Chapter Seven.
A Diabolical Business.
If the old writers were right, so was Sir Hilton Lisle, as he drew a chair forward and placed it ready for his attractive visitor, who gave the long folds of her riding-habit a graceful sweep, and then dropped with an elastic plump into the seat.
“Oh, Hilt, dear boy! Oh, Hilt!” she cried, bursting into tears.
“My dear Lady Tilborough!” he cried, catching her hands in his, as she dabbed her whip down on the table with a smart blow; “what is the matter?”
“Don’t, don’t, don’t!” she cried passionately.
“Don’t?” said Sir Hilton. “What have I done?”
“Called me Lady Tilborough in that cold, formal way, just as if you were going to refuse before I asked; and us such very, very old friends!”
“Well, Hetty, then. My dear old girl, what is the matter?”
“Ah, that’s better, Hilt,” said the lady, with a sigh of relief. “We are such old friends, aren’t we?—even if you have married that dreadfully severe wife who looks upon me as an awfully wicked woman.”
“Which you are not, Hetty,” said Sir Hilton, warmly.
“Thank ye, Hilt dear. That does me good,” she said, drawing away her hands and beginning to wipe her eyes. “I always felt that I could trust to you if I had a spill. Tilborough always used to say: ‘If you’re in any trouble, go to dear old Hilt, unless it’s money matters; and in them don’t trust him, for he’s a perfect baby.’”
“Did Lord Tilborough say that?” cried Sir Hilton, frowning.
“Yes, old fellow,” sighed the lady; “and it’s quite true. There, don’t look black, Hilty, dear old man. You know you ruined yourself, and so you would anyone else who trusted you with money.”
“Lady Tilborough!” cried Sir Hilton, indignantly.
“Stop that, dear boy. No stilts. Be honest. You know it’s true. Here, sit down and listen. I want your help.”
“Hadn’t you better go to some other friend?” said Sir Hilton, sinking back in a chair at some distance, crossing his legs, and kicking the uppermost one up and down angrily. “Dr Granton, for instance.”
“You leave Jack Granton out of the case, stupid. He wants to marry me, though he has never said so. He’s a thoroughly good fellow; but, of course, I couldn’t go to him, even if he could help me, and he can’t.”
“How can I, Lady Tilborough?”
“Hetty!” said the lady, sternly.
“Well, Hetty, then.”
“That’s better, Hilt, old man. Here, I’ll tell you directly. Look at me.”
She paused to fight down a passion of hysterical laughter.
“My dear little woman!” said Sir Hilton, springing up.
“Keep away! Don’t touch me!” cried his visitor.
“Have a glass of wine—some brandy?”
“No, no; no, no! I shall be better directly. There, did you ever see such a silly woman? That’s got the better of it. If I hadn’t let myself go then I believe I should have had a fit.”
“Ha! You quite frightened me. Now then, Hetty, old lady, what’s the matter?”
“That’s our old friend Hilt talking like himself again,” said the visitor, with a sigh of relief. “There, I’m better now, ready to take every obstacle that comes in my way. Hilt, old man, a horrible disaster.”
“Yes? Yes?” cried Sir Hilton, turning white, as if he already saw the shadow of what was to come.
“Your dear old mare.”
“Not dead?” cried Sir Hilton, wildly.
“No, no, no; but it’s as bad. She was to run for the cup to-day.”
“Yes, yes; I know.”
“Thought you had done thinking of such things.”
“I have—I haven’t—oh, for goodness’ sake, woman, go on! She hasn’t been got at?”
“Not directly, Hilt, but indirectly.”
“But how—how? Go on. I’m in torture.”
“Ha!” cried Lady Tilborough, with a sigh of satisfaction. “I knew you would be, Hilt, for your old friend’s sake.”
“Will you go on, Hetty?”
“Yes, yes. I can’t prove it. I daren’t say it, but Josh Rowle has been a deal at Sam Simpkins’s this last week or two.”
“Yes?”
“And I’m as good as sure that the old scoundrel has been at work on him.”
