The Stanbroke Girls

by Fiona Hill

  “It was Firbank!” he cried triumphantly. “The self-styled Captain Firbank.”

  But when they had arrived at the Captain’s cramped quarters, they found the gentleman in question still abed, and still asleep. Questioned, he seemed to have forgot the duel altogether, and certainly he had not seen Sir Jeffery that morning. In fact, Lord Weld had a strong impression he had never really expected to attend a duel at all—an impression, he found when they had again reentered their coach, which was shared by Lord Marchmont

  “Something is up,” the earl declared, “but I’m damned if I can say what. I suppose we might just as well go home and wait now…”

  Weld agreed. “If it weren’t for Firbank’s confoundment, I’d say it must have been an accident de Guere met with on his way from home. But it’s clear the man didn’t expect him…” He went on musing as the carriage rattled towards Cavendish Square. “And yet, what else could wake a man up at four in the morning? Where else could he have gone to?”

  Lord Marchmont, nonplussed, did not answer at first. When he did speak, it was only to sigh wearily and say how happy he would be to see his dressing-gown and slippers. “We might as well go back to sleep, I expect. Thank God, Emilia’s not an early riser. She’ll never suspect we were gone. I don’t wish her to know anything about this, of course.”

  “Understood, old man,” said the other.

  “I’m not giving up, you know. I’ll get a meeting out of that blackguard if it’s the last thing I do.”

  “Let’s hope it is not.”

  “I don’t know how to thank you for standing by me through all this, Weld. I’m sure no man ever had a better friend.”

  Lord Weld’s pale cheeks turned pink. “Don’t be foolish, old chap,” he said. “It’s nothing you wouldn’t do for me.”

  Marchmont looked at him gratefully. “I hope you will rely upon that,” he said presently.

  Weld acknowledged this with a nod and a smile. The carriage rolled on for a time in silence.

  “I’m going to offer for Lady Elizabeth Stanbroke,” Lord Marchmont then suddenly stated. “I mean to speak to her father today. What do you think?”

  Lord Weld, tired and wet though he was, immediately saw through the nonchalance of this announcement and broke into a wide grin. He reached across the carriage and grasped his friend’s hand, then, on an impulse, stood up so far as he could and threw his arms round the earl. The carriage jolted suddenly, and Lord Weld was thrown into Marchmont’s lap. The two men disentangled themselves, laughing at the mishap. “By Jupiter, old man, this is the best news I’ve had in months—in years,” corrected Weld, pleasure evident in all his features. “Have you spoken to the lady? Is it certain with her? She’s a splendid woman—I told you so!” he rushed on, before Marchmont could answer, then demanded additionally, “Does Lady Emilia know?”

  “Yes, we have spoken, no, it is not certain, indeed, you did tell me, and no, she doesn’t know.”

  “Well, won’t she be braced!” answered Weld. “Let’s wake her when we get home and tell her.”

  “My dear man, get hold of yourself. It isn’t as if I’ve found the philosopher’s stone. I’m just offering for a woman’s hand.”

  “‘Just’! When Emilia hears it—”

  “Anyhow we can’t wake her without explaining what we ourselves are doing prowling round London at this hour.”

  “Oh. Yes, I suppose we have rather been prowling.”

  “We have practically been skulking,” said Marchmont. “I assure you, Emilia takes a very dim view of my risking my life. I think you heard her on the subject of the Continental wars.”

  Weld admitted there was truth in this. “In any case, she’ll be cheerful as a cat the next time you venture out to an uncertain fate. From now on she’ll have a sister to keep her company when you’re gone…and someone to inherit from you, instead of de Guere.”

  “Yes, I dareswear she won’t care two figs if I survive or not.”

  “Oh no. Why should she?”

  “But it isn’t quite decided yet, don’t forget. I’ve still got to ask the lady—and to say truth, she’s been acting deuced strange about it lately. First she seems all for it; next she wants to think it over and worry, as if it were a desperate problem.”

  “Perhaps she doesn’t wish to appear over-eager?”

