Casual Entertainments

34

Casual Entertainments

    “Regardez le bois,” said Gaetana dully.

    “Le bois?” returned Miss Charleson dubiously.

    “Oh, bother!” said Gaetana, giving up on the attempt to converse properly in French, after all it was not today a French afternoon, it was a driving-out afternoon! “See that little wood? There are wild mushrooms in it, which I very well could be gathering, were I not clad in this good pelisse!”

    They had reached the fork in the road which would allow them to proceed variously to Dittersford, Lower Dittersford, or on to the gates of Daynesford Place and thence, eventually, Ditterminster. Muzzie looked at the edge of the little wood, and gulped.

    “But dear Gaetana, is—is not that all Daynesford land?” she quavered.

    “What if it is? No-one from the Place ever comes along here to gather the cèpes! And I dare say,” she said, scowling, “there is not even anyone at the house who so much as knows what they are!”

    “N-no: very like. But it would not be suitable, in that pelisse,” she said earnestly.

    Gaetana sighed. “No. Very well, where to now?”

    “Could it be Dittersford?”

    “But you said yourself you have not a penny in your purse, Muzzie.”

    “I could look,” said Muzzie wistfully.

    “Very well, if you wish to look at brass shoe-buckles and rusting pins, who am I to object?” said Gaetana, turning the dog-cart.

    The rotund Simpkins himself appeared on the forecourt of the village inn as they descended from the dog-cart, beaming all over his rubicund face. “Miss Ainsley! Well, this do be a treat! –Jem, lad, get that cart: be you blind as well as witless? Now, you come along into the parlour, Miss Ainsley!”

    “I would just as soon sit in the tap, Simpkins,” replied Miss Ainsley, straight-faced.

    Shaking with chuckles, the fat innkeeper assured her she was a one, and what would Madam Bert have to say if it got to her ears as he had let Miss Ainsley sit in the common tap? He bowed the girls into a minute parlour, which was entirely stuffy, its one small window looking as if it had never been opened in the last two hundred years, and shouted loudly for one, Abby. When Abby appeared, very red as to the face and very grimy as to the apron, she revealed herself to be a girl of no more than twelve years of age.

    “Light up the fire, girl!” he said cheerfully.

    “The fire, Master?” she gasped.

    “Aye, the fire: you ain’t deaf, as I believe?” he said jovially.

    “But Mr Simpkins, Old Mistress won’t never let us have a fire in the parlour, not before two weeks is passed after Old Nick’s Night!” she gasped.

    “That’s my old mother, young ladies, she’s a-gettin’ on, like, and do stick to the customs of her girlhood,” the innkeeper explained. “Where’s your wits, Abby, me dear, such customs won’t do for young ladies! Now, you light up this ’ere fire, there’s a good girl! And I’ll make it straight with Old Mistress, never you fear!”

    “Two weeks are very nearly passed after Old Nick’s Night,” said Gaetana without a tremor.

    “Yes,” agreed Muzzie, swallowing.

    “Aye, well, that be very true!” said Simpkins on a pleased note.

    “Master, she will be right-down frumious!” said Abby tearfully, though kneeling to the fire.

    “You’ll excuse her, young ladies, for she ain’t naught but an ignorant country lass: she do be meaning furious, like,” he said. “I’ll speak to Old Mistress, Abby. Now, young ladies, I’ll fetch you some fresh buttermilk, which I dessay may be more to your tastes than ale, eh?” he said, smiling all over his round, red face. “I’ll be back direct!” He bowed himself out, beaming.

    “Gaetana, I really hate buttermilk!” hissed Muzzie.

    “I must say I am not fond of it, either. However, it will not do to refuse.”

    “No,” she said sadly.

    “It do be fresh,” said Abby helpfully, blowing on her fire. “That do make the difference, young ladies. Acos when it’s sour, it ain’t near so good.”

    “Good,” said Gaetana, frowning warningly at Muzzie. “Have you worked here a long time, Abby?”

    Abby rose, wiping her grubby hand across her nose. “I has allus worked here, Miss. –Miss Ainsley, I should say!” she added quickly, essaying a sort of bob.

    There was a puzzled silence.

    Finally Muzzie said: “Yes, of course. But how old were you when you came to work for Mr Simpkins, Abby?”

    Abby looked vague. “Dunno.”

    “Have you always lived here, then?” ventured Gaetana, now envisaging all sorts of things, most of which she would not have cared to voice in front of Muzzie.

    Abby scratched her head. “When Ma was alive, we didn’t live ’ere”“

    “Oh!” cried the sympathetic Muzzie. “So you are an orphan, then?”

    “No!” she said crossly. “Vicar, he says that I has to be a orphan, only Master, he says as it ain’t no such thing, and I got a home here!”

    Gaetana swallowed. “Of course. But your parents are both dead, I think is what Miss Charleson means.”

    “Oh, aye. Both on ’em,” she said indifferently.

    Muzzie looked uncertainly at Gaetana but before either of them could say a word, a terrific rumpus arose upstairs: a noise of screeching and shouting, and much thumping on the ceiling over their heads.

    “Old Mistress! I knowed as she’d be frumious!” gasped Abby in horror.

    “What is she thumping the floor with?” asked Gaetana with interest.

    “That be her stick, Miss. She’ll use it when she wants me. I hears it quite clear from the kitchen or the tap, whichever. Only now she’s a-doin’ it acos she’s frumious. Acos Master’s gone and ordered this ’ere fire lit!”

    “Gaetana, perhaps we should go,” faltered Muzzie.

    “On the contrary, I feel our presence here will sustain Simpkins in his stance!” she choked.—Muzzle gulped.—“Is your Old Mistress bedridden, then?” Gaetana inquired of Abby.

    “That she be, thank the Lord!” she said, shuddering. “Only somehow she do got ’er eye upon everything we does, all the same!”

    “So it seems,” agreed Gaetana, as there was a final screech of rage from upstairs, and a rending crash. Then silence.

    “It would appear that old Mrs Simpkins and Great-Uncle Hildebrand Maddern are of the same mind as regards the uses of bedroom china!” choked Gaetana.

    Muzzie turned puce: Hildy’s story had seemed to her indelicate in the extreme. “Yes!” she gasped.

    After a few moments Simpkins appeared with a jug and two glasses, beaming. The girls duly drank buttermilk in the stuffy little parlour. Gaetana, to Muzzie’s embarrassment, retained the tavern-keeper for some time, asking after his health and his business, and incidentally how long Abby had been with him—since she were a babe not three year old, and the girl was a bit simple-like, begging your pardon, Miss Ainsley, Miss—but finally there was a loud shout of “TAP!” and he exited, beaming and bowing.

    “I do not suppose we could pour the rest away?” murmured Muzzie.

    “Not unless you are game to pour it on poor little Abby’s fire?”

    Muzzie shook her head.

    “I wonder if Berthe knows about her?” murmured Gaetana.

    “About whom, dear Gaetana?”

    Gaetana jumped. “Oh—nothing. Drink up, Muzzie, we had best get back, did not Eric say he would meet you this afternoon?”

    “Yes, in his curricle. On his way back from Ditterminster. And he would not take me!” she ended, pouting.

    Gaetana had already been exposed to this grudge. “No, well, brothers are very often like that.”

    Muzzie pouted and raised her glass to her lips.

    From outside there came a shout: “OY! SIMPKINS! Where the Devil are you, fellow?” in accents which were certainly not those of a country bumpkin.

    “Oh!” she gasped, glass suspended six inches from her lips. “It is a gentleman: what shall we do?”

    Gaetana’s mouth thinned. “It is not a gentleman at all, it is Lord Rockingham, and we shall not do anything, Muzzie,” she said grimly. “We have a perfect right to be here drinking Simpkins’s excellent buttermilk,”—on the strength of it she gulped the last of her portion down—“for England is, or so certain persons would maintain, a free country.”

    “But it is so unsuitable!” she gasped.

    “Rubbish,” said Gaetana, frowning.

    Muzzle’s glass remained suspended. She looked at her plaintively.

    “Drink it!” said Gaetana crossly.

    “Oh!” she gasped, jumping. “Yes, of course!” She began to finish her buttermilk.

   There came another shout of “OY! SIMPKINS!” from outside, then the sound of hasty footsteps in the little passage, and Rockingham appeared in the parlour doorway. “What the Devil—?”

    “Good afternoon, Lord Rockingham,” said Gaetana grimly.

    Muzzie was incapable of speech, but she gave a wobbly curtsey, buttermilk and all.

    “Good afternoon,” he said. “You have a moustache, Miss Ainsley,” he added by the by.—Muzzie gasped.—“Where the Devil is that fat old scoundrel, Simpkins?”

    “He is not a scoundrel, he is a respectable man. And if he is not in the taproom, I would surmise he might be in his cellar. For if he had gone upstairs to his old mother, I think we would be hearing the subsequent ruckus, do not you, Muzzie?”

    “Yes,” she whispered.

    The Marquis gave her a casual glance. “Oh, aye: it’s Miss Charleson, ain’t it? How is that brother of yours? You may tell him,” he said without waiting for an answer, “that there are still a fair few rabbits over on the part of my lands which march with the Manor, that he may care to have a go at, some time. Tell him to come up to the house and take pot-luck, after, if he cares to.”

    “Oh, of course he will care to!” said Gaetana in tones of immense scorn.

    “He will be very grateful, my Lord,” quavered Miss Charleson.

    He ignored this and said to Gaetana: “Dare say he may care to, yes. So what?”

    “Care to come up to that hideous great mansion of yours in order to take what you so gracefully refer to as ‘pot-luck’?” She gave a scornful laugh.

    Rockingham stared at her. “Has all that milk turned your brain, my girl?”

    “No, but very possibly your habit of dropping into village taverns in order to consume their unspeakable ale and fouler cider has turned yours, if you cannot see that Mr Charleson is a well-brought-up young gentleman who would not dream of turning up unannounced at Daynesford Place,” she said pointedly, “and demanding a meal.”

    “What do you mean, ‘Daynesford Place’, in those tones? –And I don’t have a habit of dropping into taverns in order to drink myself silly, my horse has gone lame.”

    “Ah! And needs to be revived with ale and cider!” she said cordially. “Or possibly you merely mean to bathe the hoof in it?”

    “That’ll be enough out of you, my girl,” he said, grinning. “And you still have that moustache, by the by.”

    He tossed her his handkerchief. Gaetana automatically put her hands up to catch it, then glared when she found herself holding it. Rockingham strolled over to the doorway, leaned his broad shoulders against the jamb, and bellowed: “SIMPKINS!”

    “It is only a very little moustache,” whispered Muzzie.

    Gaetana jumped, turned very red, and scrubbed furiously at her mouth.

   Rockingham was lounging in the doorway, pretending not to notice this byplay, though his wide mouth quivered a little.

    “Have I?” hissed Muzzie.

    “What? No!” said Gaetana crossly.

    “SIMPKINS!” shouted the Marquis. “Oh, there you are, you old devil,” he said, as the man appeared, panting and beaming and bowing all at once, in immense gratification. “Where have you been?”

    “Down cellar, me Lord! Bringing up another barrel, like!”

    “Good, you may broach it for me, in that case. Though I do not guarantee to drink myself silly on it.”

    “No, me Lord,” said the tavern-keeper foggily. “Um—” He glanced at the young ladies uncertainly. “Was your Lordship wishful to drink it in here?”

    “Won’t shock you to death, will it, seeing me drink me pint of ale?” he said, grinning, to the two girls.

    Muzzie gulped.

    “No, but on the other hand it is a sight we have no particular urge to witness, either!” said Gaetana smartly.

    “Missy Gaetana!” hissed the tavern-keeper.

    “I know, Simpkins,” she said heavily: “it do be his Lordship as I’m a-speaking to.”

    Muzzie gulped again.

    “Aye, well,” said the man uncertainly, rubbing his hands nervously on his apron, “that do be correct, Miss.”

    Rockingham frowned at Gaetana and she went very red and bit her lip. “I beg your pardon, Simpkins,” she said stiffly. “I was annoyed with Lord Rockingham, not with you.”

    “Uh—yes, Miss Ainsley!” he gasped, now quite bewildered.

    Rockingham smiled at him. “I have put Miss Ainsley’s back up by mentioning the small fact of a milk moustache on her upper lip. –Which she has now removed,” he added, eyes crinkling in amusement as the fat innkeeper goggled at Miss Ainsley’s upper lip. He put his hand on the man’s shoulder. “I think I would prefer to take my pint in the tap.”