“No; you’re wrong. Josh is as honest as the day. I always trusted him to ride square, and he always did.”
“And so he has for me, Hilt.”
“Of course. I tell you I always trusted him.”
“But not with a bottle, Hilt.”
“Eh? No; drink was his only weakness.”
“That’s right; and I believe Sam Simpkins—the old villain!—has been at him that way to get him so that he can’t ride.”
“What!”
“The miserable wretch is down with D.T.—in an awful state, and the local demon can’t allay the spirit. To make matters worse, Jack Granton, who might have helped me, can’t be found.”
“Jack was here just now. Gone on to the course.”
“What! Oh, joy! No, no; it’s no use. Too late. Nobody could make poor Josh fit to ride to-day.”
“But this is diabolical.”
“Oh, it’s ten times worse than that, Hilty, old man. I had such trust in the mare that I’m on her for nearly every shilling I possess. If she doesn’t win I’m a ruined woman.”
“Oh!” cried Sir Hilton, getting up and stamping about the room, tearing at his hair, already getting thin on the crown.
“Thank you, Hilt dear, thank you. I always knew you for a sympathetic soul. Can you imagine anything worse?”
“Yes—yes!” cried Sir Hilton; “ten times worse.”
“What?”
“I’m on her too!”
“You?”
“Yes, to the tune of four thousand pounds.”
“You, Hilt!” cried the lady, with her eyes brightening, and instead of sympathy something like ecstasy in her tones. “I thought you had ‘schworred off.’”
“Yes, of course—I had—but the mare—short of money—such faith in her—I put on—lot of my wife’s money. Hetty, how could you have managed so badly with Josh Rowle? What have you done? Oh, woman, woman! You always were the ruin of our sex! Why did you come with such horrible news as this? I’m a ruined man.”
“Yes, Hilt, and I’m a ruined woman.”
“Do you know what it means for me, Hetty?”
“Yes, Hilt, old man—four thou’.”
“Of my wife’s money? No, it means locking my dressing-room door, and then—”
“Yes? What then?”
“Revolver. No, haven’t got one—a razor.”
“Tchah!”
“While you, Hetty—”
“Not such a fool,” cried the lady. “Life’s worth more than four million millions, squared and cubed. Pull yourself together, you dear old gander.”
“Pull myself together!” groaned Sir Hilton. “Oh, why did you come with this horrible news?”
“Because I knew you could help me, stupid!”
“I—I—help you?”
“Hold up, Hilt, or you’ll break your knees. It’s an emergency—no time to lose. La Sylphide must come up to the scratch.”
“Oh!” groaned Sir Hilton. “Impossible. Try to put another jock on her, and she’ll murder him. You know what she is. There, pray leave me. I must do a bit of writing before I go.”
“Hilt!” cried Lady Tilborough, flushing with energy, as she sprang up and snatched her whip from the table, to swish it about and make it whistle through the air. “You make me feel as if I could lash you till you howled. Be a man. Suicide! Bah! You’ll have to die quite soon enough. Now then, listen. This is the only chance. In the terrible emergency I’ve come to you. Now, quick, there isn’t a minute to spare. You must help me.”
“I? How?”
“Can’t you see?”
“I’m stunned.”
“Oh, what a man! You must ride the mare yourself.”
“And win.”
“Impossible!”
“Nonsense. She will be like a lamb with you.”
“But my wife; she wouldn’t—”
“Oh!” cried Lady Tilborough, stamping, and lashing the air with her whip. “Divorce your wife.”
“She’d divorce me.”
“And a good job too! You must come and ride the mare.”
“I can’t—I can’t.”
“You must, Hilt.”
“Out of training. Too heavy.”
“Not a bit of it. You’re as fine as can be, and will want weight. You look as thin as if you’d been fretting.”
“I have been, woman; I have.”
“All the better. Come on at once.”
“I tell you I daren’t. I can’t, Hetty. It is madness.”
“Yes, to refuse. Do you hear? It is to save your four thousand pounds.”
“Oh!” groaned Sir Hilton.
“Your wife’s money.”
