“Never let me hear that word again!” said Amanda, passionately. “I am convinced now that curiosity is a vice, like — like thieving, and lying, and all the other sins!”
“All the same, I wish I’d been with you. I suppose you wouldn’t care to describe just what — but no, never mind! You did find what was necessary for your purpose, though, Mandy? You will be able now to convince Bella that this man Barsett is not a worthy husband for her?”
“Yes,” she answered, and the word was a sob.
He looked at her curiously. “What ails you, Mandy? You seem very low in spirits for someone who has done what she wanted! This is not your usual style when you have succeeded in an enterprise!”
She did not answer. He glanced at her again, but the mask concealed her expression. He thought, however, that he caught a glint of tears in her eyes. She had no doubt had a trying time of it in that place, and the hour was late; probably she was tired. He would not question her further tonight.
But it was not weariness of body, but of spirit, that assailed the intrepid Amanda. She was discovering for the first time how hollow a thing victory can be. She had found evidence of Charles Barsett’s unworthiness, indeed: but, she wondered in sudden panic, was it, after all, what she had wanted?
Chapter XVI: The Making of a Rake
The three travellers in Charles Barsett’s coach presented a sorry spectacle. Water dripped from their clothes, their foot-gear was muddy, and their manner far from animated. For some time, there was no conversation; Amanda kept her face, now relieved of the concealing mask, studiously turned away from the gentlemen, and they appeared to be immersed in their own thoughts. At last, Charles Barsett broke the long silence.
“I hesitate to trouble you with questions, Miss Amanda, at a moment when it is all too obvious that you are fatigued, and in need of rest; but there is something in this matter that puzzles my understanding. How came you by the white garments which you were wearing?”
“I do not mean to tell you,” stated Amanda, flatly, “so you may spare yourself the trouble of questioning me further.”
The sudden spurt of spirit seemed to revive her a little, for she corrected her hitherto drooping carriage, and sat upright in the manner taught her by Miss Brown.
“No matter,” he said, grimly. “I fancy I know the answer already. You obtained them from my cousin, Roger Thurlston, did you not? And, unless I am very much mistaken, this whole exploit was planned by him, not by your friend here, Mr. Webster.”
Amanda turned with dignity to John.
“You will be good enough to inform Mr. Barsett,” she said, coldly, “that I do not desire any further conversation with him. I accept his assistance because at the moment I have no choice; but after tonight, I wish never to set eyes on him again!”
John looked uncertainly from one to the other. He was recalling the moment on the river bank when he had stepped in their path out of the shadows. Amanda had clung then to Barsett as though she looked to him for protection; now she was as good as asking John to call him out. If the fellow had insulted her, b’God, thought John, then he was only too ready to oblige: but did Mandy really know what she wanted? Odd creatures, females... John sighed heavily, and for the moment, held his tongue.
Charles Barsett had bowed to them both at conclusion of Amanda’s words. His face was taut and withdrawn, and he looked momentarily older than his years. Damned if he was not a better fellow than his cousin, thought John, suddenly, in spite of all.
A long silence fell over the carriage, broken only by the sound of the trotting horses on the road. Presently, Amanda lowered the window nearest her, and leaned out. The storm had quite passed over, and the night air was sweet and fresh. She inhaled it gratefully. There was a pain at her heart that she had never experienced before, and could not at all understand. It would be good to be back with Bella, she thought, to tell her the whole story, and then be able to put the wretched affair out of her mind. She quite saw that it was a wise plan of Charles Barsett’s to take her to spend the night with his old Nurse; if she had journeyed to London alone with John, there would have been complications, for sure. She did not fear for her reputation, as Mr. Barsett had seemed to do, but rather was she afraid of any rub being put in the way of Bella’s being united to John. There had been hindrances enough already to their happiness, goodness knew. But now, at last, all seemed set fair for them: as for Mr. Barsett, she reflected passionately, she wanted never to see him again. But, of course, she never would. Bella would soon send him about his business when she knew all — she would wed John, and they would all return to Berkshire. Everything had worked out just as she had planned it — everything... At the thought of her triumph, the suppressed tears stung her eyelids.
