CHAPTER V
Well; I had beaten her at last; and in the only way in which she would yield. Weakness was of no use with her, nor gentleness, nor even that lofty patronage which, poor fool! I had shewn her in the parlour at Hare Street. She must be man's mate—which is certainly a rather savage relation at bottom—not merely his pretty and grateful wife. This I learned from her, as we rode onwards and up into the high road—(where, I may say in passing, there was no sign of our party)—though she did not know she was telling it me.
"Oh! Roger," she said. "And I thought you were a—a pussy-cat."
"That is the second time I have been told so in two days," I said.
"Who told you so?"
"His Majesty."
"I thought His Majesty was wiser," said she.
"He has been pretty wise, though," I said. "If it were not for him, we should not be riding here together."
"I suppose you made him do that too," she said.
* * * * *
But it was not only of Dolly that I had learned my lessons; it was of myself also. I was astonished how inevitable it appeared to me now that we should be riding together on such terms; and I understood that never, for one instant, all through this miserable year away from her, had I ever, interiorly, loosed my hold upon her. Beneath all my resolutions and wilful distractions the intention had persevered. All the while I was saying to myself in my own mind that I should never see Dolly again, something that was not my mind—(I suppose my heart)—was telling me the precise opposite. Well; the heart had been right, after all.
* * * * *
She asked me presently what I should say to her father.
"I shall forgive him a great deal now, that I thought I never should,"
I said with wonderful magnanimity. "A few sharp words only, and no more.
You see, my dear, it was through his sending you to Court—"
"Yes: yes," she said.
"He has behaved abominably, however," I said, "and I shall tell him so.
Dolly, my love."
"Yes," said she.
"I must go back very soon to town. I have been offered a piece of work; and even if I do not accept it, I must speak of it to them."
"Them?"
"Yes, my dear. I must say no more than that. It is secretum commissum as we say in Rome."
"And to think that you were a Benedictine novice!" exclaimed Dolly.
We talked awhile of that then; she asked me a number of questions that may be imagined under such circumstances: and my answers also can be imagined; and we spoke of a great number of things, she and I riding side by side in the dark, our very horses friendly one with another—she telling me all of how she went to Court, and why she went, and I telling her my side of the affair—until at last in Puckeridge a man ran out from the inn yard to say that our party was within and waiting for us. They had met, it appeared, a rustic fellow who had set them right, soon after they had lost us.
I do not know what they thought at first; but I know what they thought in the end; for I rated them very soundly for not keeping nearer to us; and bade James ride ahead with the lantern with all the rest between, and Dolly and I in the rear to keep them from straying again. In this manner then did she and I contrive to have a great deal more conversation before we came a little before midnight to Hare Street.
The village was all dark as we came through it; and all dark was the House when we pushed open the yard gates and rode in. We went through and beat upon the door, and presently heard a window thrown up.
"Who is there?" cried my Cousin Tom's voice.
I bade Dolly's maid answer. (She was all perplexed, poor wench, at the change of relations between her mistress and me.)
"It is Mistress Jermyn, sir," she said.
"Yes, father; I have come back," cried Dolly.
There was an exclamation from poor Tom; and in two or three minutes we saw a light beneath the door, and heard him drawing the bolts. I pushed Dolly and her maid forward as the door opened, and then myself strode suddenly forward into the light.
"Why—God bless—" cried Tom; who was in his coat and shoes. I could see how his face fell when he saw me. I looked at him very grimly: but I said nothing to him at once (for I was sorely tempted to laugh at his apparition), but turned to James and bade him see to the rest and find beds somewhere. Then I went after Dolly and her father into the Great Chamber, still with my hat on my head and looking very stern. He was talking very swiftly in a low voice to Dolly; but he stopped when I came in.
"Yes, Cousin Tom," I said, "I am come back again—all unlooked for, as I see."
"But, good God!" he cried. "What is the matter; and why is Dolly here? I was but just asking—"
I pulled out the King's paper which I had all ready, and thrust it down before the lantern that he had put on the table: and I waited till he had read it through.
"There, Cousin!" I said when he was staring on me again, "that is enough warrant for both you and me, I think. Have you anything to say?"
He began to bluster.
