On entering, he perceived the young man standing in front of the locked cabinet, and regarding it with a melancholy air. The Duke’s appearance roused him, and he glanced with visible surprise at the distinguished and aristocratic figure which the supposed policeman presented. But he made no comment and his first words were about the flagon.
“Now I come to remember,” said he, “I put the Queen Bess flagon in this cabinet. It must be so, although, as I have left my key at my rooms in St James’s Street, I can’t satisfy myself on the point.”
The Duke, now perfectly convinced of the character of his visitor, waited only to see him lay his hands on the cabinet. Such an action would be the signal for his instant arrest. But before the young man had time either to speak again or to put out his hand towards the cabinet, there came the sound of wheels quickly approaching the villa. A moment later a neat brougham rolled up to the door. The young man darted to the window, tore open the shutters, and looked out. The Duke, suspecting the arrival of confederates, turned towards the cabinet and took his stand in front of it.
“Go and open the door,” ordered the young man, turning round. “Don’t keep the lady waiting outside at this time of night.”
Curiosity conquered prudence; the Duke set more value on a night’s amusement than on the Queen Bess flagon. He went obediently and opened the door of the villa. On the step stood a young and very handsome girl. Great agitation was evident in her manner.
“Is—is the Duke here?” she asked.
“Yes, madam. If I lead you to the sitting-room, you will find him there,” answered the Duke gravely; and with a bow he preceded her along the passage.
When they reached the room, the lady, passing by him, darted forward and flung herself affectionately into the young man’s arms. He greeted her with equal warmth, while the Duke stood in the doorway in some natural embarrassment.
“I escaped so successfully!” cried the lady. “My aunt went to bed at eleven; so did I. At twelve I got up and dressed. Not a soul heard me come downstairs, and the brougham was waiting at the door just as you said.”
“My darling!” murmured the young man fondly. “Now, indeed, is our happiness certain. By to-morrow morning we shall be safe from all pursuit.” Then he turned to the Duke. “I need not tell you,” said he, “that you must observe silence on this matter. Oblige me now by going to my room and packing a bag; you’ll know what I shall want for two or three days; I can give you a quarter of an hour.”
The Duke stood in momentary hesitation. He was bewildered at the sudden change in the position caused by the appearance of this girl. Was he assisting, then, not at a refined and ingenious burglary, but at another kind of trick? The disguise assumed by the young man might have for its object the deception of a trustful girl, and not an abduction of the Queen Bess flagon.
“Well, why don’t you obey?” asked the young man sharply; and, stepping up to the Duke, he thrust a ten-pound note into his hand, whispering, “Play your part, and earn your money, you fool.”
The Duke lingered no longer. Leaving the room, he walked straight, rapidly, and with a firm tread, upstairs. When he reached the top he paused to listen. All was still! Stay! A moment later he heard a slight noise—the noise of some metal instrument turning, proceeding from the room which he had just left. The Duke sat down on the landing and took off his boots. Then with silent feet he crept cautiously downstairs again. He paused to listen for an instant outside the sitting-room door. Voices were audible, but he could not hear the words. The occupants of the room were moving about. He heard a low amused laugh. Then he pursued his way to the hall door. He had not completely closed it after admitting the lady, and he now slipped out without a sound. The brougham stood in front of the door. The Duke dodged behind it, and the driver, who was leaning forward on his seat, did not see him. The next moment he was crouching down by the side of his friend the policeman, waiting for the next development in the plot of this comedy, or crime, or whatever it might turn out to be. He put out his hand and touched his ally. To his amusement the man, sitting there on the ground, had fallen fast asleep.
“Another proof,” mused the Duke in whimsical despair, “that it is impossible to make any mode of life permanently interesting. How this fellow would despise the state of excitement which I, for the moment, am so fortunate as to enjoy! Well, I won’t wake him unless need arises.”
For some little while nothing happened. The policeman slept on, and the driver of the brougham seemed sunk in meditation, unless, indeed, he also were drowsy. The shutters of the sitting-room were again closely shut, and no sound came from behind them. The Duke crouched motionless but keenly observant.
Then the hall door creaked. The policeman snored quietly, but the Duke leant eagerly forward, and the driver of the brougham suddenly sat up quite straight, and grasped his reins more firmly. The door was cautiously opened: the lady and the young man appeared on the threshold. The young man glanced up and down the lane; then he walked quickly towards the brougham, and opened the door. The lady followed him. As she went she passed within four or five feet of where the Duke lay hidden. And, as she went by, the Duke saw—what he half-expected, yet what he could but half-believe—the gleam of the gold of the Queen Bess flagon, which she held in her gloved hands.
As has been hinted, the Duke attached no superstitious value to this article. The mad fever of the collector had left him long ago; but amidst the death of other emotions and more recondite prejudices there survives in the heart of man the primitive dislike of being “done.” It survived in the mind of the Duke of Belleville, and sprang to strong and sudden activity when he observed his Queen Bess flagon in the hands of the pretty unknown lady.
With a sudden and vigorous spring he was upon her; with a roughness which the Duke trusted that the occasion to some extent excused, he seized her arm with one hand, and with the other violently twisted the Queen Bess flagon out of her grasp. A loud cry rang from her lips. The driver threw down the reins and leapt from his seat. The young man turned with an oath and made for the Duke. The Duke of Belleville, ignoring the mere prejudice which forbids timely retreat, took to his heels, hugging the Queen Bess flagon to his breast, and heading, in his silk socks, as hard and as straight as he could for Hampstead Heath. After him pell-mell came the young man, the driver, and the lady, amazed, doubtless, at the turn of events, but resolved on the recapture of the flagon. And just as their figures vanished round the corner, the policeman rubbed his eyes and looked round, exclaiming, “What’s the row?”
In after days the Duke of Belleville was accustomed to count his feelings as he fled barefooted (for what protection could silk socks afford?) across Hampstead Heath, with three incensed pursuers on his track, among the keenest sensations of his life. The exhilaration of the night air and the chances of the situation in which he found himself combined to produce in him a remarkable elation of spirits. He laughed as he ran, till shortening breath warned him against such extravagant wasting of his resources; then he settled down to a steady run, heading across the Heath, up and down, over dip and hillock. Yet he did not distance the pack. He heard them close behind him; a glance round showed him that the lady was well up with her friends, in spite of the impediment of her skirts. The Duke began to pant; his feet had grown sore and painful; he looked round for a refuge. To his delight he perceived, about a hundred yards to his right, a small and picturesque red-brick house. It was now between one and two o’clock, but he did not hesitate. Resolving to appeal to the hospitality of this house, hoping, it may be, again to find a door left open, he turned sharp to the right, and with a last spurt made for his haven.
