Masqueraders (7 page)

‘I should be pleased, sir,’ Prudence swept the little pile of guineas to one side.

There was nothing for Sir Francis to do but to go elsewhere. He gave up his seat to Fanshawe, and trusted he might have an evening with Mr Merriot some time in the near future.

‘Why, sir, I shall count myself fortunate,’ said Prudence.

Sir Francis moved away to a group of men by the window. Prudence turned to find Sir Anthony shuffling the pack. ‘Will you name the stakes, sir?’ she said.

‘What you will,’ Sir Anthony replied. ‘What were they with my friend, Jollyot?’

She told him indifferently enough.

‘Do you make it a rule to play for so large a sum?’ blandly inquired Sir Anthony.

‘I make it a rule, sir, to play for whatever sum my opponent suggests,’ was the quick answer.

The heavy lids lifted for a moment, and she saw the grey eyes keen. ‘You must needs have faith in your skill, Mr Merriot.’

‘In my luck I have, Sir Anthony.’

‘I felicitate you. I will play you for the half of Jollyot’s stakes.’

‘As you please, sir. Will you cut?’

It would not do to show a change of front now that the large gentleman had watched her at play with Sir Francis. Prudence fumbled a little at the cards, and displayed a beginner’s uncertainty. Sir Anthony seemed to be engrossed with his own hand, but as she hesitated once more over the five cards of her discard he glanced up, and drawled: ‘Oh, spare yourself the pains, my dear boy! I am no hawk.’

Prudence fenced cautiously; she was not quite sure what the gentleman would be at. ‘The pains of what, sir?’

‘Of all this dissimulation,’ said Sir Anthony, with a disarming smile. ‘I must suppose you were taught to play picquet in your cradle.’

Almost she gasped. It seemed as though John had reason when he said that large gentleman was awake for all his sleepiness. She laughed, and forbore to evade, judging her man with some shrewdness. ‘Nearly, sir, I confess. My father has a fondness for the game.’

‘Has he indeed?’ said Sir Anthony. ‘Now, what may have induced you to play the novice with my friend Jollyot, I wonder?’

‘I have been about the world a little, Sir Anthony.’

‘That I believe.’ Leisurely Sir Anthony looked at the three cards that fell to his minor share. ‘It seems you lost no feathers in that bout.’

She laughed again. ‘Oh, I’m an ill pigeon for plucking, sir! I declare a point of five.’

‘I concede it you, my fair youth.’

‘A quarte may perhaps be good?’

‘It depends, sir, on what heads it.’

‘The King, Sir Anthony.’

‘No good,’ Sir Anthony said. ‘I hold a quarte to the Ace.’

‘I am led to believe, sir, that three Kings won’t serve?’

‘Quite right, my dear boy; they must give way to my three Aces.’

This was all in the grand manner. Prudence chuckled. ‘Oh, I’ve done then! My lead, and I count six, sir.’

The hand was played. As the cards were gathered up Sir Anthony said: ‘I take it so shrewd a youth stands in no need of a friendly warning?’

Certainly the enigmatic gentleman was developing a kindness for her. ‘You’re very kind, sir. I do not know why you should be at this trouble for me.’ It was spoken with some warmth of gratitude.

‘Nor I,’ said Fanshawe indolently. ‘But you are not—in spite of those twenty years—of a great age, and there are plenty of hawks in town.’

Prudence bowed. ‘I shall take that to heart, sir. I have to thank you.’

‘Pray do not. Plucking pigeons has never been a favourite pastime of mine. . . . Well, I concede your point, but I claim a quinte and fourteen Queens, besides three Kings. Alack for a spoiled repique! Five played, sir.’

The game came presently to an end. ‘Very even,’ said Sir Anthony. ‘Do you care to honour me at a small card party I hold on Thursday evening?’

‘Indeed, sir, mine will be the honour. On Thursday and in Clarges Street, I think?’

Sir Anthony nodded. He beckoned to a lackey standing near, and sent him to fetch wine. ‘You will drink a glass with me, Merriot?’

‘Thank you, a little canary, sir.’