    “Aye: there’s only Grandpa Adams and that witless Jim Pringle in there, me Lord.”

    “Splendid,” said Rockingham unemotionally, steering him out.

    “Oh!” cried Gaetana when their backs had disappeared, stamping her foot. “He is unbearable! Why must he always have the last word?”

    “He—he was not so very bad,” faltered Muzzie.

    “He was insufferable!” she cried.

    Muzzie gulped. “Wuh-well... I suppose you did have a little moustache, dear Gaetana. Though perhaps he should not have mentioned it. But—but he is an older gentleman.”

    Gaetana was already very flushed but ask this she went even redder, swung over to the little window, and glared out of it with her back to the girl.

    After a few moments Muzzle ventured in a timid voice: “I have drunk up my buttermilk.”

    “What? Oh.” Gaetana turned round. “Perhaps we had better go, then.”

    “Yes,” agreed Muzzie thankfully.

    They went out into the little yard and immediately Simpkins came bustling out and himself fetched the dog-cart and removed the nose-bag from Dandy’s face. “Just a few oats, like,” he explained, beaming. Gaetana concealed a wince at the thought of Ned Adams’s reaction to one of the Manor’s horses being thought in need of sustenance by the village tavern-keeper, and mounted nimbly before he could assist her. Muzzie, however, gratefully accepted his help to get up beside her.

    They were thanking him for the buttermilk when there was a shout of “OY!” from the taproom, and the Marquis hurried out. “You may take me up to the Manor: I’ll borrow one of your brother’s nags,” he informed Gaetana.

    “Your Lordship could take my cart,” ventured Simpkins.

    “What, all the way to the Place? You wouldn’t get it back before dark. No, I won’t deprive you of it, Simpkins, the young ladies may carry me as far as the Manor,” he said, hopping up into the dog-cart. “You had best keep the mare overnight: I’ll send a man for her tomorrow!” he added cheerfully. “—Drive on, my girl, what are you waiting for?”

    “Lord Rockingham,” said Gaetana between her teeth, “if you dare to address me once more as ‘my girl’, I swear I will turn around and strike you with this whip.”

    Muzzie gasped.

    “Eh?” he said. “Did I? I was not aware that I was doing so.”

    Gaetana took a deep breath.

    “Very well, Miss Ainsley, I apologize. Do drive on, there’s a good g— There’s an obliging young lady!” he corrected himself with a definite laugh in his voice. “I would quite like to see my home before sundown.”

    Gaetana took another deep breath, called grimly: “Good-bye, Simpkins!” and drove off at a spanking pace. Perhaps it was as well Dandy had had those oats.

    They were halfway between the fork in the road and the Manor gates when Lord Rockingham, who was facing back the way they had come, noted with a smothered chuckle: “Here comes a vehicle. Perhaps you had best draw in well to the side. Being fully mindful of the ditch, of course!”

    Gaetana ground her teeth and did not draw in, or slow down.

    Muzzie looked nervously over her shoulder. “Oh—it’s Eric!” she said in some relief. Not a word had been spoken on the journey except by herself. And when she had ventured as they passed the fork: “I believe there are wild mushrooms in your woods, sir,” Lord Rockingham had only said: “Eh?” and Gaetana had snorted.

    “In that case,” said Gaetana, “he may take you up straight away, it will save his coming up to the house.”

    She drew up, and the exchange was duly effected. The Marquis did not neglect to remind Mr Charleson of his rabbits, nor of the fact that he could come up to the house to take pot-luck. Eric was duly grateful for the first offer and quite overcome by the second.

    His Lordship then transferred himself to the seat beside Gaetana, remarking that he hated to ride with his back to the horses.

    “What the Devil are you doing, jaunting round the countryside with that dim-witted brat?” he said, as the curricle drove on.

    “She is spending some time with me, and some with Hildy,” replied Gaetana grimly, whipping up Dandy.

    “Well, don’t take it out on the nag!” he said with a laugh.

    “What? Oh.”

    “Dare I ask why you and Hildy have apparently volunteered to lumber yourselves with her? Or should that be self-evident to a well-brought-up gentleman?” he added slyly.

    Gaetana bit her lip. “Very likely. Um—well, she is very lonely and her mamma has apparently taken to her bed, and—well, there is no-one else,” she ended glumly. “And she cried all over Hildy.”

    “I see,” he said with a smile. “Er—Lady Charleson ain’t seriously ill, is she?”

    “No. It is a severe case of the sulks. And I cannot discuss it with you, sir,” she said, taking a deep breath.”

    “Here, that fubsy little dame they’ve got chaperoning you ain’t teaching you to be Missish, is she?” he asked in alarm.

    “What? No!” she said in indignation. “And dear Cousin Sophia is not fubsy—whatever that means—and—and she is not teaching me any such thing!”

    “No, well: don’t look as if she’d be capable of making a mouse mind her, let alone an Ainsley,” he noted comfortably. “So what is the cause of the Charleson woman’s sulks?”

    Gaetana was obscurely pleased at hearing him refer thus to their elegant neighbour and instead of withering him, replied: “Um—well, we gather she has been—been disappointed in her hopes, sir.”

    “Of young Amory, or of Ned Jubb?” he replied drily.

    Gaetana gulped.

    “Well?”

    “How on earth did you— No, well, I suppose you are not blind,” she said weakly. “Um—well, directly, of Sir Edward. I think you were present when Muzzie told us of the note he had writ to her mamma?”

    The Marquis sniggered.

    “Yes,” said Gaetana limply. “She took to her bed forthwith and Muzzie says has not been out of it since.”

    Rockingham grinned. “Aye, well, there are no flies on him: she was a fool if she believed there were. And I gather Amory has gone off home? Well,” he said, as Gaetana nodded, “she’s too old for him. And though he might fancy her, he ain’t blind.”

    “Yes,” she said weakly. “I mean no.”

    The Marquis looked at her sideways. “One theory was he had originally come into the country in pursuit of you, Miss Ainsley.”

    “No!” she gasped.

    “No?”

    Gaetana swallowed. “If—if there was, I very speedily disabused him.”

    “That would explain why he was pretty speedily paying court to the Charleson woman, then,” he said thoughtfully.

    She bit her lip. “Um—I suppose so.”

    Suddenly Rockingham put his hand on her knee and squeezed it hard. “I’m glad,” he said simply.

    Gaetana’s eyes filled abruptly, but she just drove on blindly.

    As they passed the Manor gates he reached over and took the reins from her.

    “What—?” she gasped.

    “You have confused the nag, he thought he was heading back to his stable,” he explained, turning the cart.

    Gaetana went very red and bit her lip.

   The Marquis drove on gently up the drive. “What is all this rubbish little Miss Charleson was spouting about wild mushrooms in my woods?” he said.

    “What? Oh! Um…There are des cèpes—Hildy says I am not to call them toadstools, and I do not think there is another English word—in the young woods near the crossroad, sir.”

    “Then why don’t you pick ’em?” he said mildly.

    Gaetana gulped. “They are not mine to pick, Lord Rockingham.”

    “I am offering them, Miss Ainsley.”

    “Oh. Thank you,” she said in a tiny voice.

    They jogged on gently. “I dare say Ned Adams will provide you with a horse, if Paul is still out,” she said.

    “I dare say he will. Miss Ainsley, will you marry me?” he said without the slightest change of tone.

    “What?” she gasped. “No!”

    “Why not?” he said mildly.

    Gaetana gulped. “You cannot be serious!”

    “Of course I am serious. There’s a deal of worldly goods involved, you know: I would hardly offer to endow you with ’em frivolously.”

    “That is not funny! In fact it is in the worst possible taste!” she said furiously.

    “It was not intended to be funny. –Well?” he said.

    She swallowed. “You must know I cannot,” she whispered.

    “I know you had some ridiculous notion in your head that the fancied blots upon your family escutcheon would make such a match ineligible,” he said calmly. “Is it still that?”

    “Of course,” she said faintly.

    The Marquis hesitated. “I myself do not repel you, then?”

    “What? No!” she gasped, staring up at him in patent amazement.

    “Well, that is good,” he said thoughtfully; “for a man would not care to be thought an antidote, y’know.”

    “An anti— Lord Rockingham, you—you are not being serious, and—and I think we had best forget this conversation ever took place!” said Gaetana in a shaking voice.

    Suddenly the Marquis pulled up. “Look— Stand still, you brute!” he said crossly to poor Dandy, who with his stable almost in sight could not imagine why they had stopped. “Look, Gaetana,” he said, staring hard into her eyes: “if I was Mr Brown of nowhere-in-particular, and you were Miss Smith of somewhere else nowhere in particular, would you?”

    Gaetana gulped.

    “Would you?”

    Her hands twisted together in her lap. Finally she said: “I think so.”

    “You think so,” he said limply. “Well, I suppose that is a step in the right direction!”

    Gaetana was silent.

    “Is it my age?” he said harshly.

    “Um—well... partly, I suppose... Lord Rockingham, the whole thing is impossible, please do not—”

    His hand closed very hard over both of hers. “Well, that is two counts against me, my position and my age. Anything else?”

    Tears sparkled in Gaetana’s eyes: she looked up at him and said crossly: “Very well, if you are determined to have it. Sometimes I am afraid of you, sir! I do not know that I— Well, in any case it does not arise,” she finished weakly.

    “Afraid of me?” he said, brows drawing together in a ferocious scowl.

    “Well, yes. If you could see yourself at this moment—!”

    “I did not fancy you were afraid of anything that lived or breathed, Miss Ainsley,” he said slowly.

    Gaetana swallowed. “I suppose I am afraid of—of being bullied.”

    “Bullied?” he echoed weakly.

    “I know it sounds Missish,” she said limply. “It is not you in particular, sir, so much; it—it…”

    “Well?” he said, staring at her in astonishment.

    “I have been thinking about it a lot lately, I suppose, with Miss Charleson prattling on forever about Major Grey, who is quite some years her elder... Um, well,” she said, blushing, “it is just that the thought of being shut up in a man’s house with him at—at his mercy, sometimes makes me afraid. There!” she finished, gulping. “I said it was Missish.”

    Rockingham had to swallow. “You have a mighty odd picture of married life, Miss Ainsley.”

    “Sí. No doubt,” she said dully.

    “I would give you anything your heart desires, surely you realize that?” he said in a low, urgent voice.

    Gaetana’s mouth trembled into a little smile. “We fight like cat and dog as it is, Lord Rockingham. Surely you don’t imagine that would magically cease?”

    “You may fight me. I do not fight you,” he said stiffly, releasing her hands and frowning ahead of him.

    “You contradict me unmercifully and do your best to bully me and impose your will upon me—and in fact,” said Gaetana with a mad little laugh, “you are doing your best to do so now!”

    He did not react and she said desperately: “Please may we go home?”

    Rockingham’s hands trembled. “I—I am not bullying you, Miss Ainsley. When a man offers everything he has, surely he may—may justifiably be expected to fight a little to have his offer accepted?”

    “Um—yes,” said Gaetana, swallowing. “Only it—it is not to be thought of, I have explained, and—and—”

    “And?”

    “Nothing,” she said, with tears in her eyes. “Please may we go?”

    “Just answer me this,” he said slowly. “—Get up, you brute!—Would all those things you have mentioned: the—the defects in my character, be insuperable, if we were equal in your mind?”

    A tear slid down Gaetana’s cheek. “I don’t know. I like you more than any other gentleman,” she said, very faintly.

    The Marquis’s heart gave a great leap. “I love you, Gaetana,” he said steadily.

    More tears slid down Gaetana’s cheeks. “Don’t,” she whispered.

    “I am not giving up. –Has no-one ever told you,” he said more lightly, “that the Hammond motto is ‘Hold fast’?”

    “I thought it was ‘Danes may come and Danes may go, but Hammonds will bide at Daynesford?” she said in a confused voice.

    Rockingham smiled. “That is just a country saying, but I am very glad you have bothered to retain it. No, but it indicates the tenacity of the breed, does it not? We hold fast to what we have, and we hold to our purpose.”

    Gaetana sniffed dolorously. “Sí.” She felt in her pocket and produced a large handkerchief, which she looked at in surprize.

    “That is mine, I think,” he said with a twinkle. “Was the milk nice?”

    “What? No, it was buttermilk, and I do not particularly care for it.” Gaetana blew her nose and looked at him in some bewilderment. He did not seem disturbed at all.

    “Should you like to run in the back way?” he said kindly.