Fate seemed indeed kind to him; the door was not only unbarred, it stood ajar. The Duke’s pursuers were even now upon him; they were no more than five or six yards behind when he reached the little red-tiled porch and put out his hand to push the door back.
But at the same instant the door was pulled open, and a burly man appeared on the threshold. He wore a frock coat embellished with black braid and a peaked cap. The Duke at once recognised in him an inspector of police. Evidently he was, when surprised by the Duke’s arrival, about to sally out on his round. The Duke stopped and, between his pants, made shift to address the welcome ally; but before he could get a word out the young man was upon him.
“Inspector,” said the young man in the most composed manner, “I give this fellow in charge for stealing my property.”
“I saw him take the tankard,” observed the driver, pointing towards the Queen Bess flagon.
The lady said nothing but stood by the young man, as though ready with her testimony in case it were needed.
The Inspector turned curious eyes on the Duke of Belleville; then he addressed the young man respectfully.
“May I ask, sir, who you are?”
“I am the Duke of Belleville,” answered the young man.
“The Duke of Belle-ville!” cried the Inspector, his manner showing an increased deference. “I beg your Grace’s——”
“The name,” said the Duke, “is pronounced Bevvle—to rhyme with devil.”
The Inspector looked at him scornfully.
“Your turn will come, my man,” said he, and, turning again to the young man, he continued: “Do you charge him with stealing this cup?”
“Certainly I do.”
“Do you know who he is?”
“I imagine you do,” said the young man, with a laugh. “He’s one of your own policeman.”
The Inspector stepped back and turned up the gas in his passage. Then he scrutinised the Duke’s features.
“One of my men?” he cried. “Your Grace is mistaken. I have never seen the man.”
“Yes, yes,” cried the young man, and, in his eagerness to convince the Inspector, he stepped forward, until his face fell within the range of the passage light. As this happened, the Inspector gave a loud cry.
“Hallo, Joe Simpson!” And he sprang at the young man. The latter did not wait for him: without a word he turned; the Inspector rushed forward, the young man made for the Heath, and the driver, after standing for a moment apparently bewildered, faced about, and made off in the opposite direction to that chosen by his companion. The three were thirty yards away before the Duke of Belleville could realise what had happened. Then he perceived that he stood in the passage of the Inspector’s house, alone save for the presence of the young lady, who faced him with an astonished expression on her pretty countenance.
“It is altogether a very remarkable night,” observed the Duke.
“It is impossible that you should be more puzzled than I am,” said the young lady.
“Excuse me,” said the Duke, “but you run very well.”
“I belonged to my college football club,” said the young lady modestly.
“Precisely!” cried the Duke. “I suppose this door leads to our good friend’s parlour. Shall we sit down while you tell me all about it? I must ask you to excuse the condition of my feet.”
Thus speaking, the Duke led the way into the Inspector’s parlour. Placing the Queen Bess flagon on the table, he invited the lady to be seated, and took a chair himself. Perceiving that she was somewhat agitated, he provided her with an interval in which to regain her composure by narrating to her the adventures of the evening. She heard him with genuine astonishment.
“Do you say that you are the Duke of Belleville?” she cried.
“Don’t I look like it?” asked the Duke, smiling, but at the same time concealing his feet under the Inspector’s dining-table.
“But he—he said he was the Duke.”
“He said so to me also,” observed the Duke of Belleville.
The lady looked at him long and keenly; there was, however, a simple honesty about the Duke’s manner that attracted her sympathy and engaged her confidence.
“Perhaps I’d better tell you all about it,” said she, with a sigh.
“Not unless you desire to do so, I beg,” said the Duke, with a wave of his hand.
“I am nineteen,” began the lady. The Duke heaved an envious sigh. “I live with my aunt,” she continued. “We live a very retired life. Since I left college—which I did prematurely owing to a difference of opinion with the Principal—I have seen hardly anyone. In the course of a visit to the seaside I met the gentleman who—who——”
“From whom we have just parted?” suggested the Duke.
“Thank you, yes. Not to weary you with details——”
“Principles weary me, but not details,” interposed the Duke.
“In fact,” continued the young lady, “he professed to be in love with me. Now my aunt, although not insensible to the great position which he offered me (for of course he represented himself as the Duke of Belleville) entertains the opinion that no girl should marry till she is twenty-one. Moreover she considered that the acquaintance was rather short.”
“May I ask when you first met the gentleman?”
“Last Monday week. So she forbade the marriage. I am myself of an impatient disposition.”
“So am I,” observed the Duke of Belleville, and in the interest of the discussion he became so forgetful as to withdraw his feet from the shelter of the table and cross one leg comfortably over the other. “So am I,” he repeated, nodding his head.
“I therefore determined to live my own life in my own way——”
“I think you said you had been to college?”
“Yes, but I had a difference of——”
“Quite so. Pray proceed,” said the Duke courteously.
“And to run away with my fiancé. In pursuance of this plan, I arranged to meet him to-night at his villa at Hampstead. He sent a brougham to fetch me, I made my escape successfully, and the rest you know.”
“Pardon me, but up to this point the part played by the flagon which you see on the table before you is somewhat obscure.”
“Oh, when you’d gone to pack his things, he took out a curious little instrument—he said he had forgotten his key—and opened the cabinet on the mantelpiece. Then he took out that pretty mug and gave it to me as my wedding present. He told me that it was very valuable, and he would carry it for me himself, but I declared that I must carry it for myself or I wouldn’t go. So he let me. And then you——”
“The whole thing is perfectly plain,” declared the Duke with emphasis. “You, madam, have been the victim of a most dastardly and cold-blooded plot. This fellow is a swindler. I daresay he wanted to get hold of you, and thus extort money from your aunt, but his main object was no other than to carry off the famous cup which you see before you—the Queen Bess flagon.” And the Duke, rising to his feet, began to walk up and down in great indignation. “He meant to kill two birds with one stone!” said he, in mingled anger and admiration.
“It is pretty,” said the young lady, taking up the flagon. “Oh, what is this figure?”
The Duke, perceiving that the lady desired an explanation, came and leant over her chair. She turned her face up to his in innocent eagerness; the Duke could not avoid observing that she had very fine eyes. Without making any comment on the subject, however, he leant a little lower and began to explain the significance of the figure on the Queen Bess flagon.
The Duke has been known to say that, in a world so much the sport of chance as ours, there was no reason why he should not have fallen in love with the young lady and offered to make her in very truth what she had dreamed of becoming—the Duchess of Belleville.
