Faro In Dittersford Parish

 26

 Faro In Dittersford Parish

    Lady Charleson was glorious that night. She did not wear the drifting pale grey chiffon again, for Sir Edward had seen her in that. Nor did she wear her silver-blue: she could scarcely do so, having informed Mrs Purdue that she was merely wearing it out this year. Never mind that Mrs Purdue was not to form one of the party, it was not to be hoped that such a blunder would not get to her ears. And in any case she thought she might try for a new look. The new look entailed the hurried making up of some very lovely lace that she had had lain by for this many a long year for a very special occasion. And the grim standing over of the dressmaker from Ditterminster until it was done correctly. The underdress of the resultant creation was formed from very pale lilac satin, which was of an extraordinarily fine quality, while the overdress was a drift of the white lace, re-embroidered here and there with satin ribbons and tiny seed pearls. If Muzzie had once cherished hopes that the stuffs might form her Court gown for her presentation or even her wedding gown, they were now dashed. The effect was rather, or so Lady Charleson dared to hope, and she did not believe she was flattering herself so very much, of delicate cherry blossom against the dawn sky of early spring.

    The dress had a slight train, but this apart it was, as every other lady present at Mrs Urqhart’s dinner instantly noted, far more fitted to a girl in her twenties than a woman of her age, however pretty.

    “Pretty, ain’t she?” said Dezzie to Sir Ned.

    “Very. And very cunning: one can hardly say that either lilac or lace are unsuited to a woman of her years,” he said drily as Mrs Urqhart greeted the new arrivals loudly.

    “Eh?”

    “Though the entire effect is, as I perceive you have perceived,” said Sir Ned with a naughty twinkle in his long blue eyes, “very youthful indeed.”

    “Well, quite!” said Dezzie, laughing. “Giles tells me she is older than me—wouldn’t think it, would you?” she added cheerfully.

    “Oh, I would,” said Ned Jubb with a malicious look, “though I grant you the most of male humanity would be silly enough to doubt it.”

    “Lor’,” said Dezzie, goggling at him.

    “Lady Desdemona,” he said abruptly, a flush rising to his heavy, handsome face: “may I beg you to disregard entirely anything I may do tonight in that direction? I should not like you to think— Well,” he said with a significant look as Noël Amory raised Lady Charleson’s hand to his lips, meantime looking into her eyes in an entirely improper fashion, “I am about to undertake a rescue sortie in that direction.”

    “Eh? Oh, Lord!” said Dezzie, laughing. “Ain’t it too great a sacrifice, though, Sir Ned?”

    Ned grinned and rose. “No sacrifice is too great for a fellow man in mortal danger,” he said smoothly.

    Mrs Urqhart had had to seat Lady Charleson at Sir Ned’s right hand for the dinner. She had put Lady Desdemona at his left, but Ned had refused point-blank to carry through her scheme of flirting with Dezzie in order to drive Lady Charleson to desperation. Sir Noël, however, was walled off from Lady Charleson by the substantial form of Lord Lucas, with on his other hand the luckless Jo, who, being privy to the scheme, resigned herself to cheerful but inane chatter from the one side and jealous gloom from the other.

    The dinner was very long-drawn-out and by the time the ladies withdrew from the board Muzzle’s eyelids looked rather heavy, Jo had swallowed several yawns, and Dezzie would have taken her oath on a stack of Bibles that Ned Jubb’s and Lady Charleson’s feet had been intertwined for the last fifteen minutes.

    “They will not be long,” said Mrs Urqhart when the ladies had freshened up and were seated in her smaller drawing-room, “for I have warned Ned he is not to bore on with a brandy in his hand.”

    “Does he bore on if left to himself?” asked Dezzie with a grin.

    “Aye, he do that. Well, don’t they all? Now, if you will excuse me, Lady Dezzie, I will arrange that turban for you.” She suited the action to the word. Lady Charleson raised her eyebrows slightly at her daughter. Muzzie went very red and glared at the carpet.

    Dezzie, however, was unmoved. “Lavinia gave me this outfit; I never had a turban, before.”

    “It suits you, me dear, you has a handsome face with good bones, if you does not mind me saying so. Only you must wear it right, it has to have a slight tilt, you see, and the curls showin’ on this side. There! –Don’t you think that’s better, Lady Charleson?” she added proudly.

    Lady Charleson started slightly. “Certainly. Most becoming, Lady Desdemona.”

    “Glad you think so,” she said drily.

    Mrs Urqhart allowed a short pause to develop before saying in a kind voice: “Of course, she is not to be compared with your Ladyship. I never saw nothing half so pretty as that dress. Why, I declare one would take you for Miss Muzzle’s sister, rather than her ma!”

    Johanna Jubb at this wanted very much to say “Yes, indeed,” but was afraid she could not manage it in a convincing tone. She swallowed.

    “Thank you, dear Mrs Urqhart, but I fear you flatter me,” sighed Lady Charleson.

    “No, she doesn’t. That lilac suits you. I can’t wear lilac, makes me look yellow. I like it, though,” said Dezzie sadly.

    There was a short pause whilst the company tried not to think of Lady Desdemona in lilac.

    “I like it, too,” said Jo valiantly. “But I’m too dark for it, I think.”

    Lady Charleson looked at her critically. Johanna had a creamy skin, with glossy brown curls and, sadly, not her father’s extraordinary blue eyes but brown ones, like her late mother’s: very nice, but nothing remarkable. “You are young yet, my dear, but in a few years’ time I think you will blossom into a very handsome woman. And you will be able to wear dark shades, which will suit you better than these debutante’s tones, I think. You have an excellent facial structure.”

    “Yes. I have not, at all,” put in Muzzie glumly. “Both Eric and I take after Papa, and he was very round-faced and undistinguished-looking.”

    “Darling,” reproved her mother gently, shaking her head.

    Muzzie blushed deeply. “I’m sorry, Mamma,” she said in a small voice.

    “My deary, you is the prettiest little thing and I dare swear always will be, like your Ma!” cried Mrs Urqhart kindly, if somewhat mendaciously. “Why, you have just the same pretty fair curls!”

    “Thank you,” said Muzzie, smiling gratefully.

    Lady Charleson sighed and touched her hand to her elaborate head, tonight wound with fine lengths of the lilac satin in what was not at all a turban but something much more elegant and just slightly Grecian-looking. With a large pearl and diamond brooch that should have come to Muzzie from her paternal grandmother but that she was still by far too young to wear. “It is kind in you to say so, but I fear mine is sadly faded now, Mrs Urqhart,” she sighed.

    Mrs Urqhart’s opinion was on the contrary that it was suspiciously bright and she probably touched it up. “Never say so, me dear! Why, it is so pretty and yaller!” she cried.

    “Sunny,” agreed Jo hoarsely.

    “My dears, this flattery! Really, you are too kind,” sighed her Ladyship. She was, after all, a foe almost worthy of the steel of Mrs Purdue. “But enough of me and my little concerns! Tell me, my dear Miss Jubb, does your papa intend you shall be brought out next year?”

    “Yes, your Ladyship,” admitted Jo glumly.

    “Why, perhaps we shall see something of you in London, then!” cried Muzzle.

    “That will be pleasant,” she said in a hollow voice.

    Muzzie came and sat by her, smiling, and began to tell her about Aunt Faith.