“With which she has trusted me for Parliamentary expenses.”
“Ha! Then you must ride and save it.”
“No, no, no! My spirit’s broken. I should funk everything.”
“Nonsense! Come, you will ride?”
“No, no, not even for that money, and to save the shame. I can’t—I can’t, Hetty.”
“Then for your old, old friend. Hilt, dear boy, we were nearly making a match of it once, only you were a fool. I’d have had you.”
“Would you?”
“Yes, if you hadn’t been so wild. Now then, for the sake of the old days and our old love. Hilt, for my sake. Do you want me to go down upon my knees?”
“No, no, the other way on, if you like. But the race—impossible. I can’t—I can’t. I don’t know, though. She’d never hear of it. But the newspaper. She never reads it, though; calls it a disgustingly low journal. But, no—no, I couldn’t—I couldn’t. Hetty, old girl, pray, pray don’t tempt me.”
“It is to save yourself from shame, and me, a weak, helpless woman, from absolute ruin. Don’t live to see me sold up, stock, lock, and barrel. Why, Hilt, old man, I shall be as badly off as you. All my poor gee-gees, including the mare, knocked down, and poor me marrying some tyrant who will now and then write me a paltry cheque.”
“Ha, yes!” cried Sir Hilton, drawing himself up as rigidly as if he had been struck by a cataleptic seizure, while Lady Tilborough stared at him in horror, and, unseen by either, Sydney, armed with mounted fly-rod and creel, appeared at the window, stopped short, and looked in in astonishment.
“Ha!” ejaculated the baronet, again, drawing a deep breath, as he changed into the little, wiry, alert man, with a regular horsey look coming over his face, and tightening lips. “All right, Hetty,” he cried. “I’m on.”
“Hurrah!” cried Lady Tilborough, waving her whip about her head, and then stroking it down softly on first one and then on the other side of her old friend, before making believe to hold a pair of reins and work them about, jockey fashion. “Sir Hilton up—he’s giving her her head—look at her—away she goes—a neck—half a length—a length—two lengths! Sylphide wins! Sylphide wins—a bad second, and the field nowhere.”
“Ha!” breathed Sir Hilton, with his eyes flashing.
“What about your silk and cap?”
“All right.”
“Get ’em; come on, then, Hilt. I’ll gallop back to the paddock like the wind. There’ll be some scene-shifting there by now, and the bookies working the oracle, for the news was flying when I came away that my mare was to be scratched.”
“Ha,” cried Sir Hilton. “We’ll scratch ’em, old girl. She must—she shall win.”
“Three cheers for the gentleman-rider!”
“But my wife—my election?”
“What! Win the race, and you’ll win the seat, old man. Can’t you see?”
“Only the saving of the money we have on.”
“What! Not that the popular sporting rider who won the cup will win no end of votes to-day?”
“Ah, to be sure. Yes, of course,” cried Sir Hilton, excitedly. “Be off. I’ll join you at the hotel. My word! I seem to be coming to life again, Hetty. I can hear the buzzing of the crowd, the beating of the hoofs, the whistling of the wind, and see the swarming mob, and yelling of the thousand voices as the horse sweeps on with her long, elastic stride.”
“First past the post, Hilt.”
“Yes, first past the post.”
“Now, get all you want and drive over at once. I’ll go round to the stables, shout for Mark, and tell him the news. Then I’ll gallop back at once.”
The “at once” came faintly, for Lady Tilborough was already passing through the door.
“Phew!” whistled Sir Hilton. “By George! it sends a thrill through a man again. La Sylphide. My first old love.”
He stood motionless, staring after his visitor for a few moments, and then dashed through the opposite door.
The next moment a fishing-rod was thrust in at the window, dropped against the table, and Syd, with a creel hanging from its strap, vaulted lightly through into the room, to give vent to what sounded like the tardy echo of his uncle’s whistle.
“Phe-ew!” And then he said softly, with a grin of delight upon his features: “Auntie seems to be very much out. The ball’s begun to roll, gentlemen, so make your little game.”