Mistress Wilding (11 page)

"Not so," she answered him. "It shall be a weapon of defence — not of offence. It shall stand as a buckler between me and Mr. Wilding. Trust me, I shall know how to use it."

"But there is Blake to consider," he expostulated, growing angry. "I am pledged to him."

"Your first duty is to me . . ."

"Tut!" he interrupted. "Blake feels that he owes it to his loyalty to lay this letter before the Lord-Lieutenant, and, for that matter, so do I."

"Sir Rowland would not cross my wishes in this," she answered him.

"Folly!" he cried, now thoroughly aroused. "Give me that letter."

"Nay, Richard," she answered, and waved him back.

But he advanced nevertheless.

"Give it me," he bade her, waxing fierce. "Gad! It was folly to have told you of it. I had not done so but that I never thought you such a fool as to oppose yourself to the thing we intend."

"Listen, Richard . . ." she besought him.

But he was grown insensible to pleadings.

"Give me that letter," he insisted, and caught her wrist. Her other hand, however — the one that held the sheet — was already behind her back.

The door was suddenly thrust open, and Diana appeared. "Ruth," she announced, "Mr. Wilding is here."

At the mention of that name, Richard let her free. "Wilding!" he ejaculated, his fierceness all blown out of him. He had imagined that already Mr. Wilding would be in full flight. Was the fellow
mad?

"He is following me," said Diana, and, indeed, a step could be heard in the passage.

"The letter!" growled Richard in a frenzy, between fear and anger now. "Give it me! Give it me do you hear?"

"Sh! You'll betray yourself," she cried. "He is here."

And at that same moment Mr. Wilding's tall figure, still arrayed in his bridegroom's finery of sky-blue satin, loomed in the doorway. He was serene and calm as ever. Neither the discovery of the
plot by the abstraction of the messenger's letter, nor Ruth's strange conduct — of which he had heard from Lord Gervase — had sufficed to ruffle, outwardly at least, the inscrutable
serenity of his air and manner. He paused to make his bow, then advanced into the room, with a passing glance at Richard still spurred and booted and all dust-stained.

"You appear to have ridden far, Dick," said he, smiling, and Richard shivered in spite of himself at the mocking note that seemed to ring faintly at the words. "I saw your friend, Sir Rowland,
in the garden," he added. "I think he waits for you."

Though Richard could not fail to apprehend the implied dismissal, he was minded at first to disregard it. But Mr. Wilding, turning, held the door, addressing Diana.

"Mistress Horton, said he, "will you give us leave?"

Diana curtsied and passed out, and Mr. Wilding's eye falling upon the lingering Richard at that moment, Richard thought it best to follow her example. But he went with rage in his heart at being
forced to leave that precious document behind him.

As Mr. Wilding, his back to her a moment, closed the door, Ruth slipped the paper hurriedly into the bosom of her low-necked gown. He turned to her, calm but very grave, and his dark eyes seemed
to reproach her.

"This is ill done, Ruth," said he.

"Ill done, or well done," she answered him, "done it is, and shall so remain."

He raised his brows. "Ah," said he, "I appear, then, to have misapprehended the situation. From what Gervase told me, I understood it was your brother forced you to return."

"Not forced, sir," she answered him.

"Induced, then," said he. "It but remains me to induce you to repair what I think was a mistake."

She shook her head. "I have returned home for good," said she.

"You'll pardon me," said he, "that I am so egotistical as to prefer Zoyland Chase to Lupton House. Despite the manifold attractions of the latter, I do not intend to take up my abode here."

"You are not asked to."

"What, then?"

She hated him for the smile, for his masterful air, which seemed to imply that he humoured her because he scorned to use authority, but that when he did use it, hers must it be to obey him.
Again she felt that everlasting calm, arguing such latent forces, was the thing she hated most in him.

"I think I had best be plain with you," said she. "I have fulfilled my part of the bargain that we made. I intend to do no more. I promised that if you spared my brother, I would go to the altar
with you today. I have carried out my contract to the letter. It is at an end."