Her eyes were very fine, her manner frank and engaging. Moreover, the Duke hated to see people disappointed. Thus the thing might just as well have happened as not. And on so narrow a point did the issue stand that to this day certain persons declare that it—or part of it—did happen; for why, and on what account, they ask, should an experienced connoisseur (and such undoubtedly was the Duke of Belleville) present a young lady previously unknown to him (or, for the matter of that, any young lady at all, whether known or not known to him) with such a rare, costly, and precious thing as the Queen Bess flagon? For the fact is—let the meaning and significance of the fact be what they will—that when the young lady, gazing fondly the while on the flagon, exclaimed, “I never really cared about him much, but I should have liked the beautiful flagon!” the Duke answered (he was still leaning over her chair, in order the better to explain and trace the figure on the flagon):
“Of him you are well rid. But permit me to request your acceptance of the flagon. The real Duke of Belleville, madam, must not be outdone by his counterfeit.”
“Really?” cried the young lady.
“Of course,” murmured the Duke, delighted with the pleasure which he saw in her eyes.
The young lady turned a most grateful and almost affectionate glance on the Duke. Although ignorant of the true value of the Queen Bess flagon, she was aware that the Duke had made her a very handsome present.
“Thank you,” said she, putting her hands into the Duke’s.
At this moment a loud and somewhat strident voice proceeded from the door of the room.
“Well, I never! And how did you come here?”
The Duke, looking round, perceived a stout woman, clad in a black petticoat and a woollen shawl; her arms were akimbo.
“We came in, madam,” said he, rising and bowing, “by the hall door, which we chanced to find open.”
The stout woman appeared to be at a loss for words. At length, however, she gasped out:
“Be off with you. Don’t let the Inspector catch you here!”
The Duke looked doubtfully at the young lady.
“The woman probably misunderstands,” he murmured. The young lady blushed slightly. The Inspector’s wife advanced with a threatening demeanour.
“Who are you?” she asked abruptly.
“I, madam,” began the Duke, “am the——”
“I don’t see that it matters who we are,” interposed the young lady.
“Possibly not,” admitted the Duke, with a smile.
The young lady rose, went to a little mirror that hung on the wall, and adjusted the curls which appeared from under the brim of her hat.
“Dear me,” said she, turning round with a sigh, “it must be nearly three o’clock, and my aunt always likes me to be in before daybreak.”
The stout woman gasped again.
“Because of the neighbours, you know,” said the young lady with a smile.
“Just so,” assented the Duke, and possibly he would have added more, had not the woman uttered an inarticulate cry and pointed to his feet.
“Really, madam,” remarked the Duke, with some warmth, “it would have been in better taste not to refer to the matter.” And with a severe frown he offered his arm to the young lady. They then proceeded towards the doorway. The Inspector’s wife barred the passage. The Duke assumed a most dignified air. The woman reluctantly gave away. Walking through the passage, the young lady and the Duke found themselves again in the open air. There were signs of approaching dawn.
“I really think I had better get home,” whispered the young lady.
At this moment—and the Duke was not in the least surprised—they perceived four persons approaching them. The Inspector walked with his arm through the arm of the young man who had claimed to be the Duke of Belleville; following, arm-in-arm with the driver of the brougham, came the policeman whose uniform the Duke had borrowed. All the party except the Inspector looked uneasy. The Inspector appeared somewhat puzzled. However, he greeted the Duke with a cry of welcome.
“Now we can find out the truth of it all!” he exclaimed.
“To find out truth,” remarked the Duke, “is never easy and not always desirable.”
“I understand that you are the Duke of Belleville?” asked the Inspector.
“Certainly,” said the Duke.
“Bosh!” said the young man. “Oh, you know me, Inspector Collins, and I know you, and I’m not going to try and play it on you any more. But this chap’s no more the Duke than I am, and I should have thought you might have known one of your own policemen!”
The Inspector turned upon him fiercely.
“None of your gab, Joe Simpson,” said he. Then turning to the Duke, he continued, “Do you charge the young woman with him, your Grace?” And he pointed significantly to the Queen Bess flagon, which the young lady carried in an affectionate grasp.
“This lady,” said the Duke, “has done me the honour of accepting a small token of my esteem. As for these men, I know nothing about them.” And he directed a significant glance at the young man. The young man answered his look. The policeman seemed to grow more easy in his mind. “Then you don’t charge any of them?” cried the Inspector, bewildered.
“Why, no,” answered the Duke. “And I suppose they none of them charge me?”
Nobody spoke. The Inspector took out a large red handkerchief and mopped his brow.
“Well, it beats me,” he said. “I know pretty well what these two men are; but if your Grace don’t charge ’em, what can I do?”
“Nothing, I should suppose,” said the Duke blandly. And, with a slight bow, he proceeded on his way, the young lady accompanying him. Looking back once, he perceived the young man and the driver of the brougham going off in another direction with quick furtive steps, while the Inspector and the policeman stood talking together outside the door of the house.
“The circumstances, as a whole, no doubt appear peculiar to the Inspector,” observed the Duke, with a smile.
“Do you think that we can find a hansom cab?” asked the young lady a little anxiously. “You see, my aunt——”
“Precisely,” said the Duke, and he quickened his pace.
They soon reached the boundary of the Heath, and, having walked a little way along the road, were so fortunate as to find a cab. The young lady held out her left hand to the Duke: in her right she still grasped firmly the Queen Bess flagon.
“Good-bye,” she said. “Thank you for the beautiful present.”
The Duke took her hand and allowed his glance to rest for a moment on her face. She appeared to see a question in his eyes.
“Yes, and for rescuing me from that man,” she added with a little shudder.
The Duke’s glance still rested on her face.
“Yes, and for lots of fun,” she whispered with a blush.
The Duke looked away, sighed, released her hand, helped her into the cab, and retired to a distance of some yards. The young lady spoke a few words to the cabman, took her seat, waved a small hand, held up the Queen Bess flagon, kissed it, and drove away.
“If,” observed the Duke with a sigh, “I were not a well-bred man, I should have asked her name,” and he made his way back to his house in a somewhat pensive mood.
On reaching home, however, he perceived the brougham standing before his door. A new direction was thus given to his meditations. He opened the gate of his stable-yard, and, taking the horse’s head, led it in. Having unharnessed it, he put it in the stable and fed and watered it; the brougham he drew into the coach-house. Then he went indoors, partook of some brandy mixed with water, and went to bed.
At eleven o’clock the next morning Frank, the Duke’s man, came up to Hampstead to attend to his Grace’s wants. The Duke was still in bed, but, on breakfast being ready, he rose and came downstairs in his dressing-gown and a pair of large and very easy slippers.
“I hope your Grace slept well?” said Frank.
“I never passed a better night, thank you, Frank,” said the Duke as he chipped the top off his egg.
“Half-an-hour ago, your Grace,” Frank continued, “a man called.”
“To see me?”
“It was about—about a brougham, your Grace.”
“Ah! What did you say to him?”
“I said I had no orders about a brougham from your Grace.”