"Cousin," I said, "if I have any patience it is because Dolly has given it back to me. You had best not say too much. You have done all the harm you could; and it is only by God's mercy that it has not been greater."
He said that he was Dolly's father and could do as he pleased. Besides, she herself had consented.
"I know that," I said, "because she has told me so; and that it was in despair that she went, because we two fools bungled our business. Well, you may be her father; but the Scripture tells us that a woman must leave her father and cleave to her husband; and that is what I am to be to her."
Well; when I said that, there was the Devil to pay—we three standing there in the cold chamber, with the draughts playing upon poor Tom's legs. He looked a very piteous object, very much fallen from that fine figure that he had presented when I had first set eyes on him; but he strove to compensate by emphasis what he lacked in dignity. He said that he had changed his mind; that even third cousins once removed should not marry; that he had now other designs for his daughter; that I had no right to dictate to him in his own house. He waxed wonderfully warm; but even then, in the first flush of his resistance I thought I saw a kind of wavering. I sat with one leg across the corner of the great table until he was done; while Dolly sat in a chair, turning her merry eyes from the one to the other of us. For myself, I felt no lack of confidence. I had beaten the daughter; now I was to beat the father.
When he had finished, and drew breath, I stood up.
"Very bravely said, Cousin, bare legs and all," I said. "We will speak of it all again to-morrow. But now for a bite; we have been riding since noon."
It was very strange to go upstairs again after a mouthful or two, and a glass of warm ale, and see my chamber again from which I had departed in such unhappiness near a twelvemonth ago. James had made a little fire for me, before which I drew off my boots and undressed myself. For it was from this very chamber that I had gone forth in such despair, when Dolly had said that she would not have me: and now, here I was in it again, all glowing with my ride and my drink and my great content, having kissed Dolly just now in her father's presence as a symbol of our troth. And so I went to bed and dreamed and woke and dreamed again.
We had our talk out next morning, Tom pacing up and down the Great Chamber, until I entreated him for God's sake to sit down and save my stiff neck. He was very high at first; but I was astonished how quickly he came down.
"That is very well," I said, "to speak now of better prospects for Dolly. But you will do me the honour of remembering, my dear Cousin, that in this very room once you spoke to me very differently. If you have changed your mind, you might at least have told me so; for I have not changed mine at all; and Dolly, it seems, is come round to my way of thinking at last."
"But how did you do it?" asked he, stopping in his walk.
"I lost my temper altogether," said I; "and that is a very good way if you have tried all the rest."
"But the King, man, the King! How did you get that paper out of him? Why
His Majesty himself, I am told, took particular notice—"
"Eh?" said I.
"That is no matter now," he said. "What were you going to say?"
"I must have that first," said I.
Tom began to pace the floor again.
"It is nothing at all, Cousin. It is that His Majesty spoke very kindly to my daughter upon her first coming to Court."
"I am glad I did not know that," I said, "or I might have said more to him."
"Well; but what did you say?"
Now I was in half a dozen minds as to what I should tell him. He knew for certain nothing at all of my comings and goings and of what I did for the King; yet I thought that he must have guessed a good deal. I judged it safer, therefore, to tell him a little, to stop his month; but not too much.
"Why," I said very carefully, "I have been of a little service to the King; and His Majesty was good enough to ask me if there were any little favour he could do me. So that is what I asked him."
Tom stopped in his pacing again: and it was then that I entreated him to sit down and talk like a Christian. He did so, without a word.
"In France, I suppose?" he said immediately after.
"Why, yes."
Tom looked at me again.
"And you travel with four men now, instead of one."
"I find it more convenient," I said.
"And more expensive too," he observed.
"Why, yes: a little more expensive, too," I answered. But I was a shade uneasy; because this increase of servants was at His Majesty's desire and cost. I made haste to turn the conversation back once more. I did not wish Tom to think that I was of any importance at all.
"Well; but what of Dolly?" I said.
It was then that my Cousin suddenly came down from his loftiness. He seemed to awake out of a little reverie.
"You come into the enjoyment of your property," he said, "in four years from now?"
"In less than that," I said. "It is three years and a half. My birthday is in June."
He asked me one or two more questions then as to its amount, and what arrangements I would make in the event of my marriage. When I had satisfied him upon these matters, he fell again into a reverie.