    She nodded without speaking, and the Marquis drove the dog-cart round to the stables.

    Ned Adams immediately emerged into the yard, looking surprized. “Good-day, my Lord.”

    Rockingham chucked him the reins and jumped down. “Come!” he said, holding out his hands to Gaetana.

    “I can get down, thank you,” she said, avoiding his eye.

    “There, you are fighting me again,” he noted mildly.

    Gaetana opened her mouth to contradict this, flushed, and shut it again. She stretched out her hands. Instead of taking them, he stepped up, put his hands on her waist, and swung her lightly down.

    “Aye, sack of feathers, you be to his Lordship, Miss,” said Ned Adams in a thoughtful voice.

    Very flushed, Gaetana rushed into the house without saying anything.

    The Marquis and Ned Adams eyed each other thoughtfully.

    Finally Rockingham said: “Ned, supposing I had offered your young mistress some sort of an insult, what would your reaction be?”

    “I would knock you down where you stands, your Lordship,” the man replied, surprized but grim.

    “Aye, you are a damned good fellow!” he said with a laugh, clapping him on the shoulder. “—You mean you would try,” he noted.

    Ned Adams grinned sheepishly.

    “And if I ask you not to mention to anyone that she has been crying, you—er—”

    “I won’t breathe a word, me Lord! Nor take it the wrong way,” he added cheerfully.

    “Er—no. Now, can you find me a horse?”

    Ned Adams duly bustled around and provided his Lordship with a horse. But though he did not breathe a word to a member of the household of the odd scene he had witnessed, he most certainly recounted it fully to his Martha that evening over a tasty rabbit pie. Adding jovially that if that nodcock of a Deering went and offered him five to one against his Lordship again, he would take it. For anyone with eyes in their heads could see as he meant to have her in the end!

    Gaetana herself, by the time she had had a good cry in the privacy of her bedchamber, was not sure, either, on thinking it over, that the Marquis did not mean to have her in the end. And was filled at the thought with a strange, trembling sensation that she denied angrily to herself she was feeling at all. And of which she did not breathe a word to Hildy. She was, of course, still determined not to let Giles Hammond make a fool of himself by contracting an engagement with a spy’s daughter. But now, she could not help wondering—though she did not mention this to Hildy, either—just what he meant to do to persuade her otherwise.

    Her brother, therefore, was very gratified to find that his casual announcement that he had thought he might as well ask Giles over for the night the Major was coming was received only by a small: “Oh.” And not by the impassioned diatribe that he had rather expected.

    Major Kernohan, though he had some idea of where Ainsley Manor was situate, was not well acquainted with the district, and on arriving at the house was a trifle taken aback by its size and style. As also by Deering’s. And in fact wondered uneasily if perhaps Mr Ainsley’s assurance that they were not dressing for dinner at present had been entirely on his account. He did not register the immensely benign manner of the butler, nor indeed the faint scratches upon the highly polished hall floor which indicated that Miss Hildegarde’s story about the pines had not been apocryphal, but followed him silently, wishing that he had not come.

    The butler showed him into a small, cosy, panelled room, which was occupied by Mr Paul Ainsley, a burly man with dark red hair silvering at the temples who bore a considerable resemblance to Miss Hildegarde Maddern, and a second burly man with very black hair and a chin that in spite of its evident recent shave looked as if it would be as blue as the Major’s own, were they both in their natural state. Mr Ainsley was not in evening dress but in fawn pantaloons and a brown coat, and the two older men were in buckskins, boots and riding coats. As the latter was the Major’s garb also, he experienced considerable relief at the sight of them. He was a trifle taken aback when the dark man, who was the more carelessly dressed of the two, with a very casually knotted neckcloth, stretched out a hand to him with a smile and he saw there was a huge carved emerald ring on one of his fingers.

    “This is our neighbour, Lord Rockingham,” said Paul with a twinkle in his eye, as the Major held out his left hand and opened his mouth to make his usual excuses for it.

    “Don’t apologize, heard all about it,” said the Marquis briskly. “Saw your uncle in town only t’other week.”

    “How do you do, my Lord?” replied Aurry weakly. “My Uncle Francis, was this?”

    “Yes. Welcome to the district, Major. Good to hear you’re putting Beaubois in order, place has been let go shockingly.”

    “Er—yes. Thank you, sir,” said Aurry limply.

    “And this is my agent, Jake Pringle,” said Paul with a smile, drawing the other man forward.

   Major Kernohan again shook hands. Feeling limper than ever: he would have sworn the man was an uncle or some such. That dark auburn was so exactly—

    “I beg your pardon, sir?” he said to Rockingham, flushing a little.

    “I said, supposing you were in want of an agent, Pringle here has a brother we would be quite glad to see find a decent place; he has been working in my estate office: knows a fair bit about the business.”

    “I see. Well, yes, I am looking for a reliable man; I would be most happy to have a talk with him.”

    “You must not feel,” said Paul with his nice smile, laying a hand very gently upon Aurry’s good shoulder, “that we are jockeying you into it, Major. I fear Giles can sometimes give that impression. With the best of motives, of course!”

    The Major opened his mouth to make a disclaimer.

    “Which does not, unfortunately, lessen the impact of it on the uninitiate,” said a cold soprano with the slightest hint of an accent from behind them.

    Aurry jumped, swung round, and then frankly gaped.

    “¡Sí, sí! She is so very like Hildy, you would swear they were sisters!” said Paul with a little laugh. “But Gaetana is actually my sister, and Hildy’s second cousin, of course. Querida, this is Major Kernohan, and I very much hope you have not shocked him!”

    “How do you do, Major Kernohan?” said Gaetana politely. “I’m very glad to meet you. And if my brother trusts I have not shocked you, well, I trust Lord Rockingham has not jockeyed you into agreeing to something you don’t wish for!”

    “Aye, that or bullied,” said the Marquis drily.

    The astute Major Kernohan perceived immediately there was something between the two, and felt on the one hand a little shocked, for the man was old enough to be her father, and on the other hand just the tiniest bit relieved, for if the Marquis was interested in Miss Ainsley he could not be interested in anyone else; and then, there was a considerable age difference also between himself and—and someone else. Ridiculous though that thought was.

    “How do you do, Miss Ainsley?” he said, bowing. And added, now having recovered almost completely from his surprize: “And rest assured I am not shocked on the one hand, nor jockeyed on the other. Lord Rockingham was suggesting I might like to consider Mr Pringle’s brother for the position of agent. Of which, I am sorry to say, the Beaubois land is very sorely in need!”

    “I see,” said Gaetana with a smile—though inwardly she was thinking with considerable surprize what a sad sort of face it was, and how very unlike Sir Ned’s hearty good looks or Hilary Parkinson’s beauty, and how altogether surprizing it was in Hildy to have fallen for this saturnine, sad-looking man. “Well, I am sure you could not go past Michael Pringle: he is an excellent man!”

    “Aye. Though we,” said the agent with a slow smile, which made him look astoundingly like his master, “are not partial, of course.”

    “Of course!” said Gaetana, laughing, and looking at him with great affection.

    Aurry by this time had decided there must be a relationship and as they had none of them mentioned it, it must be a relationship on the wrong side of the blanket. Yes, definitely, the man was more than a servant of the family, he thought, as Jake Pringle then grinned and drew forward a chair to the fire and, addressing his young mistress sans façon by her first name, invited her to be seated.

    Paul then showed the Major to a chair and decided with a glance at the clock on the mantel that they might have a glass of something without waiting for the others.

    “Good,” said the Marquis of Rockingham simply.

    “Luís fell in the stream this afternoon and is changing his dress,” explained Gaetana, smiling.

    “Aye: took a toss,” agreed Jake Pringle unemotionally. “I warned him Hildy’s Blue Moon won’t take a water jump, no matter who is up on him, but he had to prove it for himself!” He chuckled.

    “Won’t take a water jump? I trust Miss Hildegarde does not hunt on him, then?” said the Major.

    “No, he is her riding horse. Hildy doesn’t hunt,” said Gaetana, smiling at him. “Has she not mentioned it to you?”

    “Er—no,” he said, a trifle awkwardly.

    “Has an aversion to killing things,” explained the Marquis. “Even foxes.”

    “Especially foxes, my Lord,” corrected the agent solemnly.

    “Aye!” he choked, banging him on the back—the two of them had continued to lounge near the fire as the others had seated themselves—“especially foxes!”

    “Well, she sees the hunting of game as justified, because we eat the result,” explained Gaetana seriously.

    At this point it dawned forcibly on Major Kernohan what the precise explanation for Mr Luís Ainsley’s strange question on his attitude to the slaughtering of game must be. He found himself wishing again that he had not come.

    “We do if Luís ain’t blasted it into Kingdom Come!” gasped Jake. He and the Marquis went into a paroxysm of sniggers.

    “My brother is a trifle over-eager. He gave an unfortunate duck both barrels only yester morning,” explained Paul. The butler came in with a tray at this moment and he added: “Yes, thank you, Deering, you may leave it. And would you tell Mr Luís to get out of his bath?”

    The butler replied, unmoved: “He is out of it, Mr Ainsley, but it is believed the neckcloth is giving him a little trouble.”

    “Well, tell him our guests are all come, would you, Deering?”

    Still unmoved, the man bowed and withdrew.

    “I’ll go up and give him a little more trouble, if you like, Paul,” offered Jake, grinning.

    “Here, that was going to be my line!” cried the Marquis. They both collapsed in sniggers again.

    “Stop it, you are both being silly,” said Miss Ainsley, smiling at them. “They are in high spirits because they both witnessed Luís go over Blue Moon’s head, Major Kernohan,” she explained. “Hildy maintains it is a demonstration of the innate cruelty of the human spirit, which enjoys laughter at others’ pain.” She gave him a guileless look.

    The Major glanced in some horror at the Marquis of Rockingham, but his Lordship only gasped: “Aye! Luís’s and the foxes’ both!”—and went into a wheezing fit.

    “Would you not say so, Major?” added Miss Ainsley, now looking impossibly prim.

    “Miss Ainsley,” said Aurry frankly: “believe me, I would not even attempt to discuss such a matter with a member of your family!”

    “Major Kernohan,” said Paul, holding out his tray: “allow me to apologize for the company you find yourself in this evening. Would you care for a glass?”

    “Thank you. This is sherry, is it?”

    “Oh—yes; I’m sorry!” said Paul with a little laugh. “They are two varieties my father sent for us to try. The very pale one is impossibly dry, it may not be to your taste.”

    “And the very dark one is impossibly sweet,” said the Marquis.

    “I think it is lovely,” said Gaetana in surprize.

    “Yes, but then I’ve seen you drink that orgeat muck without turning a hair,” he said instantly.

    “Now, querida, you cannot deny that. Would you prefer something else, Major?”

    “There’s a Marsala his grandfather laid down which is not half bad,” noted Jake.

    “Not that stuff old Sir George had? M’grandfather used to talk of it,” said the Marquis. “And was there not a great port?”

    “Aye, well, it’s down there, sure enough,” he noted drily. “But as to whether he’ll let us get a sniff of it tonight—!”

    They chuckled.

    “Well, I hope he does not, for we do not need to have a houseful of drunken males to put to bed at the end of the evening!” said Gaetana severely.

    Aurry’s eyes met Paul’s and he smiled suddenly. “I should like to try the dry one, thank you, Mr Ainsley.”

    “How do you find it?” asked Paul, as he sipped.

    “Extraordinary,” admitted Aurry, smiling at him.

    “Have the sweet one instead,” said Gaetana anxiously.

    “No, I meant extraordinarily fine, Miss Ainsley!” he said with a laugh.

    The other men each took a glass but Miss Ainsley excused herself, and went out.

    Fresh glasses had been poured, and the gentlemen were discussing wines in a mildly comfortable sort of way, and the Major was beginning to wonder where the other members of the household were, when the door reopened.

    “I have told her,” said Miss Ainsley breathlessly, “that it is useless to go on calling him, if he is out on the tiles! Paul, please persuade her that it is pointless to worry!”

    Mr Ainsley, who was seated facing the door, got up hurriedly. “Hildy, dearest, you are not still worrying about Diablo?”

    “Yes,” she said in the little husky voice that Aurry Kernohan had thought he had forgotten, until he experienced that jolt in the chest. “What if a dog has got him, Paul?”

    The Marquis said quickly: “If this is that little black devil of yours, I doubt there is a dog in the county that could stand up to him!”

    “He will be out on the tiles, never fear, Hildy!” added Jake bracingly.