Ahead, the winking lights of scattered homesteads appeared and, in a short time, the carriage was pulling up before a fair-sized cottage set in a flower-scented garden.
Mr. Barsett stood to one side in order to allow John to assist Amanda to alight. A muscle tautened in his cheek as he watched them. The stone-flagged path, strewn with rose petals brought down by the recent storm, shone white in the moonlight as they opened the gate leading to the cottage door. Charles Barsett knocked thrice when they reached it, and then called out in soft tones, evidently with the intention of allaying any alarm that his summons might have caused to the occupant of the house.
In a few moments, the door opened, and framed in the doorway stood a round, motherly body with white hair set neatly under a lace cap trimmed with lavender ribbons.
“Why, Master Charles!”
The matron’s surprise deepened as she saw that he brought company, but she asked no questions, hospitably bidding them enter.
“This is Miss Amanda Twyford and Mr. Webster, Nurse. As you may observe, we are all very wet. May I crave your kindness for Miss Twyford? I desire you to supply her with a bed for the night, if you will be so good.”
“Gracious goodness, how did you come to get so soaked?” The old lady clucked, and straightway swept Amanda upstairs to her own bedchamber. Without more ado, she opened a drawer, and took out a grey muslin gown, which she laid on the bed.
“If you’ll give me your wet garments, ma’am,” she said, busily arranging a screen so that Amanda might disrobe in privacy, “I’ll have them dry in a trice before the kitchen fire.”
Amanda struggled thankfully out of her wet clothes, and donned the grey gown. She found that it fitted tolerably well, when Nurse had found her some pins with which to take up some of the fullness over the bosom. She followed the old lady downstairs feeling a little less bedraggled, and found that the gentlemen were there, having likewise changed out of their wet garments. It would appear that Mr. Barsett was a frequent visitor to the house, as he could command changes of raiment and a bed at a moment’s notice.
Nurse paused to see that Amanda was comfortably seated, before bustling into the kitchen to prepare some refreshment for her unexpected guests. Thither Charles followed her, leaving John and Amanda together in the parlour.
“’Tis only the young lady who is to have a bed?” asked Nurse, as she expertly carved slices from a large ham. “What of you and the other gentleman?”
“We ride to London.”
She raised her brows, and eyed him keenly for a second.
“Is this the young lady you are to wed?” she asked. “She’s pretty, even though she looks fagged to death, poor dear! She puts me a little in mind of your poor Mama.”
“No.” His answer was abrupt, and she looked up again, surprised. She did not often hear that tone from him. “I am affianced to Isabella Twyford. This is the younger sister, Amanda.”
She stopped her work for a moment, and looked into his eyes, noting the deep unhappiness there.
“Yet this is the one you love,” she said, quietly.
He drew in his breath sharply. Not even to himself had he admitted so much.
“Small matter what I think,” he answered, bitterly. “She holds me in abomination �
�and with good reason! Moreover, I believe that she and young Webster —” He broke off.
“Maybe you’d better tell me all about it,” invited the old lady, in the way familiar to him ever since he could remember.
He told her rapidly, in an undertone. She was the one repository of all his secrets. She shook her head when he had done, but began placidly to slice bread on a wooden platter, as though they talked of trivialities. Her unruffled composure a little soothed his troubled spirit.
“This Abbey, now,” she said, calmly. “No doubt it will be — a disgraceful place?”
He nodded, lips tight set. She made no comment, but indicated a tray standing on the dresser, close to his hand.
“Be good enough to pass that over, my dear. I think a glass of warm milk for the young lady — she looks fair done up, poor little thing”
She accepted the tray from his hands, and stacked the various items upon it. Before opening the door to carry them into the next room, she paused.
“Don’t worry, trust old Nurse. And, Master Charlie — do nothing foolish: there has been folly enough.”
“Good God, I know it!”
There was a world of bitterness in his tone.
She said no more, but carried the tray through into the parlour.
The meal was hasty, and perfunctory on the part of two of the visitors: John Webster alone ate with good appetite. Soon the two gentlemen rose to leave.
