Cynthia's Chauffeur
constituted the only clear item in Dale's seething brain: it was too
much for him; in sudden desperation he determined to stick to the
plain truth.
He had to elect very quickly, for the peppery-tempered Earl would not
brook delay.
"Not gone to London, you say? Then where the devil _has_ he gone to?
A gentleman at the hotel, a French gentleman, who said he had met
these--these persons with whom my son is gadding about the country,
told me that they had left Bristol this morning for London, because a
car that was expected to meet them here had broken down."
Suddenly his lordship, a county magistrate noted for his sharpness,
glanced at Simmonds. He marched round to the front of the car and saw
that it was registered in London. He waved an accusing umbrella in
air.
"What car is this? Is this the motor that won't go? It seems to have
reached Bristol all right? Now, my men, I must have a candid tale from
each of you, or the consequences may be most disagreeable. You, I
presume," and he lunged _en tierce_ at Simmonds, "have an employer of
some sort, and I shall make it my business----"
"This is my own car, my lord," said Simmonds stiffly. He could be
stubborn as any member of the Upper House when occasion served. "Your
lordship needn't use any threats. Just ask me what you like an' I'll
answer, if I can."
Fairholme, by no means a hasty man in the ordinary affairs of life,
and only upset now by the unforeseen annoyances of an unusually
disquieting mission, realized that he was losing caste. It was a novel
experience to be rebuked by a chauffeur, but he had the sense to
swallow his wrath.
"Perhaps I ought to explain that I am particularly anxious to see
Lord Medenham," he said more calmly. "I left London at eight o'clock
this morning, and it is most irritating to have missed him by a few
minutes. I only wish to be assured as to his whereabouts, and, of
course, I have no reason to believe that any sort of responsibility
for my son's movements rests with you."
"That's all right, my lord," said Simmonds. "Viscount Medenham was
very kind to me last Wednesday. I had a first-rate job, and was on
my way to the Savoy Hotel to take it up, when a van ran into me an'
smashed the transmission shaft. His lordship met me in Down Street,
an' offered to run my two ladies to Epsom an' along the south coast
for a day or two while I repaired damages. I was to turn up here--an'
here I am--but it suited his arrangements better to go on with the
tour, an' that is all there is to it. A bit of a joke, I call it."
"Yes, my lord, that's hit hexactly," put in Dale, with a nervous
eagerness that demanded the help of not less than two aspirates.
The Earl managed to restrain another outburst.
"Nothing to cavil at so far," he said with forced composure. "The
only point that remains is--where is Lord Medenham now?"
"Somewhere between here an' Gloucester, my lord," said Simmonds.
"Gloucester--that is not on the way to London!"
No reply; neither man was willing to bell the cat. Finding Simmonds a
tough customer, Fairholme tackled Dale.
"Come, come, this is rather absurd," he cried. "Fancy my son's
chauffeur jibbing at my questions! Once and for all, Dale, where
shall I find Lord Medenham to-night?"
There was no escape now. Dale had to blurt out the fatal word:
"Hereford!"
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, my lord. I'm goin' there with his lordship's portmanteaux."
The head of the Fitzroy clan turned to Simmonds again.
"Will you drive me to Gloucester?" he asked.
"No, my lord. I'm under contract to remain in Bristol five days."
"Very well. Stop in Bristol, and be d----d to you. Is there any reason
why you should not take me to pick up my son's belongings? Then Dale
and I can go to Hereford by train. Viscount Medenham is devilish
particular about his linen. If I stick to his shirts I shall meet him
sometime to-day, I suppose."
Simmonds sought Dale's counsel by an underlook, but that hapless
sportsman could offer no suggestion, so the other made the best of a
bad business.
"I'll do that, of course, my lord," he said with alacrity. "Just grab
his lordship's dressing-case from that porter and shove it inside," he
went on, eying Dale fiercely, well knowing that the whole collapse
arose from a cause but too easily traced.
"No, no," broke in the Earl, whose magisterial experiences had taught
him the wisdom of keeping witnesses apart, "Dale comes with me. I want
to sift this business thoroughly. Put the case in front. We can pile
the other luggage on top of it. Now, Dale, jump inside. Your friend
knows where to go, I expect."
Thus did two bizarre elements intrude themselves into the natural
order of things on that fine morning in the West of England. The very
shortness of the road between Bristol and Bath apparently offered an
insuperable obstacle to the passage of Simmonds's car along it, and
some unknown "chap," whose "nevvy" had married the sister of a
Beckhampton housemaid, became the predominating factor in a situation
that affected the fortunes of several notable people.
For his part, Lord Fairholme gave no further thought to Marigny. It
did not even occur to him it might be advisable to call again at the
College Green Hotel, since Medenham had slept elsewhere, and Hereford
was now the goal. Certainly, the Frenchman's good fairy might have
pushed her good offices to excess by permitting him to see, careering
about Bristol with a pair of chauffeurs, the man whom he believed to
be then on the way to London. But fairies are unreliable creatures,
apt to be off with a hop, skip, and a jump, and, in any case, Marigny
was writing explicit instructions to Devar, though he would have been
far more profitably employed in lounging outside the hotel.
