The Master of the Ceremonies

“Jo-si-ah, time’s flying,” cried Mrs Barclay, in a pathetic manner that was absolutely comic. “What am I to say to this man?”

“Tell him,” said Barclay sternly.

“Ah!” ejaculated Mrs Barclay, with a long sigh, as if she shrank from her task. “It must be done. Dear Mr Denville, I don’t like telling you, but Mrs Burnett – ”

Denville reeled, and caught at Barclay’s arm.

“Hold up, old fellow! Be a man,” cried the money-lender, supporting him.

The old man recovered himself, and stood up very erect, turning for a moment resentfully on Barclay, as if angry that he should have dared to touch him. Then, looking fiercely at Mrs Barclay:

“Hush, ma’am!” he cried. “Shame, shame! How can you – you who are so true and tender-hearted – let yourself be the mouthpiece of this wretched crew?”

“But indeed, Mr Denville – ”

“Oh, hush, ma’am, hush! You, who know the people so well. Mrs Burnett – my dear sweet child, May – the idol of my very life – to be made the butt now at which these wretches shoot their venomous shafts. Scandals, madam; scandals, Barclay. Coinages from the very pit. A true, sweet lady, sir. Bright as a bird. Sweet as some opening flower. And they dare to malign her with her bright, merry, innocent ways – that sweet young girl wife. Oh, shame! Shame upon them! Shame!”

“Oh, Denville, Denville,” said Barclay softly, as he laid his hand upon the old man’s shoulder.

“Ah!” he cried, “even you pity me for this. Dear Mrs Barclay, I ought to be angry with you: but no, I will not. You mean so well. But it is all I have – in a life so full of pain and suffering that I wonder how I live – the love of my daughters – them to defend against the world. Madam, you are mistaken. My daughter – an English lady – as pure as heaven. But I thank you – I am not angry – you mean well. Always kind and helpful to my dear child, Claire. Ha, ha, ha!”

It was a curious laugh, full of affectation; and he took snuff again with all the old ceremony; but he did not close the box with a loud snap, and as his hand fell to his side, the brown powder dropped in patches and flakes here and there upon the carpet.

“Ha, ha, ha!” he laughed again. “Calumnies, madam – I say it as I take my leave – the calumnies of false fribbles and envious women. Busy again with my dear children’s names. But we must live it down. Elopement! Pshaw! The coxcombs! The Jezebels! My child! Oh, I cannot mention her sweet, spring-flower name in connection with such a horror. It is atrocious.”

“Denville,” said Barclay, in answer to an appealing look from his wife.

“No, no! Not a word, sir, not a word,” cried Denville, raising his hand. “It is too absurd – too villainous. Madam, it is from your good heart that this warning comes. I thank you, ma’am, you meant to put me on my guard. Barclay, adieu, my good friend. You’ll shake hands. You’ll take no notice of this slight emotion – this display of a father’s indignation on hearing such a charge. Mrs Barclay, if I have spoken harshly, you’ll forgive me. I don’t blame you, dear madam. Au revoir! No, no; don’t ring, I beg. I pray you will not come down. You’ll banish all this – from your thoughts – ”

He stopped short and reeled again, dropping snuff-box, hat, and cane as he clasped his hands to his head, staring wildly before him. The feeble affected babble ceased suddenly, and it was another voice that seemed to come from his lips as he exclaimed loudly in hot anger:

“It is a lie! You – May! The girl I’ve loved so well – you! When my cup of suffering is brimming over. A lie – a lie, I say. Ah!”

His manner changed again; and now it was soft and full of wild appeal, as he cried:

“May – May! My darling! God help me, poor broken dotard that I am! Shall I be in time?”

He made a dash for the door, but staggered, and would have fallen had not Barclay caught him and helped him to a chair, where he sat gazing before him as if at some scene passing before his eyes.

“Blood,” he whispered at last, “to the head. Help me, Barclay, or I shall be too late.”

“No, stay here. I’ll go and do all I can.”

“No!” cried Denville fiercely. “I am her father, Barclay; we may save her – if I go too.”

He rose with nervous energy now, and gripping the money-lender’s arm they went together out into the dark street, where, indignantly refusing further help, the old man strode off, leaving Barclay watching him.

