Джорджетт Хейер - The Foundling

The Duke, feeling worn-out by the exercise of so much imagination, mopped his damp brow as soon as Mrs. Appleby had sailed away to prepare the small back bed-chamber, and nerved himself to enter his parlour He found that Belinda, having shed her bonnet and pelisse, had made herself comfortable in an easy chair by the fire, and was eating one of the few apples Tom had left in the basket on the side-table. She greeted her host with her angelic smile, and said: “How disagreeable she is! Will she let me stay here, sir?”

“Yes, for tonight she will,” he replied. “But I do not understand! Why have you come? What is it you wish me to do for you?”

She looked at him in surprise and faint reproach. “But you said you wished you might take me with you!” she reminded him.

The Duke, who clearly saw an abyss yawning at his feet, said with a great deal of uneasiness in his voice: “Did I? Yes, well, but—but I cannot take you with me!”

“Can’t you?” said Belinda wistfully. “Then what must I do, please, sir?”

“My dear girl, how can I possibly advise you?” protested Gilly. “I do not even know why you have left your uncle!”

“Oh, he is not my uncle!” said Belinda blithely.

“Not your uncle? He is your guardian though, is he not?”

“He said he would be,” agreed Belinda, “but he never gave me any of the things he promised me, and besides, I don’t like it at that horrid little inn, so perhaps I won’t have him for a guardian any more. I thought I might have you for one instead,” she added confidingly.

“No,” said the Duke firmly, “that is quite impossible!”

Belinda sighed, but appeared to resign herself to her disappointment. She took another bite out of her apple, and fixed her eyes expectantly on the Duke’s face.

“Does Liversedge know you have come to me?” he demanded. She shook her head. “But how could you contrive to escape unseen? and how did you reach Baldock? You cannot have walked all the way, surely?”

“Oh, no! I only walked to the pike-road, and a kind gentleman took me up in his carriage,” Belinda explained. “And he said he would be very glad to take me to his house, only that perhaps his wife would not like it. I daresay she is a disagreeable lady, like that one downstairs. Ladies are nearly always so, are they not? I like gentlemen better.”

The Duke did not find this difficult to believe. He refrained from comment, however, merely repeating: “How did you contrive to escape from that place?”

“Well, Uncle Swithin’s head hurt him, so he went to lie down upon his bed, and everyone else was gone into the tap-room. Besides, Mr. Mimms would not care if he saw me go, because he doesn’t hold with females.”

“I see. But what made you run away? Did Liversedge blame you for what happened at the inn this afternoon? Was he perhaps angry with you?”

“Oh, yes! He said he wished he had not saddled himself with me, for I am too stupid to be of the least use to him, and he says he will send me back to Mrs. Pilling!” replied Belinda, large tears gathering in her eyes.

“Pray do not cry!” begged the Duke. “Who is Mrs. Pilling?”

“She is a very cross lady, not at all kind to me, and she will very likely put me in prison,” said Belinda, the tears welling over.

The Duke, who had had previous experience of the ease with which Belinda wept, watched in a fascinated way the large drops rolling down her cheeks without in the smallest degree impairing her beauty, and could not find it in his heart to blame Matthew by having succumbed to so much pathetic loveliness. After a moment, he said: “I wish you will not cry! No one will put you in prison, I assure you!”

Belinda obediently stopped crying, but said in a doleful voice: “Yes, she will, sir, for I have broken my indentures.”

Light began to break in upon the Duke. “Were you apprenticed to Mrs. Pilling?” he asked.

“Oh, yes, and I was learning to trim the hats very well, but then Mr. Liversedge said that if I went away with him I should live like a lady, and have a purple dress, and a ring to put on my finger. So I went with him, but Mrs. Dovercourt was cross, and I did not like it in Oxford above half, and now I think I would like not to live with Mr. Liversedge any more. But I daren’t go back to Bath, because besides putting me in prison Mrs. Pilling would very likely beat me as well.”

“Does she do so?” demanded the Duke, quite shocked at the thought that anyone could so maltreat the lovely Belinda.

“Yes, because I am very stupid,” explained Belinda, without rancour. “And Mr. Liversedge boxed my ears, too, though I said just what he told me I must. I am very unhappy!”

“No, no, don’t be unhappy!” said the Duke, terrified lest she should dissolve once more into tears. “No one shall beat you, or box your ears, I promise! You must tell me where your home is, and I will—”

“I haven’t got a home,” said Belinda.