"Well?" said I, a little sharply.
"Cousin," he said, "I do not wish to stand in your way. But there must be no talk of marriage till '85. Will that content you?"
It did not in the least; but it was what I had expected. I was scarcely rich enough yet to support a wife, and knew that, well enough; for if I married and left the King's service there would be no more travelling expenses for me. Dolly and I last night had agreed upon that as the least that we could consent to.
"Four years is a long time," said I.
"You said three and a half just now," he observed a little bitterly.
"Well: three and a half. I suppose I must take that, if I can get nothing better."
* * * * *
Now I was secretly a little astonished that my Cousin Tom had consented so quickly, after his recent ambitions. Plainly he had aimed higher than at my poor standard during those months; for when a maid went to Court as one of the Queen's ladies the least that was expected of her was that she would marry a pretty rich man. But the reason of it all was unpleasantly evident to me. He must have gathered from what I had said and done that my favour was increasing with the King; and therefore he must have argued too that I must be serving His Majesty in some very particular way—which was the very last thing I desired him to know, as he was such a gossip. But I dared say no more then. We grasped one another's hands very heartily: and then I went to find Dolly.
* * * * *
The days that followed were very happy ones—though, as I shall presently relate, they were to be interrupted once more. I had in my mind, during them all, that I must soon go up to London again to tell Mr. Chiffinch my final decision that I could not undertake the work that he had proposed to me; for I had spoken of it at some length with Dolly, giving her a confidence that I dared not give to her father. But I did not think that I should have to go so soon.
It was in the hour before supper one evening that I told her of it, as we sat in the tapestried parlour, looking into the fire from the settle where we sat together.
"My dear," said I, "I wish to ask your advice. But it is a very private matter indeed."
"Tell me," said Dolly contentedly. (Her hand was in mine, and she looked extraordinary pretty in the firelight.)
"I am asked whether I will undertake a little work. In itself it is excellent. It concerns the protection of His Majesty; but it is the means that I am doubtful about."
Then I told her that of the details—of the how and the when and the where—I knew no more than she: but that, if all went well, I might find myself trusted by a traitor: and that I was considering whether in such a cause as this it was a work to which I could put my hand, to betray that trust, if I got it. But before I was done speaking I knew that I could not—so wonderfully does speaking to another clear one's mind—and that though I could not condemn outright a man who thought fit to do so, any more than I would condemn a scavenger for cleaning the gutter, it was not work for a gentleman to seek out a confidence that he might betray it again.
"Now that I have put it into words," I said, "I see that it cannot be done. Certainly it would advance me very much with His Majesty; (and that is one reason why I spoke to you of it)—but such advance would be too dearly bought. Do you not think so too, my dear?"
She nodded slowly and very emphatically three or four times, without speaking, as her manner was.
"Then that is decided," said I, "and in a day or two I will go to town and tell them so."
So we put the matter away then; and spoke of matters far more dear to both of us, until Tom came in and exclaimed at our sitting in the dark as he called it.
* * * * *
The interruption came that very night.
We were at supper, and speaking of Christmas, and of how we would have again the dancing as last year, when we heard a man ride past the house, pulling up his horse as he came. Such interruptions came pretty often;—it was so that I had been first sent for by Mr. Chiffinch: and it was so again that the Duke of Monmouth had come, and others—but we had plenty too of others who came, seeing the house at the end of the village, to ask their way, or what not; so we paid no attention to it. Presently, however, we heard a man's steps come along the paved walk, and then a knocking at the door. James went out to see who was there; and came back immediately saying that it was a courier with a letter for me. My conscience smote me a little, for I had delayed more than a week now from answering Mr. Chiffinch: and, sure enough, when I went out, the man was come from him. I took the letter he gave me into the Great Chamber to read it, and was astonished at its contents. There were but four lines in it.
"Mr. Mallock," it ran, "come immediately—that is to-morrow. The Lord hath delivered them into our hands. Ride by Amwell; and go through the place slowly between eleven and twelve with no servant near." And it was signed with his initials only.
I went back again into the dining-room immediately, and shut the door behind me.
"I must go to town, to-morrow," I said, all short.
Dolly looked up at me, gone a little white. I shook my head and smiled at her, but secretly; so that Tom did not see.