‘And if he should ask me to stand up with him at Almack’s, Sherry, you won’t be offended with me if I excuse myself? For, indeed –’
‘Make yourself easy: he will not do so! You need do no more than bow to him, should you meet him at any time. It will be better you should do so, you know, for it would cause a deal of talk if you were to cut him. And mind this, Kitten! Not a word of this business to a soul!’
‘No, I will not mention it,’ she promised. ‘That is – he is paying particular attentions to Isabella, Sherry. Do you not think I ought to warn her that he is not a proper person for her to know?’
‘On no account in the world!’ he said emphatically. ‘Isabella has her mother to keep an eye on her, and you may depend upon it Mrs Milborne has a very good notion of what Monty is! I wish to God you had a mother too!’
‘Oh, but you keep an eye on me, Sherry, so it is of no consequence!’ she assured him.
‘Yes, it is,’ he said. ‘I’m not a female, so how the deuce should I guess what you will be up to next? It is a thousand pities my own mother don’t take a fancy to you!’
So far from taking a fancy to her daughter-in-law, the dowager had been solacing herself for the past two months with the task of collecting and brooding over all the indiscretions committed by Hero which were known to the world at large. By some mysterious means she had contrived to discover her son’s predilection for deep play at unsavoury gaming-hells, and had actually put herself to the trouble of visiting Hero for the purpose of impressing upon her that such excesses had beenunknown to poor Anthony before his marriage had wrecked his life. Hero was quite overpowered, but the dowager arose from the session much refreshed and went away to tell her sympathetic brother that if the worst came to the worst, at least she had told Hero what she thought of her behaviour. After that, and finding that her friends were disinclined to listen to a repetition of her troubles, she withdrew again to Sheringham Place, and the house in Grosvenor Square was once more swathed in holland covers.
Hero, meanwhile, having spent an enjoyable morning buying clothes for Ruth’s baby, greatly exasperated her husband by electing to escort this unfortunate young female down to Melton for the purpose of installing her in her new home, and making her known to the Gorings. So the Viscount, returning to his house in good time to accompany his wife to a dinner-party, was met by the pleasing intelligence that her ladyship had gone into the country with Mrs Wimborne, and would not be back until the following evening. It was apparent, from the hurried note Hero had left for him, that she had forgotten all about the dinner-party; so the Viscount was obliged to create on the spot an aged relative on the distaff side of Hero’s family, to endow this mythical person with the feeblest of health, to lay her low upon her death-bed, and thus to account for his wife’s precipitate departure from town.
It was more than a week later before he met Sir Montagu under circumstances which permitted of private conversation, and Sir Montagu did not avail himself of the opportunity to take his young friend into his confidence. He had, instead, an amusing history to recount, and a successful day at the races to describe. Sherry, for once impervious to his charm, heard him with rising impatience, and presently broke in on his talk to say bluntly: ‘Yes, I dare say, but about that affair the other night, Monty –!’
Sir Montagu’s brows rose. ‘What affair, my dear boy?’
‘Outside Almack’s, of course! You know –’
‘Good heavens, Sherry, I had forgotten all about it!’ said Sir Montagu, amused. ‘If the poor young female was not mad, which I am persuaded she must be, it is one of the oldest tricks in the world, my dear fellow! Only she made a bad choice in her victim: I am a little too experienced to be caught by such an imposture, believe me!’
‘Doing it rather too brown, Monty!’ said Sherry, with quite unaccustomed dryness.
Sir Montagu’s smile seemed to harden on his lips. After a moment’s pause, he said lightly: ‘My poor boy, you are very innocent, are you not? Come! let us banish such unsavoury matters! Do you care to join me this evening at a little party in my lodging? I have Brock coming, and one or two others whom you are acquainted with.’
‘Mighty good of you, but I’m engaged with a party of my own!’ returned Sherry, and swung round on his heel, leaving Sir Montagu to some disagreeable reflections on the unwisdom of mishandling young gentlemen of such uncomfortable mettle.
