The Foundling

by Джорджетт Хейер

  Gideon lifted his hand. “Oh, no, sir! You mistake! I have no authority over Gilly! I must be the only one of us all to say so, too!”

  “Gideon!” said Lord Lionel, striking his fist on the table. “This is beyond the line of what is amusing! You have let that boy go away without one soul to wait on him, or see that he does not fall into some accident, and however well that may do for another young man, it will not do for him! He has never been obliged to fend for himself; he will not know how to go on; he may become ill through some folly or neglect! I had thought you too much attached to him to have been guilty of such behaviour!”

  “Believe me, sir, I am so much attached to him that I hope he will fall into all manner of adventures and scrapes! I have a better opinion of Adolphus than you have, or indeed than he has of himself, and I think he will learn to manage very tolerably. He does not yet know his own value. He is unsure because untried. I hope he will not too speedily return to us.”

  “I declare I am out of all patience with such talk!” exclaimed Lord Lionel, starting up. “If you do not know where he is, I am wasting my time with you! I shall leave no stone unturned to find him! When you have come to your senses, you may find me at Sale House!”

  Gideon bowed, and strode over to open the door for him. Lord Lionel fairly snatched up his hat and cane from the chair where he had laid them, and left the chambers without another word.

  “God help you, Adolphus!” said Gideon, shutting the door.

  Just what stones his parent found to turn over in the succeeding two days he was unable to discover. That Lord Lionel was in London still he knew, for he twice met him, and exchanged a few words with him. Lord Lionel was doing what he could to scotch the rumours that were flying about the town, but with indifferent success, his son inferred. These had reached Gideon’s Colonel’s ears, who stated, somewhat elliptically, that he had no desire to interfere in Captain Ware’s private affairs, and supposed he knew what he was about.

  “I have every reason, sir, to assure you that my cousin is alive and well,” replied Gideon, very stiff.

  “Well, well, no one doubts that!” said the Colonel inaccurately. “No bad thing, however, if you could prove it! Don’t mind telling you I don’t care for the talk that is running round the clubs!”

  On the fifth day after the Duke’s disappearance, a letter reached Captain Ware through the medium of the London Penny Post. It was penned by Nettlebed, and was couched in terms mysterious enough to baffle the recipient.

  “Sir, and Honoured Captain,” it began, in agitated characters, “This is to inform you, Master Gideon, as is his Grace’s true Friend which I do know and Nobody will convince me Otherwise, that having taken a Notion into my head I am leaving Town at this present, and having his Grace’s wishes in mind not saying nothing to his Lordship, which you will Comprehend, Master Gideon, knowing the ways things are, and me not wishful to do what his Grace would not relish. Master Gideon, sir, there is One who may Know the Answer to why his Grace left us, and I do not know, Sir, why I did not Consider it before, but it come to me in the Night, Sir, but tell his Lordship I will not, being, as you know, Master Gideon, Devoted to His Grace’s Interests, for which I take this Opportunity to Inform you, Sir, as I am gone away on his Grace’s Affairs, and not Deserting my Post. I remain, Master Gideon, Your Respectful Servant, James Nettlebed.”

  After perusing this communication, the Captain was not surprised to receive a visit from Lord Lionel, who came to inform him, explosively, that as though things were not already bad enough Gilly’s mutton-headed valet had now disappeared. He was so anxious to learn what his son’s opinion of this unexpected turn might be that he very magnanimously forgave him for their late tiff. But Gideon would only shake his head, and say that it was extremely odd, which made his lordship recall various grudges he had cherished against his son for years, and enumerate them in detail. But here again Gideon behaved in a very unfilial way, refusing to be drawn into a quarrel that might have relieved his parent’s exacerbated feelings, and merely grinning at him in affectionate mockery.