    Her lips quivered; she said: “Yes. Only he is so little.”

    “No, he ain’t, Hildy, dear, he’s a grown cat now,” said Jake firmly.

    “Yes, that is right, Hildy,” agreed the Marquis. “It’s natural for him to range. And all mothers must learn their boys cannot be tied to their apron strings!”

    —Major Kernohan at this point denied crossly to himself a feeling that he would like to run the pair of them through, for making so free with her pet name!

    “Indeed, querida: the young lads must have their freedom,” said Paul, taking her hand. “Come and sit by Major Kernohan.”

    “Good evening, Miss Hildegarde,” said Aurry, taking up his cue.

    Hildy went very red. “I’m sorry, Major Kernohan, I’m afraid I was rude: I have been so worried about my little cat, you see.” She held out her right hand in a vague gesture.

    “It is very understandable,” he said, taking it in his left and bowing over it.

    The Ainsleys here exchanged glances, which Major Kernohan, since they were directly in his line of sight, could not fail to notice. Perhaps it was as well for his peace of mind—or what was left of it—that he could not see that behind his back the Marquis of Rockingham and Jake Pringle were also exchanging glances.

    “We have not seen him since breakfast,” said Hildy. “He has never stayed away so long before.”

    “Well, cats are like that, you know. Especially young ones.”

    “But he is usually so punctual for his supper.”

    The Major perceived her friends and relatives were looking about as helpless as he felt. “Er—well, perhaps he is in the stable yard—or the loft?”

    “He was born there,” she said dubiously. “But Sam Potts looked for me, and swears he is not there. And I have been round the house, and called—”

    “Hildy, you haven’t been outside?” said Gaetana distressfully.

    “Yes, but I put a heavy cloak on.”

    “¡Querida, that was so silly! We know you love Diablo, but I am sure it is just that he—”

    “Nobody cares but me! And I am sure a dog has got him!” she cried, bursting into tears and rushing from the room.

    “Go after her, Gaetana, and whatever you do, stop her from going outside again,” said Paul grimly.

    “¡Sí!” agreed Gaetana, rushing out in Hildy’s wake.

    “Mr Ainsley, I don’t like to suggest it in another man’s house, but I think we had best institute a search for this animal,” said the Major.

    “Sí, I was about to suggest it myself,” agreed Paul. “The thing is, she has become—er—”

    “Obsessed with the damned brute,” said the Marquis. “You don’t need to wrap it up in clean linen, Paul.”

    “I think that is putting it a little too strongly, Giles. But she is certainly extremely attached to him. He seems to have taken the place, in an odd way, of—of all the persons she has loved and—and quite recently lost,” Paul finished uneasily, glancing at Major Kernohan.

    “Aye. And of that damned Mrs Spofford,” said Jake, draining his glass. “Well, I’ll get my coat.” He went out forthwith.

    “Mrs Spofford? A relative, Mr Ainsley?” said the Major.

    “No, the cat they have at her home. I do not know if you are aware of it, sir, but Hildy was very ill with the influenza at the end of last summer.”—The Major nodded silently.—“Sí. And then the plan was that she would go home and spend several weeks there, but in the event, she did not get to see very much of Mrs Spofford. Or, indeed, of her home. –I am afraid I am not making very much sense,” Paul finished weakly.

    “No, you are making extreme sense. My sister Vi was the same over a damned bird when our old nurse died. We had best all get out there and look for the brute. What does it look like?” he added by the by.

    “Black,” said the Marquis glumly. “Would be, on a night like this.”

    “Giles,” said Paul uncomfortably, “there is no need for you—or, indeed, Major, for you—”

    The Marquis clapped him on the back. “Rubbish, dear boy! Of course we must look for dear little Hildy’s cat! I’ll get my coat!” He strode out.

    Paul hesitated. “Has she spoken to you of Dr Rogers, Major?” he said.

    “Yes. Shall we go?” he said grimly.

    “Certainly,” said Paul, ushering him out immediately.

    Cousin Sophia came down ten minutes later to find Paul’s cosy study, which was the room they had all been using in the evenings, empty except for Gaetana and Hildy. Hildy was crouched on the rug in front of the fire, and Gaetana was crouched by her, patting her back.

    “My dearest girls, what is it?” she gasped.

    Gaetana looked up, and endeavoured to give her a warning look. “It is Diablo, Cousin Sophia: he has disappeared.”

    “Oh. But Hildy, dearest, don’t cry, cats are prone to wander, you know! Especially little toms!” she said, greatly daring. “And—and where are the gentlemen?” she quavered.

    “Out looking for him,” said Gaetana grimly.

    Cousin Sophia sat down, plump, in a large armchair. “Not—not the Marquis?” she said in a hollow voice.

    “Why should he not?” retorted Gaetana immediately.

    “But Gaetana—a gentleman of his consequence!” she gasped.

    “Pooh!” said Gaetana, scowling.

    Hildy blew her nose. “I feel so dreadful: they all went—I did not send them, Cousin Sophia,” she said, looking up and beginning to cry again: “they all just went!”

    “Not Luís. We must presume he is still in his bath,” noted his sister.

    Hildy blew her nose again. “It is not a funning matter.”

    “No, querida, I know,” she said, patting her back.

    “I am sure a dog has got him.”

    “Querida, he is a very cunning animal, who grew up in the stables: I think that is highly unlikely,” said Gaetana firmly.

    “Highly unlikely,” agreed Cousin Sophia, nodding firmly.

    Hildy blew her nose again.

    There was a short silence.

    “Hildy, you have not even changed your dress!” gasped Cousin Sophia.

    “What?” Hildy looked down dully at her grey stuff dress. “Oh. I forgot. Well, it is quite clean and respectable. And you said we were not to dress.”

    “No, but my love, at least a clean afternoon dress!” she quavered.

    “I meant to,” she said tearfully, “and then Diablo was lost and—and—”

    “Sí. Ssh, dearest,” said Gaetana, putting an arm round her. “I do not think our guests will mind. –Or even notice,” she added with a funny little smile that Hildy did not see.

    Silence again. From outside they could hear someone calling. And then what sounded like someone falling over something, and cursing freely. In a deep voice which was certainly not Paul’s, but there were plenty of other choices. Mrs Goodbody winced and closed her eyes.

    “If I put a heavy cloak on—” said Hildy at last.

    “No,” said Gaetana instantly.

    “No, my love, whatever would your mamma say? Why, Deering was saying that Higgs said it looks as if there will be a frost, tonight! And I am sure it feels like it!” said Cousin Sophia.

    Gaetana immediately built up the fire. It was very near, as of course the girls were on the hearthrug, but Mrs Goodbody looked at her very limply indeed as she did it.

    They waited.

    “That is not somebody on the roof, surely?” said Gaetana at last.

    Hildy scrambled up and ran to the window, peering up into the dark. “I think I can hear Luís—”

    “Dearest, don’t open that window!” cried Mrs Goodbody. “You will catch your death!”

    Too late, Hildy had opened the window.

    “Curse it!” shouted Luís’s voice. “Come HERE, you little devil!”

    “Luís, have you caught him?” cried Hildy, peering upwards.

    “Eh? No, I— He’s on the sill, dammit, he keeps edging— OW!” Luís broke into Spanish.

    “He is up there,” said Gaetana, putting her own shawl round Hildy’s shoulders. “But I don’t think he will come for Luís. Come away from the window, or you will come down with a chill.”

    Hildy whirled away from the window. “I’ll go up there!” she cried, and ran out of the room.

    The two ladies looked limply at each other.

    “Cousin Sophia,” said Gaetana at last in a very weak voice, “I think we had best send to tell the gentlemen to come in.”

    “Yes,” she faltered, ringing the bell. “Gaetana, I—I wonder how long he has been up there?”

    “I was wondering that,” she admitted, biting her lip.

    “We must nuh-not laugh in front of the gentlemen,” said Cousin Sophia on an uncertain note.

    “No!” she howled, abruptly going into a paroxysm of laughter, clutching her sides.

    Cousin Sophia began to giggle helplessly. “Stop it, Gaetana! Oh, dear!”

    When Deering came in they were still laughing helplessly. He retreated noiselessly and waited outside the door until the noise had abated. Then he went in as if nothing had happened.

    “Deering,” said Mrs Goodbody in a trembling voice: “I believe Mr Luís has found Miss Hildy’s little cat. So—so would you ask the gentlemen to come in, please?”

    Gaetana made a strangled sound.

    “That is so, Mrs Goodbody: he was sitting on Mr Luís’s bedroom windowsill, so Francisco informs me,” said the butler smoothly.

    Gaetana made another strangled sound.

    “Quite possibly he had been there for some time,” noted Deering impassively. “I have already sent for the gentlemen, madam.” He bowed and went out, pretending he had not noticed that Miss Ainsley had fallen face down upon the window-seat in a writhing heap.

    “Ssh!” hissed Mrs Goodbody anxiously.

    Gaetana continued to howl and writhe.

    “Oh, dear,” said Mrs Goodbody weakly to herself.

    Fortunately Gaetana had recovered enough to sit up and blow her nose by the time the gentlemen reconvened before the fire, shivering and rubbing their hands.

    Deering then reappeared, looking impassive as ever, with a large silver bowl.

    “Ha! Punch!” said the Marquis instantly.

    “I took the liberty of assuming it might be welcome, Mr Ainsley,” said Deering in a low voice.

    “Quite right, Deering: well done.”

    Deering bowed smoothly and exited.

    “Paul, that man is the Devil himself!” said Gaetana, coming over to the punch bowl, all smiles. “For when Cousin Sophia told him Luís had found the cat and to have you called in, he said yes, Francisco had told him that Diablo was on Luís’s windowsill. And that it was quite possible he had been there for some time! Without so much as—as blinking!”

    “It is one of the prerequisites of a really good butler, Miss Ainsley,” said Aurry immediately, “that he be the Devil incarnate.”

    “Oh, Lord, yes: Hollings is, too. Second sight. Well,” said the Marquis, shaking his head, “he found this, this morning.” He slipped his hand into his pocket and held out a small miniature.

    Paul gulped. “Thank you, Giles.”

    “That is Sir Vyvyan! From the sitting-room!” gasped Gaetana.

    “Er—mm. Well,” said the Marquis on apologetic note, “I did warn you, dear boy, not to let old Cousin Peregrine Jerningham loose in your house.”

    “I—I am afraid it was my fault,” quavered Mrs Goodbody. “The old gentleman came back from the shooting early and—and said he was a little tired, and— Well, I merely asked him to sit down,” she said weakly.

    The Marquis poured a glass of punch. “Great mistake, ma’am. Now,” he said kindly, “you sip a little of this. –Come along, everyone, sit down!” he added cheerfully.

    The company duly sat down. One or two persons noted silently that they had been jockeyed into it.

    “Stole a glove, once, from the Great Hail at the Place. You know: chain mail,” said Rockingham reminiscently. The company stared. “Nobody missed it, mind you. Well, Hollings may have: never said anything to me, though. His man sent it back. Reliable fellow.”

    The Major’s shoulders were shaking.

    “Go on, Kernohan: laugh,” he said generously. “We’re used to him in the family, of course.”

    “Yes!” he gasped, giving in completely.

    “All families have ’em,” the Marquis added, grinning. “—Here,” he said confidentially: “heard about Miss Hildy’s old Uncle Hildebrand?”

    “Yes!” he whooped helplessly. Immediately the other gentlemen and Miss Ainsley also went into whoops.

    “Well!” said a loud, cross voice. “I’m glad you all think it was so dashed funny! Dare say I might have got my death, fumbling about on that ledge! Aye, or fallen off!”

    The company turned their heads, to see Mr Luís Ainsley standing there, fully clad, but with his neckcloth very crumpled and his curls in wild disarray. And a large bandage on his right hand.

    “Querido, we were not laughing at that!” said Paul quickly, getting up and going over to the punch bowl.

    “Uncle Hildebrand,” Gaetana explained weakly, mopping her eyes.

    “Oh—him,” he said, looking mollified.

    “Well, go on, querido, tell us about it,” said Paul, smiling, handing him a glass of punch.

    Luís sat down with a sigh. “Well... Don’t laugh,” he warned. “Er, well, I was in my bath, and Francisco was scrubbin’ my back. –He does that,” he explained to their guests. “Can’t stop him.”

    “Paul’s man. Old family servant,” said the Marquis kindly to Major Kernohan.

    Aurry nodded numbly.