  Marchmont shook his head “No” as they drove into the carriage sweep at number 21. “That’s not like Lady Elizabeth, not at all. If she hesitates, it’s because she’s hesitant—depend upon it.”

  “Well, if she refuses you, she’ll have me to answer to,” asserted the other. Safely arrived, they descended from the coach and in a very few minutes found their several ways to dry night-clothes and warm beds.

  Noon discovered Lord Marchmont sitting at the dining-table, munching contemplatively on an apple puff, wondering how best to get at his errant cousin. Mr. Searle discovered him there, too, entering to hand him a sealed note, along with the information that it had just been delivered by a female messenger who insisted upon its utmost urgency. “She wanted to hand it to you herself, in fact, sir, but I dissuaded her,” the butler added, a hint of triumphant satisfaction in his voice.

  Marchmont dismissed him and tore into the missive, in hopes it was from his cousin and contained an explanation of his absence, but it was not. It was in a woman’s hand, unfamiliar to him, and it read thus:

  Dear Sir,

  I write in haste and send this to you by my maid. My sister has disappeared. I fear the worst. Please if you can come at once and ask for me. Forgive this imperious summons.

  Yr. svt.

  E.S.

  I leave it to the reader to imagine the celerity with which our hero responded to this. Our hero had, after all, been itching for something heroic to do all day, and this looked to be right in that line. Sister vanished! The worst feared! It was more than the average fellow dares to dream of. Lady Emilia having gone out about ten that morning, according to Searle, and not come home since, Marchmont left word for her of his destination and arrived at Lady Elizabeth’s door some twenty-three minutes later.

  Elizabeth received him alone. “The household is in such an uproar, nobody even thinks to chaperon me,” she explained. “For which I am thankful, since I must show you something the others have not yet seen…”

  “Which is?”

  “This note from Isabella. Oh, thank goodness you have come!” she exclaimed involuntarily, producing a folded paper from within the sleeve of her gown. “When her maid went to wake her this morning—which was at nine-thirty—she was not there. I found this note in my riding boot. That was the place we used to leave messages for each other when we were children. Go on and read it, please,” Elizabeth went on almost frantically. “I’ve no notion what to do next!”

  Lord Marchmont scanned the letter, which contained the following mysterious sentences:

  Be happy for me, dear sister, for I shall soon have all my Heart desires. Pray assure the others I am well, but keep this Epistle to yourself; I am in the hands of One who will allow no harm to come to me. Tell them too I will return to them on my own. When I step from this dwelling-place today I pass from the shades of childishness into the sun of womanhood. Burn this missive.

  My love.

  Isabella.

  The note read, Marchmont peered over it at Lizzie. She met his glance and held it for a moment, then made an impatient gesture. “‘The sun of womanhood!’” she hissed. “That’s Bella all over. How such a ninnyhammer could be born to my own parents I do not know…Anyway,” she went on, her tone changing to one of anxiety, “what must I do? I have only just found the letter an hour ago. No one else knows of it.” She paused to smile gratefully. “You were good to come so quickly.”

  Marchmont spoke gravely and carefully. “What do you suppose the significance of this letter to be?”

  She looked surprised. “Why, that she has gone off with de Guere, of course! That was all a sham, I suppose, in the breakfast-room that night
. Look at the way she makes the O large when she mentions him. ‘I am in the hands of One who will allow no harm to come to me,’ she writes. She is simply too odious. In any other girl one would imagine she had gone off to a convent, but with Isabella…I’m afraid it’s unmistakable. She’s ruined herself.” On these last words she abandoned the tone of vexation she had begun with and approached tears. In truth she was aghast at what her sister had done; she could hardly conceive of it. “When I think how she’ll regret this day—!”

  Elizabeth buried her face in her hands. For a moment Lord Marchmont hesitated; then he stepped to her and took her into his arms. She burst into tears, sobbing whole-heartedly into the blue superfine of his coat. “Please, you must help me think what to do,” she brought out presently, her words muffled by their being delivered directly into his lordship’s chest. “Must I tell my father what I know?”

