‘Frederick, my nerves can stand no more!’ said Mrs Griffin, surging to her feet. ‘If you mean to drag me the length of England again, I must insist upon being permitted the indulgence of half an hour’s solitude first!’
‘But Mama, it was not I who would come here!’ expostulated Mr Griffin.
Sir Richard again rang the bell, and this time desired that a chambermaid should be sent to him. Mrs Griffin was presently consigned to the care of an abigail, and left the room majestically, commanding hot water to wash with, tea, and a decent bedchamber.
Her son heaved a sigh of relief. ‘I must beg pardon, Sir Richard! You must allow me to beg your pardon!’
‘Not at all,’ said Sir Richard.
‘Yes, yes, I insist! Such an unfortunate misunderstanding! An explanation is due to you! A slip of the tongue, you know, but my mother is labouring under strong emotion, and does not quite heed what she says. You noticed it: indeed, no one could wonder at your surprise! The unhappy truth, sir is that my cousin is not a boy, but – in a word, sir – a female!’
‘This explanation, Mr Griffin, is quite unnecessary, believe me.
‘Sir,’ said Mr Griffin earnestly, ‘as a Man of the World, I should value your opinion! Concealment is useless: the truth must be discovered in the end. What, sir, would you think of a member of the Weaker Sex who assumed the disguise of a man, and left the home of her natural protector by way of the window?’
‘I should assume,’ replied Sir Richard, ‘that she had strong reasons for acting with such resolution.’
‘She did not wish to marry me,’ said Mr Griffin gloomily.
‘Oh!’ said Sir Richard.
‘Well, I’m sure I can’t see why she should be so set against me, but that’s not it, sir. The thing is that here’s my mother determined to find her, and to make her marry me, andso hush up the scandal. But I don’t like it above half. If she dislikes the notion so much, I don’t think I ought to marry her, do you?’
‘Emphatically not!’
‘I must say I am very glad to hear you say that, Sir Richard!’ said Mr Griffin, much cheered. ‘For you must know that my mother has been telling me ever since yesterday that I must marry her now, to save her name. But I think she would very likely make me uncomfortable, and nothing could make up for that, in my opinion.’
‘A lady capable of escaping out of a window in the guise of a man would quite certainly make you more than uncomfortable,’ said Sir Richard.
‘Yes, though she’s only a chit of a girl, you know. In fact, she is not yet out. I am very happy to have had the benefit of the opinion of a Man of the World. I feel that I can rely on your judgment.
‘On my judgment you might, but in nothing else, I assure you,’ said Sir Richard. ‘You know nothing of me, after all. How do you know that I am not now concealing your cousin from you?’
‘Ha-ha! Very good, upon my word! Very good, indeed!’ said Mr Griffin, saluting a jest of the first water.
EIGHT
The Griffins did not leave Queen Charlton until the cool of the afternoon, and by the time he saw their chaise off the premises of the George, Sir Richard was heartily sick of the company of surely one of his most devout worshippers. No sign was seen of Pen, who had no doubt fled the house upon the Griffins’ arrival. What sustenance she had snatched up to bear her strength up through a long day Sir Richard had no means of knowing.
Mrs Griffin, tottering downstairs to partake of light refreshment, found her son hanging upon Sir Richard’s bored lips. Upon hearing that he had divulged the secret of Pen’s identity, she first showed a dangerous tendency to swoon, but upon being supplied with a glass of ratafia by Sir Richard, revived sufficiently to pour out her wrongs into his ear.
‘What, I ask myself,’ she said dramatically, ‘has become of that tiresome girl? Into what company may she have fallen? I see that you, Sir Richard, are a person of sensibility. Conceive of my feelings! What – I say,whatif my unfortunate niece should have fallen into the hands of someMan?’
‘What indeed!’ said Sir Richard.
‘She must marry him. When I think of the care, the hopes, the maternal fondness I have lavished – but it is ever so! There is no gratitude in the world today.’
Upon this gloomy reflection, she ordered her chaise to be got ready to bear her instantly to Chippenham. She would have remained at Queen Charlton for the night, she explained, only that she suspected the sheets.
Sir Richard, having seen her off, walked down the street, to cool his heated brow, and to consider the intricacies of his position.
It was while he was absent that Miss Creed and the Honourable Beverley Brandon, approaching the George from widely divergent angles, but with identical circumspection, came face to face in the entrance-parlour.
They eyed one another. A few moments’ conversation with the tapster had put Beverley in possession of information which he found sufficiently intriguing to make him run the risk of perhaps encountering Captain Trimble in entering the inn, and prosecuting further enquiries about Sir Richard Wyndham. Sir Richard, the tapster had told him, was putting up at the George with his nephew.
Now, Sir Richard’s nephew, as Beverley knew well, was a lusty young gentleman not yet breeched. He did not mention this circumstance to the tapster, but on hearing that the mysterious nephew in question was a youth in his teens, he pricked up his ears, and penetrated from the tap-room into the main parlour of the inn.
Here Pen, entering the George cautiously from the stable-yard, came plump upon him. Never having seen his face, she did not at once recognize him, but when, after an intent stare, he moved towards her, saying with a slight stammer: ‘How d-do you do? I think you m-must be Wyndham’s n-nephew?’ she had no doubt of his identity.
