Cynthia's Chauffeur
He would have sent a note, but he remembered that you had never seen
his handwriting, so, as a proof of my genuineness, he gave me your
itinerary."
Medenham produced a closely-written sheet of note-paper, which Miss
Vanrenen presumably recognized. She turned to her stout companion, who
had been summing up car and chauffeur with careful eyes since Medenham
first spoke.
"What do _you_ think, Mrs. Devar?" she said.
When he heard the name, Medenham was so amazed that the last vestige
of chauffeurism vanished from his manner.
"You don't mean to say you are Jimmy Devar's mother?" he gasped.
Mrs. Devar positively jumped. If a look could have slain he would have
fallen then and there. As it was, she tried to freeze him to death.
"Do I understand that you are speaking of Captain Devar, of Horton's
Horse?" she said, aloof as an iceberg.
"Yes," said he coolly, though regretting the lapse. He had stupidly
brought about an awkward incident, and must remember in future not to
address either lady as an equal.
"I was not aware that my son was on familiar terms with the chauffeur
fraternity."
"Sorry, but the name slipped out unawares. Captain Devar is, or used
to be, very easy-going in his ways, you know."
"So it would seem." She turned her back on him disdainfully. "In the
circumstances, Cynthia," she said, "I am inclined to believe that we
ought to make further inquiries before we exchange cars, and drivers,
in this fashion."
"But what is to be done? All our arrangements are made--our rooms
ordered--I have even sent father each day's address. If we cancel
everything by telegraph he will be alarmed."
"Oh, I did not mean that," protested the lady hurriedly. It was
evident that she hardly knew what to say. Medenham's wholly unexpected
query had unnerved her.
"Is there any alternative?" demanded Cynthia ruefully, glancing from
one to the other.
"It is rather late to hire another car to-day, I admit----" began Mrs.
Devar.
"It would be quite impossible, madam," put in Medenham. "This is Derby
Day, and there is not a motor to be obtained in London except a
taxicab. It was sheer good luck for Simmonds that he was able to
secure me as his deputy."
He thanked his stars for that word "madam." Certainly the mere sound
of it seemed to soothe Mrs. Devar's jarred nerves, and the appearance
of the Mercury was even more reassuring.
"Ah, well," she said, "we are not traveling into the wilds. If
desirable, we can always return to town by train. By the way,
chauffeur, what is your name?"
For an instant Medenham hesitated. Then he took the plunge, strong
in the belief that a half-forgotten transaction between himself and
"Jimmy" Devar would prevent that impecunious warrior from discussing
him freely in the family circle.
"George Augustus Fitzroy," he said.
Mrs. Devar's brows knitted; she was regaining her self-possession, and
a sarcastic smile now chased away a perplexing thought. She was about
to say something when Cynthia Vanrenen broke in excitedly:
"I declare to goodness if the hotel people have not fastened on
our boxes already. They seem to know our minds better than we do
ourselves. And here is the man with the wraps.... Please be careful
with that camera.... Yes, put it there, with the glasses. What are you
doing, Fitzroy?" for Medenham was discharging his obligations to the
boy in buttons and a porter.
"Paying my debts," said he, smiling at her.
"Of course you realize that I pay all expenses?" she said, with just
the requisite note of hauteur in her voice that the situation called
for.
"This is entirely a personal matter, I assure you, Miss Vanrenen."
Medenham could not help smiling; he stooped and felt a tire
unnecessarily. Cynthia was puzzled. She wrote that evening to Irma
Norris, her cousin in Philadelphia--"Fitzroy is a new line in
chauffeurs."
"By the way, where is your trunk?" she demanded suddenly.
"I came away unexpectedly, so I have arranged that it shall be sent to
Brighton by rail," he explained.
Apparently, there was nothing more to be said. The two ladies seated
themselves, and the car sped out into the Strand. They watched the
driver's adroit yet scrupulously careful dealing with the traffic, and
Cynthia, at least, quickly grasped the essential fact that the six
cylinders worked with a silent power that held cheap every other
vehicle passed or overtaken on the road.
"It is a lovely automobile," she murmured with a little sigh of
satisfaction.
"Quite an up-to-date car, I fancy," agreed her friend.
"I don't understand how this man, Fitzroy, can afford to use it for
hiring purposes. Yet, that is his affair--not mine. I rather like him.
Don't you?"
"His manners are somewhat off-hand, but such persons are given to
aping their superiors. George Augustus Fitzroy, too--it is ridiculous.
Fitzroy is the family name of the Earls of Fairholme, and their eldest
sons have been christened George Augustus ever since the beginning of
the eighteenth century."
"The name seems to fit our chauffeur all right, and I guess he has as
good a claim to it as any other man."
Cynthia was apt to flaunt the Stars and Stripes when Mrs. Devar aired
her class conventions, and the older woman had the tact to agree with
a careless nod. Nevertheless, had Cynthia Vanrenen known how strictly
accurate was her comment she would have been the most astounded girl
in London at that minute. The Viscountcy, of course, was nothing more
than a courtesy title; in the cold eye of the law, Medenham's full
legal name was that which Mrs. Devar deemed ridiculous. As events
shaped themselves, it was of the utmost importance to Cynthia, and
to Medenham, and to several other persons who had not yet risen
above their common horizon, that Mrs. Devar's sneer should pass
unchallenged. Though that lady herself was not fashioned of the softer
human clay which expresses its strenuous emotions by fainting fits or
hysteria, some such feminine expedient would certainly have prevented
her from going another hundred yards along the south road had some
wizard told her how nearly she had guessed the truth.