“I will be here again tomorrow around noon,” said Charles Barsett, addressing Nurse. “Perhaps I may prevail upon you to be ready to accompany Miss Amanda to her home in Town? I will make arrangements for your lodging there overnight — or for a longer period, should you desire it.”
“Thank you, Mr. Barsett,” replied Nurse, who was always very circumspect in front of strangers. “I promise to be quite ready to accompany the young lady wherever and whenever she chooses.”
“It — it is very good of you,” stammered Amanda, realising for the first time that she might possibly be putting the old lady to great inconvenience. Normally, such a thing would have readily occurred to her, for she was the last person to take a service for granted; but since leaving the Abbey, she had been completely immersed in her thoughts, and scarcely knew what was going forward. “I — I am sorry to be putting you to so much trouble on my account.”
“There now, I like to be useful,” affirmed Nurse. “It puts me in mind of old times. Drink your milk, ma’am, before it gets cold, pray do!”
John bent over Amanda’s hand in taking leave, and was able to whisper in her ear.
“You’ll be all right and tight here, Mandy — the old lady puts me in mind of my own nurse, and she was the rightest one that ever walked! Do you wish that Barsett shall come for you tomorrow, or shall I?”
“No,” whispered back Amanda, hurriedly, “you stay within reach of Bella. It cannot signify whether he comes or no — I shan’t need to speak with him: Nurse will be there.”
Mr. Barsett contented himself with a low bow in her direction. She responded distantly, with averted face.
As soon as the door closed behind them, she abandoned all pretence of eating, and slumped back into her wing chair with a gesture of utter weariness.
“I’ll away to slip a warming-pan into your bed,” said Nurse, inspecting her closely while appearing to be about the business of clearing the table. “There’s nothing like a good night’s rest for restoring the spirits.”
Amanda shook her head.
“I’m not tired: I don’t believe I could sleep if I tried.”
“At your age, my dear,” replied Nurse, forgetting that this was not one of her charges, and instinctively taking a motherly tone, “you should drop off as soon as your head touches the pillow!”
“I do, in general,” said Amanda, dispiritedly. “But not tonight.”
“And what’s so special about tonight?” Amanda looked up from her rapt contemplation of the hearth-rug. Her blue eyes showed the trouble that lurked beneath. Nurse’s heart stirred with compassion. Poor lamb — poor young thing! She herself might be an old woman now, but she could still remember a time in her life when griefs had been sharp and poignant, before the gift of resignation had come to mellow even despair. How they did suffer, these young ones! It would do the pretty creature good if she could confide her trouble, thought the old lady, and wondered how she could persuade Amanda to talk to her. Perhaps, if she were only handled gently enough, she might come round to it in time.
Amanda did not answer Nurse’s question, however, but instead asked another one.
“Did you —” she hesitated a second — “were you with — Mr. Barsett when he was a child? I collect that you were.”
“I helped bring him into the world,” answered the old lady. “Ay, and held my lady’s hand as she breathed her last. His lordship was on her other side: as God is my judge, I thought that he must die, too, so pale and stricken he was!”
Amanda moistened her dry lips.
“I have heard it said that — that my lord Barsett took his son in dislike because of his wife’s death.”
Nurse’s mouth set firmly.
“I remember that when I took the child to him, he said he never wanted to set eyes on it again. I thought it was but the shock of the moment; for he loved her as a man loves a woman only once in a lifetime. Theirs was no marriage of convenience, but a love match.”
She paused for a moment, and came over to sit down on the other side of the hearth from Amanda. There was a reminiscent look in the faded grey eyes.
“But he never did recover from the shock, and — God forgive him — he never took to the child. He was a sturdy, healthy little boy, too, such as a father might well be proud of. He sensed his father’s dislike — you can never fool a child, though you may succeed with a full-grown man or woman — and in his little, innocent way, he tried to overcome it. Many’s the time I’ve watched him run to my lord eagerly with some piece of news which the child thought might please him — there was the day when he’d mastered his alphabet, and later on, when he’d taken his pony over a fence for the first time without a spill — and to see him come away again, with all the light gone from his little face, I tell you, it fair broke my heart!”
She fished in a pocket for her kerchief, and blew her nose vigorously. Amanda said nothing.
