Jalna: Books 1-4: The Building of Jalna / Morning at Jalna / Mary Wakefield / Young Renny (126 page)

“I wish,” he said, “that we could think of something really devastating to do today.”

“I wish we could,” she said wistfully. “Perhaps Mother could think of something. She hates the thought of his staying on as much as we do. She’s as sick as mud about it.”

“We can manage without her. Still, if she is on our side, so much the better.”

He stood, holding his chin in his hand, buried in thought, and showing as strong a likeness to his grandmother as is possible between a stripling and an old woman. Suddenly he raised his head abruptly and exclaimed: —

“I have it! What do you think of this?”

He poured out his plan, in which she acquiesced with the abandon of one seeking distraction from melancholy.

Their plan was just completed and Meg was breathless with her tremulous laughter when the door opened softly and Eden’s golden head was intruded.

“Oh, hullo,” he said ingratiatingly, “may I come in?”

“Yes,” said Meg, “and shut the door after you.”

He came to Renny and asked — “I want the ride on Gallant. You’ve never taken me and you promised if I said the piece!”

“Well, Mother said your nerves were upset. Why have you nerves like that?”

“They were upset because I wanted to go and you wouldn’t take me.” He looked up accusingly at Renny.

“I’ll take you today. Before the garden party.” He turned to Meg. “It will be well for me to be out of the way, in case questions are asked.”

At three o’clock all was astir in the house for the final preparations. In their bedrooms Adeline, Augusta, Mary, and Meg dressed themselves with unusual care, Adeline trying on five different caps before she found one to suit her. Sir Edwin had reached the stage of knowing that he must have help from Augusta or he would never get his collar and cravat fastened properly, when an agitated rap sounded on the door. He opened it a little way and discovered Malahide, who said anxiously: —

“What do you suppose, Edwin! I can’t get into my room! I’ve got Eliza to help me and she can’t open the door either.”

“Did you lock it when you left?”

“Now can you imagine my doing such a thing? No — this is a trick! I have been purposely locked out of my room.”

Sir Edwin was worried and could not help feeling annoyed with Malahide. Augusta spoke from the corner, where she had taken refuge.

“You must get a ladder.”

“Couldn’t the lock be taken off?” asked Sir Edwin.

“The locks of Jalna,” she returned, “are not made to be taken on and off. Malahide will have to enter his room by the window.”

“Perhaps we had better see Philip about it.”

“Philip has just this moment come up to dress. Mary had to go to the stables herself to fetch him. If he is disturbed now, he will never be ready to receive his guests.” Augusta too felt an unreasonable annoyance with Malahide.

He wavered disconsolately in the passage, twice bending his eye to the keyhole of his room as though by sheer force of will he would project himself through it. From all the bedrooms about him came the sound of splashing water and eager steps.

A quarter of an hour later servants and the hired waiters from town stopped in their journeys between house and pavilion to watch Malahide Court’s long form ascending a ladder to his window while red-faced young Hodge steadied it below.

Almost immediately he descended the ladder and looked despairingly into the face of Hodge. “My clothes are not there,” he said, “Nothing that I own is there. They have taken them away.”

Hodge looked at him with mingled scorn and pity. Secure in his own Sunday garments, he could offer no suggestion.

Eliza was passing with a tray of wineglasses and Malahide appealed to her. “What had I better do, Eliza? They have taken my clothes away.”

Eliza well knew whom he meant by
they
. She said: —

“Well, sir, you are about Mr. Ernest’s height. Perhaps he might lend you some things.”

Malahide jumped at this suggestion. He hastened into the house and to Ernest’s room. Ernest appeared, in answer to the knock, fully dressed even to the carnation in his buttonhole. He listened sympathetically.

“I’m very sorry for this, Malahide. Mamma will be much upset, too. Come in and I will see what I can do for you.”

Ernest had an excellent wardrobe. He soon provided Malahide with all that was necessary, though a perfect fit he could not provide, being himself less narrow in the shoulder and less long in leg and arm. Still Malahide was presentable and was ready to descend the stairs at the same time as Philip and Mary. He decided to say nothing to them of the incident, but to allow Ernest to inform them of it when he thought best.