"Indeed," said he; "I think it has not yet begun." He advanced towards her, and took her hand. She yielded it, unwilling though she was. "This is unworthy of you, madam," said he, his tone grave
and deferential. "You think to escape fulfilling the spirit of your bargain by adhering to the letter of it. Not so," he ended, and shook his head, smiling gently. "The carriage is still at your
door. You return with me to Zoyland Chase to take possession of your home."

"You mistake," said she, and tore her hand from his. "You say that what I have done is unworthy. I admit it; but it is with unworthiness that we must combat unworthiness. Was your attitude
towards me less unworthy?"

"I'll make amends for it if you'll come home," said he.

"My home is here. You cannot compel me."

"I should be loath to," he admitted, sighing.

"You cannot," she insisted.

"I think I can," said he. "There is a law . . ."

"A law that will hang you if you invoke it," she cut in quickly. "This much can I safely promise you."

She had need to say no more to tell him everything. At all times half a word was as much to Mr. Wilding as a whole sentence to another. She saw the tightening of his lips, the hardening of his
eyes, beyond which he gave no other sign that she had hit him.

"I see," said he. "It is another bargain that you make. I do suspect there is some trader's blood in the Westmacott veins. Let us be clear. You hold the wherewithal to ruin me, and you will use
it if I insist upon my husband's rights. Is it not so?"

She nodded in silence, surprised at the rapidity with which he had read the situation.

"I admit," said he, "that you have me between sword and wall." He laughed shortly. "Let me know more," he begged her. "Am I to understand that so long as I leave you in peace — so long as
I do not insist upon your becoming my wife in more than name — you will not wield the weapon that you hold?"

"You are to understand so," she answered.

He took a turn in the room, very thoughtful. Not of himself was he thinking now, but of the Duke of Monmouth. Trenchard had told him some ugly truths that morning of how in his love-making he
appeared to have shipwrecked the Cause ere it was well launched. If this letter got to Whitehall there was no gauging — ignorant as he was of what was in it — the ruin that might
follow; but they had reason to fear the worst. He saw his duty to the Duke most clearly, and he breathed a prayer of thanks that Richard had chosen to put that letter to such a use as this. He knew
himself checkmated; but he was a man who knew how to bear defeat in a becoming manner. He turned suddenly.

"The letter is in your hands?" he inquired.

"It is," she answered.

"May I see it?" he asked.

She shook her head — not daring to show it or betray its whereabouts lest he should use force to become possessed of it — a thing, indeed, that was very far from his purpose.

He considered a moment, his mind intent now rather upon the Duke's interest than his own.

"You know," quoth he, "the desperate enterprise to which I stand committed. But it is a bargain between us that you do not betray me nor that enterprise so long as I leave you rid of my
presence."

"That is the bargain I propose," said she.

He looked at her a moment with hungry eyes, and she found his glance almost more than she could bear, so strong was its appeal. Besides, it may be that she was a thought beglamoured by the
danger in which he stood, which seemed to invest him with a certain heroic dignity.

"Ruth," he said at length, "it may well be that that which you desire may speedily come to pass; it may well be that in the course of this rebellion that is hatching you may be widowed. But at
least I know that if my head falls it will not be my wife who has betrayed me to the axe. For that much, believe me, I am supremely grateful."

He advanced. He took her unresisting hand again and bore it to his lips, bowing low before her. Then erect and graceful he turned on his heel and left her.

CHAPTER IX

MR. TRENCHARD'S COUNTERSTROKE

NOW, however much it might satisfy Mr. Wilding to have Ruth's word for it that so long as he left her in peace neither he nor the Cause had any betrayal
to fear from her, Mr. Trenchard was of a very different mind.

He fumed and swore and worked himself into a very passion. "Zoons, man!" he cried, "it would mean utter ruin to you if that letter reached Whitehall."

"I realize it; but my mind is easy. I have her promise."

"A woman's promise!" snorted Trenchard, and proceeded with great circumstance of expletives to damn "everything that daggled a petticoat."

"Your fears are idle," Wilding assured him. "What she says she will do."

"And her brother?" quoth Trenchard. "Have you bethought you of that canary-bird? He'll know the letter's whereabouts. He has cause to fear you more than ever now. Are you sure he'll not be
making use of it to lay you by the heels?"