“I don’t hardly know what to do,” he said musingly. “Ah! who are you?”

“His lordship’s man, sir,” said a livery servant. “Lord Carboro’ says could you make it convenient to come to him directly?”

“No, I’m busy. Well, yes, I will. Is he at home?”

“No, sir; at the reading-room.”

“Go on, then,” said Barclay. “Tell his lordship I’ll be there directly.”

The man went off, and Barclay hurried indoors to speak with his wife, and came out five minutes later to join the old nobleman at the reading-room that answered the purpose of a club.

Volume Three – Chapter Six.

On the Downs

High up on the Downs behind the town lay a patch of wood, dwarfed and stunted in its growth by the sharp breezes that came off the sea. The soil in which they grew, too, was exceedingly shallow; and, as the chalk beneath was not very generous in its supply of nutriment, the trees sent their roots along the surface, and their low-spreading branches inland, with a few shabby twigs seaward to meet the cutting blasts.

Right through this patch of thick low wood ran the London Road, and across it the coast road, going west, while a tall finger-post that had once been painted stood with outstretched arms, bending over a little old grey milestone, as if it were blessing it for being so humble and so small.

It was along this road that Richard Linnell, Mellersh, and James Bell had cantered, and then turned off at the cross, on the night of their pursuit, and the chalky way looked much the same beneath twinkling stars on the night succeeding the day when Louis Gravani had had his interview with Claire, as on that of Mrs Pontardent’s party.

The similarity was increased by the presence of a yellow post-chaise; but it was not drawn up at the back of Mrs Pontardent’s garden, but here on the short turf close up to the trees and opposite the finger-post.

The chaise, an old yellow weather-beaten affair, seemed to be misty, and the horses indistinct in the darkness, looking quite the ghost of a vehicle that might be expected to fade away like a trick of the imagination, everything was so still. The very horses were asleep, standing bent of knee and with pendent heads. One of the wheelers, however, uttered a sigh now and then as if unhappy in its dreams, for it was suffering not from nightmare, a trouble that might have befallen any horse, but from the weight of the sleeping postboy on its back. The man evidently believed in his steed as an old friend, and had lain forward over the pommel of his saddle, half clasping the horse’s neck, and was sleeping heavily, while his companion, who rode one of the leaders, had dismounted and seated himself upon the turf where the road was cut down through the chalk, so that his legs were in the channel and his back against a steep bank.

They had been asleep quite an hour, when a quick step was heard, a misty-looking figure in a long grey wrapper, and closely-veiled, came along the road, stopped short by the postboys, retreated and whispered softly as the turf opposite was reached:

“Hist! Are you there? Oh, gracious! What a wicked girl I am! He has not come.”

The figure seemed to take courage and approached the chaise again.

“He may be inside,” she said softly, and going on tip-toe to the door her hand was raised to the fastening, when one of the wheelers snorted and half roused the mounted postboy.

“Hullo, then, old gal,” he muttered loudly. “Yo – yo – yo – yo – yo! Gate – gate.”

“What shall I do?” exclaimed the veiled figure, and she seized one of the spokes of the wheel and clung to it as the other postboy, slightly roused by his companion, took up his cry and shouted drowsily:

“Yo – yo – yo – yo – yo! Gate – gate!”

The horses sighed, and the men subsided into their nap, a long ride on the previous evening having made them particularly drowsy.

“Talking in their sleep,” said the veiled figure, raising herself and trying the handle of the chaise door, opening it, and reaching in to make sure whether it was tenanted or no.

“Not come,” she sighed. “He must be late, or else I’ve missed him. He is looking for me. Oh, what a wicked girl I am! What’s that?”

She turned sharply round, darting behind the chaise and among the trees as a faint sound was heard; and this directly after took the form of footsteps, a short slight man approaching on the other side of the road, stopping to gaze at the chaise and then backing slowly into the low bush-like trees, which effectually hid him from sight.

There was utter stillness again for a few moments, when the dull sound of steps was once more heard, and another short slight figure approached armed with a stout cane.

He kept to the grass and walked straight up to the sleeping postboys, examined them, and then stood listening.