“Quite right, Frank, quite right,” said the Duke with a smile. “What did he say to that?”
“He appeared to be put out, but said that he would call again, your Grace.”
“Very good,” said the Duke, rising and lighting a cigarette.
Frank lingered uneasily near the door.
“Is anything the matter, Frank?” asked the Duke kindly.
“Well, your Grace, in—in point of fact, there is—there is a strange brougham and a strange horse in the stables, your Grace.”
“In what respect,” asked the Duke, “are the brougham and the horse strange, Frank?”
“I—I should say, your Grace, a brougham and a horse that I have not seen before in your Grace’s stables.”
“That is a very different thing, Frank,” observed the Duke with a patient smile. “I suppose that I am at liberty to acquire a brougham and a horse if it occurs to me to do so?”
“Of course, your Grace,” stammered Frank.
“I will drive into town in that brougham to-day, Frank,” said the Duke.
Frank bowed and withdrew. The Duke strolled to the window and stood looking out as he smoked his cigarette.
“I don’t think the man will call again,” said he. Then he drew from his pocket the ten-pound note that the young man had given him, and regarded it thoughtfully. “A brougham, a horse, ten pounds, and a very diverting experience,” he mused. “Yes, I am in better spirits this morning!”
As for the Queen Bess flagon, he appeared to have forgotten all about it.
THE DUKE’S ALLOTMENT
I
THE Duke of Belleville (nothing annoyed his Grace more than to hear his name mispronounced—it should sound “Bevvle”) was tired of it all. That succinctly expresses his condition; and the condition is really not to be wondered at after fifteen years of an existence such as his, although it is true that he had occasionally met with some agreeable and even some unexpected adventures. He wanted a new sensation, a new experience, a new environment, although it was possible that he would not want any of them for very long. He consulted his man Frank on the matter one evening at dinner.
“When I felt like that as a lad, your Grace,” Frank remarked, “my father used to put me to digging.”
“Excellent, Frank! Buy me a labourer’s allotment to-morrow morning.”
“Very good, your Grace,” said Frank.
He was an invaluable servant, although at times, the Duke would complain, lacking in imagination.
“Have you got it, Frank?” said the Duke the next morning at lunch.
“Yes, your Grace. And I thought it well also to obtain a cottage.”
“Very thoughtful! Clothes?”
“I thought that perhaps your Grace would prefer to give your personal——”
“Quite right, Frank. I’ll go to Clarkson’s to-morrow.”
“I beg your Grace’s pardon—am I to accompany your Grace?”
“I do not propose to dig all night, nor even after sunset. Men on allotments eat, I am given to suppose!”
“I beg your Grace’s pardon.”
“Never mind, Frank. In the evening we shall be as usual. Give the necessary orders. Neither you nor the chef will, of course, be visible.”
“Very good, your Grace.” Frank placed the coffee and old brandy on the table, and withdrew.
The next morning the Duke repaired to Wardour Street and mentioned something about private theatricals. The suave and accomplished proprietor was fertile in suggestion.
“I mustn’t look too new or clean,” the Duke stipulated. The hint was sufficient; he was equipped with an entirely realistic costume.
“Duplicate it, please,” said the Duke as he re-entered his brougham. “It was careless of me to forget that it might rain.”
The Duke and Frank left King’s Cross the same evening (the chef had preceded them with the luggage; he made no stipulation about kitchen or scullery maids—everybody was always anxious to oblige his Grace) under cover of night. A journey of some forty miles brought them to their destination. On the outskirts of the little town lay the allotments. They were twelve in number, each comprising half-an-acre of land. Three cottages stood facing the allotments with their backs to the highroad. One of these now appertained to the Duke. The chef had done wonders; all was clean and comfortable—though the furniture was, of course, very plain. The dinner was excellent. A new spade, a new hoe, a new rake, and a new wheelbarrow stood just within the door.
“Get up early and rub them over with dirt, Frank,” said the Duke as he retired, well pleased, to rest.
The next morning also he breakfasted with excellent appetite.
“I beg your Grace’s pardon,” said Frank, “but your Grace will not forget to be out of work?”
“I came here to be in work, Frank.”
“The men work on their allotments only in their spare time, your Grace.”
“I see, I see. Thank you, Frank. I will certainly be out of work, if occasion arises to define precisely my economic position. I trust, however, that this is not an inquisitive neighbourhood.”
It was not, as a rule. But just now there were special circumstances, unknown to Frank—and to the Duke.
He began to dig at 9.30 A.M. His allotment had been a good deal neglected, and the ground happened to be hard. Presently he found himself afflicted with acute sensations in the back. He begun to wonder what men on allotments did when they felt tired. A thought struck him—a reminiscence of his wide and curious reading. Observing a small girl seated on the railing which bordered the allotments he approached her. “Child,” said he kindly, “be good enough to go to the nearest public-house and fetch me a pint of four-’alf.”
“W’ere’s your money?” said the child.
The Duke had been too realistic; there was no money in his pocket. He returned to his labours (he had promised himself to be independent of Frank for at least three hours) with a sigh. The little girl laughed scornfully, and then performed a somersault. The Duke was not quite pleased.
By twelve o’clock his back was very bad and his hands blistered. His corduroy trousers were cutting him at the back of the knees. Also it had begun to rain. “I have the sensation vividly enough for the moment. I will return to the cottage and have lunch,” he said to himself, throwing down his spade. He had turned up a considerable amount of earth, and had found some vegetables amongst it. He was not very clear what they were. He picked up his coat, put it on, and began instinctively to feel for a cigarette. No case was to be found.
“Oh, d—n that Frank!” said the Duke mechanically.
“Need you swear?” asked a voice suddenly.
“Who wouldn’t?” mumbled the Duke, who was just wiping his brow (which was like that of the blacksmith in the poem) with a large and fearfully rough pocket-handkerchief.
“What?”
The voice was very sharp. It recalled to the Duke the necessities of his situation. Emerging from behind the handkerchief, he found himself in the presence of a tall stout lady of imperious demeanour. She wore a skirt, consequentially ample, of shiny black, and a black velvet mantle embellished with beads, apparently jet.
The Duke’s instinct rarely failed him—that was what would have made him such a great man of affairs. “The parson’s wife!” he thought to himself, without a moment’s hesitation. Then he cast about for his wisest course of action.
“Why aren’t you at work?” the lady demanded sternly.
The Duke had worked extraordinarily hard for three hours. He was indignant. But he was wary. He was considering what accent to adopt. It struck him that he would try the Somersetshire; he had heard that at the theatres; the rural (but honest) father of the erring (but sweet) heroine usually employed it. Of course, if the parson’s wife happened to come from Somerset—— Well, some risks must be taken.
“I do be of a-workin’,” said the Duke. “Lasteways, I do be of a just ’avin’ done it.” He clung to his “be” with no small confidence.