“Then there was the aunt, Mrs. Thurlston,” continued Nurse, sniffing slightly. “She never cared for Master Charles from the first. But she had the interests of her own boy at heart — I suppose you can scarce blame her for that! She made sure that any boyish exploits that Master Charles got up to, lost nothing in the telling to my lord! But worst of all, there was Master Roger.”
She stopped, and a grim look spread over the gentle features.
“They were very attached to each other, weren’t they?” asked Amanda.
She might not wish to see Charles Barsett ever again, but nevertheless, she was finding this account of his past life interesting in the extreme. For once, it was not only curiosity which moved her: she found herself possessed of a burning desire to find some justification for his actions, some mitigation of the dreadfulness of his offence. Vaguely, it was borne in upon her that this was a new feeling.
“No brothers were ever closer,” replied the old lady. “Everything was done together, every secret shared. At least, on one side, it was. Master Charles believed for many years that his cousin confided completely in him, but he was to find otherwise. On that worthless boy my poor young master lavished all the affection that, in a happier home, he would have given to mother, father, brothers and sisters: and, in return, what did he gain? Nothing but the worst kind of treachery!”
“Treachery?” asked Amanda.
“Too weak a word,” said the old lady, in a trembling voice, “too weak a word for the betrayal of a single-minded affection such as his! For he is possessed of an intense nature, my dear; don’t be deceived by that languid, sneering manner of his! That is the face he shows to the world.”
“But what did Mr. Thurlston actually do?” asked Amanda, with a trace of her usual animation.
Nurse pursed her lips. “Everything that he possibly could to discredit Master Charles. No secret was safe with him; it would go straight to Mrs. Thurlston, and she would see that it found its way to my lord — presented in its worst possible light!”
“But surely it was only natural that Mr. Thurlston should have confided in his parent?” asked Amanda, dubiously.
“That was just what was so cunning in the scheme! For a long time, Master Charles believed that it was all as you say, and that his aunt was really the one to blame. And then came the day when he could not mistake any longer — when it was brought home to him just what his cousin’s character was.”
“What happened?” Amanda leaned forward in her chair, interest shining in her eyes.
Nurse hesitated, and considered the girl dubiously. She looked such a child in the grey gown that was too large for her, and with her honey-gold curls drying in tight little ringlets round her head. But something must be done for Master Charles, unless his heart was to be broken a second time. It might be of no avail, but all Nurse’s maternal instincts forced her on to make the trial.
“Properly speaking, it isn’t a story for your young ears,” she began, cautiously. “But perhaps you should know of these matters, after all.”
Amanda was surprised. “I should? Why do you say so?”
“Your sister is betrothed to Master Charles, is she not?” asked Nurse, artfully.
Amanda nodded; she had almost forgotten that fact herself.
“Well, then, since I haven’t the pleasure of Miss Twyford’s acquaintance, it may be as well to tell her sister of these things. Mayhap you can explain them to her, my dear, and then she may be persuaded not to think so hardly of him for — for follies which I dare swear are past, never to be committed again!”
Amanda looked thoughtful, and nodded silently.
“It happened this way,” went on the old lady, watching her carefully, ready to stop her narrative at the first sign of affront; “There was an abigail in my lord’s service — a pretty, silly wench up from the country, and no better than she ought to be. It was discovered that she was with child, and the housekeeper was for packing her off home again. But she made a stir, declaring that Master Charles was responsible for her condition, and that my lord should pay for it, and handsomely, too. At that time, the young gentlemen were close on eighteen, and I had long since outlived my usefulness in the household, but still my lord would keep me on, for I had been nurse to his dear wife. Master Charles came to me one night, full of trouble. He swore that he was not to blame; but what really troubled him was that he knew for a fact that his cousin was responsible. It seemed that my young master had seen the wench coming from Master Roger’s room on several occasions. Yet this precious cousin had stood by and said nothing when my lord had given Master Charles the dressing-down of his life over the business. However, my boy could not believe that his cousin would not eventually confess; he thought that Master Roger had been taken unawares, and been too afraid to speak up there and then, in face of the first transports of my lord’s wrath.”
The Georgian Rake Page 19
