A large open landau contained the stout Baroness and her niece; a couple of men-servants mounting on the box before them with pistols and blunderbusses ready in event of a meeting with highwaymen. In another carriage were their ladyships' maids, and another servant in guard of the trunks, which, vast and numerous as they were, were as nothing compared to the enormous baggage-train accompanying a lady of the present time. Mr. Warrington's modest valises were placed in this second carriage under the maid's guardianship, and Mr. Gumbo proposed to ride by the window for the chief part of the journey.
My lord, with his stepmother and Lady Fanny, accompanied their kinswoman to the carriage steps, and bade her farewell with many dutiful embraces. Her Lady Maria followed in a riding-dress, which Harry Warrington thought the most becoming costume in the world. A host of servants stood around, and begged Heaven bless her ladyship. The Baroness's departure was known in the village, and scores of the folks there stood waiting under the trees outside the gates, and huzzayed and waved their hats as the ponderous vehicles rolled away.
Gumbo was gone for Mr. Warrington's horses, as my lord, with his arm under his young guest's, paced up and down the court. “I hear you carry away some of our horses out of Castlewood?” my lord said.
Harry blushed. “A gentleman cannot refuse a fair game at the cards,” he said. “I never wanted to play, nor would have played for money had not my cousin William forced me. As for the chaplain, it went to my heart to win from him, but he was as eager as my cousin.”
“I know—I know! There is no blame to you, my boy. At Rome you can't help doing as Rome does; and I am very glad that you have been able to give Will a lesson. He is mad about play—would gamble his coat off his back—and I and the family have had to pay his debts ever so many times. May I ask how much you have won of him?”
“Well, some eighteen pieces the first day or two, and his note for a hundred and twenty more, and the brown horse, sixty—that makes nigh upon two hundred. But, you know, cousin, all was fair, and it was even against my will that we played at all. Will ain't a match for me, my lord—that is the fact. Indeed he is not.”
“He is a match for most people, though,” said my lord. “His brown horse, I think you said?”
“Yes. His brown horse—Prince William, out of Constitution. You don't suppose I would set him sixty against his bay, my lord?”
“Oh, I didn't know. I saw Will riding out this morning; most likely I did not remark what horse he was on. And you won the black mare from the parson?”
“For fourteen. He will mount Gumbo very well. Why does not the rascal come round with the horses?” Harry's mind was away to lovely Maria. He longed to be trotting by her side.