But the luck of the born adventurer saved Medenham from premature
exposure. "I dare all" was the motto of his house, and it was fated
to be tested in full measure ere he saw London again. Of these
considerations the purring Mercury neither knew nor cared. She sang
the song of the free highway, and sped through the leafy lanes of
Surrey with a fine disregard for Acts of Parliament and the "rules
and regulations therein made and provided." Soon after one o'clock,
however, she was compelled to climb the road to the downs in meek
agreement with two lines of toiling chars-a-bancs and laboring motors.
Just to show her mettle when the opportunity offered, she took the
steep hill opposite the stands with a greyhound rush that vastly
disconcerted a policeman who told Medenham to "hurry up out of the
dip."
Then, having found a clear space, she dozed for a while, and Cynthia,
like a true-born American, began the day's business by giving the
answer before either of her companions even thought of putting the
Great Question.
"Grimalkin will win!" she cried. "Mr. Deane told my father so. I want
to play Grimalkin for ten dollars!"
CHAPTER II
THE FIRST DAY'S RUN
Though Medenham was no turf devotee, he formed distinctly unfavorable
conclusions as to the financial stability of the bawling bookmakers
near at hand.
"If you wish to do any betting, Miss Vanrenen," he said, "give me the
money and I will invest it for you. There is no hurry. The Derby will
not be run till three o'clock. We have an hour and a half in which to
study form."
For the life of him he could not imitate the complete annihilation of
self practiced by the well-bred English servant. The American girl
missed the absence of this trait far less than the other woman, but,
by this time, even Mrs. Devar began to accept Medenham's good-humored
assumption of equality as part of the day's amusement.
Cynthia handed him a card. She had bought three while they were
crawling up the hill behind a break-load of jeering Cockneys.
"What will win the first race?" she asked. "Father says you men often
hear more than the owners about the real performances of horses."
Medenham tried to look knowing. He thanked his stars for Dale's
information.
"I am told Eyot has a chance," he said.
"Well, put me a sovereign on Eyot, please. Are _you_ playing the
ponies, Mrs. Devar?"
That lady, being quick-witted, took care not to offend Cynthia by
pretending not to understand, though it set Medenham's teeth on edge
to hear a racehorse called a pony. She opened a gold purse and
produced a coin.
"I don't mind risking a little," she tittered.
Medenham found, however, that she also had handed him a sovereign, and
his conscience smote him, for he guessed already, with accuracy as it
happened, that she was Miss Vanrenen's paid chaperon during the
absence of the girl's father on the Continent.
"Personally, I am a duffer in matters connected with the turf," he
explained. "A friend of mine--a chauffeur--mentioned Eyot----"
"Oh, that is all right," laughed Cynthia. "I like the color--Eau de
Nil and white. Look! There he goes!"
She had good eyes, as well as pretty ones, else she could not have
distinguished the silk jacket worn by the rider of a horse cantering
at that moment along the cleared course. Crowded coaches, four rows
deep, lined the rails near the judge's box, and the gay-hued parasols
of their feminine occupants almost completely blocked the view, a
distant one in any case, owing to the width of the intervening
valley.
Medenham raised no further protest. He walked to a stand where a press
of people betokened the presence of a popular layer of odds, found
that Eyot's price was chalked up at five to one, and backed him for
four pounds. He had to push and elbow his way through a struggling
crowd; immediately after the bet was made, Eyot's quotation was
reduced by two points in response to signals tick-tacked from the
inclosures. This, of course, argued a decided following for Dale's
selection, and these eleventh hour movements in the turf market are
illuminative. Before he got back to the car there was a mighty shout
of "They're off!" and he saw Cynthia Vanrenen stand on the seat to
watch the race through her glasses.
Mrs. Devar stood up, too. Both women were so intent on the troop of
horses now streaming over the crest of the six-furlong course that he
was able to stare his fill without attracting their attention.
"I like Cynthia," he said to himself, "though I shall be in a deuce of
a mess if I meet her anywhere after this piece of masquerading. Not
much chance of that, I expect, seeing that Dad and I go to Scotland
early in July. But what a bore to tumble across Jimmy's mater! I hope
it is not a case of 'like mother like son,' because Jimmy is the
limit."
A strange roar, gathering force and volume each instant, rose from a
hundred thousand throats. Soon the shout became insistent, and Cynthia
Vanrenen yielded to its magnetism.
"Eyot wins!" she cried delightedly. "Yes, none of them can catch him
now. Go on, jockey--don't look round! Oh, if I were your master I'd
give you such a talking to. Ah-h-h! We've won, Mrs. Devar--we've won!
Just think of it!"
"How much, I wonder?" Mrs. Devar, though excited, had the calculating
habit.
"Five pounds each," said Medenham, who had approached unnoticed during
the tumult.
Cynthia's eyes sparkled.
"Five pounds! Why, I heard some betting person over there offering
only three to one."
It was a task beyond his powers to curb an unruly tongue in the
presence of this emancipated schoolgirl. He met her ebullient mood
halfway.