“Indeed, sir, when I have visited Chandernagore (which is very rarely) I han’t pretended to such high company as Mons. Renault’s, I’ll assure you.”
“Pray pardon me, sir. My eyes have played me false,” says Mr le Beaume, and the matter dropped. I don’t know why I have set it down, save that I am always longing for anything to happen that might relieve me from Menotti’s pursuit, and that for the moment I was so uncharitable as to hope he might be proved to have been in correspondence with our natural enemies.
In the course of the afternoon we heard something of the letters from Muxadavad which had caused such a commotion, for Captain Colquhoun looked in to tell Mr Freyne that they contained no confirmation of the death of the Soubah, mentioning only his great weakness. The communication was a private one from Mr Watts to the President, but it had got abroad that he warned Mr Drake very solemnly of the unfriendliness shown towards the factory at the Court of the Nabob, where all the talk concerned only the weakness of the defences of Calcutta, and the ease with which even a small army might overcome ’em. More than this, Mr Watts declared that our town is filled with the spies of Surajah Dowlah, and that every word and motion of ours is reported at Muxadavad. He recommended Mr Drake very earnestly to make search for these persons and turn them out of our bounds, and counselled him also to get rid of the Gentoo Kissendasseat and his family, who have remained in Calcutta on one pretext or another for a whole month, and whose sheltering has given great umbrage to the Chuta Nabob. But the effect of this excellent advice the good man spoiled by mentioning that the opinion at Muxadavad seemed to be favourable to the claims of Gosseta Begum to the throne rather than those of Surajah Dowlah; for this has strengthened the Council in their resolution to wait and see what happens before taking any steps.
This news gave us a troubled Sunday, as my Amelia will readily believe; but at least we enjoyed an interval of rest from our private woes, which were to burst upon us this morning with greater violence than ever before. Surely, Amelia, I must be either a very guilty or a very unfortunate creature, for not only am I in perpetual tribulation myself, but I bring trouble upon all connected with me. I was at work with my pen and ink in the varanda after breakfast, copying to the best of my power a fine print in one of the books Mr Bellamy had lent me, when I heard at the gate the boisterous cry of “Tok! Tok!” by which the bearers of a palanqueen announce their approach. My first impulse was to fly to my chamber, for the only likely visitor I could think of was Mr Fraser; but remembering that he had not been long enough in Calcutta to insist on riding such short distances, I waited where I was, and presently ran to assist Mrs Hamlin out of her machine.
“Then it en’t true!” she said, looking at me as if in surprise.
“What en’t true, madam?” I asked her.
“I’ll tell you, miss.” She mounted the steps and sank upon a couch, unpinning her cap-strings and panting. “They said you was gone off with Mr Bentinck.”
“Me, madam?” I stared at her. “With Mr Bentinck?”
“They did indeed, miss. Of course I contradicted it at once. ‘Miss is much too dutiful and well brought up a young woman to do anything of the sort,’ I told ’em; ‘and with such a dear good papa, too, that would indulge her in anything she set her heart on, where would be the use of it?’ But the duel and all that has given such an occasion for talk that you can’t be surprised at ’em.”
“Dear madam, you torture me!” I cried, all manner of horrors tumbling over one another in their haste to rush into my mind. “Who has fought a duel, and what was the reason of it, and what have I to do with it?”