Mary had hoped to shake them off, but as they persisted in following and no relief came—for Basset and his rescue party had gone to the canal by another road—she saw nothing for it but to go on to Lord Audley’s. With a curt word she made the man turn that way.
The crowd still attended, curious, amused. It had doubled its numbers, nay, had trebled them. There were friends as well as foes among them now, some of Hatton’s men, some of Banfield’s, yellow favors as well as blue. If Mary had known it, she might have set Ben down and not a hand would have been laid upon him. Even the leaders of the riot were now thankful that they had not carried the matter farther. Enough had been done.
But Mary did not know this. She thought that the man was still in peril. She did not dream of leaving him. And it was at the head of a crowd of three or four hundred of the riff-raff of Riddsley that she broke in upon the quiet of the suburban road in which The Butterflies stood. Tumultuously, followed by laughter and hooting and cheers, she swept along it with her train, and came to a halt before the house.
No house was ever more surprised. Mrs. Wilkinson’s scared face peered above one blind, her sisters’ caps showed above another. Was it an accident? Was it a riot? Was it a Puseyite protest? What was it? Every servant, every neighbor, Lord Audley himself came to the windows.
Mary signed to the driver to help Ben down, and the moment the man’s foot touched the ground she grasped his arm. With a burning face, but with her head in the air, she guided his stumbling footsteps through the gate and along the paved walk. They came together to the door. They went in.
The crowd formed up five deep along the railings, and waited in wondering silence to see what would happen. What would his lordship say? What would his lordship do? This was bringing the election to his doors with a vengeance, and there were not a few of the better sort who saw the fun of the situation.
CHAPTER XXXV
MY LORD SPEAKS OUT
Mary had passed through twenty minutes of tense excitement. The risk had been slight, after the first moment of intervention, but she had not known this, and she was still trembling with indignation, a creature all fire and passion, when the door of The Butterflies opened to admit her. Leaving Ben Bosham on the threshold she lost not a moment, but with her story on her lips, hurried up the stairs, and on the landing came plump upon Lord Audley.
From the window he had seen something of what was afoot below. He had recognized Mary and the tattered Bosham, and he had read the riddle, grasped the facts, and cursed the busybody, all within thirty seconds. “D—n it! this passes everything,” he had muttered to himself as he turned from the window in disgust. “This is altogether too much!” And he had opened the door—ready also to open his mind to her!
“What in the world is it?” he asked. He held the door for her to enter. “What has happened? I could not believe my eyes when I saw you in company with that wretched creature!” he continued. “And all the tagrag and bobtail in the place behind you? What is it, Mary?”