Unfortunately for his own schemes, it was not given to Sir Montagu to appreciate the fundamental honesty in Sherry which made him shy off in disgust from a disingenuity blatant enough to amount to actual falsity. Sir Montagu, whose pecuniary embarrassments made him all the more disinclined to acknowledge even so trifling an obligation as a bastard child, had decided on the spur of a most unnerving moment to deny all knowledge of a wench whose existence he had indeed almost forgotten, and it would have been quite impossible for one of his character to have recanted, even to Sherry. He consoled himself with the reflection that Sherry’s miffs were never long-lived; but when, some days later, he ran into Sherry in St James’s Street, and detected a good deal of reserve in his manner, he felta considerable degree of chagrin, and had little hesitation in ascribing this coldness to Lady Sheringham, who had bestowed the smallest of unsmiling bows upon him at the theatre a couple of evenings previously.
It was not to be expected, of course, that his estrangement from Sir Montagu would have the immediate effect of weaning Sherry from his gaming habits. But it did keep him away from certain establishments in Pall Mall and Pickering Place, where he would be bound to meet Revesby, and send him back to Watier’s and White’s. And this, as Mr Ringwood confided to Ferdy Fakenham, was an advantage, for although the play was deeper at Watier’s than anywhere else in town, at least that holy of holies was not patronised by sharps or ivory-turners.
It was not long, in the nature of things, before the knowledge of Ruth Wimborne’s present whereabouts came to Sir Montagu’s ears, for Ferdy told the story to his brother, and Mr Ringwood let it out to Lord Wrotham over the second bottle of port at a snug little dinner at his lodgings. It was rather too good a joke to be kept from such gentlemen as could be counted on to appreciate it, and the whisper began to circulate in strictly male circles. Sir Matthew Brockenhurst slyly twitted Sir Montagu upon it, and while Sir Montagu laughed at the notion that he could be implicated in the affair, under his mirth he seethed with rage. Correctly assuming that left to his own devices Sherry would never have thought of befriending Ruth Wimborne, Sir Montagu chalked up a fresh score on his tally with Sherry’s wife, promising himself the satisfaction of paying it off in full measure. He had a good deal of effrontery, but the situation evoked by the knowledge that his discarded mistress had found an asylum for herself and her infant on one of Sherry’s estates was not one he felt himself able to carry off with any degree of grace. He was obliged to face the fact that one of the most richly feathered pigeons tocome in his way had flown out of his reach, and showed no disposition to flutter back to him.
It was while Sherry was away at Newmarket that Hero made a new acquaintance. She was one of a party invited by her cousin, Mrs Hoby, to visit the Pantheon Assembly Rooms on the night of a Grand Masquerade, and it was during the course of the evening that a fashionably dressed woman, with quiet manners, and a great air of elegance, came to Mrs Hoby’s box, and begged to know if she was not right in believing that she was addressing Lady Sheringham.
Hero acknowledged it, and the lady sat down beside her, introducing herself as Mrs Gillingham, and adding that Lord Sheringham had perhaps mentioned her name to his bride? Upon Hero’s replying that he had not, she laughed, and said that it was so very like Sherry to have forgotten all about her.
‘I have not been in good health these past few months, or I should have done myself the honour of calling upon you, Lady Sheringham, be sure! I have known Sherry any time these past five years, and I have had the greatest desire to meet his wife. I feel we must be friends; I pride myself on knowing at first glance when I wish for a better acquaintance with anyone!’
Hero blushed, and thanked her, and begged leave to present her cousin. Mrs Gillingham, who was a good many years senior to any of Mrs Hoby’s party, was extremely gracious and amiable, remained for a short while, chatting easily, and departed only when she had obtained Hero’s promise to waive the formality of the morning call, and to make one of a little card-party she was giving on the following evening.
‘Do you think I should go, Theresa!’ Hero asked doubtfully, when Mrs Gillingham had withdrawn.