  On the sixth day of the Duke’s absence, the letter he had written from Baldock reached Albany, but since Captain Ware’s correspondence was not of a nature to make early postal deliveries a matter of moment, it did not arrive until midway through the morning. The Captain came in at noon to find it awaiting him. He perused it appreciatively, and did not in the least grudge the monies it had cost him to receive it. He tucked it into his pocket-book, and, having won the battle over his worser self, sent off a brief note to his father, informing him that Gilly was alive, in health, and in mischief. He then shed his regimentals, attired himself in a costume suitable for a gentleman bent upon attending a spoiling engagement, and sallied forth in his curricle to Epsom, where he witnessed a meeting between a young pugilist, whom he was inclined to fancy, with a veteran of the Ring. He did not return to his chambers until a very late hour; and as he had given Wragby leave of absence for the day Mr. Liversedge, arriving in London, and making all speed to Albany, knocked in vain on the door of his chambers. Mr. Liversedge was forced to postpone his visit until the following morning, and to put up for the night at the cheapest inn he could discover.

  He was sufficiently conversant with, the habits of fashionable gentlemen not to commit the solecism of calling on Captain Ware too early in the morning. Unfortunately he reckoned without Gideon’s military duties, which, on this particular morning, took him out at a time when, according to all the rules, he should have been still abed. Wragby, who three times answered the door to him during the course of the day, informed him roundly that the Captain wouldn’t come home until evening, and wouldn’t receive such an importunate visitor when he did come home.

  “He will receive me, my man,” said Mr. Liversedge loftily. “It is a matter of the greatest importance!”

  “It may be to you, but it won’t be to him,” replied Wragby, unimpressed, and shut the door in his face.

  Nothing daunted, Mr. Liversedge returned to Albany at six o’clock, when the Captain was changing his dress for a convivial gathering at the Castle Tavern. He sent in his card, a circumstance which induced the reluctant Wragby to mention his existence to his master.

  Captain Ware picked the card up distastefully, and studied it. “Is it a dun, Wragby?”

  “That,” responded his servitor, “is what I thought myself, sir, when I see this Individual first, but not at this hour it ain’t, that’s certain!”

  “Oh, well, show him into the parlour! I’ll see him!” said Gideon, returning to the mirror, and wrestling with the exigencies of his cravat.’

  He joined his visitor ten minutes later. Mr. Liversedge, who had travelled post from Baldock, at his brother’s expense, was a trifle startled by the formidable proportions of his host. He had been prepared to find that Captain Ware, holding a commission in the Lifeguards, was six foot tall, but his brief acquaintance with Captain Ware’s noble relative had not led him to expect to be confronted by a young giant, with shoulders to match his height, and a cast of countenance which even the greatest optimist would have recognized to be uncompromising in the extreme. He rose from his chair, and executed a profound bow.

  Gideon’s hard gray eyes ran over him in one comprehensive glance. “What’s your business with me?” he asked. “I fancy I don’t know you.”

  Mr. Liversedge’s experiences as a gentleman’s gentleman led him instantly to recognize and to appreciate the True Quality. He bowed to it again. “Sir,” he said, “I have sought you out on an affair of great moment.”

  “Have you, by God?” said Gideon. “Well, be brief, for I am engaged to dine with a party of friends in half an hour!”

  Mr. Liversedge cast a conspiratorial glance towards the door. “Am I assured of your private ear, sir?” he asked.

  Gideon began to be amused. He walked over to the door leading into the little hall, and opened it, and looked out. He then closed it again, and said with becoming gravity: “No prying ears attend
upon us, Mr. Liversedge. You may safely unburden your soul to me!”

  “Captain Ware,” said Mr. Liversedge softly, “you have, I apprehend, a Noble Relative.”

  Quite suddenly Gideon ceased to be amused. Some instinct for danger, however, prompted him to reply lightly: “I am nearly related to the Duke of Sale.”

  Mr. Liversedge smiled approvingly at him. “Exactly so, sir! I fancy I do not err when I say that you stand close to him in the succession to the title, and the prodigious property which appertains to his Grace.”

  Not a muscle quivered in the dark face looming above him; the faint, satirical smile still hovered on the Captain’s austere mouth; there was nothing in the lounging pose to warn Mr. Liversedge that the Captain’s every faculty was on the alert. There was a moment’s pause. “Quite close,” drawled Gideon, his eyelids beginning to droop a little over his eyes, in a way which would have put his intimates on their guard. “Sit down, Mr. Liversedge!”

