by Andrew Lang
CHAPTER VI
MR. NICHOLAS WOGAN REMINDS THE PARSON OF A NIGHT AT THE MAZARIN PALACE
While Wogan pursued in vain a flying foe, Lady Oxford and Parson Kellywaited in the house for his return, her ladyship in a greatdiscomposure and impatience, and the Parson more silent than ordinary.Whatever he may have thought of Scrope's unexpected visit, his prideforbade him questions.
'The most unfortunate affair,' exclaimed her ladyship distractedly.'Sure never was a woman so cursed. But indeed I was born under afrowning star, Mr. Kelly, and so my lord's friends cannot visit him,but some untoward accident puts them into peril.'
'You need be troubled by no fears on our account,' replied Kelly, 'forNick will ensure the fellow's silence before ever he lets him out ofhis sight.'
'True,' said she, with a fresh pang of anxiety, 'Mr. Wogan is with himand will doubtless seek an explanation.'
Kelly smiled, but without any overwhelming amusement.
'Neither,' said he, 'need your ladyship fear that he will listen toany indiscreet explanation. Words have very little to do with theexplanations which Nicholas favours.'
Lady Oxford remarked the distant stateliness in Kelly's tone and wasin a hurry to retrieve the slip she had made.
'It is just that I mean,' she cried, coming over to Kelly. 'If Mr.Wogan--kills this man,' and her eyes flashed as though she did in herheart desire that consummation, 'here at the Park Gates--'
'Believe me,' replied Kelly reassuringly, 'he will omit no properceremony if he does.'
'No, nor will the county justices either,' retorted Lady Oxford, 'andthere are Mr. George Kelly and Mr. Nicholas Wogan to explain theirpresence at Brampton Bryan Manor, as best they can, to a bench ofbumpkins.'
'Again your ladyship is unnecessarily alarmed. For if Mr. Scrope isnow no more, Mr. George Kelly and Mr. Nicholas Wogan are still Mr.James Johnson and his secretary Mr. Hilton. No harm threatens BramptonBryan Manor from their visit.'
This he said no less coldly, and to cut the conversation short,stalked with excessive dignity to the door. Lady Oxford was gazingruefully down the avenue from the window, when she heard the knob ofthe door move under his hand. She turned quickly about.
'It was not of Brampton Bryan Manor I was thinking,' she saidhurriedly, 'nor of our safety. Why, in what poor esteem do you holdme! Am I then so contemptible a thing?' There was no anger in herreproach. Rather it melted in a most touching sadness. 'Have I nofriends whose safety troubles me?' she added. At that out came herhandkerchief and fluttered at her eyes. 'Nay, but I thought I had--twoof the noblest.' It was a mere scrap of a handkerchief, and thegreater part of that a lace edging. It would not have sopped up manytears, but it served her ladyship's turn. For indeed the mere sight ofit convinced Kelly of his monstrous cruelty.
'Your ladyship!' he cried, turning back. 'Tears! And I have causedthem. Faith, I should be hanged for that. Yet they flow for my friendand me, and I am blessed instead.'
But she would have none of his apologies. She stepped back as heapproached.
'No,' said she, and wiped an imaginary tear-drop from the dryest ofeyes; 'you have asked me for an explanation of Mr. Scrope's coming andyou have a right to ask it.'
'Madam,' expostulated Kelly, 'I was careful, on the contrary, to askfor no explanation whatever. For I have no right to it.'
'Oh, but you have,' returned her ladyship with asperity; and then upwent her handkerchief again.
'All men,' she said, in a voice most pathetical, 'have a right to askany explanation of any woman, at anytime. Women, poor sad creatures,are suspect from their cradles, and to distrust them is theprerogative of manhood.' Here she tore away her handkerchief andlifted her hands in an ardent prayer. 'Oh that some day I might meetwith one single man who would believe us worthy of respect!' Shewalked away to the window and said in a low voice, 'With whatfriendship would I requite him.'
Thus the unfortunate Mr. Kelly was not merely plunged in remorse, butbrought to see that he had missed the one solitary path which wouldhave led him into this great lady's friendship.
'Your ladyship,' he implored, 'mistakes my sentiments altogether.'