    Before the party Sir Noël had suggested whist, but this had been vetoed by Mrs Urqhart on the grounds that Mr O’Flynn and Lady Desdemona didn’t care for cards. Noël was therefore quite astounded when, on the gentlemen’s coming into the small drawing-room, Mrs Urqhart immediately rose and said: “We is in here,” and the doors to the adjoining salon were thrown open to reveal a table set out ready for cards.

    “Now, don’t say I didn’t ought, Noël,” she said, not meeting his eye, “but I haven’t played at faro since my poor Pumps passed on, and—”

    “Faro?” he gasped.

    “I could not permit Millicent!” gasped Lady Charleson. Mr O’Flynn did not speak any criticism of his hostess, but he looked very shocked and nodded agreement with his cousin.

    “I’m damned if I could permit Johanna, either,” said Ned in a shaken voice. “Faro, Betsy?”

    “The grand ladies and gentlemen play faro in London,” she said aggrievedly.

    “Largely the gentlemen, I believe,” returned Ned, getting over his shock and starting to wonder what she was up to. “It is a game of the gambling hells, my dear.”

    “Well, I seen ladies play, too. And anyway I was not proposin’ we should play for money. Only I thought it would be fun,” she said wistfully.

    “Yes, it would! Why not?” said Dezzie with a laugh.

     Mr O’Flynn swallowed hard and tried to smile.

    “There is not much skill involved, you know, Mr O’Flynn: it is all on the luck of the draw,” said Mrs Urqhart kindly, looking at his expression.

    “Indeed?” he replied valiantly. “Perhaps, then, Cousin, if it is not for money?” he ventured, not meeting her eye.

    “Papa, please could I?” said Johanna in an undertone.

    “Well… If you are serious that we should not play for money, Betsy,” he said, hoping this was the right tack to take.

    “Out o’ course! I would not dream of it, never fear me! No, we shall play for beads,” she said, clapping her hands loudly. “BHAI!”

    The company jumped, and the elderly Indian butler came in, bowing.

    “Bring them beads, we want ’em, now,” she ordered. “I has this collection of glass beads, my dears, and some funny old stones as we picked up in India amongst ’em, and the children was used to stake ’em at lottery tickets and so forth,” she informed the company.

    “Mamma, if it would not be gambling?” hissed Muzzle pleadingly.

    Lady Charleson had never played faro, and she shuddered to think of the hay Mrs Purdue would make of it if the story came to her ears. On the other hand she was very sorely tempted: it would very likely be fun, and even if it were not, if Sir Edward was to play and she was to be left out of it—

    “Could you not, dear ma’am, if it is but for beads?” said Sir Ned, smiling into her eyes.

    “I think beads could not be said to be ineligible!” agreed Charles Grey with a little laugh. Muzzie looked up at him worshipfully.

    “Why, yes; I am sure my mamma would permit my sisters, if it were for beads,” lied Sir Noël, smiling.

    Lady Charleson was very pleased to be the centre of the gentlemen’s attention, though it was true she had not planned it at this precise moment. The fan was unfurled immediately. It was an ivory fan tipped with white ostrich plumes and quite indescribably fluttery and feminine, certainly when wielded by Evangeline Charleson. The long, thick lashes fluttered over the blue eyes and the soft fronds of ostrich fluttered below them. “I declare you are positively in league against me! Very well, my darling child, if you wish it,” she said.

    “Oh, fank you, Mamma!” lisped Muzzie, clasping her hands together gratefully.

    “I doubt if it is the first step down the primrose path, you know,” murmured Ned confidentially.

    Lady Charleson was not at all sure what he meant, to say truth, but she was exceedingly pleased to be spoken to in such a tone by Sir Edward, so she smiled slowly into his eyes above her fan and returned: “Well—no, very likely not! But is it not most shocking?”

    “Delightfully so,” he said, smiling.

    She gave a little giggle and a little gasp and allowed herself to shiver delicately all over, the fronds of her fan also shivering. And Ned Jubb, hopelessly in love with Miss Hildegarde Maddern or not, could not help an involuntary little shiver in response. Damn the woman: she knew all the tricks of her trade!

    Faro, as Mrs Urqhart had shrewdly guessed, had the effect of loosening up the company considerably. For it was, as Muzzie naïvely declared, a most exciting game and she could not see why everybody did not play it at parties! Even though they were playing only for beads—and in certain cases not in small measure because of the relief that they were playing only for beads—everyone became very animated indeed. There was much laughter and teasing and envy of other persons’ heaps of beads—Major Grey, in particular, being an indecently heavy winner—and Mrs Urqhart saw to it that a footman proffered champagne from time to time. The two young girls did not partake, but everyone else did.

    As the champagne circulated, at Sir Edward’s and Lady Charleson’s end of the table dark sleeves of dress coats began to brush against pale forearms accidentally and elbows touched now and again, and hands picking up cards or beads just whispered together and quickly withdrew. And breath came rather faster, Lady Charleson’s well-shaped pale bosom rising and falling noticeably above the low-cut lilac and lace of her pretty dress. After some time and several more glasses of champagne Ned’s knee moved, his foot nudged hers and his warm, strong thigh pressed unmistakeably against her satin and lace one. A bright flush rose to Evangeline’s forehead and, though she did not look at him, she had recourse to her fan. But she did not move her leg away.

    It was really getting quite late when Muzzie cried: “Oh! I cannot have lost my last bead! Oh, it is so unfair, Major!” as Major Grey, grinning, scooped up a huge pile of his winnings.

    “Never let it be said I was a sore winner!” he said with a laugh. “Have some of my bounty, Miss Charleson!”

    Muzzie gasped and squeaked as he poured beads into her lap—incidentally, for he had had his fair share of the champagne, squinting down her bosom and deciding it was a dashed luscious one and he would not half mind, if she was rather older, of course, getting a handful of that.

    “Shall I fill your lap also?” murmured Ned Jubb in Lady Charleson’s ear. Under the table his hand squeezed her thigh very hard, once.

    She repressed a tiny gasp and did not reply directly. It would not have been true to say that at this precise moment she felt ready to fling her cap over the windmill for Edward Jubb, but she felt as near to it as a woman of her type could. She looked up the table and said to her daughter’s flushed round face: “Dearest, I really think that is enough faro: let us take it as a sign, that you have lost your last bead.”

    “But Mamma, Major Grey has given me some of his!”

    “Er—no, I think not, Millicent, dear. Mrs Urqhart has some very pretty albums over there: I think you had best sit down quietly on that sofa and look at them.”

    “It is the fate of all losers at faro, you know, to sit quietly and look at albums, Miss Charleson,” put in Lord Lucas with a kind smile.

    “Aye, and in a little while I shall ring for tea,” said Mrs Urqhart. “That’s right, lovey, over on that sofa; there is a case of pretty miniatures there you as you can look at, too. –Why, Major, you is not a-goin’ to rise a heavy winner, is you?”

    Major Grey replied merrily: “Indeed; my papa is a wise man who taught me very young the motto ‘Quit while ahead’—especially when it is beads, you know! I shall join Miss Charleson at the albums. I trust they contain sketches of Indian life?”

    “Well, I cain’t draw worth a fig, though Pa had a proper drawing master to me, poor fellow. But yes, they is largely Pumps’s India sketches, and some done by my daughters.”

    “Splendid!” He strolled over to join the fluttered Muzzie.

    Why Major Grey, who after all was a man of two and thirty, had placed himself at Muzzie Charleson’s side for the faro was not clear. He had not himself speculated very deeply on it, but merely supposed vaguely that it had seemed the natural move, since he had been next to her at dinner. He did not now ponder at all as to why he was leaving the faro table to join her, though he did feel vaguely that playing for beads had palled and that it would be pleasant to be beside a little plump thing on a sofa with the opportunity to touch elbows and so forth while they looked at albums. Possibly the champagne was a factor, here.

