Diana, andpitied poor Bolingbroke heartily for having lost her. She was thenin her prime,--a beauty, a wit, and a great lady, with a dash of thehumanities about her that brought both men and women to her feet.

  "You must come to see me, Mr. Carvel," said she. "I wish to talk to youof Dorothy."

  "Your Ladyship believes me versed in no other subject?" I asked.

  "None other worth the mention," she replied instantly; "Topham tells meyou can talk horses, and that mystery of mysteries, American politics.But look at Miss Manners Dow. I'll warrant she is making Sir Charles seeto his laurels, and young Stavordale is struck dumb."

  I looked up quickly and beheld Dolly surrounded by a circle of admirers.

  "Mark the shot strike!" Lady Di continued, between the deals; "that timeChartersea went down. I fancy he is bowled over rather often," she saidslyly. "What a brute it is. And they say that that little woman she hasfor a father imagines a union with the duke will redound to his glory."

  "They say," remarked Mrs. Meynel, sitting next me, "that the duke hasthumbscrews of some kind on Mr. Manners."

  "Miss Manners is able to take care of herself," said Topham.

  "'On dit', that she has already refused as many dukes as did her Graceof Argyle," said Mrs. Meynel.

  I had lost track of the cards, and knew I was losing prodigiously. Butmy eyes went back again and again to the group by the doorway, whereDolly was holding court and dispensing justice, and perchance injustice.The circle increased. Ribands, generals whose chests were covered withmedals of valour, French noblemen, and foreign ambassadors stopped fora word with the Beauty and passed on their way, some smiling, somereflecting, to make room for others. I overheard from the neighbouringtables a spiteful protest that a young upstart from the coloniesshould turn Lady Tankerville's drum into a levee. My ears tingled as Ilistened. But not a feathered parrot in the carping lot of them coulddeny that Miss Manners had beauty and wit enough to keep them all atbay. Hers was not an English beauty: every line of her face and pose ofher body p
roclaimed her of that noble type of Maryland women, distinctlyAmerican, over which many Englishmen before and since have lost theirheads and hearts.

  "Egad!" exclaimed Mr. Storer, who was looking on; "she's alreadydefeated some of the Treasury Bench, and bless me if she isn't ratingNorth himself."

  Half the heads in the room were turned toward Miss Manners, who wasexchanging jokes with the Prime Minister of Great Britain. I saw acorpulent man, ludicrously like the King's pictures, with bulging grayeyes that seemed to take in nothing. And this was North, upon whoseconduct with the King depended the fate of our America. Good-natured hewas, and his laziness was painfully apparent. He had the reputation ofgoing to sleep standing, like a horse.

  "But the Beauty contrives to keep him awake," said Storer.

  "If you stay among us, Mr. Carvel," said Topham, "she will get you acommissionership for the asking."

  "Look," cried Lady Di, "there comes Mr. Fox, the precocious, theirresistible. Were he in the Bible, we should read of him passing thetime of day with King Solomon."

  "Or instructing Daniel in the art of lion-taming," put in Mrs. Meynel.

  There was Mr. Fox in truth, and the Beauty's face lighted up at sight ofhim. And presently, when Lord North had made his bow and passed on,he was seen to lead her out of the room, leaving her circle to go topieces, like an empire without a head.