    “And anyway,” said Luís uneasily, “I suppose I was singing a bit.”

    Gaetana choked. “Caterwauling!” she gasped.

    “Ho, ho, very witty,” he noted. “Um, I was singing a bit,” he said, giving her a hard look—Gaetana spluttered—“and Francisco says what is that noise, and I says it is me, of course, and he says no, thought he heard something wailing. And—er—well, I damned his eyes for an impertinent so-and-so,” he said, eyeing the company uneasily.

    No-one dared to laugh, though several pairs of shoulders quivered.

    “So—um, anyway, I gets out of the bath and Francisco— Um, never mind. Thinks  he ith your nurse,” he muttered.

    Gaetana choked.

    “I got dressed!” said Luís loudly. “And, um—well, I was tying my neckcloth.”

    “For several hours: sí, sí, querido, we quite understand,” said Paul soothingly.

    “NO!” he shouted. “Um—beg pardon, Cousin Sophia. Um—no, well, I was tying it, you see, and then, I’ll be damned if I did not hear this dashed wailing noise meself! So I says to Francisco, if that’s a cat on the roof, throw a boot at it. And Francisco looks out but he can’t see a thing. Um—then what? Oh, yes, Thomas comes in with a message—oh, yes, Major, saying you are arrived!” he said cheerfully. “Nice to see you, by the by!”

    Aurry managed to smile politely, but only just.

    “Um—then what? Oh, yes, I was tyin’ my neckcloth, but every time I got it just about right the damned caterwauling started up again! So finally I decided I’d throw a boot at it meself, and I went over to the window, and—uh—there it wath.” He swallowed. “Two yellow eyes peering at me out of the dark: I swear, that was the eeriest thing! Well, of course I have seen a thing or two in the Pyrenees; I remember one time—”

    “We presume this was Diablo?” interrupted Paul smoothly.

    “¡Sí!” he said, glaring. “Of course. So Francisco screeches out it’s him, at first I thought it was some of his damned Spanish superstitious nonsense—”

    “Luís, the man is a revolutionary and a republican, he is no more superstitious than I am!” said Paul.

    “Pooh, they is all the same under the skin! Born into it, cannot help it. No, well, anyway,” he said quickly, “it was him, and so we thought we’d better let him in, in case Hildy was worried about him. –Well, she had been calling him earlier,” he explained to the company. “Only the little brute kept backing away and I finally had to get out practically upon the ledge, with Francisco hangin’ on to me ankles! And even then he fought like the Devil! And never wath there a cat better named!” he said with feeling.

    “¡Querido, this is indeed an epic!” said Paul in awe.

    “You can drop that,” he said, grinning sheepishly.

    “Well, it was more than any of us managed to do,” noted Aurry.

    “Sí; but Major, we were not sitting there in our baths while the cat wailed on the windowsill!” cried Gaetana indignantly.

    Major Kernohan here disgraced himself utterly by going into helpless hysterics in Mr Ainsley’s cosy study.

    Somehow it did not seem to matter, though: for immediately Mr Ainsley himself, Miss Ainsley, Mr Pringle and the Marquis of Rockingham followed suit. And in very short order Mrs Sophia Goodbody did likewise.

    Fortunately they had more or less laughed it all out when Hildy arrived five minutes later, beaming at them, carrying a small black cat with a red bow round his neck. “Thank you so much, everybody!”‘ she said. “He was on the tiles, after all! And he has been fighting, there is a scratch on his nose, but he came off best, did you not, Diablo?”

    “Aye,” noted Jake, looking hard at Luís’s bandaged hand.

    “And Luís,” she said blithely, “was so brave! I think Diablo panicked out on the ledge, and Luís got him in regardless!” She beamed at him.

    Rockingham coughed.

    Hildy gave him an apprehensive look. “You have not caught cold, I hope, Marquis?”

    “No, I am fortunately of a stout constitution, Miss Hildy. I perceive that animal has a bow round his neck.”

    “Why, yes! He often wears one; does he not look sweet?” she smiled.

    “Very. In that case, perhaps you will allow me to send you a small token to hang on it?”

    “Why—why yes, thank you, if you would care to,” she said in some surprize.

    “Good. It belonged to a pug of my grandmamma’s. It is,” said the Marquis grimly, “a small silver bell.”

    Jake gave a shout of laughter and hit his knee. “Aye! The very thing! Belling the cat!” he choked.

    “I’ll send it over tomorrow morning, first thing,” promised Rockingham. “At the least,” he noted drily, “it will help Luís to distinguish between his own caterwauling, the voices of the spirits of the night, and that animal’s efforts.”

    Luís merely grinned.

    “Yes,” said Hildy in a small voice. “I’m afraid I have put you all to a lot of unnecessary trouble.”

    “No, Hildy, dear, we were as worried as you,” said Paul, putting an arm gently about her. “Come over to the fire. Of course we could not sit here while he was lost.”

    An ecstatic look spread slowly over his brother’s face. “Here, you don’t mean they all went out into the night hunting for him, Hildy?” he gasped.

    “Um—yes,” she said, swallowing.

    Luís immediately went into helpless hysterics. But most of those present recognized ruefully they had had it coming.

    Major Kernohan, though he was of course a sensible man, was apt to experience a little embarrassment at dinners given by those not nearly acquainted with his disability, for of course he had very little control over his knife; but Paul Ainsley’s dinner that night was remarkable for the absence of anything that needed to be sliced by the diner before it was consumed. One might have assumed, with the prevalence of game in the country and the prevalence of a taste for slaughtering it amongst the company, that items such as roast pheasant might have featured largely on the menu; but though there was pheasant, it was in the form of a ragoût, and the pigeons were in a pie, and though there was rabbit, it was stewed, and smothered in a tasty cream sauce, and the lièvre was featured both en pâté, as a remove with the first course, and as collops of fillet with a Madeira sauce, with the second course. Which was delicious, though Luís, who was seated near to the dish, did not fail to note as he politely helped his neighbours to it, that he also fancied a good hare done Périgourdine, stuffed and glazed in white wine, y’know, and he was not too sure what Berthe put in the sauce of it, but it was dashed decent, too.

    There were, of course, many other smaller dishes with both courses, ranging from purées to tartlets to fricassees. And no fewer than three soups with the first course. One, not surprisingly, being a giblet soup. Which Luís kindly told the Major not to bother with, but to try some of this rabbit, instead. And the purée of panais was not half bad, he did not know what Berthe did to ’em, but she made ’em quite edible!

    The Major had been relieved to see Miss Hildegarde leave the cat behind, before the study fire, when the company proceeded to dinner. For though he liked cats and thought that Miss Hildegarde with her little cat was the sweetest thing he had ever laid eyes on, he did not approve of their presence at the dinner table. Hildy informed him, however, that Diablo had just had his supper—he had been very hungry. As he was unaffectedly lying before the fire with his bulging black belly exposed to it, the Major could see that he must have been, yes. He offered Miss Hildegarde his good arm and they both went out, smiling. Fortunately unaware that behind their backs Luís was nudging Jake violently and Jake was grinning and nodding at Luís.

    Perhaps needless to state, the Major had not registered at all that Hildy was in a little grey woollen gown, decorated only with a tiny frill at its high neck, and not in any of the more fashionable, frivolous garments he had been used to see her in, in Bath. Or if he had, it was only to register that she looked more daintily adorable than ever.

    The family was using the smaller dining-room, with an oval table, round which the company fitted comfortably. Paul was at its head with Cousin Sophia on his right hand and Hildy on his left, while Jake was at its foot, with Luís to his right and Gaetana to his left. The Major was fitted in between Luís and Hildy, and the Marquis between Gaetana and Mrs Goodbody. Nobody at the table was under any illusion that any of this was chance. Except possibly Hildy, who had been so concerned with Diablo for most of the afternoon that she had had very little time to think about anything else at all. Which, her Cousin Paul silently considered, was a good thing, for if she might have intended to be nervous over the Major’s visit, she had certainly not had the leisure for it.

    “Of course,” said Luís confidentially to the Major, over a generous portion of the rabbit, “if we was just ourselves, we would not have all these dishes. Though Berthe sees to it we ain’t never ill-nourished!” he added with a laugh. “—Here, don’t touch them if you ain’t used to them; dare say they might not agree with you,” he added in alarm, as the Major lifted a dish of lightly stewed mushrooms.

    “But I am very fond of fungi of all sorts,” he said weakly.

    “Oh. Um—we call these girolles. Um, think they’re called chanterelles, too. Don’t know if they have an English name,” he said cautiously.

    “I think the English use ‘chanterelles’, generally. My mamma’s cook calls them flap mushrooms; my papa is extremely partial to them,” he said. He set the dish down between them. “May I help you to some, Mr Luís?”

    “Er—mm. Thanks very much,” said Luís uneasily. He watched nervously as Aurry served him with his left hand. “Berthe does ’em in olive oil, y’know,” he informed him in relieved tones. “Um—think she might add something,” he noted dubiously.

    “Chopped shallots,” said Gaetana from across the table, with a smile. “I asked her.”

    “Indeed? I shall suggest it to Mamma,” said the Major, smiling. “I think her cook usually does them in butter.”

    Luís swallowed hastily. “That is good with the little white mushrooms—champignons de Paris, vous savez?” he added kindly. The Major nodded. “Aye. Only with your meatier fungus, I maintain you cannot go past a decent olive oil. Madre sent over a good tun of it from Spain, y’know. Dare say Berthe is scarcely through a tenth of it, as yet. Had the Devil’s own time persuading the English excisemen it was not some sort of wine or spirits!” He laughed cheerfully.

    “Luís, you never told us that!” said Hildy, leaning forward a little from her position on the Major’s right.

    “No, well, one does not wish to make a fuss, y’know! And then, with all that sherry and port and stuff Harry had loaded me up with as well—!” He laughed again.

    “Good gracious, did you transport a tun of olive oil and barrels of spirits over the Pyrenees?” asked the Major.

    “Eh? Lord, no! Came by ship. –No, we went down to Spain through France: Pa had a fancy to see what had been left of the country in Boney’s wake. And they was doin’ surprisin’ well, too. Some quite decent roads, they have, nowadays.”

    “And decent laws. Not to say education for all,” noted his sister.

    “Not to say equality for all,” noted Hildy.

    “Er—um, yes. Well, no need to discuss that over the dinner table, eh?” said Luís hastily, with a nervous glance at the Major. “What was I—? Oh, yes! Yes, came over the Pyrenees with Madre and Pa,” he explained. “Well into spring by the time we got there, but the snow was still pretty low in the passes, believe me! –Don’t bother passin’ this dish to Hildy,” he added, helping himself to a second lot of the mushrooms: “she don’t care for ’em.”

    “You may pass them to me, however, Luís,” noted Gaetana.

    “There was some up the other end,” he replied suspiciously.

    “Give it here,” said Jake heavily. “Paul and his Lordship have got down on the other dish long since. While certain people were talking,” he noted. Grinning, Luis passed him the dish, and Jake and Gaetana helped themselves to the chanterelles.

    “Moreh’ uh goob, too,” noted Luís thickly.

    “I beg your pardon?” said the Major courteously.

    Luís swallowed. “Morelth—I mean morels. Well, I think that is what you say in English. Get ’em in spring, ain’t that right, Gaetana?”

    “Eugh... oui. Des morilles.”

    “I have never heard of them,” said Hildy shyly.

    “Nor I,” said the Major, smiling at her. “Are you sure you would not care for some of the flap mushrooms, Miss Hildegarde?”

    “No, really, thank you. I know it is silly of me, and I have eaten them in a pie. Only they look so like toadstools.”

    “Botanically,” said the Marquis from across the table, “they are, are they not?”

    “Um—well,” said Hildy, her eyes twinkling, “not quite. According to a very fine book I have, sir, botanically there is no such thing as a toadstool or a mushroom.”

    The Marquis smiled. “One of Dr Rogers’s books, would that be?”

    Hildy nodded, smiling shyly back at him. Major Kernohan felt a strange jab in the chest that could scarcely be jealousy, surely? And looked down blindly at his plate.

    “Try some of this delicious purée de marrons instead, Hildy,” suggested Paul, passing the dish.

    Mrs Goodbody said eagerly: “It is wholly delightful, and what Berthe does to them, I am sure I cannot say, for although she has given me the receet most willingly, I cannot see that the addition of a little shallot or onion and celery, plus butter and cream to finish, can possibly result in such a magical dish as this!”

    “There is pepper in it, too,” said Luís seriously.