    So he duly sat down, rather close, though very properly not touching, and smiled into her big blue eyes. “Well, which shall it be first, Miss Charleson? The miniatures or the albums?”

    “I do not mind, sir,” whispered Muzzie, very pink.

    Major Grey didn’t mind deciding, so that was all right. He bent forward and opened the case of miniatures. After a minute he said in a stunned voice: “Why, these are extraordinary!”

    “They are all Indian pictures, I think,” she said timidly.

    “Aye, but— Look at the fine brushwork, and the detail! I have never seen anything like them.” He picked up one small framed picture and examined it narrowly.

    “That is a very pretty lady,” said Muzzie hoarsely.

    Naturally Mrs Urqhart had not set out the rude pictures which Ned proposed purchasing and which Tim proposed giving him. This was quite an ordinary one: a lady’s head and torso, the head turned a little away in profile. The lady held a delicate sprig of flowers and was draped in a gauzy veil. Under the veil she wore an abbreviated jacket or spencer of the sort that Major Grey was now accustomed to see his hostess wear with a saree, but unlike Mrs Urqhart’s, this lady’s was almost as transparent as the veil. Certainly a neat brown nipple pointed straight at the viewer. Her jewellery was largely emeralds and pearls, the double rope of the latter evidently as fine as the rope that Mrs Urqhart was wearing tonight.

    Major Grey looked closer. “Why, she has a pearl in her nose!” he said in a stunned voice. “Look, my dear!”

    Muzzie went very pink and peered at the picture. If there was a pearl in the nose, it was not fixed in the side shown by the artist. “It is not a mistake, or—or something she has in her hair on the other side, is it?”

    “No, it is—not a single pearl, I think—possibly a small ring of them, to match the earring.” The earring was composed of a ring of well-sized pearls with a ruby centre, and a very large emerald drop depending from the whole.

    Muzzie touched her own nose dubiously.

    “It is true that Bapsee—that is Mrs Urqhart’s servant, you know—that she wears a small gold stud in her nose,” he said numbly.

    Muzzie goggled at him.

    “They must punch a hole in the nostril as we might in the ear,” he said weakly.

    “How bizarre!” she gasped, still touching a hand to her nose.

    “I would not like to see a hole punched in your pretty little nose, at all events,” said Major Grey in a shaken voice.

    Muzzie turned puce. ‘‘No,” she whispered, looking down.

    The Major came to himself, laughed a little, and said: “Well, it is the custom there, I suppose! Have you remarked the hands, Miss Charleson? It is some sort of a red stain: is it not curious?”

    “It is not just the shading, is it?”

    “No: look, the tips of the fingers are dyed with it.”

    Muzzie peered again. The blonde curls brushed his coat sleeve. Major Grey felt rather warm and happy—though the champagne, again, could well have been a factor. “Why, so they are! How—how neat and quaint!” she said, laughing. ‘‘And see, she has a thumb ring!”

    “Indeed. A curious fashion, but as you say, very quaint. Some other young ladies, of course,” he said on a sly note, “have rosy-tipped little fingers like the dawn, they would not need to paint them in this quaint fashion to make them look quite adorable.” With one long finger he just flipped her little pink one where it was pointing to the lady’s hand.

    Muzzie jumped, and gasped, and drew back her hand, and blushed again and squeaked: “Oh, Major Grey!”

    “Oh, what, Major Grey?” he said teasingly, though dimly aware he should not: after all she was the merest child.

    “You should not!” gasped Muzzie, peeping up at him.

    Charles Grey felt a rush of warmth that was not entirely due to the champagne and thought involuntarily: By God, I should like to, though! and said somewhat hoarsely: “But you make it impossible to refrain, Miss Charleson.”

    “Oh,” gulped Muzzie, looking down at the painting again.

    Major Grey looked with interest at the delicacy of her eyelids and the pouting pink curve of her mouth and—for she could not see him do it—glanced down her bosom again and decided it was a dashed pity that that little dress was not lower cut, and said in a would-be airy voice: “Remark the fine technique with which the artist has painted this gauze.” He pointed to the fine creases of the stuff over the elbow.

    “Yes,” said Muzzie helplessly, looking at the dark pointing nipple a little above it and blushing all over again.

    Major Grey’s lips twitched in amusement. He did not remark further on the miniature of the lady but laid it back in its place and picked up another. “What is this, do you think? A hunting scene? It is very complex.”

    The centre of the picture featured a tree but surrounding this tree were many rocks and people with horses. The people were wearing strange dress but many of them had beards or moustachios, so they were clearly gentlemen. And, recognized Muzzie thankfully, fully clad. One of them had a hawk on his wrist. It was not set out at all as a European painting would be, though Major Grey, who had seen considerably more of art than had Muzzie Charleson, was reminded of some Mediaeval paintings.

    “I think they are hunting,” agreed Muzzie shyly.

    “Mm. What are these?” There were several well-sized animals, indeed as big as the horses, to the right of the tree. At first sight they appeared to be frisking, but he looked again and bit his lip.

    “Oh, they are wounded!” she cried.

    “Yes. It must be a hunt: I think they are some sort of deer,” he said weakly. “See the tails? This one is escaping, it has only a slight wound on its rump.”

    “Yes,” agreed Muzzie gratefully. “Oh, do but look, Major! Here is a baby one, in this corner!”

    So it was. Major Grey looked at it with relief: it at least did not have a delicately painted spray of blood sprouting from a wound. “Aye, is it not sweet?”

    “Oh, yes! What an impression this gives of its big eyes and dainty ears!” breathed Muzzie. “See the man behind it? Do you suppose he is taking it home for a pet?”

    No, if anything he’d be taking it home to put it on the spit: these fellows did not look the kind that took fawns home for pets. “Aye, that will be it,” he lied gallantly. “I dare say he may have a pretty little daughter at home of around—well, seventeen, shall we say,”—Muzzie blushed and fluttered her eyelashes, but not, decided Charles Grey in some relief, at all deliberately, unlike her frightful mother—“who will just love to have a little fawn for a pet.”

    “Oh, yes!” she breathed.

    The Major smiled, and had to fight back an impulse to tell her that his father kept a few deer, and— They both looked at the miniature again, but both were very conscious of the other’s near presence.

    “Is this a fox, do you think?” she said at last.

    In the foreground—really the picture was very odd, there was a little perspective in the top third of it but the bottom two-thirds had none at all, and the more the Major looked at it the more he thought it was very Mediaeval in technique—in the foreground, painted quite clearly against some grass and a rock, was a little leaping creature. Its feet were rather like a fox’s and it had a pointed muzzle, but if anything the tiny head was more like a greyhound’s! Though it was definitely not a dog. The tail was not that of a fox, however.

    There was a considerable silence. Muzzie looked from the mongoose to the Major with a trusting expression on her round face.

    Charles Grey found himself absurdly tempted to lie, just in order to impress her. He did not, however. Finally he said: “I don’t think it can be a fox: that is not a brush, is it?”

    “No, it does not look like it.”

    “I don’t know what it is. It must be an Indian animal,” he admitted.

    “Yes, I think so, too.” She then pointed out a gentleman who seemed to have gone to sleep with his long gun over his shoulder. Major Grey would not have liked to have encountered the wrong end of a gun like that: it was more than half as high as a man. He did not remark on this, for it might remind her of the wounded deer, but said: “I confess I cannot figure out the subject of the composition at all.”

