The Hand of Ethelberta: A Comedy in Chapters

  42. THE DONCASTLES' RESIDENCE, AND OUTSIDE THE SAME

  Mrs. Doncastle's dressing-bell had rung, but Menlove, the lady's maid,having at the same time received a letter by the evening post, paused toread it before replying to the summons:--

  'ENCKWORTH COURT, Wednesday.

  DARLING LOUISA,--I can assure you that I am no more likely than yourself to form another attachment, as you will perceive by what follows. Before we left town I thought that to be able to see you occasionally was sufficient for happiness, but down in this lonely place the case is different. In short, my dear, I ask you to consent to a union with me as soon as you possibly can. Your prettiness has won my eyes and lips completely, sweet, and I lie awake at night to think of the golden curls you allowed to escape from their confinement on those nice times of private clothes, when we walked in the park and slipped the bonds of service, which you were never born to any more than I. . . .

  'Had not my own feelings been so strong, I should have told you at the first dash of my pen that what I expected is coming to pass at last--the old dog is going to be privately married to Mrs. P. Yes, indeed, and the wedding is coming off to-morrow, secret as the grave. All her friends will doubtless leave service on account of it. What he does now makes little difference to me, of course, as I had already given warning, but I shall stick to him like a Briton in spite of it. He has to-day made me a present, and a further five pounds for yourself, expecting you to hold your tongue on every matter connected with Mrs. P.'s friends, and to say nothing to any of them about this marriage until it is over. His lordship impressed this upon me very strong, and familiar as a brother, and of course we obey his instructions to the letter; for I need hardly say that unless he keeps his promise to help me in setting up the shop, our nuptials cannot be consumed. His help depends upon our obedience, as you are aware. . . .'

  This, and much more, was from her very last lover, Lord Mountclere'svalet, who had been taken in hand directly she had convinced herself ofJoey's hopeless youthfulness. The missive sent Mrs. Menlove's spiritssoaring like spring larks; she flew upstairs in answer to the bell with ajoyful, triumphant look, which the illuminated figure of Mrs. Doncastlein her dressing-room could not quite repress. One could almost forgiveMenlove her arts when so modest a result brought such vast content.

  Mrs. Doncastle seemed inclined to make no remark during the dressing, andat last Menlove could repress herself no longer.

  'I should like to name something to you, m'm.'

  'Yes.'

  'I shall be wishing to leave soon, if it is convenient.'

  'Very well, Menlove,' answered Mrs. Doncastle, as she serenely surveyedher right eyebrow in the glass. 'Am I to take this as a formal notice?'

  'If you please; but I could stay a week or two beyond the month ifsuitable. I am going to be married--that's what it is, m'm.'

  'O! I am glad to hear it, though I am sorry to lose you.'

  'It is Lord Mountclere's valet--Mr. Tipman--m'm.'

  'Indeed.'

  Menlove went on building up Mrs. Doncastle's hair awhile in silence.

  'I suppose you heard the other news that arrived in town to-day, m'm?'she said again. 'Lord Mountclere is going to be married to-morrow.'

  'To-morrow? Are you quite sure?'

  'O yes, m'm. Mr. Tipman has just told me so in his letter. He is goingto be married to Mrs. Petherwin. It is to be quite a private wedding.'

  Mrs. Doncastle made no remark, and she remained in the same stillposition as before; but a countenance expressing transcendent surprisewas reflected to Menlove by the glass.

  At this sight Menlove's tongue so burned to go further, and unfold thelady's relations with the butler downstairs, that she would have lost amonth's wages to be at liberty to do it. The disclosure was almost toomagnificent to be repressed. To deny herself so exquisite an indulgencerequired an effort which nothing on earth could have sustained save theone thing that did sustain it--the knowledge that upon her silence hungthe most enormous desideratum in the world, her own marriage. She saidno more, and Mrs. Doncastle went away.

  It was an ordinary family dinner that day, but their nephew Neighhappened to be present. Just as they were sitting down Mrs. Doncastlesaid to her husband: 'Why have you not told me of the weddingto-morrow?--or don't you know anything about it?'

  'Wedding?' said Mr. Doncastle.

  'Lord Mountclere is to be married to Mrs. Petherwin quite privately.'

  'Good God!' said some person.

