“I will render a strict account to you,” promised Sylvester, pulling up a chair to the bedside, and sitting down. “That hock, by the bye, will have to be fomented for a day or two, but there should be no lasting injury. A tidy pair, so far as I could judge by lantern-light.”

“My father bought them last year—proper high-bred ’uns!” Tom said. “I wouldn’t have had this happen to them for a thousand pounds!”

“I’ll go bail you wouldn’t! A harsh parent?”

“No, no, he’s a prime gun, but—!”

“I know,” said Sylvester sympathetically. “So was mine, but—!”

Tom grinned at him. “You must think me a cow-handed whipster! But if only that curst donkey hadn’t brayed—However, it’s no use saying that: my father will say I made wretched work of it, and the worst of it is I think I did! And what sort of a case I should have been in if you hadn’t come to the rescue, sir, I don’t know!”

“If you must thank anybody, thank Keighley!” recommended Sylvester. “I couldn’t have set the broken bone, you know.”

“No, but it was you who fetched Upsall, which was a great deal too kind of you. There’s another thing, too.” He hesitated, looking rather shyly at Sylvester, and colouring a little. “Phoebe didn’t understand—she isn’t by any means fly to the time of day, you know!—but I did, and—and I’m very much obliged to you for what you’ve done for her. Sending that girl to sleep with her, I mean. I don’t know if it will answer, or if—Well, the thing is, sir—now that we are in such a rare mess do you think I ought to marry her?”

Sylvester had been regarding him with friendly amusement, but this naive question brought a startled frown to his face. “But isn’t that your intention?” he asked.

“No—oh, lord, no! I mean, it wasn’t my intention (though I did offer to!) until we were grassed by that overturn. But now that we’re cooped up here perhaps I ought, as a man of honour—Only ten to one she’ll refuse to marry me, and then where shall we be?”

“If you are not eloping, what are you doing?” demanded Sylvester.

“I guessed that was what you must be thinking, sir,” said Tom.

“I imagine you might. Nor am I the only one who thinks it!” said Sylvester. “When I left Austerby I did so because Marlow had already set out for the Border in pursuit of you!”

“No!” exclaimed Tom. “Well, what a gudgeon! If he thought Phoebe had run off with me why the deuce hadn’t he the wit to inquire for me at the Manor? My mother could have told him all was well!”

“I can only say that she did not appear to me to have perfectly understood that,” responded Sylvester dryly. “As it chanced it was she who came to Austerby, bringing with her the letter you had written to her. You young idiot, I don’t know precisely what you told her, but it certainly didn’t persuade her that all was well! It threw her into a state of great affliction—and what she said to Lady Marlow I shall always be happy to think I was privileged to hear!”

“Did she give her snuff?” asked Tom appreciatively. “But she can’t have thought I had eloped with Phoebe! Why, I particularly told her there was no need for her to be in a fidget! Lord Marlow might, I daresay, but not Mama!”

“On the contrary! Lord Marlow pooh-poohed the suggestion. He was only brought to believe it on the testimony of one of his younger daughters. I forget what her name is: a sanctimonious schoolgirl whose piety I found nauseating.”

“Eliza,” said Tom instantly. “But she knew nothing about it! Unless she was listening at the keyhole, and if that was the case she must have known we hadn’t gone to the Border.”

“She was, but she insisted that she had heard you say you were going to Gretna Green.”

Tom frowned in an effort of memory. “I suppose I might have said so: I know I couldn’t see any other way out of the fix. But Phoebe had a much better scheme, as it happened, which I own I was devilish glad to hear! I’m as fond of her as I could be—well, I’ve run tame at Austerby ever since I was breeched, you know, and she’s like my sister!—but I’m damned if I want to marry her! The thing was I promised I’d help her, and the only way I could think of to do it was by doing so.”

“Help her to do what?” interrupted Sylvester, considerably mystified.

“To escape from Austerby. So—”

“Well, I blame no one for wishing to do that, but what the devil made you choose such a moment? Didn’t you know there was snow in the air?”

“Yes, of course I did, sir, but I had no choice! The need was urgent—or, at least, Phoebe thought it was. If I hadn’t taken her she meant to go to London by herself, on the common stage!”

“Why?”

Tom hesitated, glancing speculatively at Sylvester. Sylvester said encouragingly: “I won’t cry rope on you!”

The smile won Tom; he said in a burst of confidence:

“Well, the truth is the whole thing was a fudge, but Lady Marlow told Phoebe you were going to Austerby to make her an offer! I must say it sounded like a hum to me, but it seems Lord Marlow thought so too, so one can’t blame Phoebe for being taken in, and cast into flat despair because of it.”