    “Nor I. They have definitely been on a hunt, but why is this gentleman asleep?”

    Major Grey shook his head.

    “It is very foreign,” ventured Muzzie in a whisper.

    “Aye, it is that!” he agreed, smiling. “Shall we look at the album, Miss Charleson?” Out of the corner of his eye he had perceived that several more of the miniatures featured either semi-naked ladies—it seemed to be the fashion favoured by the Indian ladies, but he did not feel equal to explaining this to Miss Charleson—or further hunting scenes.

    Muzzie agreed with relief. She could see that several more of the miniatures featured scarce-clad ladies and she did not feel equal to looking at them in Major Grey’s company, for somehow, she knew not how it was, her heart had beat very fast when he had shewn her that lady, and when he had looked at the lady’s breast it had felt as if his eye had pierced right through her own gown and seen that she was like that underneath, too!

    At the table in the centre of the room the game continued, Mrs Urqhart encouraging Lord Lucas loudly with: “Come along, now, Lucas, let us see how you can deal!”

    “Yes, and let us hope you bring me luck!” said Jo with a laugh.

    “Luck? You have got that fine blue bead off me!” cried Sir Noël indignantly.

    “Lady Charleson,” said Sir Ned in a low voice as it at last dawned what Betsy’s intentions for the layout of her card salon must be: “there is another sofa with more albums at the far end of the room. If you should not dislike it, shall we? For I must confess that playing for beads—er—has palled.”

    Lady Charleson gave him a knowing little smile. –Obviously thought the nabob habitually spent his nights playing for huge sums in the London hells, noted Ned Jubb drily. Well, a man who was fool enough to do that would very soon find himself without his fortune!

    “Indeed, although faro is a most exciting game I confess I should very much like to sit quietly for a little,” she agreed.

    Sir Ned offered his arm forthwith.

    “I fear I should not have permitted Millicent to play,” she sighed as they reached the sofa.

    “Nonsense!” he said bracingly, seeing her tenderly onto it: “there was no harm in it, at all!”

    “No,” she agreed, ‘‘but word gets around our little neighbourhood so quickly, you know, and even one’s most innocent moves may be quite misinterpreted.”

    Was this a warning to him to go slow? Well, he had no intention of playing with her foot while they were on the sofa in full view of everyone. But he fancied the company—always setting aside Betsy, of course—would not remark a discreet pressure of his thigh against hers.

    He instituted this pressure forthwith, therefore, but replied, as if the thigh were doing it quite of its own volition: “It is not ineligible for you to sit out with an old fellow like me, is it?”

    “Oh! No, I am sure— Why, you are not an old fellow at all, Sir Edward, how can you say such a thing?” She fluttered the lashes at him and unfurled the fan.

    “I am glad to hear that you think so. –Are you a little heated, my dear?” he added in a low voice. The colour had not been remarkable in her cheeks before, but at this it flamed up and she flicked him a look out of her big blue eyes. “May I?” He took the fan gently from her, allowing his hand to linger over hers.

    Evangeline’s bosom rose and fell very fast. “Thank you,” she said huskily.

    Ned had also risen, in fact some time earlier, though he knew himself well enough not to be at all surprized at this phenomenon, even in one who was emotionally attached to quite another lady. However, at the tone of her voice—which for once he did not think was deliberate, there had been a little tremor of desire in it which no woman in his sufficiently wide experience was capable of faking—his heart beat distinctly faster and his own breath came a little short.

    He fanned her silently for quite a while, not neglecting to study the bosom as he did so, while Evangeline, with lowered eyes, turned over the pages of an album without seeing a thing. The low height of the table whereon this album reposed necessitated her leaning forward a little and she was fully aware that this meant that Sir Edward must be able to see a goodly way into her scant bodice.

    Finally he murmured: “Are you still over-heated?”

    “A little,” she said faintly.

    “Shall we take a turn on the balcony? It’s quite a mild night and the wind has dropped.”

    “If you think we should, Sir Edward,” she murmured.

    “I think we should.”

    Evangeline shot him one melting look that was calculated to turn the average man’s knees to water—amongst other things—and Sir Ned stood up and held out his arm to her. They went out onto the balcony without signalling their departure to the faro table, which was quite absorbed in its game.

    “Yes, it is milder tonight than it has been for some time,” he said, walking slowly to the rail.

    In fact it was not very warm, though it was true the weather had improved today. Evangeline had a warm wrap with her, the outer fabric being a lilac satin which no-one in the district would recognise as having come from an huge old-fashioned petticoat of her mamma’s that she had had put by for years. It was lined with a warm woollen stuff, but this was hidden with a grey silk that she had purchased for a gown but had decided against, as being too ageing. One edge was trimmed with delicate white swansdown, again a legacy from her mamma, and fortunate it was that Mrs Purdue was not here tonight, or she would undoubtedly have managed to wonder why the whole wrap was not so trimmed.

    “Indeed,” she agreed. She released his arm and, resisting the temptation to huddle herself in the wrap, turned to look slowly about her, incidentally leaning back a little against the balcony with her back a little arched and her bosom well displayed.

    Ned Jubb felt like telling her he didn’t need this further encouragement, wasn’t it evident he was encouraged enough already? At the same time, he could not deny he felt very much like jumping on her then and there.

    “Why, how charming,” she discovered: “there are steps going down to the garden. It is quite Italianate, is it not?”

    He was quite surprized to learn that she knew enough to say so. “Yes, though in an Italian house the steps might be at the front of the house, I think, and the lower floor would be consecrated to the servants’ use. Shall we go down? The rose beds are just below, here.”

    Lady Charleson hesitated.

    “Are you afraid of me?” he said provocatively.

    “Of course I am, you asserlutely naughty man!” she hissed.

    Ned’s teeth flashed in the dark. “Good,” he said, holding out his arm.

    She hesitated again, but finally took it, and as he had quite expected she would, pressed her bosom to his upper-arm. Ned’s heart duly galloped. They descended the Italianate steps very slowly.

    The circular rose garden was quite charming, for in the centre of the formal beds was a large round pond with an elaborate marble fountain, and several marble statues were dotted around amongst the beds. And Mrs Urqhart had caused sufficiently discreet candles to be  floated in saucers on the pond. “It is quite an exquisite notion,” approved Lady Charleson.

    “Exquisite or not, there is too much candlelight here for my taste—come into the lee of this cypress,” he said after they had stood by the pond for a little.

    “Sir Edward, what can you mean?” she murmured. “I am a respectable widow.”

    “Mm.” He drew her into the lee of a large Italianate cypress. “I think you have been a respectable widow far too long, my dear!” he said gaily, cupping her face in his hands.

    Evangeline said nothing but she allowed her eyes to meet his and her lips just to part.

    Ned pulled her roughly against him and kissed her thoroughly. After perhaps two seconds she responded strongly, pressing herself to him and panting a little, clasping his back tightly. When he paused for breath she said faintly: “Oh, Sir Edward! This is most drefful improper!”

    “Yes,” said Ned vaguely, getting a hand behind her.

    “What— Oh!” gasped Evangeline, shuddering against him as he squeezed her posterior. “How—how dare you, sir!” She pulled away from him, panting.

    “Don’t say you didn’t like it!” he said with a little laugh.

    “Of course I— Oh, I think you are the naughtiest man in the world!” she gasped, raising her hands to her glowing cheeks.