  Mr. Doncastle did not speak the words; they were not spoken by Neigh:they seemed to float over the room and round the walls, as if originatingin some spiritualistic source. Yet Mrs. Doncastle, remembering thesymptoms of attachment between Ethelberta and her nephew which hadappeared during the summer, looked towards Neigh instantly, as if shethought the words must have come from him after all; but Neigh's face wasperfectly calm; he, together with her husband, was sitting with his eyesfixed in the direction of the sideboard; and turning to the same spot shebeheld Chickerel standing pale as death, his lips being parted as if hedid not know where he was.

  'Did you speak?' said Mrs. Doncastle, looking with astonishment at thebutler.

  'Chickerel, what's the matter--are you ill?' said Mr. Doncastlesimultaneously. 'Was it you who said that?'

  'I did, sir,' said Chickerel in a husky voice, scarcely above a whisper.'I could not help it.'

  'Why?'

  'She is my daughter, and it shall be known at once!'

  'Who is your daughter?'

  He paused a few moments nervously. 'Mrs. Petherwin,' he said.

  Upon this announcement Neigh looked at poor Chickerel as if he sawthrough him into the wall. Mrs. Doncastle uttered a faint exclamationand leant back in her chair: the bare possibility of the truth ofChickerel's claims to such paternity shook her to pieces when she viewedher intimacies with Ethelberta during the past season--the court she hadpaid her, the arrangements she had entered into to please her; above all,the dinner-party which she had contrived and carried out solely togratify Lord Mountclere and bring him into personal communication withthe general favourite; thus making herself probably the chief thoughunconscious instrument in promoting a match by which her butler was tobecome father-in-law to a peer she delighted to honour. The crowd ofperceptions almost took away her life; she closed her eyes in a whiteshiver.

  'Do you mean to say that the lady who sat here at dinner at the same timethat Lord Mountclere was present, is your daughter?' asked Doncastle.

  'Yes, sir,' said Chickerel respectfully.

  'How did she come to be your daughter?'

  'I-- Well, she is my daughter, sir.'

  'Did you educate her?'

  'Not altogether, sir. She was a very clever child. Lady Petherwin tooka deal of trouble about her education. They were both left widows aboutthe same time: the son died, then the father. My daughter was onlyseventeen then. But though she's older now, her marriage with LordMountclere means misery. He ought to marry another woman.'

  'It is very extraordinary,' Mr. Doncastle murmured. 'If you are ill youhad better go and rest yourself, Chickerel. Send in Thomas.'

  Chickerel, who seemed to be much disturbed, then very gladly left theroom, and dinner proceeded. But such was the peculiarity of the case,that, though there was in it neither murder, robbery, illness, accident,fire, or any other of the tragic and legitimate shakers of human nerves,two of the three who were gathered there sat through the meal without theleast consciousness of what viands had composed it. Impressivenessdepends as much upon propinquity as upon magnitude; and to have honouredunawares the daughter of the vilest Antipodean miscreant and murdererwould have been less discomfiting to Mrs. Doncastle than it was to makethe same blunder with the daughter of a respectable servant who happenedto live in her own house. To Neigh the announcement was as thecatastrophe of a story already begun, rather than as an isolated wonder.Ethelberta's words had prepared him for
something, though the nature ofthat thing was unknown.

  'Chickerel ought not to have kept us in ignorance of this--of course heought not!' said Mrs. Doncastle, as soon as they were left alone.

  'I don't see why not,' replied Mr. Doncastle, who took the matter verycoolly, as was his custom.

  'Then she herself should have let it be known.'

  'Nor does that follow. You didn't tell Mrs. Petherwin that yourgrandfather narrowly escaped hanging for shooting his rival in a duel.'

  'Of course not. There was no reason why I should give extraneousinformation.'

  'Nor was there any reason why she should. As for Chickerel, he doubtlessfelt how unbecoming it would be to make personal remarks upon one of yourguests--Ha-ha-ha! Well, well--Ha-ha-ha-ha!'

  'I know this,' said Mrs. Doncastle, in great anger, 'that if my fatherhad been in the room, I should not have let the fact pass unnoticed, andtreated him like a stranger!'

  'Would you have had her introduce Chickerel to us all round? My dearMargaret, it was a complicated position for a woman.'