“Where do you come from?”
“Zummer-sett,” said he.
“You talk in a funny way. When did you come here?”
The Duke felt sure that he ought not to say “Last night”; accordingly he replied “Yuster-e’en.”
The lady looked suspicious. “You’re seeking employment?”
Suddenly—and opportunely—the Duke remembered Frank’s warning: he was to be out of work.
“Yus, I be,” he said, wondering if his face were dirty enough.
“Church or Chapel?” she asked sharply.
“Charch,” answered the Duke. And by a happy thought he added, “Ma’am.”
“What’s your name?” With the question she produced a little note-book and a pencil.
“Bevv——” he began thoughtlessly. He stopped. A barren invention, and a mind acute to the danger of hesitation, combined to land him in “Devvle.”
“Devil? That’s a very odd name.”
“My feyther’s name afore me,” affirmed the Duke, who felt that he was playing his part rather well, though he regretted that a different initial consonant had not occurred to him.
The lady surveyed him with a long and distrustful glance.
“Have you had any beer this morning?” she asked.
The Duke never took beer—not even in the evening. “None,” he replied with a touch of indignation.
“I wish I was sure of that!” she remarked. The Duke, himself regretfully sure (for the digging had changed his feelings towards beer), wondered at her suspicious disposition. “Well, we shall see. You’re in my daughter’s district. She will come and see you.”
“Vurry good, ma’am,” said the Duke.
“Are you married?”
“No, ma’am.”
“You live alone, then?”
Swiftly the Duke reflected. “I got a brother, ma’am, but ’e do be kind o’—kind o’ weak.”
“A pair of you, I think!” she remarked rather disconcertingly, as she turned and marched off. The Duke returned to his cottage and decided, over a pint of hock and a bottle of seltzer, that he had come out of the interview with much credit.
He did not hurry back to work after lunch. Why, he reflected, should he? None of the other men were working on their allotments. This fact seemed rather strange to him, since he overlooked the circumstance that harvest was in full swing and all his supposed compeers busy from dawn till late evening in the fields; but, knowing that he was strange to his surroundings, he waited patiently for an explanation. He lit his pipe—a clay pipe, coloured by and borrowed from one of his stableboys, and sat on the fence in an agreeable meditation. The rain had ceased, and the afternoon was mild.
“What more in reality,” he exclaimed, “does a man want than this? I was quite right to insist on an entirely simple dinner.” He paused and added: “After all I will do a little weeding.”
When he had done quite a little weeding, a thought struck him. He repaired to the cottage and called Frank. Frank appeared; he also wore corduroys and other suitable habiliments. “Very good, Frank, very good. You’re really an intelligent man. If a young lady calls, you’re an idiot.”
“I—I beg your Grace’s pardon?”
“If a young lady calls, you’re to appear to be an idiot.” The Duke, as he spoke, smiled over the reflection that his order to Frank embodied nothing very unusual.
“Very good, your Grace! What’s Monsieur Alphonse to be?”
“If he must exist at all he’d better be in bed—with something a trifle infectious,” answered the Duke, after a moment’s reflection.
“Very good, your Grace. Burgundy or champagne at dinner? The chambertin appears to have recovered from the journey.”
“Then let me have the chambertin,” said his Grace. “Dinner at seven. I feel as if I should be hungry. I am now going to take a walk.”
On his walk through what proved to be exceedingly pretty country, the Duke meditated, in admiration mingled with annoyance, on the excellent organisation of English rural parishes. The immediate notice taken of his arrival, the instantaneous zeal for his moral welfare, argued much that was good—the Duke determined to say a few words about it in the House of Lords—but, on the other hand, it certainly rendered more difficult his experiment in the simple life—to say nothing of necessitating his adventurous excursion into the Somerset dialect.
“She is probably actuated,” he concluded, “by a groundless fear that I shall resort to the Nonconformist chapel.”
Seven o’clock found him seated before his brightly furnished dining-table. The table was of deal, but it was covered with damask, decked with silver, and ornamented by the chambertin. The Duke had a fine appetite, and fell to cheerfully on Monsieur Alphonse’s creations; these were studiously rural in their character—Watteau-like confections. Monsieur Alphonse was dreaming of the Petit Trianon.
The cottage was not large; the sitting-room was in close proximity to the door. A sharp rap of somebody’s knuckles on the door startled him, just as he was finishing his first glass of chambertin. He was in demi-toilette—a dress jacket and black tie. It should be added that, although daylight prevailed outside, the blind of the window was carefully drawn down.
The knock was repeated—rather impatiently. “Frank!” called the Duke in a voice carefully modulated.
“I’m on my way, your Grace,” Frank answered, putting his head in at the door. “I merely waited to put on a blanket over my dress-coat. Monsieur Alphonse has got into bed. He looks very natural in his official apron, your Grace.”
“Good,” said the Duke. “Don’t permit the person to enter.” He smiled slightly as he regarded Frank, who had hastily assumed a red blanket, striped with blue, and wore his hair brushed up straight from his head.
The next moment the Duke heard the door of the cottage open, and one of the sweetest voices he had ever listened to in his life softly pronouncing the question: “Oh, please, are you the man Devil?”
“I really ought to have recollected to tell Frank about that little mistake of mine,” thought the Duke, smiling.
His smile, however, vanished as he heard Frank, in answer to the question, shout with extraordinary vigour: “Yahoo, yahoo, yahoo!”
“This will never do,” said the Duke, rising and laying down his napkin. “The fellow always over-acts. I said idiocy—not mania.”
It appeared to do very well, all the same, for the sweet voice remarked, with no trace of surprise, “Oh, of course, you’re his poor brother; mamma—I’m Miss Hordern, you know, Miss Angela Hordern—told me about you. Please don’t let yourself become nervous or—or excited.”
Monsieur Alphonse’s voice suddenly broke forth, crying loudly: “I have ze fevaar—ze fevaar—veri bad fevaar!”
“Point de zele! Talleyrand was right,” said the Duke sadly.
“Who’s that?” cried Miss Angela. “Is some poor man ill in there? Oh, it’s not Devil himself, is it?”
No answer came from Frank, unless a realistically idiotic chuckle, faintly struggling, as it seemed to the Duke’s ears, with more natural mirth, may be counted as such.
“I must see this girl,” said the Duke.
“I think I’d better call again to-morrow,” said Miss Angela. “I’m in a hurry now—it’s Mothers’ Meeting night. I’ll come in to-morrow. Will you give this to your brother? Mamma sent it. Can you understand me, poor fellow?
“Yahoo, yahoo,” murmured Frank.
The door closed. The Duke dashed to the window, furtively drew the blind a little aside, and looked out.