    Ned stepped in again, since the posture left her appropriately defenceless. and buried his face in her breasts. He began to caress her thigh, very slowly, the lace slipping up and down over the satin undergown. After a little of this treatment, not to his surprise, Lady Charleson leaned a lot of weight on him and gave a little moan.

    Ned covered her mouth with his and fumbled the dress up her leg. “No!” she gasped, trying to pull away.

    “Don’t be Missish, my dear,” he said into her neck and bit it gently. She gave a little squeal and Ned pulled her dress up quickly and shoved his hand between her thighs.

    “No!” she gasped.

    “Mm—darling,” he said into her breasts, mumbling his face over them.

    “Oh... Edward,” said Evangeline in a swooning voice.

    … “Well!” he said into her ear with a smile as she clung to him, panting, a little later.

    “You—wickedest—man!” panted Evangeline.

    “Pooh, you enjoyed it,” he said, nibbling her ear.

    “That does not mean that you were not wicked, sir,” she said, pulling away from him and smoothing at her dress.

    Ned laughed. “Come here.” He pulled her gently against him and said into her ear: “I wish I could ask you to do something for me in return, but it ain’t the time nor the place, is it?”

    “Certainly not! And you need not suppose, sir, that I—that I— Well, you took me by surprize, and well you know it!”

    “Aye, and you took me by surprize, ma’am. Hot to handle, ain’t you?”

    She stepped back with dignity and patted at her hair, quite unnecessarily. “At all events, my husband always said so,” she admitted, looking sideways at him from under her lashes.

    “Lucky Devil!” he said with a chuckle. “I have to get back to London, you know,” he added. “But may I come to call when I return?”

    “I— I scarce dare say yes, you are such a naughty, naughty man!” she whispered.

    “Mm,” he agreed, adjusting her wrap for her and leaving his arm round it.

    “Sir Edward, I have already mentioned the propensity of this little neighbourhood for gossip,” she said on a desperate note; “I scarcely think— Well, it would be remarked, you know.”

    “What, may not a respectable widower attempt to pay court to a respectable widow-woman, in Dittersford Parish?” he said with a faint laugh in his voice.

    Evangeline’s heart beat very fast, this time with simple triumph. So he did have honourable intentions! “I suppose that would not be wholly ineligible, sir,” she said, very low, with the slightest of emphases on the “that”.

    Ned didn’t for a minute suppose it would—no. “Good, in that case I shall come to call directly I am returned from London, with the greatest bunch of flowers you ever saw!” he chuckled.

    “I shall be pleased to receive you, sir,” said Evangeline primly.

    At that Ned Jubb gave a genuine laugh and said: “Shall you, my dear?’ I wish very much it could be so!”

    “I do think,” said Mrs Urqhart severely as he accompanied her upstairs on her orders, leaving the young men to a last cigar or brandy or both downstairs, “that you could have seen Lady Dezzie home, at the least!”

    “But Betsy, my dear, she did not want me to. In fact, I am sorry to dash your hopes, you know, but I fear she does not want me. Period.”

    “What do you mean?” said Mrs Urqhart crossly, opening her bedroom door. “Yes, you may take me shoes off, you heathen, and I thought I done told you not to watch up for me this late?” she said in a grumpy voice to the salaaming Bapsee.

    Bapsee merely replied with a giggle: “I always am take the shoes off, Betsy Begum!”

    Mrs Urqhart sat down, plump, on her bed and glared as Ned, grinning, threw himself down at full length on the window seat and linked his hands behind his head.

    “I said, what did you mean?” she said loudly. “Jooldee, jooldee, you is gettin’ slow as a wet week in your old age!” she added irritably to Bapsee.

    “We is all getting old age, Betsy Begum.”

    “Shut your mouth, you creature! Well, Ned Jubb? I am listenin’!”

    Ned knew that Bapsee was as close as an oyster: nevertheless he hesitated. “Well, my dear, although I like Lady Dezzie very much and admire her, you know, I am quite sure that she does not want me now and will never want me in the future, however much you may try to throw us together.”

    There was a short pause.

    “What does that mean, pray?” she said grumpily.

    “Oh... Well, I cannot tell whether it is that she is a one-man woman and that man was her late husband, or whether, you know, she is perhaps one of those women who never need a man in the way a man generally needs a woman.”

    “Oh,” said Mrs Urqhart thoughtfully.

    “It is clear she must have been very fond of her husband indeed, but as to how passionate the relationship was...” He shrugged a little. “I can’t say; but I can say that she is not the type who would ever stir my blood, and I am pretty sure that I could never stir hers.”

    “You was talkin’ to her all through the tea-tray!” she cried.

    “Yes, for I do like her, and besides, Evangeline and I had tacitly agreed that it would not do to sit in each other’s pockets for the remainder of the evening. But— Well, you know me,” he said, making a face.

    “Do I?” she retorted grimly.

    “Aye,” said Ned, wrinkling his nose. “I could not forebear to try her, you know—for I can see as well as you that she is a strikingly handsome woman who would make a most suitable helpmate—even if she is the sister of a marquis.”

    “Well?”

    He shrugged. “There was no flicker of—of consciousness of me as a man, my dear.”

    Mrs Urqhart was silent, pouting. Finally she said: “P’raps you give her the wrong signals.”

    He gave a startled laugh. “I don’t think so!”

    “I s’pose you will say there is no question of you misinterpretin’ her signals, neither.”

    “None at all,” he said gently. “It is quite, quite unmistakable, you know, however respectable the woman.”

    “Aye, I knows, I ain’t that stupid,” she agreed, sighing. “Well, it’s a great pity.”

    “I’m sorry,” said Ned politely.

    Mrs Urqhart seized a pillow and hurled it at his head.

    “No! Truly!” he gasped, catching it with ease.

    “Aye, no doubt. Well, what happened with that Charleson cow?”

    “Er…”

    “Lawks, Bapsee is mum as they come, me love, never fear her!”

    “Yes, but I would not speak of Bapsee in front of Lady Charleson, you know.”

   Mrs Urqhart goggled at him. “Oh, very well! –Go on, scarper, you heathen. And you can come back when I ring, and not before!”

    “When you ring, Betsy Begum, yes. –Lady Charleson is being widow long time, Sir Edward Sahib.”

    “Not that long, she ain’t, and push your BARROW!” shouted Mrs Urqhart, turning an alarming shade of purple.

    “Push barrow, Betsy Begum?”

    “Get OUT!”

    Bowing, though also giggling, Bapsee got.

    “Heathen,” she muttered. “Well, go on.”

    Ned stretched on the window seat, grinning. “We-ell—”

    “You never!” she gasped.

    “I had not the time, really,” he said regretfully.

    “Well, how far did it go?”

    “Er—too far, I fear.”

    “What?” she gasped, bolt upright.

    “I started off by kissing her; well, she was ready for that.”

    Mrs Urqhart gave a slight sniff.

    “Er… Then I got a finger up her.”

    “WHAT?” she screeched.

    “She was ready for that, too. Like a bitch on heat. Thought she was going to take the finger off.”

    “You great loon, Ned Jubb, that is practically grounds for breach of promise!”

    “No, it ain’t: no witnesses,” he said, grinning.

    “Was that it?” said Mrs Urqhart in a hollow voice.

    “Mm? Oh—more or less. Well, I got her hand on me—no, no, outside me nether garment,” he said, pulling an awful face. “I don’t deny I had much ado not to shove it up her—not that I think she’d have let me go that far.”

    “Much!”