'Mr. Kelly,' she replied, proudly, 'we will not, if you please, pursuethe matter. You have your explanation and I trust you will allow it tocontent you,' and so she sailed majestically out of the room, leavingMr. Kelly in that perturbation that he quite failed to notice he hadreceived no explanation whatever. She dropped her stateliness,however, when the door was closed behind her, and, hurrying across thehall, lay in wait behind a shrubbery for Wogan's return. Wogan, on theother hand, had admirable reasons for avoiding all paths, and soslipped into the back of the house unseen. Consequently it was notuntil half-an-hour later, when Lady Oxford was fairly distracted, thatshe discovered him, decently clothed, and urging upon Kelly thenecessity of an immediate retreat. He broke off from his advice asLady Oxford entered.
'You have done him no hurt? 'she asked, looking Wogan over from headto foot in search of a speck of blood, and ready to swoon if she sawone.
'Not the least in the world,' replied Wogan.
'Nor he you?'
'There was never any likelihood of that.' Wogan had to put the bestface on the matter possible, and since he could not own to thehumiliating truth, why, the necessary lie might just as well redoundto his credit. 'I swore him to secrecy upon his bended knees. He tookthe oath on the hilt of this very sword, 'and Wogan hitched forwardhis hanger.
A footman at this moment announced that dinner was served.
'Will you give me your hand, Mr. Wogan?' asked Lady Oxford, anddetaining him until Kelly had passed out of the room:
'He gave you doubtless a reason for his coming?' she asked.
'Surely he did,' said Wogen, who was not for admitting any omission onhis own part.
'And what reason?' asked her ladyship.
Mr. Wogan looked at the ground and got a flash of inspiration.
'Why,' said he as bold as brass, 'precisely the same reason which yougave to my friend George Kelly,' in which answer Wogan hit the literaltruth, although her ladyship looked puzzled, as well she might, andthen flushed a fine crimson.
However, she made up an ingenious story, and that same day hintedrather than told it with a pretty suggestion of sympathy which quitemelted Mr. Kelly's heart, and threw Wogan into some doubt whether tobelieve her or no. Scrope, it appeared, had been at some indefinitetime a secretary to Mr. Walpole, and was entrusted with the keeping ofthe good man's accounts. Lady Oxford was then simply Mistress MargaretMiddleton and intimate with her cousin, Mr. Walpole, although sinceher marriage, as Mr. Kelly and his friend were requested to note, thatintimacy had entirely ceased. Hence it came about that the rash Scropecast longing eyes upon the humble relation of his patron, and wasindeed so carried away by passion that Margaret was forced now andagain to chide him for the forwardness of his demeanour. Also, alas!he transgressed in a more serious way. For Mr. Walpole's accounts fellinto the saddest disorder; there were sums of money of which no tracecould be found until--well, the deplorable affair was hushed up. Mr.Scrope was turned off and set down his dismissal to Margaret, who,gentle soul, would not have hurt a fly. From that time he had notspared her his resentment, and would go miles out of his way if by anychance he might fix a slight upon her. Which conduct she mostChristianly forgave, since indeed the poor man's head must needs beturned.
'Yet he had all the appearances of prosperity,' objected Wogan.
'I fancied that I said that there were large sums missing,' repliedher ladyship.
'Yes, you did indeed say so,' said Mr. Kelly, 'but you avoided theimplication out of your generous pity.'
It is not in truth very difficult to befool a man who does half thefooling himself. Mr. Kelly was altogether appeased by Lady Oxford'sexplanation, which to his friend seemed to explain nothing, but nonethe less he readily acknowledged to Wogan the propriety of hurryinghis business to a close.
'To tell the
truth,' said Wogan, as soon as her ladyship hadwithdrawn, 'I feel my cravat stiffening prophetically about my neck.My presence does not help you; indeed, it is another danger; and sincewe are but a few miles from Aberystwith, I am thinking that I could donothing wiser than start for that port to-night.'
The Parson drew figures with his forefinger on the table for a while;then:
'I would not have you go, he said slowly. 'I will use what despatch Imay; but I would not have you go, and leave me here.'