“Oh!” said the Duke, somewhat dashed. “But you have relatives, have you not, Miss—What is your name?”

“Belinda,” she answered, with a look of surprise.

“Yes, I know, but your other name? Your surname?”

“Oh, I haven’t any other name!” she told him. “I’ma foundling.”

“A foundling!” he ejaculated. “Then you do not even know who your mother and father were?”

“Oh, no!” she said. “If you please, sir, may I have another apple?”

He handed her the basket. “Of course. But, my poor child, have you no relatives to whom you can him for help?”

“Oh, no!” she said again, shaking her head so that her golden curls were set quivering and bobbing. “Foundlings don’t, you know.”

“I didn’t know. That is, I had never thought—It is very dreadful!”

She agreed to this, but more with the air of one willing to please than with any particular chagrin.

“What in heaven’s name am I to do with you?” said the Duke, looking harassed.

Belinda said hopefully: “You did say that you wished you might give me the purple silk dress,” she suggested.

He could not help laughing. “No, no, that is not what I meant!”

She sighed, and the corners of her mouth drooped tragically. “No one ever gives me a purple silk dress,” she mourned, a sob in her voice.

The Duke had never had occasion to bestow much thought on female attire, but now that he came to consider the matter dispassionately he was bound to own that there was much to be said in extenuation of all those who had refused to let Belinda have her heart’s desire. The combination of those bright gold curls and a dress of purple silk would be shocking enough, he imagined, to stun all beholders. He made haste to divert her thoughts. “Belinda, have you no friend to whom you might go?”

She appeared to bend her mind seriously to this question; and after staring with wrinkled brow at the Duke for a moment or two, suddenly dazzled him with one of her brilliant smiles, and said: “Oh, yes, I have a friend that was used to work at a mantua-maker’s, only she was married, and went away from Bath. I should like of all things to visit her, for I daresay she has a baby now, and I am excessively fond of babies!”

“Where does she live?” asked the Duke.

Belinda sighed. “She went to a place called Hitchin, but I don’t know where it is, and I only recall it because it sounds like kitchen, and I think that is very droll, don’t you, sir?”

“Hitchin!” he exclaimed, his harassed air lightening a little. “But Hitchin lies only a few miles from here! I daresay no more than six or seven, perhaps not as much! If you think you would like to visit this friend, I will take you there tomorrow! Do you know her direction?”

“Oh, no!” said Belinda unconcernedly.

Again the Duke was dashed “Well, do you know her name?” he asked.

Belinda laughed merrily at this. “Why, of course I know her name! It is Maggie Street!”

“Then depend upon it we shall soon find her!” he said, much relieved.

At this moment, Mrs. Appleby entered the parlour, and announced that as Miss’s bedchamber was now ready for her she would escort Miss to it.

“Yes, please do so!” said the Duke. “And perhaps you would be so good as to bring up a glass of milk to her, for I fear she is rather hungry.”

“Very good, sir,” replied Mrs. Appleby stiffly. “Come with me, miss, if you please!”

She picked up the bandboxes, and swept them and Belinda inexorably out of the room, leaving the Duke feeling extremely exhausted, but not a little thankful that he was not to be saddled with Belinda for the rest of his life, as at one moment he had feared that he might be.

The following morning, the Duke thought it wisest to visit Tom before that young gentleman had emerged from his room, to warn him that he had acquired a sister overnight. Tom was inclined to take this in bad part, giving it as his opinion that girls spoiled everything. When he learned that Belinda’s presence had made it necessary for the Duke to change his plans, his face fell perceptibly, and it was only an assurance that he should eventually be taken to London that enabled him to meet his new sister without overt hostility. He evinced little curiosity, which was a relief to the Duke, and, not having reached an impressionable stage in his career, was quite unmoved by the loveliness that presently burst upon him. He ate his breakfast in unusual silence, occasionally shooting a darkling look at Belinda, and lost no time in effacing himself when he had finished. The Duke sent him off to discover where he could hire a post-chaise-and-pair to carry the whole party to Hitchin that morning, for not only was he extremely anxious to hand Belinda over to her friend as soon as possible, but Belinda herself was troubled by fears that Mr. Liversedge might pursue and recapture her. It was in vain that the Duke explained to her that since Mr. Liversedge was neither her uncle nor her guardian he had no hold over her, and would scarcely dare to coerce her: she appeared to listen to his words, but it was apparent that they conveyed little to her intelligence.