    “No, no, Betsy, she’s the sort that allows that on the wedding night or never.”

    “Well, just you mind it’s never, acos it sounds to me as if you gone too far already!”

    “Well... A little; I shall have to cool off. in any case the ploy worked: she did not so much as glance at Noël all evening,” he said airily.

    Noël’s Aunt Betsy replied grimly: “Oh, she glanced, all right. And with them legs on him, it ain’t to be expected as she wouldn’t.”

    “Eh?” he said, looking at his own.

    “They is fair, for a man of your age. Heavyish, but fair, if you likes that sort. Only his is like—um—that Greek feller.”

    “Eh?”

    “Well, I forget his name. He’s a statue or somethin’. Little Hildy was a-going on about—” She broke off.

    “Not in the context of Noël’s legs, I trust,” he said grimly.

    “No, I thought of that for meself,” she said airily. “Anyway, his is splendid whilst yours is just fair, so mind yourself.”

    Ned looked down at himself again.

    “Aye, and your third leg ain’t so dusty, neither! There, I said it, you vain dog!” she shouted.

    “Lady C. seemed to like it, anyway,” he noted.

    She snorted richly. “Noël’s got one, too, you know. And afore you says anything, she’s already seen she can have the same effect on his what she has on yours.”

    “Mm. But I doubt if she’ll imperil her chances of getting her hands on the nabob’s fortune by—er—getting her hands on his!” he ended with a choke of laughter.

    “No, well, possibly we is safe for a bit. Until she realises you was leadin’ her on.”

    “Oh, then I’ll come back and give her a bit more encouragement,” he said airily.

    “Aye, and let yourself in for that breach o’ promise case,” she predicted.

    “Oh, pooh!”

    “Just don’t write anything,” she warned grimly.

    “Not a word!” he promised, laughing.

    “I only wanted you to get the woman worked up, y’know.”

    “Well, I have done that.”

    “And some,” she muttered.

    Ned shrugged.

    “Here, how long is it since you had it?” she demanded on a grim note.

    “Er... Well, since I sent Kamala back to India, I suppose,” he admitted.

    “You shouldn’t never have done it, you is a man what needs it regular.”

    “Aye, I suppose... But it was high time she was settled with her fat baboo, she was not getting any younger, any more than I, you know.”

    “N— That is over three years since!” she gasped. “You’re a fool! And you ain’t never found another one?”

    “The respectable ones wish to marry my fortune and the unrespectable ones are not clean, my dear.”

    She sniffed again. “You been in India too long.”

    “I don’t mean that they don’t bathe!” He paused. “Well, that, too, I have to admit.”

    “Aye: Europeans do stink, the Indians is right on that one.”

    “Yes.”

    Mrs Urqhart wrinkled her brow. “What about that eldest girl of Kamala’s, the one she had by the husband what died?”

    “Well, she did offer her.”

    “Out o’ course she did, the woman has a head on her shoulders! –-Well?”

   Ned sighed and ran a hand through his grizzled curls. “The baboo had found her a respectable husband—well, Anglo-Indian, given Kamala’s doubtful parentage, but a decent enough chap for a chee-chee. And the girl wished for it, so... “

    “You is too soft, she would have been a comfort to you, you fool!”

    “In me declining years—oh, quite.” He yawned, and got up. “I’m off to bed. If you’re asleep in the morning, I shan’t disturb you. I shall certainly be back for the engagement party at the Manor, but if you think I’m needed before that, drop me a line.” He kissed her cheek.

    “Well, you done your best, I suppose,” she said glumly. ‘

    “Betsy, I am not in danger from Evangeline Charleson’s wiles!” he said with a laugh.

    “They all says that, afore the hooks sink into their gullets,” she noted glumly.

    “Rubbish! You are just tired, from too much party. –By the way, the faro was an inspiration, my dear: congratulations.”

    “Aye, it loosened ’em up. –Loosened some up a damn’ sight too far,” she muttered.

    Ned just laughed, patted her shoulder, and strolled off.

     Mrs Urqhart threw the last pillow across the room, and shouted: “BAPSEE!”

    Bapsee came in giggling. “Sir Edward Sahib is very excite because Lady Charleson is wanting it!”

    “Shut your mouth,” groaned Mrs Urqhart. “I’m a fool, that’s what, a fool!”

    Bapsee lapsed into Urdoo and informed her mistress that Sir Edward Sahib was as strong as a fine water buffalo (male) and that Lady Charleson was young enough to bear him a fine son.

    “Is you DEAF?” she screamed. “That is not what I wants, you fool!”

    “But you not want Noël Baba give her baby, neither, Betsy Begum,” she said in bewilderment.

    “No! I just wanted Ned to lead the woman ON!” she shouted.

    “He does that, Betsy Begum. Ranjit and me see in garden. He puts hand—”

    Mrs Urqhart moaned, and covered her ears.

    “She is like very much, Betsy Begum,” she assured her anxiously.

    “Oh, go away,” moaned her mistress. “You will never understand, if you lives to be an hundred, why did I ever pull you out of the slum you was born in?”

    Bapsee began to undress her. “Any English lady would like Sir Edward Sahib,” she said confidentially. “He is like big bull.” She switched to Urdoo again. “He has a very fine—” Here she said a word that Mrs Urqhart probably should not have known.

    “Here, has you had it?” she said in alarm.

    “No! I am much too old for him!” she giggled.

    “Aye, well. –Here, that daughter of your’n with the husband what died.”

    “Please?”

    Mrs Urqhart switched to Urdoo and asked Bapsee whether the daughter was going to come to England as had been suggested and if so whether Bapsee thought she would fancy Sir Edward. And vice versa. Bapsee replied on a regretful note that the daughter’s brother-in-law had married her. Mrs Urqhart did not enquire whether this was the brother-in-law what was married already or the brother-in-law what was sixteen, because in India, either would have done. “Well, we must find him someone!”

    “But you have found him Lady Charleson, memsahib!”

    Mrs Urqhart closed her eyes.

    “Good, you sleep now, Betsy Begum.”

    “Go away,” she sighed.

    Bapsee bowed, extinguished all the candles but the one by the bedside, and withdrew.

    “Fool,” muttered Mrs Urqhart. As she muttered it in English it was not possible to tell whether she meant Bapsee, Ned Jubb, or even herself.

    Downstairs, Lord Lucas very soon took himself off to bed, yawning. Neither Amory nor Grey thought it was because he was particularly exhausted by the faro: they thought it was because he intended to ride over to the Manor early on the morrow to pay a call on his pretty widow.

    “So,” said Noël on a sour note, pitching his cigar butt into the fireplace: “Ned Jubb has a fancy for La belle Evangeline.”

    “Eh? Oh! It certainly looked like it. Ain’t she a dreadful female, though?” said Major Grey with a shudder.

    “Yes, and watch out you don’t end up with her for a mamma-in-law!” he returned sharply.

    “Eh? Come off it, dear boy, I am near old enough to be little Muzzie’s papa!” he said with a startled laugh, flushing a little.

    “Oh?”

    The Major said uneasily: “Well, she is a cuddly little thing, but practically one of the infantry, y’know.”

    “Oh?”

    “Look, the garden is at our disposal, Amory, if that’s the way you feel!” he cried, turning very red.

    “No—sorry, Charles,” said Noël, grinning sheepishly. “Damned Ned has put my nose out of joint.”

    “Yes, well, and no wonder! I mean, with the fortune he has to offer,” he said on an apologetic note.

    “Mm.”

