Джорджетт Хейер - The Foundling

She nodded, and her curls danced. “Of course I did!” she assured him. “And he said that he would like to meet you.”

The Duke shuddered. “I may readily believe it! I trust he may never have his wish granted!”

“Oh, no! he is a dead bore!” agreed Belinda. “Besides, I told him that you had gone away and left me, so he knew he could not meet you.”

The Duke sank his head in his hands. “Belinda, Belinda, if I do not speedily contrive to hand you into safe keeping I foresee that there will be scarce a town in England where I shall dare to show my face again! So you told him I had deserted you! And what then?”

“Then he said he should take me home with him, and give me something better than a silk dress, or a ring to put on my finger. And he said his sister would be very glad to take care of me. So I came back with him here, sir, and fetched my bandboxes, and he took me to his home. But I don’t think Miss Clitheroe was glad at all, for she seemed very cross to me. However, she said I might stay, and she gave me some fruit to eat, and a handkerchief to hem, and she did say that I set neat stitches. But I do not care for hemming, so when Mr. Clitheroe came in I asked him what it was that he would give me, because I would like very much to have it. And I quite thought it would be something splendid, sir, for he said it was better than a silk dress! Only it was nothing but a take-in after all! He just gave me a Bible!”

Her face of chagrin was ludicrous enough to make her harassed protector burst out laughing. “My poor Belinda!”

“Well, I do think it was a great deal too bad of him, sir! The shabbiest trick! So I said I had a Bible already, and then I thought very likely you would have returned, so I would come back here to find you. And would you believe it, they would not let me! Oh, they did prose so!”

“But what did they want you to do instead?” demanded Tom.

“I don’t know, for I didn’t listen above half. I quite saw that I must run away, and I made up my mind to do so when they should have gone to bed, only by the luckiest chance they went off to a dinner-party—or was it a prayer-meeting? It was some such thing, but I wasn’t attending particularly. So I didn’t say anything, but only smiled, and made them think I would stay, and as soon as they were gone from the house, I slipped out when the servants were not by, and came back to the inn. And, if you please, sir, I have not had any dinner.”

“Ring the bell, Tom, and bespeak dinner for her,” said the Duke. “I am going to find a coach time-table!”

“Oh, are we leaving now?” asked Belinda, brightening.

“No, tomorrow, you stupid thing!” said Tom.

“Immediately!” said the Duke, walking towards the door.

“What?” cried Tom. “Oh, famous, sir! Where do we go?”

“Beyond Mr. Clitheroe’s reach!” replied the Duke. “Constables and magistrates I can deal with to admiration, but not—not, I know well, Mr. Clitheroe!”

He returned to his charges half an hour later with the information that they were bound for Aylesbury in a hired chaise. Belinda, who was making an excellent meal, accepted this without question, but Tom thought poorly of it, and demanded to be told why they must go to such a stuffy place.

“Because I find that there is a coach which runs from Aylesbury to Reading,” replied the Duke. “We may board that tomorrow, and from Reading we can take the London stage to Bath.”

“It would be more genteel to go in a post-chaise,” said Belinda wistfully.

“It would not only be more genteel, it would be by far more comfortable,” agreed the Duke. “It would also be more expensive, and I have been drawing the bustle to such purpose this day that my pockets will soon be to let.”

“Well, I would rather go on the stage!” said Tom, his eyes sparkling. “I shall ride on the roof, and make the coachman give me the reins! I have always wanted to tool a coach! I shall gallop along at such a rate! What a jest it would be if we overturned!”

This agreeable prospect made both him and Belinda laugh heartily. The Duke sent him off to pack up his belongings, devoutly trusting that there did not exist a coachman mad enough to entrust the ribbons to him.

While these stirring events were taking place in Hitchin, Mr. Liversedge was still knocking abortively on Captain Ware’s door. He gained admittance to the chambers at about the time the Duke and his two charges set out from the Sun Inn in a hired chaise, with Aylesbury for their destination.