“In fact,” said Sylvester, “an offer from me would not have been welcome to her?”

“Oh, lord, no!” said Tom. “She said nothing would induce her to marry you! But I daresay you may have seen how it is in that house: if you had meant to offer for her Lady Marlow would have bullied her into submitting. The only thing was for her to run away.” He stopped, uneasily aware of having said more than was discreet. There was an odd expression in Sylvester’s eyes, hard to interpret but rather disquieting. “You know what females are, sir!” he added, trying to mend matters. “It was all nonsense, of course, for she scarcely knew you. I hope—I mean—perhaps I shouldn’t have told you!”

“Oh, why not?” Sylvester said lightly, smiling again.

10

Tom was relieved to see the smile, but he was not wholly reassured. “I beg pardon!” he said. “I thought it wouldn’t signify, telling you how it was, if you didn’t wish to offer for her—and you don’t, do you?”

“No, certainly not! What did I do to inspire Miss Marlow with this violent dislike of me?”

“Oh, I don’t know! Nothing, I daresay,” said Tom uncomfortably. “I expect you are not just her style, that’s all.”

“Not timbered up to her weight, in fact. Where, by the way, are you meaning to take her?”

“To her grandmother. She lives in London, and Phoebe is persuaded she will take her part—or that she would have done so, if it had been necessary.”

Sylvester’s eyes lifted suddenly to Tom’s. “Do you mean Lady Ingham?” he asked.

“Yes,” Tom nodded. “The other one died years ago. Are you acquainted with Lady Ingham, sir?”

“Oh, yes!” replied Sylvester, a laugh in his voice. “She is my godmother.”

“Is she, though? Then you must know her pretty well. Do you think she will let Phoebe stay with her? Phoebe seems to think there can be no doubt, but I can’t help wondering whether she won’t think it pretty shocking of her to have run off from home, and perhaps send her back again. What do you think, sir?”

“How can I say?” countered Sylvester. “Miss Marlow, I collect, still holds by her scheme, even though the menace of an offer from me doesn’t exist?”

“Oh yes! I did suggest to her that she need not go to London after all, but she says she will do so, and I must say I think she should—if only the old lady will receive her kindly! You know, sir, Lady Marlow is a regular brute, and it’s not a particle of use thinking Marlow will protect Phoebe, because he won’t! Phoebe knows there’s no help to be got from him—well, he told her so, when she begged him to stand by her!—and now she says she shan’t go back on any account. Only what’s to be done? Even if the snow melted tomorrow I can’t escort her, and I know I ought not to let her go alone. But if that detestable woman catches her here the trap will be down!”

“Not so much fretting and fussing, Galahad!” said Sylvester. “There’s no immediate danger, and before it becomes imminent I don’t doubt you will have hit upon an answer to the problem. Or I might do so for you.”

“How?” asked Tom quickly.

“Well,” replied Sylvester, getting up,” somewhere between this place and Austerby I have a chaise. I have left orders at the Bear, in Hungerford, that when it arrives there my servants are to be directed to this inn. In the circumstances, I shall be delighted to convey Miss Marlow to her grandmother!”

Tom’s face lightened; he exclaimed: “Oh, by Jove, would you do that, sir? It would be the very thing—if she will go with you!”

“Let me beg you not to fidget yourself into a fever on the chance that she won’t! You had much better try if you can go to sleep. I only hope you may not be too uncomfortable to do so.”

“Oh, no! That is, Dr Upsall left some stuff he said I should drink: syrup of poppies, or some such thing. I daresay I shall sleep like a log.”

“Well, if you should wake, and wish for anything, knock on the wall behind you,” said Sylvester. “I shall hear you: I am a tolerably light sleeper. I’ll send Keighley to you now. Goodnight!”

He went away with a nod and a smile, leaving Tom to his various reflections. Prominent among these was a determination to endure hours of wakefulness rather than to drag his noble acquaintance from his bed. Thanks, however, to Keighley, interpreting the surgeon’s instructions liberally, he very soon succumbed to a large dose of the narcotic prescribed for him, and slept the night through. His dreams were untroubled, for although, when Sylvester left him, he thought over all that he had disclosed, and wished the greater part of it unsaid, he was soon able to persuade himself that he had been grossly indulging his imagination when he had read danger in that queer look of Sylvester’s. When he came to consider the matter he could not remember that he had said anything to arouse anger in Sylvester. It was not given to Tom, rating himself modestly, to understand the emotions of one who had been encouraged all the years of his adult life to set his value high.