    “Noël, you was never serious in that direction, surely?” he said, startled.

    “What, serious about becoming your papa-in-law, old fellow? –No, don’t eat me!” he gasped, laughing. “Well—no. Wouldn’t have minded a summer romance, though: you know?”

    “I doubt if she would have let that get very far, old man,” said Major Grey shrewdly.

    “No... Hot-eyed type, though. Reminds me of Lady Violet C.”

    “Oh, absolutely!”

    “Glad you can see it. Lucas could not.”

    “Lucas!” said Major Grey with a laugh.

    “You have a point,” conceded Noël, smiling. “Dear fellow though he is, of course. No, well, do you not think—?”

    “Not a hope. Wouldn’t let you get over the first fence, old man. Well, maybe the first,” he conceded. “You’d never take the second without a ring in your pocket, however.”

    “No, I suppose you’re right. Well, I must admit Ainsley said something of the sort one day. Just casually, y’know.”

    Major Grey looked at him ironically: he did not think that Paul Ainsley ever said anything just casually. But all he said was: “Mm, well, there you are.”

    “Aye. –Lucas was sayin’ his old uncle means to draw his coverts next month: you game?”

    “Papa is expecting me at some stage... I should like to.”

    “After the engagement party at the Manor, then?”

    “Yes, very well. I shall write Papa a line, he will be wondering— Well, you know how it is, old man.”

    “Charles, if your family is expecting you—”

    “Not exactly. It’s Mary Anne’s birthday at the end of next month, I must be home for that, she’ll be sixteen.”

    “That the youngest?”

    “Yes. –Hell, I remember the day she was born as clear as if it was yesterday! I have never seen Papa in such a stew. Well, Mamma had not been very well, y’know,” he said awkwardly. “But we came off all right and tight in the end, and then the dear old fellow drank a bottle of claret straight off and swore off it for life!”

    ‘Lor’,” said Noël limply.

    “Family life,” said Major Grey, smiling ruefully.

    “Aye.”

    The Major hesitated. Then he said: “Miss Charleson cannot be very much older than Mary Anne.”

    “Aye, that must be so.” Noël looked at his friend’s face. “Dear old fellow, Mary Anne is your sister, after all, not your daughter! If you have fallen for little Muzzie— Hell, I hope I have not said anything out of order, Charles.”

    “Nothing more than usual! No, it’s absurd, there’s fifteen years between us.”

    “That ain’t impossible.”

    “Not impossible, no, but it is damned absurd. –Shall we take the guns out tomorrow, Noël?”

    “Mm? Oh—Ainsley suggested we ride over to somewhere on the far side of the Place to look at dogs; should you care to?”

     “Well, if I am awake, but it has been a late night for me, you know,” he quavered.

    “Elderly as you are,” acknowledged Noël.

    Major Grey just grinned, and went out.

    “Not Mop-Head Muzzie! I shall have to give up his acquaintance!” gasped Noël, releasing the bubble of laughter that had been welling up in his throat for some time, and falling helplessly all over the study.

    He laughed for some time, and went up to bed feeling a lot better, in spite of La belle Evangeline’s fickleness, than he had for quite a while.

    Since Lady Charleson had given her butler strict instructions that visitors were not to be admitted to the house if only Miss Millicent were there to receive them, it must remain forever a mystery how Mrs Purdue had got in the following morning. Before Lady Charleson was up.

    There was, however, no mystery as to how Mrs Purdue had had the whole story of the faro party: Muzzie was as putty in her hands.

    Mrs Purdue emerged from Willow Court looking very grim. After only a short pause for thought she instructed her coachman to drive to the local vicarage. The coachman, who had thought they were destined to drive into Ditterminster to visit the Bishop’s wife this morning—at least, his mistress had expressed the intention of calling there, he had had every intention of repairing to a hostelry conveniently near to the Palace—looked extremely disconcerted but did not dare to say anything.

    Mrs Stalling was an early riser so she was not only up and dressed, she was correctly seated in the room which she called her small morning-room and to which Mrs Purdue referred as “that pretty little parlour at the vicarage,” correctly occupied with stitchery, when a carriage was heard to draw up.

    “Mamma, it’s Mrs Purdue!” gasped her youngest daughter, Linnaea, retreating from the window in horror. –Mr Stalling was a great admirer of the Swedish naturalist. Mrs Stalling had held out for some time, but Linnaea was the fourth girl, after Mary, Jane and Emily.

    “Run along upstairs then, my dear,” said Mrs Stalling—a trifle majestically, but with perfect understanding. Linnaea escaped thankfully.

    Mrs Purdue, however, though she greeted Mrs Stalling most graciously and expressed an interest in her stitchery—Mrs Stalling meanwhile thanking her lucky stars that it was not a day on which she had chosen to mend the boys’ linen—had called not on social affairs but to see the Vicar on a matter of great urgency.

    Even though it was Sermon Morning, a sacred (the term was not too strong) time in the Stalling household, Mrs Stalling led her forthwith into the Vicar’s study.

    In consequence of this visit, Mr Stalling had a grave duty to perform that afternoon.

    “Eh?” said Mrs Urqhart, raising herself on an elbow on her bed and goggling at her butler.

    Ranjit bowed again. “I say you is laid down, memsahib, after visitors all afternoon, and Mr Stalling he says it is matter of most urgent delicacy.”

    Mrs Urqhart groaned. “If it be that strawberry receet for little Linny’s complexion again, I give it to his wife two months since.”

    “No, not strawberry receet, memsahib: most urgent delicacy.”

    Mrs Urqhart groaned again. “It’ll be the church roof! Could you not have given him a fistful of guineas and been done with it, you black savage?”

    “Not church roof, Urqhart Begum.”

    “Gawd,” she groaned, sitting up.

    “Most urgent delicacy,” he bowed.

    “Ave, so you said, so you said. –Here, organs wasn’t mentioned, were they?”

    “No organs, memsahib.”

    “Lordy, I dunno,” she sighed. “Send me Bapsee, then, don’t stand there a-gawking with your mouth at half-cock!”

    “Apologies, memsahib. Most urgent—”

    Mrs Urqhart threw a pillow at him.

    … “Eh?” she said, staring blankly, when Mr Stalling—with the utmost delicacy—had broached his business.

    Mr Stalling gave a polite cough. “Naturally one realizes that you would not have perfectly understood, Mrs Urqhart—and of course your motives were of the purest, no-one doubts that!” he added hurriedly, thinking of the Roof Fund. “But—well, it is a gambling game, when all is said and done, and I understand that—er—young persons were present; indeed, very young ladies!” he said desperately.

    “Look—” Mrs Urqhart broke off. She rang the bell. “Just wait,” she said, holding up a finger.

    The Vicar waited nervously.

    Ranjit, immaculate in his white tunic and turban, came in, bowing.

    “Ranjit, what game was we all a-playin’ last night?” said his mistress without preamble.

    Ranjit might have been a black heathen but he was no savage and he knew perfectly well the sorts of concerns that occupied the minds of vicars of small country parishes. Especially those that were under the thumb of genteel lady parishioners closely related to their bishop. He looked warily at Mr Stalling.

    “He knows, you fool! I wants you to demonstrate that you knows!” she said loudly.

    Ranjit bowed again. “Ladies and gentlemen play faro, madam.”

    “Yes, exact. Now, you tell Mr Stalling, here, what we was playin’ for: what the stakes was, I mean.”

    Ranjit bowed to the Vicar. “Ladies and gentlemen play for beads, Mr Stalling, very pretty beads.”

