'I shall not wait for Colonel Sampson,' she said quietly. 'That would mean another two days at least. Get me the ink and paper. And bid the man not to unsaddle his horse. Go down yourself, will you? I like not that the domestics should come up here just now. Nothing shall be said of the journey till our plans are ready. Above all, nothing must come to Zacchary's ears. If Zacchary thinks I am taking an unwarranted step, he will be hard to move, harder than the four greys and the coach. Tell the man to wait at the door, and I will descend.'
'Bien, Mademoiselle.'
Realising that a new phase of her mistress's character was asserting itself, Simone went below. Presently Marion came downstairs with a note in her hand. The manservant was standing in the drive, bridle in hand; Marion went out at the door and down the steps.
'Reuben,' she said, 'you will go at once to St. James's and find where Captain Beckenham is. His orderly will know. If he be on duty at the Palace, find some means of reaching him. Here is money. If he be supping with friends, learn where is the house. Do not return until you have delivered the letter. The matter is urgent.'
Reuben took the note, touched his cap, and leaping into the saddle, cantered out into the square, a smile of pure pleasure on his face. Here was the twofold excitement of the prospect of hunting among pleasure haunts for my young gentleman, and the delight of serving a fair lady who wished to see her gallant admirer. Reuben was young, and a bachelor.
Marion supped with Simone for company, and dismissing the servants after the meat was brought, sat silent, eating a morsel here and there as her random thoughts came back to the present. Had Mistress Keziah seen her expression as she sat at the head of her aunt's table that night, she would have remembered her own thoughts of the girl months before. 'She'll go her own way; her mother has given her that sweetness, but she's a Penrock.' Simone, watching her unobtrusively, attending to her needs with the perfect tact natural to her, was content that the face should wear that look. Better the girl should play the part of a mimic general marshalling a toy army, than sink into tears before an imagined grief. As she noticed the absorbed quiet of the steady features, Simone suddenly found herself wondering what Marion would be like when her tranquillity was swept away in stormy action, when that something sleeping in her was fully roused.
CHAPTER XIII
THE ESCORT
Reuben had not been page boy and footman to my Lady Fairfax for nothing. Standing on the step of her coach he had learned the roads and houses of Kensington, Chelsey, and the City; carrying my lady's cushion to the theatre, waiting outside her box, and hearing the talk of courtiers in between the acts, he had gained some insight into the world of fashion. Thus there was no need for Marion to detail instruction about the course he must take in hunting down the gentleman of the sword. Exactly two hours after starting, having visited St. James's and two theatres in vain, drawn the coffee houses blank, he finally ran his quarry to earth outside a cockpit in Covent Garden, where several gentlemen were discussing the rival merits of the birds.
'And my lord Duke,' Beckenham was saying, 'having lost £500 on Firebrand——' He broke off as Reuben elbowed his way into the group and stood hat in hand. 'What may you want, my lad?'