  'Then she ought not to have come!'

  'There may be something in that, though she was dining out at otherhouses as good as ours. Well, I should have done just as she did, forthe joke of the thing. Ha-ha-ha!--it is very good--very. It was a casein which the appetite for a jest would overpower the sting of consciencein any well-constituted being--that, my dear, I must maintain.'

  'I say she should not have come!' answered Mrs. Doncastle firmly. 'Ofcourse I shall dismiss Chickerel.'

  'Of course you will do no such thing. I have never had a butler in thehouse before who suited me so well. It is a great credit to the man tohave such a daughter, and I am not sure that we do not derive some lustreof a humble kind from his presence in the house. But, seriously, Iwonder at your short-sightedness, when you know the troubles we have hadthrough getting new men from nobody knows where.'

  Neigh, perceiving that the breeze in the atmosphere might ultimatelyintensify to a palpable black squall, seemed to think it would be well totake leave of his uncle and aunt as soon as he conveniently could;nevertheless, he was much less discomposed by the situation than by theactive cause which had led to it. When Mrs. Doncastle arose, her husbandsaid he was going to speak to Chickerel for a minute or two, and Neighfollowed his aunt upstairs.

  Presently Doncastle joined them. 'I have been talking to Chickerel,' hesaid. 'It is a very curious affair--this marriage of his daughter andLord Mountclere. The whole situation is the most astounding I have evermet with. The man is quite ill about the news. He has shown me a letterwhich has just reached him from his son on the same subject. LordMountclere's brother and this young man have actually gone off togetherto try to prevent the wedding, and Chickerel has asked to be allowed togo himself, if he can get soon enough to the station to catch the nightmail. Of course he may go if he wishes.'

  'What a funny thing!' said the lady, with a wretchedly factitious smile.'The times have taken a strange turn when the angry parent of the comedy,who goes post-haste to prevent the undutiful daughter's rash marriage, isa gentleman from below stairs, and the unworthy lover a peer of therealm!'

  Neigh spoke for almost the first time. 'I don't blame Chickerel inobjecting to Lord Mountclere. I should object to him myself if I had adaughter. I never liked him.'

  'Why?' said Mrs. Doncastle, lifting her eyelids as if the act were aheavy task.

  'For reasons which don't generally appear.'

  'Yes,' said Mr. Doncastle, in a low tone. 'Still, we must not believeall we hear.'

  'Is Chickerel going?' said Neigh.

  'He leaves in five or ten minutes,' said Doncastle.

  After a few further words Neigh mentioned that he was unable to staylonger that evening, and left them. When he had reached the outside ofthe door he walked a little way up the pavement and back again, as ifreluctant to lose sight of the street, finally standing under a lamp-postwhence he could command a view of Mr. Doncastle's front. Presently a mancame out in a great-coat and with a small bag in his hand; Neigh at oncerecognizing the person as Chickerel, went up to him.

  'Mr. Doncastle tells me you are going on a sudden journey. At what timedoes your train leave?' Neigh asked.

  'I go by the ten o'clock, sir: I hope it is a third-class,' saidChickerel; 'though I am afraid it may not be.'

  'It is as much as you will do to get to the station,' said Neigh, turningthe face of his watch to the light. 'Here, come into my cab--I amdriving that way.'

  'Thank you, sir,' said Chickerel.

  Neigh called a cab at the first opportunity, and they entered and drovealong together. Neither spoke during the journey. When they weredriving up to the station entrance Neigh looked again to see the hour.

  'You have not a minute to lose,' he said, in repressed anxiety. 'Andyour journey will be expensive: instead of walking from Anglebury toKnollsea, you had better drive--above all, don't lose time. Never mindwhat class the train is. Take this from me, since the emergency isgreat.' He handed something to Chickerel folded up small.

  The butler took it without inquiry, and stepped out hastily.

  'I sincerely hope she-- Well, good-night, Chickerel,' continued Neigh,ending his words abruptly. The cab containing him drove again towardsthe station-gates, leaving Chickerel standing on the kerb.

  He passed through the booking-office, and looked at the paper Neigh hadput into his hand. It was a five-pound note.

  Chickerel mused on the circumstance as he took his ticket and got intothe train.