    “Beads?” said the Vicar numbly.

    “Aye, beads,” confirmed the old lady. “Go and fetch ’em, Ranjit.”

    Ranjit bowed and went out.

    They waited in dead silence, Mr Stalling unable to think of anything to say to break it and Mrs Urqhart grimly amused at his embarrassment.

    Ranjit returned with a tray of beads. “Beads, Mr Stalling,” he said gravely, presenting them to him. “Major Grey is heavy winner in beads.”

    “That’ll do,” said Mrs Urqhart on a weak note, fearing she going to lose her gravity.

    “I see,” said Mr Stalling limply. “Er—thank you, my good man.”

    “Not at all, sir,” said Ranjit in tones of the perfect butler. He bowed once more, and exited majestically.

    “Well?” said Mrs Urqhart drily. “Is beads a-goin’ to corrupt the neighbourhood?

    Mr Stalling rose, very flurried. “I cannot express— I must have been misinformed: my informant— Naturally you would not dream of holding gambling sessions, my dear Mrs Urqhart! I trust you will forgive me!”

    Mrs Urqhart got up slowly. “Forgive you? I’m flattered,” she said drily.

    Mr Stalling, gulped, very red.

    “Only,” she said, ringing the bell, “if you wants any more contributions to the Church Roof Fund, I would think twice about believing Rumour, if I was you. Acos when I was a girl we learned that she—they tell me it is a Classical goddess, Rumour,” she said, fixing him with a hard eye: “that she has a lyin’ tongue.”

    “Indeed,” said Mr Stalling, giving a trembling bow.

    They waited. Nothing happened.

    “How is little Linny’s complexion, these days?” she asked graciously, ringing the bell again, though with no sign of perturbation.

    “Wh-what?” he stuttered. “Oh! The—the receet has helped a good deal, I believe; my wife is most grateful—most grateful!”

    “Good. The value of that receet is,” said Mrs Urqhart, straight-faced, “that it can be applied external or internal, if the patient be young enough.”

    “Yes, indeed,” he fumbled, bowing.

    Mrs Urqhart inclined her head.

    They waited.

    At long last one of her English footmen came in, bowing. His wig was a trifle askew but Mrs Urqhart, though normally forthright about such matters, did not point this out. “I beg your pardon, madam, but Ranjit required our assistance on the front lawn,” he said.

    “On the front lawn, eh?” said Mrs Urqhart, her eye lighting up.

    The young man bowed. “Yes, indeed. Shall I show Mr Stalling out, madam?”

    “Well, if the front lawn be quite ready, Matthew, yes,” replied Mrs Urqhart with great anticipation.

    “I think it may be said to be ready, madam.”

    “Good. Good-day, then, Mr Stalling. And you bear in mind what I said about lying tongues,” she said calmly.

    Mr Stalling bowed. “Pray, dear Mrs Urqhart—! I cannot apologize enough!”

    “Aye, well, you apologized already, so you can go, now,” she said. She nodded, and walked out.

    “This way, sir,” said the footman impassively.

    The Vicar tottered out numbly, unaware that Mrs Urqhart had rushed to a front window from where she had a perfect view of her velvety English lawn.

    Emerging from the house in sort of relieved daze, Mr Stalling looked about him in a stunned fashion. What he saw was not calculated to cheer the heart of an English vicar of a small country parish. On the velvety English lawn was erected what the Vicar could only conclude was a heathen altar, of extreme hideousness. It was certainly sending up heavily scented heathenish coloured smoke. Prancing and wailing around this altar were four outlandishly garbed figures. One of them was a woman, and as he watched she shook her long grey hair down, wailed like a banshee and beat her breast. He had insufficient knowledge of the customs of the great subcontinent to realise that had this performance been genuine the next move would have been the smashing of the many glass bangles on her wrists, but Bapsee was fond of her bangles and didn’t bother to go that far for the benefit of a feringhee priest. The smallest figure was so shockingly clad—or rather underclad—that Mr Stalling blenched. He wore only a sort of rag about the loins. And a wreath of flowers round his neck, but one could not count that.

    Trembling, the Vicar mounted on his horse, his lips moving in silent invocation—the wailing meanwhile rising to a frenzied pitch—and rode hastily away from the halls of Sodom and Gomorrah as fast as his utilitarian cob would carry him.

    “OY!” yelled Mrs Urqhart, flinging her window wide.

    The wailing and prancing stopped.

    “Yes, memsahib?” called Ranjit on a nervous note, unwinding a bright cotton saree from his immaculate person.

    “You can stop now, he’s a-frightened off!” she choked.

    “Was good, eh, memsahib?” called Ranjit in some relief.

    “Aye: it was perfectly splendid, you beggars!” she choked, going off in a gale of laughter.

    “We give him nice fright: he not come back in hurry to complain of faros and gamblings in our house,” said Bapsee with satisfaction, winding up her hair again.

    “I should doubt it! –Yes, yes, very good, Mali, you can stop now!” she cried, laughing very much, as the little gardener beat his breast and wailed.

    “Good, no, memsahib?” he beamed, stopping. “Very real like saddhoo!”

    “Aye, that you be! What is that on your forehead, man?”

    “Only dirt, no have ash today,” he said sadly.

    “Never mind, it looks real good! –What was you a-singing there, Ranjit?” she asked.

    “Only song of sad lover who compares beloved to a rose. But sounds most very heathenish, no?”

    “Horrifyin’!” she gasped.

    Grinning widely, Ranjit bowed. “Bring snake carving back in house, James,” he ordered.

    “Glory be, that is never James under them sarees?” she gasped.

    James removed his turban, grinning.

    “Well, you shall all have an extra day off and a lakh of guineas to share bewtixt the four of you!” she declared.

    “Not lakh, is too much, memsahib,” objected Ranjit.

    “Well, twenty guineas each, and no argument! I dunno when I’ve laughed so much! And never did I ever see a English vicar skedaddle off so fast with his tail betwixt his legs!”

    James hefted up the carved snake from the front hall, grinning. “He’ll spread it all over the parish, Mrs Urqhart,” he warned.

    “Aye, out o’ course he will! Ain’t that the cream of the jest, you loon?” she cried.

    James grinned in great relief. He’d been afraid—though Ranjit had assured him that he was wrong—that she wouldn’t see it like that.

    “Well, come along back inside and we’ll all have a cup of chai!” she beamed. “No, no, no-one is a-forcin’ you, fool!” she cried as the gardener began to object.

    He bowed several times and scurried to gather up the scattered blooms from the lawn.

    “Them Hindoos,” she said, shaking her head. “Well, the rest of you may come in ekdum, and drink up your chai like Christians, at all events!”

    Her retinue consented to this, and came in to take chai. Even the little gardener came round to the French window and squatted respectfully just outside it to help them talk their wonderful plot to death in the Indian fashion, as the late afternoon waned into evening. And which of them enjoyed it the more, cunning old Ranjit, faithful-hearted Bapsee, the simple little gardener who had been with Mrs Urqhart since his boyhood, the stolid James, who had never had such fun in all his well-ordered English existence, or the hearty old lady herself, would have been hard to say.

    Mr Stalling went home, told his wife she was not to admit anyone to his study when he was preparing his sermon Ever Again, and shut himself in there, refusing all sustenance. Presumably he communed with his Maker but what the result of the communion was no-one ever knew. Though it was true that the story of the heathenish goings-on on the lawn of The Towers never did, to Mrs Urqhart’s great regret, get round the neighbourhood after all.