Philip cast him a glance of amusement and whispered to Mary: —

“By the Lord Harry! What a fit! He looks more than ever like a tadpole!”

Mary scarcely heard what he said. She was worried by the disappearance of Eden just when he should have been dressed. “I
can’t
think where he is,” she said anxiously. “He was playing about after lunch, the servants say, and he was warned to not go away. But when Katie was ready to dress him he could not be found. It is very worrying. First you — and now Eden. I really have had enough to do without that.”

Philip hunched his shoulders. “Don’t worry, darling. The first guests are arriving. The Laceys, of course. And there are Mrs. Vaughan and Robert. Poor old boy, he looks very ill!”

In the brilliant sunshine the guests, in summer attire, poured on to the lawn as from a cornucopia of gayety and colour. The band played as husband and wife, with Adeline on one side and the Buckleys and Malahide on the other, received their guests. Meg, looking charming in the pink organdie, assisted by Vera and Nicholas and Ernest, helped to make things go smoothly and found it easier than she had expected, though she dared not look in the direction of Malahide and she concealed a real anxiety for Renny and Eden. What might not the colt have done!

The baby, Piers, in a white dress and blue sash, toddled sturdily among the guests, pressing his way between the legs of gentlemen who held cups of hot coffee in their hands or reaching toward the trays of pink ices which invited him. He ignored the pats and kisses that were lavished on his downy head.

Eden had been told by Renny to watch for his going in the direction of the stables. He was then to run, not after him, but to the bridle path which led through the wood, where they were to meet for the ride. Eagerly Eden watched for the figure of his brother and, when he perceived him lounging across the croquet lawn, he set out as fast as he could.

His heart was still beating quickly when Renny, mounted on Gallant, rode up. The next moment he was perched on the colt’s back with a strong arm encircling him. It was glorious.

Along the velvet path they cantered, the dark green wood on either side. They passed a field of yellow wheat set in the wood, then a rabbit fled out of their path and the colt danced in pretended fright. They circled the field in pursuit of the rabbit.

Eden laughed delightedly. “I like it! I like it! Oh, I’m glad I said the piece! Renny, will you take me for lots of rides on Gallant?”

“We’ll see.” He held the small body close. Nice little fellow…. He would take care of him always … him and Piers … better to have small brothers like this than chaps of one’s own age one would be sure to quarrel with.

Eden wanted to ride out on the road, but Renny refused that. If there were any mishap, he would never hear the end of it. Besides, it was time they went back to dress. Three times they had cantered the length of the bridle path. He wheeled the colt and turned his head in the direction of the stables. He glanced at his watch and was alarmed to find that it had stopped. It was his first wrist watch, brought to him from London by his uncles, and it was not behaving well. Good Lord, he thought, we shall be late for the party and I shall catch it!

He gave the colt a slap and they sped toward the stables. Then he remembered that he must set Eden down before they were seen. He had just drawn the bridle when a motor car, driven by one of the guests, appeared, panting along the drive. A pair of carriage horses just come to a stand before the stable pranced and backed from the approaching car. Another latecomer drove up in a dogcart, and his horse, a rangy black mare, broke into a gallop and came toward the colt. The band struck up a lively march.

Renny could not put Eden down in such a position. The colt reared and stood on his hind legs. The motorist, new at driving, accelerated and crashed into the palings of the paddock. In a moment a mare and her twin foals had escaped from it and were careering, with squeals of delight, in the direction of the marquee. The carriage horses continued to prance and back till the rear of the carriage was locked in the motor car.

The colt, uttering a clarion whinny, galloped thunderously after the mare and foals. All four, like an advancing storm, bore down on the garden party.

“Look out, look out!” shouted Philip to his guests, and ran towards the colt’s head.

Nicholas and Ernest hastened to protect their mother. Augusta snatched up the baby, who screamed and kicked her. Ladies, in wide flounced skirts and enormous Merry Widow hats, darted about the lawn like frightened tropic birds. One dropped a frilled pink sunshade, which rolled over and over toward the colt. He leaped aside, evading Philip’s outstretched hand, and plunged in the direction of a table laden with cakes and ices. The mare and her foals, as though executing a spirited folk dance, pranced with loud whickerings among the guests. The bandsmen, unconscious, behind their screen of shrubbery, of the disturbance on the lawn, burst into still livelier music.