“Upon my word!” said the Duke. “Yes, upon my word!” he reflected, twisting his moustache as he returned to the table.
Frank entered, holding a silver salver. “With Miss Angela Hordern’s compliments, your Grace.”
“Thank you, Frank. You can serve the fish; and beg Alphonse in future to wait for his cue.”
“Very good, your Grace.”
Frank withdrew, and the Duke examined the paper which he had taken from the salver. It acquired a certain interest from having passed through Miss Angela’s hands. The Duke fingered it delicately and eyed it pensively. It was entitled “A Dram for a Drinker; or, Just a Drop to do you Good.”
“A neat title,” the Duke mused, “but perhaps liable to defeat its own object by evoking a reminiscence too pleasurable.”
Frank entered with the fish. “Frank, I am at home next time Miss Hordern calls. You are not—nor Monsieur Alphonse.”
“Very good, your Grace,” Frank answered. “Your Grace will answer the door yourself?”
The Duke had overlooked the point. He did not feel that he could answer a door at all plausibly.
“Leave it on the jar,” he commanded, in a happy inspiration.
But when he was left alone his brow clouded a little. “Suppose the mother comes!” he thought. His face cleared. “She shall see Alphonse and Frank. And I will see Miss Angela.” He lit his cigar with a composed cheerfulness. “It is impossible,” he said meditatively, “to deny the interest of a sociological experiment. I am, however, inclined to hope that it will rain very hard to-morrow.” He stroked his back warily as he slid into a chair.
II
HE rose early the next morning—and observed the weather anxiously. It rained heavily. “Good,” said he, feeling his back. “One can’t dig in the wet. I shall have time to arrange affairs.”
He had, in fact, tasks of no small difficulty to achieve.
The first was with Monsieur Alphonse. The Duke courteously requested the chef’s presence, Frank being the intermediary. Alphonse came.
“Monsieur,” said the Duke, “I have to make a communication to you.”
“Hélas, Monsieur le Duc!” said Monsieur Alphonse.
“I shall not dine to-night. No, I sha’n’t have any dinner at all to-night.”
“But this is worse than anything I had expected!”
“I shall have tea—at seven.”
“Mais——” said Alphonse.
“Bread-and-butter, thickish; and tea—the tea of the grocer du pays.”
“Miséricorde!! Monsieur le Duc will sup?”
“Possibly. As for tea, I understand that it would be appropriate if you added a shrimp. Monsieur, we play a part!”
“A part, Monsieur le Duc?”
“There’s a lady in the case, Alphonse.”
“Everything explains itself!” cried Alphonse, looking as though he might be about to throw himself on the Duke’s bosom. “And she loves ze shrimp?”
“Adores it.”
“It is not to be had in this wilderness, I fear.”
“No, Alphonse. Go and get it—at Greenwich, or Wapping, or wherever it lives. Leave at once. Be back at six-thirty. Good-bye, Alphonse.”
“A lady in the case! I will find ze shrimp!” said Alphonse, as he left the parlour.
Frank remained to be dealt with. The Duke summoned him, and addressed him with a serious air.
“You are attached to me, Frank?”
“Yes, your Grace.”
“I wish to be alone to-day. Have the goodness to occupy Mrs Hordern’s attention.”
“I don’t rightly know how to do it, your Grace.”
“What day of the week is it?”
“Sunday, your Grace.”
“A fortunate circumstance. One doesn’t dig on Sundays?”
“No, your Grace.”
“The rain may stop for all I care,” said the Duke. “Go and call on Mrs Hordern, Frank, and get taken to church. Mitigate your mental inferiority to a reasonable extent; and say that the man with the fever has been removed.”
“How, your Grace?” asked Frank.
“Don’t trouble me with details. Do as I tell you.”
“Very good, your Grace.”
“And let Miss Hordern arrive here at seven a’clock.”
“Yes, your Grace.”
“That will do, Frank. I shall not go out to-day. Leave the corduroys on the bed.”
“Thank you, your Grace.”
“And, Frank, in case I change my mind, let there be a motor-car here and a table at the Savoy this evening, rather late.”
“I’ll attend to it at once, your Grace.”
There was more work than usual at the local telegraph office before ten that morning. But no one connected it with the cottage at the allotments. The young woman in charge understood that a gentleman had lost his motor-car.
The simple device of sticking on his door a short notice that a case of infectious disease awaited removal to the workhouse infirmary secured for the Duke a quiet day. He sat behind his blind and observed his neighbours, who, in the intervals left them between the claims of devotion and those of conviviality, inspected their allotments and his. His appeared to the Duke to command a disproportionate amount of attention. He feared that he must have dug up something prematurely—Frank had omitted to acquaint him with the course of husbandry initiated by his predecessor. The laughter of his neighbours somewhat jarred his sensitive spirit. And they certainly stared a lot at his shut door, his forbidding notice, and his blind so carefully drawn. He was also vexed by a sudden thought that, it being Sunday, Miss Angela might have to go to church and would not come to tea.
“However I made my wishes quite clear to Frank,” he murmured, hoping for the best.
At one o’clock Frank returned by a circular route, and entered from the road, through the back-yard, which obviated the necessity of crossing the allotments. He served a cold luncheon.
“You’ve arranged matters?”
“Yes, your Grace. The young lady will call at seven, with some jelly for your bad throat.”
“I was rather afraid she might wish to go to church, Frank.”
“Yes, your Grace; but, as you are too ill to go, the vicar thinks that it will do just as well if she comes and reads the Lessons of the Day to your Grace.”
“That it will do just as well?”
“That was the vicar’s expression, your Grace.”
“Ah, he spoke from a professional point of view, no doubt. The arrangement is quite satisfactory. How did you get on with Mrs Hordern—and at church?”
“I did very well, your Grace, since your Grace is kind enough to inquire. With reference to last night, I explained that my attacks of mental affliction were intermittent, though frequently recurrent. But the doctor is to come and see me to-morrow—by Mrs Hordern’s orders, your Grace.”
“ ‘Sufficient unto the day!’ ” said the Duke serenely. “You will remove that notice from the door as soon as our neighbours have started for evening church—or chapel.”
The afternoon wore itself slowly away, the Duke finding himself afflicted with some degree of ennui. “Is there no situation in life, however humble, however laborious,” he said, “that is free from this plague? It is, indeed, a lesson to me that we should be content with our several stations.” He went to his bedroom, snatched a short repose, and, rising in better heart, assumed his corduroys.
At six-thirty a large motor-car broke down opposite the village inn. The chauffeur announced that the necessary repairs would take some time. He took some time himself, and some refreshment, before he set about them. At six-fifty Frank, returning from a little stroll in the neighbourhood of the inn, reported the arrival of Monsieur Ferdinand, his Grace’s chief chauffeur, and removed the notice from the door of the cottage. He laid tea and withdrew. Everything was ready except the shrimps. There was, as yet, no sign of the shrimps, nor of Monsieur Alphonse.