The wine was brought; one or two gentlemen had wandered towards the table, and stood now in converse there. Sir Anthony made Mr Merriot known to them. Prudence found herself pledged to ride out next morning in the Park with a chubby-faced young gentleman of a friendly disposition. This was the Honourable Charles Belfort, who combined a passion for dice with almost phenomenal ill-luck, but managed to remain cheerful under it.

‘Well, Charles, what fortune?’ Sir Anthony looked up in some amusement at the young profligate.

‘The same as ever. It always is.’ Belfort shook his head. ‘Bad, very bad, but I have a notion that my luck will turn to-morrow, at about eight o’clock.’

‘Good Gad, Bel, why at eight?’ demanded Mr Molyneux.

The Honourable Charles looked grave. ‘Angels told me so in a vision,’ he said.

There was a shout of laughter.

‘Nonsense, Charles, they were prophesying your entry into a spunging house!’ This was my Lord Kestrel, leaning on the back of Fanshawe’s chair.

‘You see how it is, sir’—Belfort addressed himself plaintively to Prudence.—‘They all laugh at me, even when I tell them of a visitation from heaven. Irreligious, damme, that’s what it is.’

There was a fresh outburst of mirth. Through it came Sir Anthony’s deep voice, full of friendly mockery. ‘You delude yourself, Charles: no angel would visit you unless by mischance. Doubtless a sign from the devil that he is about to claim his own.’ He rose, and picked up his snuffbox. ‘Well, Merriot, I must do myself the pleasure of making my bow to your sister. Upstairs, when I was there, she was surrounded.’

‘I’ll lead you to her, sir,’ said Prudence readily. ‘At nine in the morning, Mr Belfort: I shall be with you.’

Sir Anthony went out on Mr Merriot’s arm. Halfway up the broad stairway he said: ‘It occurs to me you may be in need of a sponsor at White’s, my dear boy. You know you may command me. May I carry your name there?’

So she was to become a member of a club for gentlemen of quality? Egad, where would it all end? No help for it: the large gentleman overwhelmed one. She accepted gracefully, and then with a hesitancy not unpleasing in a young man looked up into the square face, and said diffidently:—‘I think you go to some trouble for me, Sir Anthony. From all I have heard I had not thought to find so much kindness in London.’

‘There are any number would do the same, boy—my friend Jollyot, for instance. But you had better take me for sponsor.’

‘I do, very gladly, sir.’

They came into the withdrawing room, where the crowd had dwindled somewhat. Robin was easily found, talking to an exquisite of advanced years. From the looks of it he was receiving some extravagant compliments. Prudence could not but applaud inwardly the pretty modesty of the downcast eye, and the face slightly averted.

Over his fan Robin saw them. He rid himself of his elderly admirer with some adroitness, and came rustling forward. ‘My dear, I vow I am nigh to swooning from fatigue!’ he told Prudence. He swept a curtsey to Sir Anthony, and flashed him a dazzling smile. ‘Give you good even, sir. I saw you a while back, but there was such a press of people then!’

Sir Anthony’s lips just brushed Robin’s hand. ‘All gathered about Miss Merriot,’ he said gallantly.

‘What, with the beautiful Miss Gunning in the same room? Fie, sir, this is flattery! Peter, of your love for me, procure me a glass of negus.’

Prudence went away to execute this command; Robin sat down with Sir Anthony upon a couch. When Prudence returned with the wine it seemed as though a good understanding had been established between them. Robin looked up brightly. ‘Sir Anthony tells me he is to steal you from me on Thursday, my Peter. Thus are we poor sisters imposed upon!’

‘I want also to sponsor your Peter at White’s, ma’am,’ Sir Anthony said, smiling. ‘Thus still more are you imposed upon.’

‘Oh, these clubs! This means I shall see nothing of the creature.’ Miss Merriot put up her fan to hide her face from Sir Anthony, in feigned indignation. So, at least, it appeared, but behind the fan that mobile eyebrow flew up for Prudence’s benefit, and the blue eyes brimmed with laughter. It was done in a trice, and the fan shut again with a snap. ‘Your kindness to Peter is much greater than your consideration for his poor sister, sir!’ she rallied Fanshawe.

‘Why, as to that I offer my apologies, ma’am. I stand somewhat in both your debts.’

‘Ah, let’s have done with that!’ Prudence said quickly. ‘There is no debt that I know of.’