    “Perhaps it is the proportions,” said Hildy. “Thank you, Paul.”

    Paul helped her to the dish. “Major, would you care for some?”

    “Thank you, Mr Ainsley, I should very much care to try it. Mamma’s cook, I own, never does anything more adventurous with chestnuts than sometimes add them to a stuffing.”

    Hildy picked up the dish and placed it between them. It was now, of course, on the Major’s right. She hesitated fractionally, then picked up the serving spoon and, blushing a little, put some purée on his plate.

    “Thank you,” he said. Unaware that the eyes of the entire table had become rivetted on them and that all conversation had ceased.

    Paul, of course, was the first to recover himself, and said quickly: “Berthe has also a way of doing them in a meat stock: stewed in it and then served with a glaze.”

    “That would be dashed good with venison,” noted Luís in a mournful tone.

    “Do you care for it?” said the Marquis.

    Luís’s fork remained suspended halfway to his mouth. “Care for it?” he croaked. “I should just think so, sir!”

    “Luís was disappointed that the pines from Chypsley were not venison,” said Paul gravely.

    “I should say so!” he said with feeling.

    “Oh, well, in that case I’ll send you some over. I prefer beef, myself,” said Rockingham on an indifferent note.

    “Oh, by Jove, that ith very decent of you, Marquis!” he cried.

    “Not at all. You could run a few deer, if you wished to, up on that higher ground,” he said to Paul.

    “I think you are forgetting that my grounds are not nearly so extensive as yours!” said Paul with a little laugh. “And we are quite determined to try sheep on our higher ground.”

    “Aye, that’s right, your Lordship,” agreed Jake from the foot of the table.

    “Stupid creatures, sheep. Cut up the ground, too,” he noted.

    “Cut up the ground, my Lord? Not half as much as a herd of cattle will do!” replied Jake in amaze. “Why, Mr Richards himself was saying that the beef herd you are running over towards your Upper Daynesfold lands were breaking up the soil something horrible, and they had to move them to new pastures entirely, in the end!”

    “Aye, but take those hills up beyond Gerrity’s place where they have run sheep for generations. Pock-marked? The ground is unfit to ride a decent horse over! And the hills are criss-crossed with their damned little paths, there is nothing like sheep to ruin—”

    The Marquis and Jake embarked on an extended argument as to whether sheep, cattle or, for good measure, deer, ruined the ground more. Luís joined in, apparently on the assumption that what they meant was, ruined the ground for hunting—though it was not at all clear to other members of the company that in fact they did.

    Under cover of the noise, Major Kernohan said very softly to his neighbour: “Miss Hildegarde, you do not seem to be eating very much.”

    Hildy jumped, and blushed. “Oh! Well—well, I suppose I do not generally have a very big appetite. But there is the second course to come, and then the dessert. I always like the fruit and the nuts.”

    The Major looked at her in some concern.

    “I eat a lot more, if it is a day on which I have been able to take some vigorous exercise,” explained Hildy shyly. “Only today, you see, was a—a sitting and reading morning, and then we had a French afternoon.”

    “Er—I see,” he said uncertainly.

    “Well, no, you do not! We have a young neighbour who comes to visit several days a week, for—for she has no sisters, only one brother.”

    The Major nodded, smiling.

    “Um—well, we are fond of her, but—but we have very little in common with her, sir. But she is quite keen to improve her mind, so—so we have agreed, that one morning a week she will spend some time reading, and one afternoon we will help her with her French.”

    “I see: two occupations not guaranteed to work up an appetite!” said Aurry with a twinkle.

    “Exactly.”

    Paul had been listening; he smiled, and said: “Well, that is debatable, for the standard of Miss Charleson’s French would, I fear, inspire in me a need to run madly across the grounds the minute she had left the house—if not earlier! But then it is not I who have so kindly volunteered to coach her.”

    “No,” agreed Hildy with a sigh. “I’m afraid I sank to the level of allowing her to write out a menu, this afternoon.”

    Paul smiled but asked a trifle grimly: “And where was Gaetana during this menu-writing, may I ask?”

    “Do not be cross with her, dear Paul,” put in Cousin Sophia anxiously. “She had volunteered to help Berthe clean the mushrooms and—and peel the chestnuts, and so forth, for with so many made dishes to prepare for tonight, our good Berthe was really run off her feet. And little Melia is a good girl, but not very handy as yet.”

    The Major’s sisters did not, of course, help out in the kitchen, and he watched in some amusement to see what Mr Ainsley’s reaction to this news would be. And was not surprized when Paul merely said drily: “Well, I would not have said that Gaetana was handy, either. But I’m glad she saw that there was a need for her aid, and lent it.”

    “Er—yes, my dear,” said Mrs Goodbody dubiously.

    “Muzzle wanted to help, too,” admitted Hildy. “But we thought her mamma would have a fit, and we had best not let her. Not with menial tasks like peeling chestnuts!” she added with a gurgle.

    “No, certainly not,” agreed Paul immediately.

    “Though Berthe claims to be well on the way to teaching her to make a white soup,” added Hildy dubiously.

    Gaetana had caught this: she made a scornful noise.

    “It is a useful thing for a young woman to know,” said Mrs Goodbody.

    “Sí, sí, dear Cousin Sophia, but Berthe only claims that she is successfully teaching her because Mrs Giles said it was a very difficult task, and had best be left until Miss Charleson had learned some of the basics!” cried Gaetana.

    The Major smiled.

    “Mrs Giles is our housekeeper,” said Hildy to him in a low voice.

    “I see.”

    “They—she and Berthe, I mean—are normally the closest of allies. Only—um—there have lately been a few, um, near-disputes between them,” Hildy added weakly. “They are both teaching Muzzle, you see.”

    “I see. Er—this young lady seems very keen to learn the domestic arts. Could she not do so in her own home?”

    “Um—well, no,” said Hildy in an anguished voice.

    Paul leaned forward a little. “Her mamma is not precisely very well at the moment, and their housekeeper is quite an elderly woman.”

    “Yes,” said Hildy in relief.

    “And there is certainly no-one in their household who could teach her to write a menu in French!” he added with a laugh.

    “No,” owned Hildy. “Though on the other hand there is no-one in ours who could decorate it as she did: she drew the prettiest little bows and scrolls on it, and added tiny fruits and flowers.”

    “None of which she could identify in French,” noted Paul.

    “Um—no!” she choked, giggling.

     The Major smiled. Mrs Goodbody then passing him a dish of tartlets of fricassée de volailles in a cream sauce as highly recommended, he urged one upon Hildy. She took one, but he noted she did not finish it.

    During the second course she again ate very little. He gradually perceived that her well-meaning Cousin Luís’s attempts to force some of the heartier dishes on her were embarrassing her, so himself fended him off. Unaware that under cover of the general conversation, her cousins Paul and Gaetana, her elderly relative Mrs Goodbody, the Marquis of Rockingham and Mr Jake Pringle all observed him do so with the greatest of approbation.

    Paul eventually, smiling, passed a syllabub, and Deering came quietly round the table and removed Hildy’s plate, placing a new one in front of her.

    “I love this,” she said to the Major.

    “Good,” he replied, firmly taking the bowl with his left hand. “Allow me.” He set it down and the butler immediately handed him a serving spoon.

    “Berthe has decorated it wonderfully tonight: she does not always do so,” said Hildy.

    “Yes, indeed: little silver cashoos and crystallized rose petals, I see.” He paused. “But no violets.”

    “No,” said Hildy in a strangled voice. “We were not here during the earlier part of the year, so we could not gather any.”

    The Marquis observed from the other side of the table that she had gone very red. He said with a twinkle in his eye: “Like ’em, do you, Miss Hildy?”

    “Yes. I am very fond of them,” she said hoarsely.

    “Well, we are famed for our violets round these parts: in spring the hedgerows are full of ’em,” he said. He paused. “Is that not true, Miss Ainsley?”

    There was a little silence. The eyes of the table became rivetted on Miss Ainsley. She had gone as red as Hildy. “So I am told,” she said in a strangled voice.

    “Aye,” said Jake easily, “the district has always been known for its violets, and if you girls like ’em sugared, I am sure there will be no difficulty about that! Providin’ Berthe knows how to do ’em,” he added with a smothered chuckle.

    “Of course she does!” cried Gaetana in astonishment.

    “Yes, she does, I asked her,” said Hildy, blushing once more.

    “Aye, she can cook anything,” said Luís on a note of finality. “Here, Major, have you ever had lark?”

    “Luís!” cried Hildy indignantly.

    The Major had helped her quietly to syllabub, though not failing to note interestedly every detail of the conversational exchange, and in especial Miss Hildegarde’s blushes. He set the spoon down, shook his head as the butler quietly offered to remove his plate, and took a lemon curd tartlet. “I have had it in Spain, Mr Luís.”

    “Aye: quite a popular small bird there, you may see ’em at the market in cages, any day. Well, they keeps ’em for their song as well, y’know.”

    “Querido—” said Paul on a warning note.

    “Eh? Oh,” he said, glancing at Hildy. “Well, I was only going to say they are called alouettes in French. Curious, ain’t it?”

    “Er—the word is not like ‘lark’, certainly,” murmured the Major.

    “My point exactly! Can I help you to this dish of rognons, Major?”

    “No, thank you very much, Mr Luís; I have sufficient here.”

    Luís helped himself to the dish of rognons. Adding to his plate a spoonful of puréed turnips in an absent manner. He then embarked on a serious discussion with Jake as to the comparative virtues of turnip greens, which he did not care for, spinach, which Jake did not care for, and a Spanish vegetable of which he had forgot not only the English name, but unfortunately the Spanish one as well.

    Champagne was offered with this course, and though the Major would not have offered it to his younger unmarried sisters, he was glad to see Miss Hildegarde drink hers in little sips. He himself had accepted some of Mr Ainsley’s excellent burgundy, but as the butler came round again, allowed him to give him some champagne. “Er—no more for Miss Hildegarde, I think,” he murmured.

    The butler bowed, but Hildy looked up and smiled at him and said: “It’s all right, Major, Deering knows. We are having champagne tonight for a treat because it is a proper dinner party, and we have not had company for some time.”

    “You have had me!” said the Marquis indignantly across the table.

    “Yes, but as perhaps that huge pie with no remove but a dish of buttered turnips and some potatoes last time you came might have indicated, dear sir, we count you as quite one of the family!” she said with a laugh.

    Rockingham looked very gratified. At the same time Miss Ainsley flushed and looked down at her plate.

    The Major observed this byplay with interest. “Was it a good pie, Marquis?”

    “An excellent pie, my dear Kernohan. And Miss Hildy exaggerates: there was a dish of puréed chestnuts as well. And though we sat down seven to the pie there would have been enough left over for the kitchen! I never get anything half so decent in my own house.”

    “I am sure that is not true,” said Miss Ainsley in a stifled voice.

    “Indeed it is! Since my mamma went abroad, they insist on sending up vast courses of complex dishes that a man on his own cannot possibly get through, no matter how much I tell ’em that a pie or a simple joint of meat will do me. With perhaps some cheese—that was a fine cheese we had after that pie, was it not, Miss Hildy?”

    “Yes, it was. I have forgotten its name. Deering’s brother, who is in service in another part of the country, very kindly sent it. What was it, Deering?” she asked the butler.

    “It was a Double Gloucester, Miss Hildy,” he said, bowing.

    “And since you liked it so much, dear Hildy, I have asked Deering to place a regular order with his brother!” said Paul with his nice laugh.

    “Oh!” said Hildy, blushing terrifically. “Not really?” He nodded, and she said: “Oh, you should not! Oh, thank you, Paul. But I am afraid you are spoiling me.”

    “Rubbish!” said the Marquis brusquely. “She gave us all a fright, you know, when she came down with that dashed influenza,” he said to the Major. “Had it at the Place: we were all gnawing our fingernails for a while, there.”

    “Indeed?” said the Major. “I had not realised. It must have been uncomfortable for you, Miss Hildegarde, to be ill away from your home.”

    “Yes, but they were all so kind to me!” said Hildy, smiling mistily at the Marquis.

    “My sister was there, of course. And my aunt,” he said with a grimace.

    “Both of his Lordship’s sisters and his Aunt Lavinia, her daughter Susan, and his niece Miss Hobbs, were very, very good to me,” said Hildy firmly.

    “Aye, well, we could scarcely throw her into the dungeons for darin’ to fall sick in our house,” noted the Marquis.

    “Though of course you wished to,” said Aurry.