“It can’t be that Alphonse will fail me!” thought the Duke uneasily. The shrimps, although not absolutely essential, constituted an artistic detail particularly congruous with his taste.
Precisely at seven o’clock he saw Miss Hordern approaching. With enormous pleasure he noted the graceful outline of her figure as she crossed the allotment; with less pleasure he observed that she was accompanied by what is termed a “growing lad” of about fourteen. “These precautions aren’t very complimentary,” thought the Duke.
Her knock sounded on the door. The Duke fell into a doze. She knocked again.
“I do hope he’s not—not queer again to-day,” said Angela.
“The door’s open: let’s go in and look. I’m not afraid.”
He heard them enter the house; he rose and opened the sitting-room door.
“Oh, there you are! Good-evening. May we come in? Mamma would have come and let me go to church, only she’s got such a bad headache that she’s been obliged to go to bed.”
The Duke made no immediate reply. Angela came in, followed by the boy. The boy put down on the table a round parcel which he was carrying.
“Jelly,” thought the Duke.
Angela laid down a volume.
“Lessons,” the Duke surmised.
“Oh, but you haven’t had your tea yet!” said Angela. “I’m afraid we are interrupting you?”
“It’s laid for two,” remarked the boy.
“Himself and his poor brother, Tommy!”
“I do be proud——” began the Duke.
But suddenly the door from the kitchen opened and Monsieur Alphonse appeared. He carried a large plate loaded with shrimps.
“Ze shrimp!” he cried triumphantly, waving a napkin which he held in his other hand.
“Crikey, who’s this!” cried Tommy.
Well he might! Monsieur Alphonse wore a tight-fitting frock-coat, a waterfall tie of huge dimensions, pearl-grey trousers, white spats, and patent-leather boots, a red rose in one lapel of the coat, and in the other the blue ribbon of the Order of St Honoratus of Pomerania, bestowed on him by his Serene Highness the Reigning Duke, on the occasion of the latter’s coronation banquet.
The Duke was vexed. “Monsieur Alphonse,” he said, “I did not ring.” Naturally he forgot the absence of a bell.
“Mais, Monsieur le——”
The Duke arrested his words with a gesture, and turned to Angela.
“Further concealment, madam, is, I fear, useless. I am not what I seem. May I rely on your honour?”
Angela fixed her charming blue eyes on the Duke.
“But who are you? And what does it mean?”
There is no telling what explanation the Duke intended to proffer; for at this instant Tommy cried, with every appearance of agitation: “Angela, Willie Anderson was right! It is them!”
“Them!” said Angela affrightedly, and sank into a chair.
“Who’s Willie Anderson, my boy?” asked the Duke kindly.
“He’s the Chief Constable—and you’ll soon find it out. If you did take the silver plate, you needn’t have knocked old Lady Culverstone down with the poker, you—you scoundrel, you!”
“I knock old Lady Culverstone down with the—— Oh, preposterous!” exclaimed the Duke. He turned to Angela.
“You don’t believe that of me?” he asked in a tender voice.
“It was supposed they wore the disguise of working-men,” she answered. “Willie did tell me that.”
“Willie?”
“I’m—I’m engaged to Captain Anderson, the Chief Constable,” Angela confessed, with a pretty blush.
“There you are!” said the Duke, fairly exasperated by this additional vexation. “That’s what always happens to me!”
Before he could say any more, Frank rushed in from the kitchen.
“The cottage is surrounded with police and labourers!” he cried. “They’ll be in at the door in a moment!”
To confirm his words there came a loud crash on the door (which Angela had thoughtfully closed after her). The next instant it burst open; a young man dashed into the room—a good-looking young man—followed by three police constables and half-a-dozen of the Duke’s curious neighbours. They had drawn their conclusions from his strange reserve and his obvious ignorance of agriculture; they had communicated with the police. Captain Anderson was a smart officer (D.S.O.). Three London burglars were wanted for the robbery at old Lady Culverstone’s, and were believed to be lurking in the neighbourhood, knowing that the railway and the road to London would be watched.
The Duke never hesitated. As Captain Anderson dashed in at one door, he dashed out at the other, followed by Frank and Monsieur Alphonse. He could, of course, have declared himself, but such an action would have severely wounded his amour propre; he prided himself on carrying out his experiments unostentatiously, and hated getting his name into the papers.
“Make for the inn!” he whispered to his companions, as they escaped from the back door of the cottage, dashed across its tiny yard, and gained the main road.
“After them, my lads!” rang out Captain Anderson’s military tones; and the whole force was at their heels, Tommy gleefully shouting “Tally ho!” Only two of the more intelligent neighbours stopped in the cottage and inspected the Duke’s household goods. They were afraid to take the silver (it was a special set, used during excursions, and bore no crest or arms) but they took the chambertin with results surprising to themselves; for it tasted mild.
All the rest went after the Duke, and with them Angela, who was as active a girl as one could wish to see. Moreover, she was wily; she knew the country. While the Duke and his companions, holding a lead of barely twenty yards, rushed along the highroad towards the inn, while Captain Anderson (who was not so intimately connected with the district) led his pack directly after them—Tommy hanging persistently to their heels—Angela took a short cut. The road curved. She struck across the diameter of the curve, breasting the undergrowth, narrowly avoiding the gorse, holding her Sunday skirt high in her hand, full of courage, eager to help her betrothed, eager to help to put a feather in his cap, to assist in his brilliant capture of the burglars.
Thus it chanced that when the Duke, Frank, and Monsieur Alphonse reached the motor-car—in which Monsieur Ferdinand, hearing the rush of hurrying feet and knowing that the Duke was occasionally pressed for time, had already taken his seat—they were, indeed, clear of their pursuers but they were faced by Angela.
“Jump in,” cried the Duke.
Frank and Monsieur Alphonse obeyed. The Duke was following himself with all agility—for Captain Anderson was now no more than ten yards off—when Angela threw herself upon him, gripping him firmly, and crying: “I’ll hold him for you, Willie!”
The Duke admired her courage, but regretted her persistency. He could not, without roughness, disengage himself from her grasp; but he could lift her into the car with him. He did. She gave a scream. “Full steam ahead!” cried the Duke. With a turn of Monsieur Ferdinand’s handles they were off!
Just in time! Monsieur Alphonse, on the back seat, felt Anderson’s hand clutch his coat collar just as they started. Fortunately Frank had taken occasion to drop a waterproof rug over the number of the car at the back.
“Stop, stop, stop, I say!” cried Angela.