‘Well, let us say that what you are pleased to call my kindness is naught but a seal to what I hope is a friendship.’

‘I’m honoured to have it so, sir,’ Prudence said, and felt the colour rise, to her annoyance.

The large gentleman had a mind to befriend her, and there was no help for it. And was one glad of it, or sorry? There was apparently no answer to the riddle.

CHAPTER VII

A Taste of a Large Gentleman’s Temper

The morning’s ride sowed promising seeds of a new friendship. The Honourable Charles had an engaging frankness; he kept no secrets from those admitted into the circle of his acquaintance, and it seemed probable that his life might be an open book for Prudence to read if she had a mind that way. With admirable dexterity she steered all talk into channels of her own choosing. She was certainly not squeamish, but half an hour spent in the company of the expansive Mr Belfort was enough to show that the greater part of his reminiscences was calculated to bring a blush to maiden cheeks. Prudence maintained an even complexion, and had sense enough to think none the worse of him for all his lurid confidences. Sure, they were not meant for a lady’s ears.

The ride at an end, it was Charles and Peter with them; they might have been blood brothers. Prudence acquiesced in it, but grimaced to herself when she reflected that it had been in her mind to lie close in London. Evidently this was not to be. But there was nothing to be feared from Mr Belfort: the disguise was deep enough to hoodwink a dozen such rattlepates.

She came back to Arlington Street to find Robin posturing above a bouquet of red roses. Robin achieved a simper. ‘Behold me, my Peter, in a maidenly flutter!’

Prudence put down her whip and gloves. ‘What’s this?’

‘My elderly admirer!’ said Robin in an ecstasy, and gave up a note. ‘Read, my little one!’

Prudence gave a chuckle over the amorous note. ‘Robin, you rogue!’

‘I was made to be a breaker of hearts,’ sighed Robin.

‘Oh, this one was cracked many times before!’

Robin tilted his head a little; the merry devil looked out of his limpid blue eyes. ‘I’ve a mind to enthrall the mountain,’ he said softly.

‘You won’t do it. He’s more like to unmask you than to worship at your shameless feet,’ Prudence answered.

‘Oh? Here’s a change of front, by my faith! Unmask me, is it? Now why?’

‘John was right. The gentleman’s wide awake for all we think him so dull.’

‘So?’ Robin awaited more. She told him of the incident at cards the night before. He listened in silence, but shrugged a careless shoulder at the end. ‘I don’t see a great deal to that. Easy enough to see your game if he stood at your elbow. Did you fleece the wolf?’

‘Some fifty guineas. We may stand in need of them if this is to continue long. But Sir Anthony——’ she paused.

‘You’re bewitched. What now?’

‘I believe we shall do well to preserve a strict guard before him.’

‘As you please, but I think you rate a mountain’s intelligence too high. Consider, my dear, how should any man suspect what is after all the very light of improbability? Why should so wild a surmise so much as cross his brain?’

‘There is that, of course. Plague take the man, he must needs load me with favours!’

Robin laughed. ‘He takes you to White’s, eh? Some little matter of a card-party too, I think?’

‘On Thursday, at his house.’

Robin folded pious hands. ‘I believe my sense of propriety is offended,’ he quoted maliciously.

The shot glanced off her armour. ‘You’ve none, child, rest assured.’

Robin let be at that, and went off to make ready for a call on Miss Grayson. My Lady Lowestoft’s town chaise bore him to the house, and a lackey in sombre livery ushered him into the withdrawing-room.

An elderly lady arose from a chair near the fire, and dropped a stately curtsey. Before Robin could return the salute Miss Letty bounced out of her chair and came running towards him. An embrace was clearly offered; Robin withstood temptation, and held out his hands. Miss Letty’s were put into them, and so he kept her at arm’s length.

‘My dear, dear Miss Merriot! I have so hoped you would come!’ Letty cried.

The elder Miss Grayson spoke an austere reproof ‘Letitia, your manners, child!’

Robin swept a curtsey to the lady. ‘Why, ma’am, I beg you’ll not chide her. I should be flattered indeed to receive such a welcome.’

‘I fear, ma’am, our Letitia is a sad madcap,’ Miss Grayson said. ‘Pray will you not be seated? My honoured brother told me we might expect the pleasure of this visit.’