‘Oh, unquestionably, my dear cousin! Such a distinguished air, and her gown in the first style of elegance! The address too; Curzon Street: it is unexceptionable! She is acquainted withyour husband, moreover, andthatmust make her acceptable to you, I have no doubt!’
‘Y-es,’ said Hero. ‘But Sherry told me once that he knows many people he does not wish to present to me.’
Mrs Hoby gave a little shriek of laughter. ‘Oh, my dear, what will you say next, I wonder? Depend upon it, Mrs Gillingham does not come underthatcategory! Why, she must be thirty-five, if she is a day, and very likely more!’
So upon the following evening Hero was set down at a slip of a house in Curzon Street, and made a somewhat shy entrance into a saloon already full of guests. Her hostess came forward at once, and made her welcome in the kindest way, introducing her to one or two complete strangers, and pressing a glass of champagne upon her. Hero was a little surprised to find that she knew no one in the room, and after looking about her for a while she began to feel uneasy, and to fear that perhaps Sherry would not have wished her to have come. When Sir Matthew Brockenhurst arrived, with the Honourable Wilfrid Yarford, she wished it more than ever, and had she known how to excuse herself without giving offence to her hostess, or drawing upon herself the particular notice she wished to avoid, she would certainly have done so. She did not know, however, and when the company adjourned to a much larger apartment on the first floor, where card tables were set out, she meekly allowed herself to be shepherded up the stairs with the rest of the guests.
She liked playing cards, and since she had been initiated into the mysteries of faro, rouge et noir, macao, and a number of other games of chance by Sherry himself, she naturally considered that she was well able to hold her own in any company. This proved, however, not to be the case. The stakes, too, were much higher than any she had yet played for, and she was soon put into a little confusion by finding herself without any moremoney to stake. Mrs Gillingham was kindness itself, smiling at her innocence, and explaining to her how everyone punted on tick until the luck turned for them, and showing her how to write a vowel. Hero remembered hearing Sherry talk of having given vowels, so she knew that this must be the accepted custom, and settled down to win back her losses. She became so absorbed in the game that she scarcely noticed anything beyond the turn of a card; and what with the excitement of the play, the heat of the room, and the champagne which was continually poured into her glass, she began to plunge more and more heavily, arising in the small hours a much greater loser than she had had any very clear idea of. Her vowels appeared, incredibly, to run into four figures, and how she was ever to pay such a sum until her next quarter’s allowance should be paid to her account she had not the least idea. But here again Mrs Gillingham was most understanding, assuring her that Jack Cranbourne, who had held the bank, would not dream of pressing for payment, and expressing her conviction that another evening’s play would see all the vowels redeemed, and a stream of guineas pouring into her young friend’s lap. Hero, effectually sobered by her losses, had no desire to spend another evening in this house, but she knew that what Mrs Gillingham said was true, because Sherry had said the same. One had only to have courage, to ignore one’s losses, and to continue playing, for the luck to change, and set all to rights.
But the second night’s play was even more disastrous than the first; and some warning instinct in Hero told her that a third would be no more successful. Thoroughly frightened, shivering at the thought of the vast sums she had lost, and not knowing which way to turn in her extremity, she spent what was left of the night in tossing about in her bed, and racking her brains to find a way out of her difficulties. To present Sherry with the sum of her obligations seemed to her unthinkable, for poor Sherryhad his own obligations, and had said only a week earlier that they must really try to practise economy. Hero wept into her pillow with grief to think that she should have added to Sherry’s embarrassments; and thought that her mother-in-law had spoken no less than the truth when she had accused her of having wrecked his life.
He came home from Newmarket that day, to find a heavy-eyed wife, who explained nervously that she had the headache. He said that he had one himself, and had no hesitation in ascribing it to the malignant behaviour of four out of five of the horses he had backed. Hero turned pale, and faltered: ‘Was your luck so very bad, Sherry?’