The gin with which Wragby had so lavishly supplied him made Mr. Liversedge feel very unwell; and a night spent upon the kitchen floor had given him, he complained, a stiff neck. An assurance from Wragby that a halter would soon cure this was received by him in high dudgeon. He spoke with great dignity for several minutes, but to deaf ears. Wragby recommended him to shut his mummer, and to make haste and shave himself, since the Captain would certainly refuse to take such an oyster-faced rogue up beside him in his curricle. Mr. Liversedge said that he had no desire to be taken up beside the Captain. “In fact,” he added austerely, “the less I see of a young man whom I find unsympathetic in the extreme the better pleased I shall be!”

“You stow your whids, and do what I tell you!” said Wragby.

“It is a marvel to me,” said Mr. Liversedge, picking up the razor, and looking at it contemptuously, “that any gentleman should employ such a vulgar fellow as you.”

“And don’t give me no saucy answers!” said Wragby.

By the time the Captain was ready to set forward on the journey, Mr. Liversedge had not only shaved, but had Imbibed a cup of strong coffee, which revived him sufficiently to enable him to greet his host with creditable urbanity. His optimistic temperament led him to busy himself with the forming of various schemes for turning the present distressing state of affairs to good account rather than to waste time kicking against the pricks. The day was fine, and the cool air refreshing to him. It was not long before he was complimenting Captain Ware upon his horses, and his skill in handling the ribbons.

“Devilish obliging of you to say so!” said Gideon sardonically. “You are no doubt a judge!”

“Yes,” said Mr. Liversedge, tucking the rug more securely round his legs. “I fancy I may be held to be so, sir. You must know that many years ago I was employed in the stables of a notable whip—quite a nonesuch, indeed! A menial position, and one from which I swiftly rose, but it enabled me to judge a horse, and a whip.”

Gideon was amused, “A groom, were you? And what then?”

“In course of time, sir, I attained what was then the sum of my ambition. I became a gentleman’s gentleman.”

Gideon glanced curiously at him. “Why did you abandon that profession?”

Mr. Liversedge described one of his airy gestures. “Various causes, sir, various causes! You may say that it did not afford enough scope for a man of my vision. My ideas have ever been large, and my genius is for the cards and the bones. In fact, had I not suffered certain ill-merited reverses I should not today be in your company, for I assure you that the business in which I have lately been engaged is wholly alien to my tastes—quite repugnant to me, indeed! But necessity, my dear sir, takes no account of sensibility!”

“You are a consummate rogue!” said Gideon forthrightly.

“Sir,” responded Mr. Liversedge, “I must protest against the use of that epithet! A consummate rogue, you will allow, is a rogue from choice, and feels no compunction for his roguery. With me it is far otherwise, I assure you. Particularly have my feelings been wrung by the plight of your noble relative—a most amiable young man, and one whom I was excessively loth to put to inconvenience!”

“You scoundrel, you would have murdered him at a word from me!” Gideon exclaimed.

“That,” said Mr. Liversedge firmly, “would have been your responsibility, Captain Ware.”

At this point, Wragby, who from his seat behind them had been listening to this conversation, interposed to beg his master to pull up so that he might have the pleasure of drawing Mr. Liversedge’s cork.

“No,” said Gideon. “I prefer to hand him over in due course to the Law.”

“I am persuaded,” said Mr. Liversedge, “that when I have restored your relative to you, as I am really anxious to do, you will think better of that unhandsome notion, sir. Ingratitude is a vice which I abhor!”

“We shall see what my relative has to say about it,” replied Gideon grimly.

Mr. Liversedge, who could not feel that forty-eight hours spent in a dark cellar would engender in his victim any feelings of mercy, relapsed into a depressed silence.

But his mercurial spirits could not long remain damped, and by the time Gideon stopped to change horses, he had recovered enough to regale him with a very entertaining anecdote to his first employer’s discredit. While Wragby besought the ostlers to fig out two lively ones, and made arrangements for the Captain’s own horses to be led back to London, he considered the chances of escape; but even his hopeful mind was obliged to realize that these were slim. However, he was a great believer in Providence, and he could not but feel that Providence would intervene on his behalf before the end of the journey. He had not yet divulged the locality of the Duke’s prison, and he had not been urged to do so. Captain Ware was taking it for granted that he would lead him to it. Upon reflection, Mr. Liversedge acknowledged gloomily that unless something quite unforeseen occurred this was precisely what he would do.