  The earl placed a kiss on the top of her soft blond hair, so lightly he was not sure if she felt it. “I’m afraid so. This is very serious, as you understand.”

  Elizabeth nodded brokenly.

  “Shall we go see Lord Trevor together?” he asked.

  She nodded again. “Oh, I am sorry to behave so stupidly,” she said, still warbling a little from her crying spell. “Ordinarily, you know, I’m just as strong and as sensible as…But when I think she’s gone and done it she’ll never recover from it! What do you—what do you expect he’ll do with her?”

  But Lord Marchmont knew better than to honour such a question with an honest answer. “I think it will be best if we do one thing at a time,” was all he said. “For the moment, let us seek out your father.”

  She replied quietly, “He’s in his library. Come.” Elizabeth held out her hand to him and led him to the room in question. “I’d better speak to him first,” she said at the door, then vanished inside for a minute. When she came out to fetch him she appeared a little paler than before, but also a little calmer. “My father understands you are aware of our predicament,” she told him. “He would like to speak to you.”

  Marchmont followed her into the little room. Behind a massive desk sat the Earl of Trevor, a tall, brittle-looking man with a habitually worried aspect. He now appeared even more worried than usual, of course, and even as he rose to shake Marchmont’s hand broke into speech concerning the immediate crisis. “My daughter tells me you are prepared to act as our friend in this,” he began. “I thank you.”

  The other man made a gesture to dismiss this gratitude.

  “It seems my children have been keeping secrets from me. This is a heavy burden—” His voice cracked and he stopped.

  “I thought it was all finished, Papa,” Elizabeth explained miserably. “I thought I had dissuaded her…”

  Trevor swallowed hard. “At all events, it would appear Isabella has gone off—has been abducted by this…what was his name?”

  “Sir Jeffery de Guere,” Elizabeth supplied.

  “This de Guere, then.” He paused, then burst out, “Lizzie says the fellow is your cousin. Would he really do such a horrible thing?”

  Lord Marchmont sadly confirmed that he might.

  “Then we have no choice but to ride out after her—after them, I mean to say—and see if we can’t prevent even greater…that is, if we can’t catch them before…” His voice faded.

  “I agree with you entirely, sir,” interposed Marchmont. “By all means, let us follow. I have a couple of excellent horses at my disposal—”

  “But this is not your tragedy,” objected Trevor. “It’s too much to ask—”

  “No one has asked,” said Marchmont tersely. “I offer myself. Will you accept?”

  “But, of course, it’s only—”

  “Excellent, then. Now I should also like to offer the help of my friend Lord Weld. You may rely utterly upon his discretion, and as he speaks French with uncommon fluency, and as he is but lately returned from the Continent, I suggest we send him across the Channel, in case they have fled in that direction. Perhaps Halcot will go with him. You and I, sir—I assume you will join me?” he interrupted himself.

  “Yes, but—”

  “You and I, sir, will travel north, towards Gretna Green. If we leave at once, we may save ourselves much effort, so I suggest—”

  “Elizabeth, where is Halcot?” Trevor broke in, standing up suddenly.

  “I don’t know, sir. With my mother, I think, in her sitting-room.”

  “Very well then, go and fetch him. We’ll send him to France with your friend Weld, shall we?” asked the old earl.

  Elizabeth hesitated, looking from Marchmont to Trevor and back again.

  “Well, don’t stand there gawking, my girl,” snapped her father. “Go and fetch Charlie!”

  So ordered, Lizzie paused no longer but turned at once and hastened to find her brother. The two men continued their conference, discussing horses and routes and the desirability of bringing others into the search. They decided against this latter course, however, as it seemed imperative above all to maintain as much secrecy as possible. “I’m sure we’ll catch up with them, sir,” said Marchmont, with a confidence he did not feel.

  “Why should my daughters have kept this from me?” Trevor wondered aloud. “I have never given them reason to hide from me. I have always encouraged them to be frank. Why did Isabella not come to me and speak her mind? I can’t make it out.”

  They were waiting for Charlie, who seemed to be an age in coming. “I’m afraid de Guere is such a bad bit of business,” Marchmont explained tentatively, “that Lady Isabella was afraid of your displeasure if she had asked.”