“I regret it deeply, but for the moment I’m not in a position to oblige you, madam,” said the Duke, as he wedged her in safely between himself and Monsieur Ferdinand, on the roomy front seat. “The local police are otherwise occupied—you need not exercise excessive caution, Ferdinand,” he remarked to the chauffeur. Ferdinand obeyed his injunctions.
Nothing more passed for some minutes. They were, in fact, all very much out of breath—except Ferdinand, and he had enough to do with his own work. At last, however, Angela gasped: “Anyhow, the air is delicious!”
The Duke was gratified and encouraged. “I’m so glad you’re enjoying the drive,” said he.
“Please don’t speak to me.”
“I fell into the error of supposing that you addressed me, madam.”
“What does it all mean?” she said—for it was impossible for her not now to perceive that she was dealing with a gentleman.
The Duke replied with some warmth. “It means, madam, simply that I claim, and intend, to exercise an Englishman’s right to occupy or, if you will, to amuse himself in his own way within the limits of the law; and that I will not be interfered with or harried by policemen and so forth while I’m so engaged. Do I do any harm to anybody? It’s preposterous.”
“I suppose you’re mad really,” she said thoughtfully.
“Then let’s be mad together for just a little while,” he suggested. “Come now, you’re finding this enjoyable?”
“What will Willie be feeling—and thinking?” She gave a light laugh. “Oh, I’m glad mamma’s gone to bed!” she added the next moment.
“She is beginning to enjoy herself,” the Duke decided.
“You will take me back?”
The Duke looked at his watch. “You shall be at the vicarage not later than half-past ten.”
“Oh, but that’s very late!”
“Earlier, if you wish, but in no case later. After all, Mrs Hordern has gone to bed—and Captain Anderson is probably very busy.”
Angela looked at him; her eyes twinkled a little—or maybe that was only an impression of the Duke’s.
“I’ve always heard that it’s dangerous to thwart mad people,” she said.
The Duke has been heard to say that this young lady, whom he entertained that night in a manner which may be termed purely fortuitous, was one of the most agreeable companions whom it had ever been his fortune to meet. The praise, coming from him, is high. There can be little doubt that Miss Angela Hordern, in her turn, felt the attraction which the Duke’s good-breeding and intellectual alertness seldom failed to arouse.
“I should love a motor!” sighed Miss Angela.
“You’re going to have one,” said the Duke. “But we must have something to eat first.”
“You talk as if you were a prince in disguise!” she laughed.
The Duke laughed too, reflecting that, as a matter of strict formality, he was entitled to the style she mentioned. In view of this fact he did not feel called upon expressly to deny the suggestion. There can be little doubt that his silence, to which perhaps she attributed too much significance, enhanced the pleasure of her ride.
“I’m to know you then only by that very funny name?”
In an examination of her profile—for which the light still sufficed—the Duke had grown abstracted. “What name?” he murmured vaguely.
“The one you told mamma—Devil! That’s not really your name?”
“Not exactly!” laughed the Duke.
“I should think not,” laughed the lady. Herself somewhat addicted to colloquial expressions, she failed to understand with what accuracy the Duke had phrased his reply.
“I shall think of you as the Prince of Darkness,” said she with the kindliest glance.
“I doubt whether much of this is not wasted on a Chief Constable,” thought the Duke.
“Are you married?” she asked.
“I am not,” said the Duke, turning sharply round as he spoke. He fancied that he had heard Monsieur Alphonse exclaim “Mon Dieu!” It must have been a mistake. Both Monsieur Alphonse and Frank appeared to be asleep.
“I’m going to be.”
“You’ve conveyed that to me already.”
“He’s such a dear!”
“I think, Ferdinand, that we might venture on going a little faster,” said the Duke. “Your licence is new: we will take the risk.”
Perhaps Miss Angela detected a certain lack of enthusiasm in the Duke’s demeanour. At any rate she said no more about the Chief Constable. From no point of view, if we consider the matter, would the topic be a grateful one to her host.
They were on the outskirts of London, flashing by Hampstead Heath.
“Is this actually London?” she asked, somewhat alarmed. “You will remember your promise?”
The Duke looked at his watch. “Eight-twenty! The Savoy would be rather a rush for you.” He called across to Monsieur Ferdinand: “To the cottage!”
Five minutes later they stopped before the Duke’s small house in a lane adjoining the Heath.
“Monsieur Alphonse, here’s your opportunity. A nice little dinner in a quarter of an hour for mademoiselle and myself!”
“It shall be so, Monsieur le——”
“Quick, quick!” interrupted the Duke. “Excuse me one moment. Frank, show Miss Hordern in, and see to her wants. I must have a word with Ferdinand.”
Angela Hordern entered the little house full of a pleasurable anticipation. All was ready for them; fresh flowers bloomed everywhere; The Observer and The Referee lay on the table. She turned to Frank in a sudden surprise:
“He meant to come here all the time?”
“No, madam. But this is always kept ready by his Gra——,—by my master’s orders.”
“He must be very rich!”
“I am given to understand that the revenue has decreased slightly of late,” was Frank’s answer, given with admirable carelessness.
“That’s all settled,” said the Duke, entering the room with a cheerful air. “I’m right, Frank, in supposing that Sir Gerald Standish is still in the Bahamas?”
“Yes, your——” He caught the Duke’s eye, and dexterously ended: “Quite right, sir.”
“Then this car will do admirably,” said the Duke. “You have no idea,” he continued to Angela, “how convenient it is to persuade two or three friends to allow one to register a car or two in their names, especially when they happen to be leaving the country. I don’t happen to be aware whether the practice is legal.”
Frank brought in an omelette.
“Pray be seated,” continued the Duke. “This particular car will take you home in forty-five minutes. Ferdinand has gone to bring it here—and a most trustworthy man to drive you.”
“But—but what am I to do with them?”
“The man will remove the number of the car, and himself return by train——”
“There isn’t any train at this time of night—or rather at the time it will be by then.”
“Oh yes, there’ll be a train—Ferdinand won’t forget that.”
“You mean—a special?”
“Really,” said the Duke, with the slightest air of being questioned enough, “they have so many different names for trains that I don’t encumber my memory with them. There will, however, be a train. As for the car—— What’s this, Frank?”
“Alphonse offers his sincere apologies. But the design, at least, is novel. The way the truffles are arranged——”
“Miss Hordern will excuse our shortcomings. Where is the champagne?”
“On the ice, your——”
“Yes, yes. As for the car, Miss Hordern, I venture to hope that you will accept it as a token of my regard—and a reminiscence of an evening which has turned out not, I hope, altogether unpleasantly?”
“Oh, I couldn’t!”
“You accepted the Chief Constable.”
“But he—he’s very delightful,” Angela said, apparently eager to convince him of the soundness of her judgment.
“So is the car,” said the Duke, tactfully avoiding the discussion.