Cynthia's Chauffeur
words they mouth! No; I quote 'Comus' only because on one
half-forgotten occasion I played in it."
"Where?"
The prompt question took him unaware.
"At Fairholme," he said.
"Is that another castle?"
"No--merely a Georgian residence."
"I seem to have heard of it--somewhere--I can't remember."
He remembered quite well--was not Mrs. Devar, student of Burke,
sitting in the car at the castle gate?
"Oh, we must hurry," he said shamefacedly. "I have kept you here too
long, for we have yet to
trace huge forests and unharbour'd heaths,
Infamous hills and sandy perilous wilds,
before we see Chester--and Mrs. Leland."
With that the bubble was pricked, and staid Ludlow became a busy
market-town again, its streets blocked by the barrows of hucksters
and farmers' carts, its converging roads thronged with cattle. At
Shrewsbury Medenham was vouchsafed a gleam of frosty humor by
Mrs. Devar's anxiety lest her son might have obeyed her earlier
injunctions, and kept tryst at "The Raven" after all. That trivial
diversion soon passed. He hoped that Cynthia would share the front
seat with him in the final run to Chester; but she remained tucked up
in the tonneau, and the dread that kept her there was bitter-sweet to
him, since it betrayed her increasing lack of confidence in herself.
The rendezvous was at the Grosvenor Hotel, and Medenham had made up
his mind how to act long before the red towers of Chester Cathedral
glowed above the city's haze in the fire of a magnificent sunset. Dale
was waiting on the pavement when the Mercury drew up at the galleried
entrance to the hotel.
Medenham leaped down.
"Good-by, Miss Vanrenen," he said, holding out his hand. "I can catch
an early train to town by hurrying away at once. This is Dale, who
will take my place. He is thoroughly reliable, and an even more
careful driver than I am."
"Are you really going--like that?" faltered Cynthia, and her face
blanched at the suddenness of it.
"Yes. I shall have the pleasure of seeing you in London when you
return."
Their hands met in a firm clasp. Mrs. Devar, too flustered at first to
gasp more than an "Oh!" of astonishment, leaned forward and shook his
hand with marked cordiality.
"You must tell Dale to take great care of us," she said, knowingly.
"I think he realizes the exceeding trust I repose in him," he said,
but the accompanying smile was meant for Cynthia, and she read into it
a farewell that presaged many things.
He disappeared without another word. When a slim, elegantly-gowned
lady had hastened to the door from the drawing-room, whence she was
summoned by a page, she found two dust-covered figures in the act of
alighting from a well-appointed car. Her next glance was at the solemn
jowl of the chauffeur.
"Cynthia, my darling girl!" she cried, with arms thrown wide.
There could be no doubting the heartiness of the greeting, and in that
motherly embrace Cynthia felt a repose, a security, that she had been
willfully skeptical of during many weary hours. But polite usage
called for an introduction, and Mrs. Leland and Mrs. Devar eyed each
other warily, with the smiles of convention.
Mrs. Leland glanced at Dale.
"And who is this?" she asked, seizing the opportunity to settle a
point that was perplexing her strangely.
"Our chauffeur," said Cynthia, and a glint of fun showed through the
wanness of her cheeks.
"But not--not----"
Even smooth-tongued Mrs. Leland was at a loss.
"Not Fitzroy, who left us a minute ago. This man's name is Dale. One
wonders, though, how you knew--why you doubted," cried Cynthia in
sharp discernment.
"Pray why did Fitzroy leave you a minute ago?" was all that the other
woman could find to say.
"He had to return to London. But, there--it is I who ought to
ask questions. Let us go inside. I want to get some of the grit
out of my eyes and hair; then I shall become an absolute mark of
interrogation--so I warn you. Of course, I am delighted to see you;
but queer things have happened, and I am pining to have them cleared
up. When did you see father last? Is he still in London?"
Mrs. Leland answered, with freer speech now, but in her heart she was
saddened by Medenham's duplicity. Six months earlier he and the Earl
had dined at the villa she was occupying at San Remo for the winter.
She then took a great liking to him on account of his shy and reticent
but singularly pleasing manners. She was prepared to laugh at the
present escapade when she had discussed it with him that night. Now
he had fled, doubtless through fear. That was bad. That looked ugly
and mean. Most certainly Peter Vanrenen had acted rightly in bringing
her post-haste from Trouville. She must use all her skill if mischief
were to be avoided.
CHAPTER XIII
WHEREIN WRATH BEGUILES GOOD JUDGMENT
"Good-mornin', George."
"Good-morning, dad."
"Enjoy your run to Hereford?"
"Immensely. Did you?"
"It was not so bad. Rather tiresome, you know, travelin' alone, but on
the return journey I fell in with a decent sort of Frenchman who
helped to pass the time."
"Monsieur Marigny, in fact?"
"Ah, you know him, of course. I had forgotten."
"I have met him. He is not the kind of person I care to know."
The Earl selected an egg, tapped it, and asked his son what he thought
of the crops--did they want rain? The two were breakfasting alone--at
the moment there was not even a man-servant in the room--but Lord
Fairholme had long ago established the golden rule that controversial
topics were taboo during meals. Medenham laughed outright at the
sudden change of topic. He remembered that Dale was sent to bed in the
Green Dragon Hotel at eight o'clock, and he had not the least doubt
that his father's ukase was really a dodge to secure an undisturbed
dinner. But he was under no delusions because of this placid meeting
in the breakfast-room. There was thunder in the air. Tomkinson had
warned him of it overnight.