  “It would be nothing compared to this!”

  “Of course not…but I suppose she is young yet, and not as sensible as she might be—”

  “No, she’s always been hot-headed. Nothing like Elizabeth, although I must say I’m disappointed in her as well. If Bella did not come forward, at least Elizabeth might have done.”

  “I believe she felt it a point of honour not to break her sister’s confidences. She did tell me, however.”

  “She did?”

  “And I thought I had taken the matter in hand,” continued the younger man. “I should have known something was up when the wretch failed to show this morning—”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  Lord Marchmont looked embarrassed. “A little affair of…er, honour, sir. I felt the need of, ah, responding to an insult to Lady Isabella…”

  “Indeed?”

  “Yes, I am afraid so. And the villain did not appear this morning, even though he had sworn to—”

  “Am I to understand you had challenged your cousin to a duel?”

  Feeling strangely sheepish, Marchmont confessed this was so.

  “May I ask, sir, what particular interest you have in the sanctity of Lady Isabella’s name? You do not consider yourself a—suitor for her hand?”

  “Lord, no!” was surprised out of Marchmont rather bluntly.

  “Then—”

  “It is…well, I’ve been meaning to speak to your lordship of this very matter. The fact is, it’s your daughter Eliz—”

  At this moment the door reopened, and Lord Halcot burst in, accompanied by Elizabeth. Lord Marchmont stopped in midsentence, naturally, but not before the intelligent Trevor had had time to guess at the tenor of his aborted disclosure. There was far too much to think about, what with getting the search underway, for him to consider this new bit of information until much later, however. In the meanwhile, Lord Weld was sent for and advised of the situation; a system of communications was worked out between the two embarking parties; and it was arranged that Amy Lewis and the ladies of the family would retire at once from the London scene to their quieter home in Warwickshire. “We’ll have to give out that my wife is ill, I suppose,” said Lord Trevor. “Either way there’s bound to be talk, but at least no one will know Isabella is missing.”

  Lord Marchmont spoke up. “I think my sister Emilia might like to accompany them, if you would
be so kind as to invite her. I should not like to leave her alone in London, in any case—”

  “But, of course. I shall call on her at once,” said Lady Elizabeth. There were many other details to be arranged, but the gentlemen worked well together, and by five o’clock that day the ladies of Haddon House were packing for their retreat. They were to depart for the country the following morning; whereas the gentlemen, having first made a fruitless tour of the London inns in hopes of finding their quarry’s point of departure, had already ridden out north and south, onto the open road.

  13

  Lady Lewis hurried down to the drawing-room of the Nestling, a small, handsome house in which her husband’s family had resided for generations. She had been reading to Amy, who lay, looking markedly pale, on a day-bed in an upstairs parlour; but a servant had advised her that Lady Elizabeth was in the drawing-room, and she wished to have a few words with Lizzie before she came up to her daughter. “Is there news?” she asked before she had even said hello. Her plump face betrayed an entirely unwonted anxiousness, and even after she had rushed into the drawing-room she continued to wander nervously from table to window to chair.

  “Good morning, ma’am,” said Elizabeth, with a slight bow. She carried a basket covered with a napkin and looked so completely the country gentlewoman one would scarcely have believed that four days before she had been rubbing shoulders with the cream of the London monde.

  “Oh yes, good morning. The post—? Was there news?”

  Elizabeth was sorry to have to disappoint her—almost as sorry as she herself had been when the letters from her father and her brother had been read. “We have heard from them both again,” she told Lady Lewis gently, “but they have neither of them found much to speak of. My father and Lord Marchmont” (she could hardly pronounce this name without a conscious blush), “did hear of a young couple called the Jeffreys, in York, but the innkeeper recalled him as having been fair and her as being dark, instead of the other way round. In any case, they are pressing ahead. Charlie and Lord Weld wrote just before they left England. They hadn’t heard anything at all. Lord Weld was out making inquiries of the packet-boat captains on the Channel, however.”