    “Of course,” he agreed sedately. They looked at each other, and smiled.

    “And then Luís brought me Diablo, Major,” added Hildy.

    “Ave, and by Jove he was wild then!” said Luís with feeling. “But it wasn’t my idea, y’know: it was Floss’s. –Her littlest sister,” he explained.

    “Yes. She knows I like cats,” said Hildy. “And I thought that I should not see him for many months, for I took him home, when we left,”—the Major was puzzled, then he realized he meant when she had left the Manor, and nodded—“but when I arrived here from dear Mrs Kernohan’s, Gaetana led me straight upstairs and there he was in his basket!” she said, beaming. “Paul had sent for him!”

    “Did he recognize you?” asked the Major with a twinkle in his eye.

    “Of course. He got right—” Hildy broke off.

    “Right what?” asked Luís with interest.

    “Um—well,” she said desperately, as the attention of the whole table was now fixed on her, “I did not encourage him. But he was so determined, I could not stop him. He got right into bed with me and—and slept against my stomach all night.”

    “Hildy, dearest!” gasped Mrs Goodbody.

    “I’m sorry, Cousin Sophia. Only—only he purred and purred, and when I tried to put him out he miaowed and got straight back—”

    “Hush,” said Paul, putting his hand on hers. “You cannot think that any of us would object to your having your little cat in your bed, querida?”

    “Well,” she said, very red, “I am not supposed to. And Floss is only allowed to have Mrs Spofford on the bed at home on the understanding that she will not get in the bed.”

    “Does Mrs Spofford understand it, though?” asked Luís with a grin.

    “Yes. She is very well trained,” said Hildy.

    There was a short silence. Possibly some people might have been thinking that in that case it might be possible to make an effort to train Diablo.

    Finally Mrs Goodbody said: “Hildy tells us you are very fond of music, Major Kernohan."

    “Why, yes, and living in Bath I have been so fortunate as to be able to sing with the Abbey choir.”

    Not only Mrs Goodbody and the well-mannered Paul expressed great interest at this but also, to Aurry Kernohan’s surprize, the Marquis of Rockingham, and they all talked eagerly about music. The Major was glad to see as they did so that the flush died out of Miss Hildegarde’s cheeks and she not only ate up her syllabub but then allowed the butler to give her a small slice of almond tart with a little cream.

    When Mr Luís Ainsley had ascertained aggrievedly that the other end of the table had finished the almond tart while he had but been occupied with a blancmanger, a lemon cream and a few macaroons, the servants were finally able to clear and the dessert was brought in.

    The Kernohans were, of course, accustomed to eat well, and the Major had besides become aware that the Manor was putting its best foot forward today, but he was certainly a little surprized at the variety of fruits which were offered. Though not at the exquisite little cakes, for he had already realized that their “Berthe” was a considerable artiste.

    “The pears are from the Place,” said Paul with a smile as a platter of them was set in front of the Major. “Our own orchard was not in entirely good heart when I took over here.”

    “I’m sure it was better than mine: it is a jungle. I think it will have to be hacked down,” said the Major.

    “Would you care for some raisins, sir?” said Hildy in a low voice, as Paul chose a piece of fruit for Mrs Goodbody.

    Aurry smiled at her. “Why, yes, Miss Hildegarde, and if you should care to cut me off a small bunch I would be very grateful.”

    “Allow me, sir,” said the butler from behind him. He helped him to some raisins and added: “Should you care for a pear, sir? The pears from Daynesford Place are reckoned very fine.”

    “Or a slice of Chypsley pine?” said Hildy with a twinkle in her eye.

    Aurry grinned. He was curious to see exactly what precautions Paul Ainsley might have taken over the matter of the dessert, for of course he had not failed to register the absence of large slices of meat which would require cutting by the diner, or limbs of pheasant or duck, or whole quail, which were the sorts of things with which he found it impossible to cope. So he gave in to temptation and said: “Why, yes, I confess, if it should not seem too greedy in me, Miss Hildegarde, I should care for both a pear and a slice of one of your famous pines.”

    “Good. I think I will have a slice of the pine, too, please, Deering.”

    Aurry watched the subsequent proceedings in immense gratification. The elaborately arranged dish which held the pineapple sliced but put back together again was in front of Jake Pringle. The butler trod down the table without haste, removed the dish, brought it up and placed it between Hildy and the Major and—still without haste—removed two excellent slices, placing one on Hildy’s plate and one on Aurry’s. He then carefully cut up—not merely the Major’s, that would have been tactless in the extreme—no, both rounds of pineapple, into bite-size pieces. Aurry was not in the least surprized when the man then offered him the dish of pears, let him choose one and place it on his plate, murmured: “Pray allow me, sir,” neatly peeled it with knife and fork, and then—supreme tact—placed the knife and fork back in their proper positions. As if possibly the Major might have cared to slice the fruit a little more for himself!

    “Thank you,” he said simply.

    Deering merely bowed slightly, ascertained that Miss Hildegarde did not require anything more for the time being, and moved on.

    “The pine is nice, is it not?” said Hildy shyly.

    Aurry glanced up the table: the butler was now well out of earshot. “Delicious,” he murmured. “And your butler is exquisite.”

    Hildy bit her lip and shot him an anxious look.

    “No—truly!” he said with a tiny choke of laughter.

    She hesitated, then, blushing, murmured: “We were not absolutely sure of what you would wish us to do.”

    “I understand that, Miss Hildegarde. I have been perfectly comfortable throughout, you need not fear.”

    “I’m glad,” she said.

    The Major wanted very much to touch the little hand that lay on the edge of the table very near his plate. He did not, of course. Instead he offered her his plate, smiling. “Would you care for a slice of pear, Miss Hildegarde?”

    “Just a little, please. I did not like to ask for a whole fruit, for I thought I might not get through it. Thank you, sir,” she said, taking a piece with her fork.

    They ate fruit in silence, the Major from time to time glancing at her from under his lashes.

    The Marquis then suggested she try a piece of cheese, but Hildy refused, saying she had had plenty.

    “It is a lovely cheese, querida,” said Gaetana. “Different from that Double one you liked, but nice.”

    “No, really, I have had sufficient. I might just have a hazelnut,” said Hildy.

    The Marquis here laughed, and, casually cracking a nut for her in his fingers, recounted for Aurry’s benefit the story of the two “young maidens” at the hazel wood. Which, as he had of course had it from Jake, who had had it from the shepherds, might have been said to be rather third-hand. Nevertheless Aurry chuckled very much. Then he found to his surprize that Miss Hildegarde was peeping at him doubtfully.

    “What is it?” he said.

    “Your sisters would not do that sort of thing,” she murmured.

    “Well, no, but they are not fortunate enough to live in the country! But I make no doubt Tarry would gather hazels with the best of ’em, given the chance!”

    “Yes, she would,” agreed Hildy, smiling.

    “She is the soprano, is she not?” said Rockingham immediately.

    “Indeed,” agreed Aurry in astonishment.

    “Hildy told me. She was disappointed that she did not have the chance to hear your brother play his flute.”

    “He does play quite well. But he’s lazy about practising, unless he is kept up to the mark.”

    “Is he? Never minded, meself. Well, enjoy it, really. Well, I never think of it as practising, precisely,” he admitted.

    The Major was very much astonished, for though he had of course realized by now that the Marquis was interested in music, he had not put him down as a man who played. “What instrument do you play, sir?”

    “Oh, the pianoforte. They have quite a decent instrument here; we could have some music, later, if you would care for it.” He paused. “So long,” he said with a twinkle in his eyes, “as I am not jockeying you all into it, of course.”

    At this point Major Kernohan realized that he had been misled entirely by the Marquis of Rockingham’s customary country-squire manner, and had made more than one mistake about the quality of his character and intelligence. And told himself ruefully it served him right, and that he might have guessed that a man who was so warmly welcomed into Paul Ainsley’s family circle must have more to him than met the eye. Or rather, as he now perceived, than the Marquis of Rockingham allowed to meet the eye of the casual acquaintance.

    “You probably are doing so,” Miss Ainsley returned calmly, “but as you know we all love to hear you play, in this instance we shall not object.”

    “No, indeed, Marquis!” agreed Mrs Goodbody.

    “Some Mozart would be pleasant, eh, Mrs Goodbody?” he murmured, again with a twinkle.

    “Oh, yes, indeed, sir!”

    “Yes. Mrs Goodbody,” he said straight-faced to Aurry, “finds Beethoven rather too tempestuous for the small salon.”

    “He is,” said Gaetana, frowning. “I always think one should listen to him on a high hill, with the wind blowing strongly.”

    “Well, you are out, there, my dear young lady,” said the Marquis with huge courtesy, “for the sound would be quite blown away. One needs a fair-sized room, with decent acoustics, for Beethoven.”

    “Oh. That is rather disappointing,” admitted Gaetana. “What is acoustics?”

    “They are plural, my dear young lady. Er—the qualities which allow an enclosed space to afford a sound its full value.”

    “Oh, Marquis!” cried Hildy, clapping her hands. “What a splendid definition! You are a positive Dr Johnson!”

    “¡Sí, sí!” said Paul, laughing. “We must add it to our list of definitions, Hildy! –We are compiling a New Lexicon. On non-historical principles,” he explained solemnly to Aurry. Taken unawares, the Major choked.

    “Yes. So far,” said Hildy primly, “we have only got one definition beside Lord Rockingham’s.”

    “Dare one ask what it is?” said Rockingham in a doomed voice.

    “It is Luís’s definition of a citrouille, of course.”

    “I say!” cried Luis indignantly. “That ith most unfair!”

    “Go on, Miss Hildy, you cannot leave it at that,” said the Marquis, grinning.

    “Well—correct me if I have it wrong, Paul,” she said, eyes sparkling, “but I think it went something like— No, perhaps I should explain,” she said courteously to the Marquis, “that he was attempting to define it for our gardener, who only speaks English. He said: ‘A citrouille? Er—well, you know.’”

    “I did not!” he cried indignantly.

    “Yes, you did. But hush, that was only the beginning. I shall give it in full. ‘A citrouille? Er—well, you know. Big thing. Er—yaller.’” She paused. “‘—ish.’”

    The company exploded in gales of laughter—apart from the unfortunate Luís, who merely grinned sheepishly.

    Hildy smiled pleasedly, and accepted another hazel from the Marquis.

    Conversation became general again. To the Major’s left Luís and Jake began to discuss the state of the local ducks, and the state of the local swamps, and on the other side of the table Mrs Goodbody and the Marquis began to talk about opera and soon drew Paul and Gaetana into the conversation.

    After a little the Major said in a low voice: “Miss Hildegarde, if you will excuse the pun, I fear I have bitten off more than I can chew, with these raisins.”

    Hildy looked at him blankly for a moment. Then she saw that past him, Luís, though not ceasing to talk at full spate, was tearing off raisins with one hand from the fair-sized bunch he had in his other, and blushed. ‘‘I see. Could I help?”

    “I should be very grateful. Though I suppose I could hold up the bunch and gnaw ’em off.”

    “No. It was silly of me to offer them to you,” she said in a low voice.

     Major Kernohan pushed his plate towards her and Hildy detached the raisins from his little bunch, one by one, making very sure she had removed all of the stalk from each.

    “Thank you. It is the little things that occasionally become rather tiresome,” he murmured. He began to eat the raisins slowly. “They are very fine.”

    “Mm: Spanish,” said Hildy, biting her lip.

    Aurry hesitated; then he said: “There is absolutely nothing to upset yourself over. The very first week I was up and about at home, they took me to a dinner where I was faced with grilled mackerel with gooseberry sauce. I think my neighbour thought I was mad, when I just sat and stared at it. But you know what a dear, good fellow Dorian is: he simply came round and filleted the thing for me. And resumed his seat without saying a word.”

    “That was very well done in him!” she said, eyes shining.

    “Yes; it was a pity Uncle Francis could not have been there,” he said, twinkling at her, “for he might have been forced to revise his opinion of the frippery fellow, somewhat.”

    “Yes, indeed!” agreed Hildy strongly. She hesitated, then said: “Even although he may not have many very serious interests, he certainly does not want for feeling, or principle.”

    “No, so I think,” said Aurry with some difficulty, wondering if she had fallen seriously for the frippery fellow, after all.

    “Have you heard from the family, lately, sir?” she asked.

    “Well, yes, I had a letter from Roly only the other day. He  tells me that my Aunt Maria is determined to bring about a match between dear old John and Henrietta Hallam, and that Romney is terrible cut up about it!”