"There's bin ructions while you were away, my lord," the butler had
whispered, waylaying him in the hall just before midnight. "Lady St.
Maur has upset the Earl somethink dreadful;" and Medenham had growled
in reply: "Her ladyship will lunch here at one o'clock to-morrow,
Tomkinson. Have an ambulance ready at two, for she will be in little
pieces before I have done with her. The mangling will be somethink
orful."
"But what has become of Dale, my lord?" went on Tomkinson in a hushed
voice.
"Dale? He is all right. Why? Is _he_ in the soup, too?"
"No, my lord. I've heard nothink of that, but he sent me a wire from
Bristol----"
"A telegram--about what?"
"About a horse."
"Oh, the deuce take you and your horses. By the way, that reminds
me--you gave me a rotten tip for the Derby."
"It was a false run race, my lord. The favorite was swep' off his feet
at Tattenham Corner, and couldn't get into his stride again till the
field was opposite Langland's Stands. After that----"
"After that I'm going to bed. But I forgive you, Tomkinson. You put up
a ripping good lunch. You're a far better butler than a tipster."
This brief conversation had illumined at least one dubious page in the
records of the past few days. Medenham realized now that his aunt had
emptied the vials of her wrath on Mrs. Devar, but, that lady being
absent in body, the Earl had received the full dose. It indicated
somewhat the line he should follow when, breakfast ended, his father
suggested that they should smoke a cigarette in the library.
Once there, and the door closed, the Earl established himself on the
hearth-rug with his back to the fireplace. It was high summer, and the
lazy London heat crept in through the open windows; but the hearth-rug
constituted a throne, a seat of Solomon; had his lordship stood
anywhere else he would have felt lacking in authority.
"Now, George, my boy, tell me all about it," he said, with a genially
paternal air that lent itself admirably to the discussion of a
youngster's transgressions.
Medenham had a sense of humor denied to his well-meaning sire. He
recalled the last time he had heard those words. He and another sprig
of nobility had come up to London from Winchester without leave in
order to attend a famous glove contest between heavyweights, and there
had been wigs on the green before an irate head-master would even
deign to flog them. That had happened twelve years ago, almost to a
day. Since then he had fought through a great war, had circled the
globe, had sought the wild places of earth and its monsters in their
lairs. He knew men and matters as his father had never known them. A
Prime Minister had urged him to adopt a political career, and had
virtually promised him a colonial under-secretaryship as soon as he
entered parliament. He held the D.S.O., had been thanked by the Royal
Geographical Society for a paper on Kilimanjaro, and cordially invited
by the Foreign Office to send in any further notes in his possession.
Months later, he heard that Sir Somebody Something was deeply
interested in his comments on the activity of a certain Great Power in
the neighborhood of Britain's chief coaling-stations in the Indian
Ocean.
The absurdity of a family conclave in which he should again be treated
as a small boy, and admonished to apologize and be flogged, while it
brought a smile to his lips, banished any notion of angry
remonstrance.
"By 'all about it' I suppose you mean that you wish to hear what I
have been doing since last Wednesday," he said pleasantly. "Well, dad,
I have obeyed your orders. You asked me to find a wife worthy to reign
at Fairholme. I have succeeded."
"You don't mean to say you have _married_ her!" shouted the Earl, in a
purple upheaval of rage whose lightning-like abruptness was not its
least amazing feature. Certainly Medenham was taken aback by it.
Indeed, he was almost alarmed, though he had no knowledge of apoplexy
in the family.
"I have not even asked the lady yet," he said quietly. "I hope--I
think--that the idea will not be disagreeable to her; but a future
Countess of Fairholme is not to be carried by storm in that fashion.
We must get to know her people----"
"D----n her people!" broke in the older man. "Have you taken leave of
your wits, George, to stand there and talk such infernal nonsense?"
"Steady, dad, steady!" and the quiet voice grew still more calm,
though the forehead wrinkled a little, and there was an ominous
tightening of the lips. "You must take that back. Peter Vanrenen is
quite as great a man in the United States as you are in England--may I
even say, without disrespect, a man who has won a more commanding
position?--and his daughter, Cynthia, is better fitted to adorn a
coronet than a great many women now entitled to wear one."
The Earl laughed, with an immoderate display of an amusement he was
far from feeling.
"Are these Wiggy Devar's credentials? By gad, that shabby little
wretch is flying high when she tries to bag my son for her pretty
protegee!"
"Don't you think it would be wiser, sir, if you allowed me to tell you
exactly what has taken place since we met last?"
"What good purpose will that serve? I have heard the whole story from
Lady Porthcawl, from Dale, from that Frenchman--and Heaven knows I
have been well coached in Mrs. Devar's antecedents by your Aunt Susan.
George, I am surprised that a man of your sound commonsense should
permit yourself to be humbugged so egregiously.... Yes, yes, I am
aware that an accident led you to take Simmonds's place in the
first instance, but can't you see that the Devar creature must have
gone instantly on her bended knees--if she ever does pray, which I
doubt--and thanked Providence for the chance that enabled her to
dispose of an earldom?... At a pretty stiff price, too, I'll be bound,