“Save Eden!” screamed Mary, wringing her hands. “Oh, Philip, save my child!”

Eden, excited to the point of exaltation, tried to find something on the colt’s neck to grasp, but its mane had been lately hogged and his fingers encountered only the slippery hard hide. It reared again, stood upright like a grand grey statue, then bucked twice, the second time throwing both riders into the middle of the table. It wheeled then, galloped along the drive, knocking over a gentleman in immaculate pearl grey, and sped through the gate on to the road. The mare and her foals ceased executing their folk dance and followed him.

Renny picked himself up and looked to see whether Eden were hurt. Mary had him in her arms frantically examining a scratch on his cheek.

“I’m all right, Mamma,” he cried. “It was a splendid ride!”

Mary turned her white face to Renny. “You might have been the cause of his death,” she said.

“Where his headlong ways will lead him, God only knows,” said Augusta.

Everyone crowded about them. The guests commiserating, the family blaming. Renny received both with a hangdog air, alternately wiping the blood from a cut on his forehead and the ice cream from the front of his jersey.

By degrees a certain feverish order was restored. Stablemen were dispatched by Philip to seek the horses. The wreckage of the refreshment table was gathered up. Malahide Court made himself useful in calming the ladies, and Adeline treated the whole matter with a fierce kind of humour. It was an escapade after her own heart.

“The whelp is always into mischief,” she said, grinning amiably. “There is scarcely a day of our lives but what he puts us to shame.” But she bridled with pride in him.

There had been so much excitement that no one had noticed the change in the weather. The sky, which had been all too brilliant, was now overcast. A few large drops struck the roof of the marquee. A wind whispered and moaned beneath the music of the band. Then rain began to fall in a sharp shower.

There was no time to get to the house. The guests crowded beneath the spreading branches of the trees. They looked curiously at a cart drawn by a sorry-looking nag, all bones and tangled mane, the like of which had never before been seen at Jalna. A shock-headed boy was perched on the seat. He drew up and sat in the rain in front of the guests.

Philip’s blue eyes became prominent as he looked at this monstrosity. He waved a peremptory hand to the boy, who slouched on the seat gazing at the horse’s ears, apparently in a trance.

The shower stopped and the gathering crowd moved with inquisitive accord in the direction of the cart.

They had already seen that it was heaped with luggage. Now they saw that the trunk, the suitcases and bags, each bore a bright steamship label on which was written in clear lettering: “Malahide Court — Ballyside Hall — County Meath — Ireland.” All eyes turned inquiringly to Malahide. He stood in his short-sleeved, short-legged suit, in a collar somewhat too large, looking the picture of chagrin.

“Excess luggage!” he exclaimed, to Ethel Lacey.

“And so you are leaving too,” she said. “I had not known it.”

“Nor I. Indeed this apparition is all spite. Philip and Molly would be devastated if I were to go so soon.”

Philip cast his eyes over the poor old mare which drew the cart. He said to Renny: —

“How did you come by this nag?”

“I bought her from a rag picker.”

Philip made a wry face. “And now I have the pleasure of shooting and burying her.” He turned sternly to his son. “Get up on the seat and drive to the stable and tell Hodge to have her put away. When you’ve done that, make yourself presentable and apologize to our guests for the disturbance you’ve created.”

If he had thought to humiliate Renny he was disappointed. His son jumped to the seat of the cart and took the reins blithely. But the poor old horse from sheer weakness refused to move, and stood with gaunt legs straddled and bony head drooping. Its great nostrils were stretched in misery, and suffering had given it human eyes of despair.

Eden had been taken into the house. Champagne corks were being drawn, for a health was to be drunk to the voyagers. The sun burned brightly between rotund white clouds. The band played airs from
Floradora
. There was no sign left of the unhappy incident save the loaded cart before the house, and from it the guests determinedly kept their eyes averted.

Ernest came to Philip and said irritably: —

“You must get that dreadful sight removed. It’s appalling. It makes the house look like an Irish peasant’s shanty. Have you no authority over that boy?”