  He indicated a chair by the table, in the full light of the oil-lamp which stood on it, and Mr. Liversedge took it, with a word of thanks. He could have wished that the Captain had seen fit to lower his large frame into an opposite chair, but the Captain apparently preferred to prop his shoulders against the high mantelpiece, a little out of the direct beam of the lamp. “Go on, Mr. Liversedge!” he invited cordially.

  “His Grace, I further apprehend,” said Mr. Liversedge blandly, “is missing from his residence?”

  “As you say,” agreed Gideon.

  Mr. Liversedge regarded him soulfully. “What a shocking thing it would be if his Grace were never to return to it!” he said. “His absence must, I am persuaded, be causing his relatives grave disquiet.”

  Gideon’s lazy glance dwelled for a thoughtful moment on the strip of sticking-plaster adorning his guest’s brow. Was this the dragon you left for dead, Adolphus? was the silent question in his brain. And just what mischief are you in, my little one? Aloud, he said: “I am sure you are perfectly well-informed on that head, Mr. Liversedge.”

  Mr. Liversedge, who had employed his time since his arrival in London in picking up the gleanings of town-scandal, admitted it, but modestly. He then heaved a sigh and said: “One must hope that no accident may have befallen him! Yet how inscrutable are the decrees of Providence, sir! You will have doubtless observed it. There is no knowing what the twists of Fortune may be! Why, I daresay you, Captain Ware,—a worthy scion, I am sure, of a distinguished house!—may never have contemplated the possibility that you might awake one morning to find yourself the heir to your noble relative’s possessions!”

  The Captain’s drawl became even more marked. “That, Mr. Liversedge, is a reflection that is bound to intrude upon the mind of a man of ordinary common-sense. Life is, after all, uncertain.”

  Mr. Liversedge perceived that his visions were about to be fulfilled. It was pleasant to find that his reading of human character had not been at fault. But he had not seriously supposed that it could be. He smiled approvingly at Gideon, and said: “Yet when one considers that his Grace is a young man, and in the possession of his health and faculties, I daresay anyone would be willing to hazard a large wager against the chances of your becoming second in the line of the succession within—shall we say?—the month!”

  “How large a wager?” asked Gideon.

  Mr. Liversedge waved one hand in an airy gesture. “Oh, against such odds, sir, I daresay you would venture as much as fifty thousand pounds!”

  Gideon shook his head. “I never bet so far above my fortune, Mr. Liversedge. Now, had you offered me a wager that I should not be Duke of Sale within a month—!”

  Mr. Liversedge considered his resources rapidly. “Well, I daresay it could be contrived,” he said dubiously.

  Gideon very nearly laughed in his face. He overcame the impulse, and said: “You know, I am not such a gamester as you believe, sir. Such wild bets hold little attraction for me. You will own that you would find it hard to raise such a sum, as you would be obliged to do if his Grace should not depart this life within the month.”

  “Sir,” said Mr. Liversedge earnestly, “if I entered upon a bet of that magnitude it would only be in the certainty that his Grace would depart this life within the month!”

  “How could you have that certainty?” smiled Gideon.

  Mr. Liversedge drew a breath. “Captain Ware,” he said. “I am not an unreasonable man. I do not waste your time with frivolous suggestions. More, sir! I do not ignore the peculiar delicacy of your position. Indeed, being myself a man of great sensibility, I have given much thought to your position. Naturally you could not contemplate, in any little arrangement between us, the smallest suggestion of—er—”

  “Blood-money,” supplied Gideon.

  Mr. Liversedge looked pained. “That, sir, is an ugly phrase, and one which is as repugnant to me as it must be to you. All I offer you is a handsome wager. I am sure there are many seemingly more improbable betsentered in the book at White’s. Not, of course, that this one would be entered there. A simple exchange of notes between us, sir, is all that would be necessary. And here let me assure you that I regard that as a mere formality, customary in affairs of such a nature. My faith in you as a man of honour, Captain Ware, makes it impossible for me to contemplate the necessity of producing your note at some future date.”

  “I’m obliged to you,” said Gideon. “But I find my faith in you less securely rooted, Mr. Liversedge. I don’t believe, for instance, that you have it in your power to make me lose such a bet.”