Mr. Wilding smiled upon the fury provoked by Trenchard's concern and love for him. "She has promised," he said with an insistent faith that was fuel to Trenchard's anger, "and I can depend upon
her word."

"So cannot I," snapped his friend.

"The thing that plagues me most," said Wilding, ignoring the remark, "is that we are kept in ignorance of the letter's contents at a time when we most long for news. Not a doubt but it would
have enabled us to set our minds at ease on the score of these foolish rumours."

"Aye — or else confirmed them," said pessimistic Trenchard. He wagged his head. "They say the Duke has put to sea already."

"Folly!" Wilding protested.

"Whitehall thinks otherwise. What of the troops at Taunton?"

"More folly."

"Well — I would you had that letter."

"At least," said Wilding, "I have the superscription, and we know from Shenke that no name was mentioned in the letter itself."

"There's evidence enough without it," Trenchard reminded him, and fell soon after into abstraction, turning over in his mind a notion with which he had suddenly been inspired. That notion kept
Trenchard secretly occupied for a couple of days; but in the end he succeeded in perfecting it.

Now it befell that towards dusk one evening early in the week Richard Westmacott went abroad alone, as was commonly his habit, his goal being the Saracen's Head, where he and Sir Rowland spent
many a night over wine and cards — to Sir Rowland's moderate profit, for he had not played the pigeon in town so long without having acquired sufficient knowledge to enable him to play the
rook in the country. As Westmacott was passing up the High Street, a black shadow fell athwart the light that streamed from the door of the Bell Inn, and out through the doorway lurched Mr.
Trenchard a thought unsteadily to hurtle so violently against Richard that he broke the long stem of the white clay pipe he was carrying. Now Richard was not to know that Mr. Trenchard —
having informed himself of Mr. Westmacott's evening habits — had been waiting for the past half-hour in that doorway hoping that Mr. Westmacott would not depart this evening from his usual
custom. Another thing that Mr. Westmacott was not to know — considering his youth — was the singular histrionic ability which this old rake had displayed in those younger days of his
when he had been a player, and the further circumstance that he had excelled in those parts in which ebriety was to be counterfeited. Indeed, we have it on the word of no less an authority on
theatrical matters than Mr. Pepys that Mr. Nicholas Trenchard's appearance as Pistol in "Henry IV" in the year of the blessed Restoration was the talk alike of town and court.

Mr. Trenchard steadied himself from the impact, and, swearing a round and awful Elizabethan oath, accused the other of being drunk, then struck an attitude to demand with truculence, "Would ye
take the wall o' me, sir?"

Richard hastened to make himself known to this turbulent roysterer, who straightway forgot his grievance to take Westmacott affectionately by the hand and overwhelm him with apologies. And that
done, Trenchard — who affected the condition known as maudlin drunk — must needs protest almost in tears how profound was his love for Richard, and insist that the boy return with him
to the Bell Inn, that they might pledge each other.

Richard, himself sober, was contemptuous of Trenchard so obviously obfuscated. At first it was his impulse to excuse himself, as possibly Blake might be already waiting for him; but on second
thoughts, remembering that Trenchard was Mr. Wilding's most intimate
famulus
, it occurred to him that by a little crafty questioning he might succeed in smoking Mr. Wilding's intentions in
the matter of that letter — for from his sister he had failed to get satisfaction.

So he permitted himself to be led indoors to a table by the window which stood vacant. There were at the time a dozen guests or so in the common-room. Trenchard bawled for wine and brandy, and
for all that he babbled in an irresponsible, foolish manner of all things that were of no matter, yet not the most adroit of pumping could elicit from him any such information as Richard sought.
Perforce young Westmacott must remain, plying him with more and more drink — and being plied in his turn — to the end that he might not waste the occasion.

An hour later found Richard much the worse for wear, and Trenchard certainly no better. Richard forgot his purpose, forgot that Blake waited for him at the Saracen's Head. And now Trenchard
seemed to be pulling himself together.

"I want to talk to you, Richard," said he, and although thick, there was in his voice a certain impressive quality that had been absent hitherto. "'S a rumour current." He lowered his voice to a
whisper almost, and, leaning across, took his companion by the arm. He hiccoughed noisily, then began again. "'S a rumour current, sweetheart, that you're disaffected."