    Hildy choked. “That is just like Mr Roly: I can hear him say it!” she gasped.

    “Yes, indeed. It was lovely to hear from him. Though I was sadly disappointed that he had not essayed an epistle in verse,” he said slyly.

    Hildy rolled her lips very tightly together. The Major looked at her in some amusement. Finally she managed to say: “You are all too hard on poor Mr Roland, sir.”

    “You know,” said the Major thoughtfully, “—do, pray, have a raisin, Miss Hildegarde—you know, it has apparently never occurred to my idiot youngest brother that ladies may also possess a critical faculty.”

    Hildy took a raisin numbly. “No,” she said.

    His eyes twinkled. “Surely the thought had crossed your mind that whereas he will not show his poetic efforts to us, he is apparently confident that you will not notice any flaws in them?”

    “Does that speak ill of his opinion of women’s critical faculties in general, sir, or of mine?” said Hildegarde in a hollow voice.

    The Major choked on a raisin.

    Luís immediately banged him enthusiastically on the back. “She is sharp as a pin, y’know!” he informed him, beaming,

    “That is just—” He coughed. “Thank you, Mr Luís!” he gasped. “That is just what I was endeavouring to maintain,” he said plaintively.

    “Hildy, querida, if he has not quite choked to death,” said Gaetana from the other side of the table to her cousin, “there are many more raisins here!”

    “You deserved that!” Miss Hildegarde informed the Major severely.

    “Miss Hildegarde, I was attempting to express admiration of your—”

    “You were attempting to be horrid about Mr Roly again, and it serves you right! Especially since he has taken the trouble to write you a nice letter!”

    “Mm. To which I cannot respond as he would like,” he said drily.

    Hildy turned scarlet and he said quickly: “No, no, dear Miss Hildegarde! No, he has invited himself warmly to visit me, but there is nowhere fit for him to sleep at Beaubois House!”

    “Oh,” she said limply.

    “Aye, they are but camping there,” explained Luís.

    “Yes, you said,” agreed Hildy dubiously. “But could not Mr Roland also camp, Major?”

    “Roly? With his pomades and his two-foot neckcloths and frightening waistcoats?” he gasped. “No, seriously, Miss Hildegarde, he is used to his home comforts.” He shrugged a little.

    Hildy looked at him doubtfully. “Would he not be company for you?”

    “Well,” said Aurry reminiscently, ‘I took him on a walking tour once, on my second-to-last leave before Waterloo, it would have been—and it was a disaster from beginning to end! What with his blisters and the kinks in his back from the rocks he claimed I made him sleep on, and the impossibility of doing anything at all until he had got some hot water to shave with in the morning—he was about seventeen at the time,” he explained to the company, who were all now frankly listening: the gentlemen all choked: “truly, much as I would love to see the dear fellow, my constitution would not support it!”

    “I know!” she cried. “He may stay at the Hammond Arms!”

    “Yes: it is said to be a most comfortable hostelry,” said Paul.

    “That is an excellent idea. I shall put it to him,” said Aurry, smiling. “Thank you for the suggestion, Miss Hildegarde.”

    “I was thinking, sir, how will you write to him?” she asked shyly, looking up into his face.

    “Well, I can scrawl a bit with my left hand.”

    “If you would not deem it an impertinence, Major,” said Hildy bravely, “I would be very glad to act as your secretary, for anything you might wish to—to have written.”

    “Thank you,” he said gently. “That is very good of you. I had begun to wonder how I should go on, for I know Papa would like news of me, and Dollery—that is my man—can barely write his name.”

    “I am sure I could come over to Ditterminster in the carriage,” she said seriously.

    “Then perhaps I could arrange to give you and your family a meal at the inn there? It would be convenient for you, and it would enable me to repay your cousin’s kind hospitality.”

    Hildy’s face broke into smiles. “Yes! Mr Dorian is right: you know all about tactics and such, Major Kernohan!”

    The Major had begun to doubt it; indeed he had begun to perceive that, with the exception of the young gentleman at his left, he was pretty well surrounded by tacticians!

    “And if we made it a driving-out afternoon,” Hildy added, “then perhaps we might bring Miss Charleson? She does so love to wander around the shops and so forth, and her mamma won’t— is not taking her anywhere at present!” she finished in a gasp.

    “Well… Has she a very large appetite?” said the Major uneasily.

    “No! She is a very normal young lady!” she gasped, taken quite unawares and going into a gale of giggles.

    Aye, well, thought Aurry Kernohan, looking at her with great affection, that was another one of the household that was no tactician! Sharp as a pin though she might be!

    “Paul, did you hear?” said Hildy eagerly. “We have made a plan, well, actually the Major has conceived it—”

    Quickly Paul approved it as an excellent plan. And perhaps Hildy and Cousin Sophia could discuss the details of it while the gentlemen had their port?

    Mrs Goodbody took the hint, and immediately rose. Since Paul conducted her to the door, the Marquis was enabled to say: “My dear young lady, allow me,” to Gaetana.

    “If you think,” she said crossly, “that I am going to break down and admit that ‘my good girl’ is preferable to ‘my dear young lady’ let me tell you, you are vastly mistaken!”

    Rockingham bowed her out, shoulders shaking.

    Paul Ainsley did not appear to notice, at that point. But Aurry, having bowed Hildy out and returned to his seat, was not in the least surprized to see his host sink limply into his chair and say in a very weak voice: “¡Dios, Giles! Is that why you have been relentlessly calling her ‘my dear young lady’ all evening?”

    “Aye, well, she objected violently to the other!” he said airily.

    Mr Ainsley went into a terrific sniggering fit forthwith.

    When the ladies were settled in the small salon Gaetana said eagerly: “Hildy, dear, how very pleasant he is!”

    “Yes,” said Hildy in a small voice. “Oh, dear. If only we had not had the pears and those Spanish raisins!”

    Gaetana got up and sat down again beside her. “Querida, it was nothing. Did he not tell you himself how some silly people served him mackerel, of all things? With all those tiny bones!”

    “And it is such an oily fish,” said Cousin Sophia.

    “Yes. –Did you hear that?” said Hildy in surprize.—Gaetana nodded.—“Yes. Only that day he had his dear brother to help him. Mr Dorian,” she said with trembling lips, “is a lovely gentleman, and people do not appreciate him.”

    “No,” agreed Gaetana uncertainly.

    “All the fruit was a mistake,” said Hildy.

    Gaetana squeezed her hands. “Querida, it would have been far worse had we not served any. It would have been so particular! Major Kernohan must have felt it.”

    “Indeed,” agreed Cousin Sophia. “But as it was, there was nothing to remark, or—or to make him feel his disability.”

    “¡Sí, sí!” Gaetana said gaily. “And then, although his dear brother was absent, our dear Hildy was there to help him!”

    “Yes.” Hildy got up. “Would you mind very much, if I went and got Diablo?”

    “Why, no, of course not, my dearest child, if you think he will settle,” replied Mrs Goodbody.

    “Thank you,” said Hildy in a tiny voice, going out.

    Mrs Goodbody and Gaetana looked limply at each other.

    After a moment Gaetana said: “What do you think, Cousin Sophia?”

    “My dear, I do not know what to think! I thought it was going so well! Yet she seems so—so very disturbed!”

    “Yes. Can it be,” said Gaetana in a low voice, “that she had not—for she must only have seen him when he was protected by his family—that she had not thought very much about the implications of his disability?”

    “Well—well, I do not quite see...”

    “He has so very little use in the arm: I had not realized,” said Gaetana, swallowing.

    “Do you think it that bad, dearest?”

    Gaetana bit her lip. “Yes. I was watching. He did not use his knife once.”

    “No-o... Well, at least he is not disfigured, my dear!”

    Gaetana sighed. In a way, she thought, that might be easier for him, for if the disability was apparent, there would be no need for the Major ever to have to explain it. But she did not try express this thought to Cousin Sophia.

    “Possibly,” ventured the little lady after a while, “dearest Hildy had not herself realized how much the arm hampers him.”

    “I think it might be that,” Gaetana agreed, biting her lip.

    By the time the gentlemen came in they had finalized the plans for the trip to Ditterminster—if the day chosen should suit Major Kernohan, of course—and Cousin Sophia had even penned a little note to Lady Charleson, leaving the day blank, for the nonce. She was chatting placidly, meanwhile working at her crochet, Hildy was sitting near the fire with Diablo purring on her lap, or rather producing that sated sound which he did after his supper and which Maria, after much thought, had pronounced to be “snurring”, a cross between a purr and a snore, and Gaetana was sitting on the rug beside them, leaning against Hildy’s chair and idly stroking him.

    “Pretty picture,” said Jake, smiling.

    “Aye,” said Rockingham softly, looking at Gaetana in her deep violet dress with its flounce and its lace collar.

    “Yes,” said Aurry softly, looking at Hildy in her little grey dress with her little cat with his silly red bow on her knee.

    At Mrs Goodbody’s urging, Rockingham very soon sat down to play. Everyone listened in absolute silence. After a little, Hildy saw to her distress that the Major had shaded his face with his good hand. She looked down blindly at her little cat. Her lips trembled.

    Rockingham played Mozart for some time. Eventually, however, with a sly look on his face, he sorted through the music, found the requisite sheet, and broke into the opening bars of My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose. “Come along, Miss Hildy!” he  said with a laugh. “She is vastly improved, you will be surprised,” he added to Aurry. “That Fewster female from Daynesford is a hen, but she is not a bad teacher.”

    “She is an excellent teacher and she is not in the least a hen,” said Paul, frowning at him, and trying not to laugh.

    “Come along, Miss Hildy!” repeated the Marquis bracingly.

    Hildy swallowed. “No, truly, sir, I would much rather not.”

    Aurry got up. “I know it. I will sing it, if you like.”

    Rockingham immediately rippled his hands over the keys in a series of modulations. “Low enough for you?” he said with a smile.

    The Major nodded.

    At the conclusion of the song, Cousin Sophia unashamedly wiped tears away and blew her nose. Gaetana sniffed and gulped, though she clapped very hard.

    “Here, querida,” said Paul in a low voice, giving Hildy his handkerchief.

    She jumped, and mopped her eyes mechanically.

    “Major Kernohan, that was wonderful!” Paul then said with shining eyes.

    “Aye: delightful. Of course it is a man’s song. Hadn’t realized that, only hearing Hildy sing it,” said Jake.

    “Oh, indeed!” said Cousin Sophia fervently. “That was so moving, Major Kernohan!”

    The Major laughed a little but bowed and said nicely: “I am very glad you enjoyed it, ma’am.”

    Luís had clapped very much. “Aye—sounded quite different when you sang it, sir.”

    Hildy blew her nose. “I shall never sing it again,” she said firmly.

    “Don’t be downhearted, my dear: he is a much more experienced vocalist than you. You have got the tone quite well. You’ll see: with more practice you’ll be able to sing it with as much feeling as he,” said Rockingham, smiling at her.

    Certain persons in the room doubted this last very much: Paul, for one. And he rather thought Jake, and he would not have been at all surprized to learn Cousin Sophia also, had perceived as he had that the Major had sung that song with so much feeling for one person alone.

   “What are you writing, Paul?” asked Gaetana, finding him in his study next morning before breakfast.

    “I thought I would just get off a letter to Tia Patty, while it is all fresh in my mind!” he said with a little chuckle.

    She looked at him nervously. “What are you telling her?”

    “Oh... nothing very much. Just that we have been doing some—er—casual entertaining!”

    “Casual entertaining? When we all collapsed into our beds in a state of complete prostration at the end of the evening?” she gasped.

    “Sí, sí.”

    Gaetana was about to go out, but thought better of it. “What have you writ about Hildy and the Major?”

    “Nothing. Only that as he has become in some sort a neighbour and is Mrs Parkinson’s relative, we thought we had best invite him.”

    “Casually,” she noted.

    “Sí. Casually.”

    “And have you mentioned that we are casually proposing to drive into Ditterminster two days hence so that Hildy may casually write letters for this casual acquaintance in the inn parlour?”

    “Er—well, no,” he said apologetically. “I felt it might strike her as less casual than we all, of course, realize it is.”

    Gaetana took a deep breath. “Casual!” She marched out.

    “Though I have,” murmured her brother, dipping his pen in the standish again, “casually mentioned that the situation between Giles and yourself appears to be not altogether...” He paused. “Casual!” he said. “Though it is certainly, I blush to admit it, highly entertaining!” He bent to his letter again, smiling.