  Mr. Liversedge looked reproachful. “It pains me, sir, to encounter mistrust in one with whom I have been so frank. I might add, in one whom I am anxious to benefit. Or should I have told you at the outset that his Grace is at the moment sojourning at a little place quite in the heart of our delightful countryside? When I had the honour of seeing him last, he was wearing an olive riding-coat of excellent tailoring, and a drab Benjamin over it, with four capes. He had a handsome timepiece in his pocket, too; with his crest engraved upon the back, and his initials upon the front. He sighed. “Perhaps I should have brought it to you, sir, but anything savouring of common thievery is very distasteful to me. However, I daresay you may recognize this exquisitely embroidered handkerchief.” He dived a hand into his pocket as he spoke, and produced Gilly’s bloodstained handkerchief.

  Gideon took it from him, and for a moment stood staring down at it, his face very pale, and the lines about his mouth and jaw suddenly accentuated. The stains had grown brown, but Gideon knew bloodstains when he saw them, and his gorge rose. He laid the handkerchief down, his long fingers quivering, and raised his head, and looked at Mr. Liversedge. Mr. Liversedge had known from the moment that he had mentioned the olive coat that he had struck home. He had not failed to remark that betraying quiver of the fingers. He smiled indulgently; he would have been excited himself, he reflected, if he realized all at once, as Captain Ware had, how close he stood to a Dukedom. Then he met the Captain’s eyes, and in the very short space of time granted him for rumination he thought that they blazed with the strangest light he had ever seen in a fellow-creature’s eyes. He had even a sensation of being scorched, which was perhaps not surprising, since Gideon was seeing him through a hot, red mist.

  The next instant, Mr. Liversedge, no puny figure, had been plucked from his seat, and two iron hands were throttling him remorselessly, shaking him savagely as they did so. While he tore desperately at them, his starting eyes stared up in filming horror into a face dark with rage, with lips curling back from close-shut teeth, and nostrils terrifyingly distended. Before his vision failed, Mr. Liversedge read murder in this face, and knew that for once in his life his judgment had been at fault. Then, as his eyes threatened to burst from their sockets, and his tongue was forced out between his lips, he saw and knew nothing more. As he lost consciousness Gideon cast him from him, and he fell in an inert heap on to the floor.

  Chapter XVI

  The noise of Mr. Liversedge’s fall brough
t Wragby swiftly upon the scene. He found his master brushing his hands together, as though to rid them of some lingering dirt and his master’s guest lying on the floor. He betrayed no particular surprise at this unusual scene, but casting an experienced eye over Mr. Liversedge remarked: “Well, it looks like you dished him up, sir. It’s bellows to mend with him sure enough. But what I ask you, sir, is, how am I to get rid of him, if you’ve killed him? Too hasty, that’s what you are!”

  “I haven’t,” Gideon said shortly. “At least—Here, get some water, and throw it over him! I don’t want him dead!”

  “Pity you didn’t think of that afore, sir,” said Wragby severely. “Nice sort of bobbery to be going on in a gentleman’s chambers!”

  He left the room, returning in a minute or two with a jug of water, which he emptied generously over Mr. Liversedge’s countenance. “It seems a waste,” he said, “but I don’t know but what we hadn’t better put a ball-of-fire down his gullet.”

  Gideon strode over to the sideboard, and poured out some brandy. “Not dead, is he?”

  “No, sir,” replied Wragby, who had been feeling for Mr. Liversedge’s heart. “He’s alive, but pretty well burnt to the socket.” He considered Mr. Liversedge’s mangled cravat, and shook his head. “Well, I thought you’d given him a leveller, sir, but I see as how you’ve been a-strangling of him.” He loosened the cravat, straightened the sufferer’s limbs, and raised his head. Gideon dropped on his knee, and put the glass he held to Mr. Liversedge’s slack mouth. “Easy, now, easy, sir!” Wragby warned him. “You don’t want to choke him again, and nor you don’t want that good ball-of-fire to be running down his shirt! Better let me give it to him. I’ll have him round in a brace of snaps.”

  Gideon relinquished the glass, and rose. “Wragby, his Grace is in trouble!”