Kelly was true to his word, and used so much despatch that within twodays he extorted a promise from Lord Oxford to undertake the muslintrade in England, as the cant phrase went. Possibly he might have wonthat same promise before had used the same despatch. But Lord Oxford'sfoible was to hold long discourses, and Mr. Pope truly said that hehad an epical habit of beginning everything at the middle. However itmay be, the two men left the Manor on the morning of the third day.Wogan drove back with the Parson as far as Worcester, who for thefirst few miles remained in a melancholy silence, and then burst outof a sudden.
'To think that she should be mewed up in a corner of Herefordshire,with no companions but drunken rustics! Mated to an old pantaloon,too!'
'Sure it was her ladyship's own doing,' murmured Wogan.
'No woman in all London could hold a candle to her. And we distrustedher--we distrusted her, Nick.' He beat a clenched fist into the palmof his other hand to emphasise the enormity of the crime. 'Why, whatimpertinent fools men are!'
Then he again relapsed into silence and again broke out.
'Damme! but Fortune plays bitter tricks upon the world. 'Tis all verywell to strike at a pair of rascals like you and me, Nick, but shestrikes at those who offend her least. Faith, but I am bewildered.Here is a woman indisputably born to be a queen and she is a nurse.And no better prospect when my lord dies than a poor jointure and adull Dower House.'
'Oh, she told you that, did she?' said Wogan. 'Sure it was a queenlycomplaint.'
'She made no complaint,' said Kelly fiercely. 'She would not--shecould not. It is a woman of unexampled patience.'
He grumbled into silence, and his thoughts changed and turned moodilyabout himself.
'Why did I ever preach that sermon?' he exclaimed. 'But for that Imight now have the care of half-a-dozen rambling parishes. Instead ofhurrying and scurrying from one end of Europe to the other, at therisk of my neck, I might sit of an evening by the peat fire of an innkitchen and give the law to my neighbour. I might have a littlecountry parsonage all trailed over with roses, and leisure to ensurepreferment by my studies and enjoy the wisdom of my Latin friendTully. I might have a wife, too,' he added, 'and maybe half a score ofchildren to plague me out of my five wits with their rogueries.'
He fetched up a sigh as he ended which would have done credit to myLady Oxford; and Wogan, seeing his friend in this unwonted pother, wasminded to laugh him out of it.
'And a credit to your cloth you would have been,' says he. 'Why, it'sa bottle you would have taken into the pulpit with you, and a mightybig tumbler to measure your discourse by. Indeed there would have beenbut one point of resemblance between yourself and your worthierbrethren, and that's the number of times you turned your glass upsidedown before you came to an end.'
Kelly, however, was not to be diverted from his melancholy. Thepicture of the parsonage was too vivid on the canvas of his desires.And since he dreamed of one impossibility, no doubt he went a stepfurther and dreamed of another besides. No doubt his picture of theparsonage showed the figure of the parson's wife, and no doubt theparson's wife was very like to my Lady Oxford.
Wogan, though he had laughed, was, to tell the truth, somewhatdisturbed, and began to reckon up how much he was himself to blame forsetting Kelly's thoughts towards her ladyship. He had not thought thathis friend had taken the woman so much to heart. But whenever theParson fell a dreaming of a quiet life and the cure of souls, it was asure sign the world was going very ill with him.
'I would have you remember, George,' said Wogan, 'that not so long agoI saw you stand up before a certain company in Paris and cry out withan honest--ay, an honest passion, "May nothing come between the Causeand me!"
Kelly flushed as his words were recalled to him and turned his headaway. Wogan held out his hand.
'George, am I then to understand that something has come between theCause and you?' And he had to repeat the question before he got ananswer. Then Kelly turned back.
'Understand nothing, Nick, but that I am a fool,' he cried heartily,and slapped his hand into Wogan's. 'True, the Cause, the Cause,' hemuttered to himself once or twice. After all, Nick,' he said, 'we havegot the old man's assurance. My Lord Oxford will lend a hand. We havenot failed the Cause.' And they did not speak again until they droveinto Worcester. Then Kelly turned to Nick with a sad sort of smile.
'Well, have you nothing to say to me? 'said he.
Mr. Wogan could discover nothing to say until he had stepped out ofthe chaise at the post-house and was shaking his friend's hand. Thenhe delivered himself of the soundest piece of philosophy imaginable.
'Woman,' he said, 'is very much like a jelly-fish--very pretty andpink and transparent to look at, but with a devil of a sting if youtouch it.'