So everybody was dissatisfied, more or less, the quaking Dale more,
perhaps, than any, and the person who had absolutely no shadow of
care on his soul was Medenham himself, at that moment guiding the
Mercury along the splendid highway that connects Bristol with
Gloucester--taking the run leisurely, too, lest Cynthia should miss
one fleeting glimpse of the ever-changing beauties of the Severn
estuary.
During one of these adagio movements by the engine, Cynthia, who had
been consulting a guidebook, leaned forward with a smile on her face.
"What is a lamprey?" she asked.
"A special variety of eel which has a habit of sticking to stones by
its mouth," said Medenham. Then he added, after a pause: "Henry the
First was sixty-seven years of age when he died, so the dish of
lampreys was perhaps blamed unjustly."
"You have a good memory," she retorted.
"Oh, is that in your book, Miss Vanrenen? Well, here is another fact
about Gloucester. Alfred the Great held a Witenagemot there in 896. Do
you know what a Witenagemot is?"
"Yes," she said, "a smoking concert."
Mrs. Devar invariably resented these bits of by-play, since she could
no more extract their meaning than if they were uttered in Choctaw.
"Some very good people live in Gloucestershire," she put in. "There
are the----" She began to give extracts from Burke's "Landed Gentry,"
whereupon the speedometer index sprang to forty-five, and a noble
fifteenth century tower soon lifted its stone lacework above the trees
and spires of the ancient city.
Cynthia wished to obtain some photographs of old inns, so, when
they had admired the cathedral, and shuddered at the memory of
Richard the Third--who wrote at Gloucester the order to Brackenbury
for the murder of the princes in the Tower of London--and smiled at
Cromwell's mordant wit in saying that the place had more churches
than godliness when told of the local proverb, "As sure as God's in
Gloucester," Medenham brought them to Northgate Street, where the New
Inn--which is nearly always the most antiquated hostelry in an English
country-town--supplied a fine example of massive timberwork, with
courtyard and external galleries.
The light was so perfect that he persuaded Cynthia to stand in a
doorway and let him take a picture. During the focusing interval, he
suggested that the day's route should be varied by leaving the coast
road at Westbury and running through the Forest of Dean, where a
secluded hotel in the midst of a real woodland would be an ideal place
for luncheon.
She agreed. Something in his tone told her that Mrs. Devar's consent
to the arrangement had better be taken for granted. So they sped
through the blossom-laden lanes of Gloucestershire to the leafy depths
of the Forest, and saw the High Beeches, and the Old Beech, and the
King's Walk, and many of the gorgeous vistas that those twin artists
Spring and Summer etched on the wooded undulations of one of Britain's
most delightful landscapes; as a fitting sequel to a run through
fairyland they lunched at the Speech House Hotel, where once the skins
of daring trespassers on the King's preserves were wont to be nailed
on the Court House door by the Verderers.
It was Cynthia who pointed the moral.
"There is always an ogre's cave near the Enchanted Garden," she said,
"and those were surely ogerish days when men were flayed alive for
hunting the King's deer."
It is not to be wondered at if they dawdled somewhat by the way, when
that way led past Offa's Dyke, through Chepstow, and Tintern, and
Monmouth, and Symon's Yat. Indeed, Cynthia's moods alternated between
wide-eyed enjoyment and sheer regret, for each romantic ruin and
charming countryside not only aroused her enthusiasm but evoked a
longing to remain riveted to the spot. Yet she would not be a woman
if there were not exceptions to this rule, as shall be seen in due
course.
Mrs. Devar, perchance tempted by the word "Castle," quitted the car at
Chepstow, and climbed to the nail-studded oak door of one of the most
perfect examples of a Norman stronghold now extant. Once committed to
the role of sightseer, she was compelled to adhere to it, and before
the fourth court was reached, had she known the story, she would have
sympathized with the pilgrim who did _not_ boil the peas in his shoes
of penance. Chepstow Castle is a splendid ruin, but its steep
gradients and rough pavements are not fitted for stout ladies who wear
tight boots.
To make matters worse, the feelings of Cynthia's chaperon soon became
as sore as her toes. The only feature of Marten's Tower that appealed
to her was its diabolical ingenuity in providing opportunities for
that interfering chauffeur to assist, almost to lift, Cynthia from one
mass of fallen masonry to another. Though she knew nothing of Henry
Marten she reviled his memory. She heard "Fitzroy" telling her wayward
charge that the reformer really hated Charles I. because the King
called him "an ugly rascal" in public, and directed that he should be
turned out of Hyde Park; the words supplied a cue.
"Pity kings are not as powerful nowadays," she snapped. "The
presumption of the lower orders is becoming intolerable."
"Unfortunately, Marten retaliated by signing the King's death
warrant," said Medenham.
"Of course. What else could one expect from a person of his class?"
"But Sir Henry Marten was a celebrated judge, and the son of a
baronet, and he married a rich widow--these are not the prevalent
democratic vices," persisted Medenham.
"You must have sat up half the night reading the guidebook," she cried
in vexation at her blunder.
Cynthia laughed so cheerfully that Mrs. Devar thought she had scored.
Medenham left it at that, and was content. Both he and Cynthia knew
that lack of space forbade indulgence in such minor details of history
on the part of the book's compiler.
Another little incident heated Mrs. Devar to boiling-point. Cynthia
more than once hinted that, if tired, she might wait for them in the
lowermost court, where a fine tree spread its shade over some benches,