Chapter 26
Without waiting for yes or no, he stooped and took the kiss. Maude flung his hands away. He should have left out the "cousin," or not have taken the kiss.
He went and stood with his elbow on the mantelpiece, soberly, as if he had only kissed a sister. Maude sat down again.
"Why did you not send us word you were coming?" she asked.
"There was no necessity for it. And I only made my mind up this morning."
"What a long time you have been away! I thought you went for a week."
"I did not get my business over very quickly; and waited afterwards to see Thomas Carr, who was out of town. The Ashtons were away, you know; so I had no inducement to hurry back again."
"Very complimentary to _her_. Who's Thomas Carr?" asked Maude.
"A barrister; the greatest friend I possess in this world. We were at college together, and he used to keep me straight."
"Keep you straight! Val!"
"It's quite true. I went to him in all my sc.r.a.pes and troubles. He is the most honourable, upright, straightforward man I know; and, as such, possesses a talent for serving--"
"Hartledon! Is it _you_?"
The interruption came from the dowager. She and the butler came in together, both looking equally astonished at the appearance of Lord Hartledon. The former said dinner was served.
"Will you let me sit down in this coat?" asked Val.
The countess-dowager would willingly have allowed him to sit down without any. Her welcome was demonstrative; her display of affection quite warm, and she called him "Val," tenderly. He escaped for a minute to his room, washed his hands, brushed his hair, and was down again, and taking the head of his own table.
It was pleasant to have him there--a welcome change from Hartledon's recent monotony; and even Maude, with her boasted dislike, felt prejudice melting away. Boasted dislike, not real, it had been. None could dislike Percival. He was not Edward, and it was him Maude had loved. Percival she never would love, but she might learn to like him. As he sat near her, in his plain black morning attire, courteous, genuinely sweet-tempered, his good looks conspicuous, a smile on his delicate, refined, but vacillating lips, and his honest dark-blue eyes bent upon her in kindness, Maude for the first time admitted a vision of the possible future, together with a dim consciousness that it might not be intolerable. Half the world, of her age and s.e.x, would have deemed it indeed a triumph to be made the wife of that attractive man.
He had cautiously stood aside for Lady Kirton to take the head of the table; but the dowager had positively refused, and subsided into the chair at the foot. She did not fill it in dear Edward's time, she said; neither should she in dear Val's; he had come home to occupy his own place. And oh, thank goodness he was come! She and Maude had been so lonely and miserable, growing thinner daily from sheer _ennui_. So she faced Lord Hartledon at the end of the table, her flaxen curls surmounted by an array of black plumes, and looking very like a substantial female mute.
"What an awful thing that is about the Rectory!" exclaimed she, when they
Lord Hartledon looked up quietly. "What is the matter at the Rectory?"
"Fever has broken out."
"Is that all!" he exclaimed, some amus.e.m.e.nt on his face. "I thought it must have taken fire."
"A fever's worse than a fire."
"Do you think so?"
"_Think so!_" echoed the dowager. "You can run away from a fire; but a fever may take you before you are aware of it. Every soul in the Rectory may die; it may spread to the parish; it may spread here. I have kept tar burning outside the house the last two days."
"You are not serious, Lady Kirton!"
"I am serious. I wouldn't catch a fever for the whole world. I should die of fright before it had time to kill me. Besides--I have Maude to guard.
You were forgetting her."
"There's no danger at all. One of the servants became ill after they returned home, and it proved to be fever. I don't suppose it will spread."
"How did _you_ hear about it?"
"From Miss Ashton. She mentioned it in her last letter to me."
"I didn't know you corresponded with her," cried the dowager, her tones rather shrill.
"Not correspond with Miss Ashton!" he repeated. "Of course I do."
The old dowager had a fit of choking: something had gone the wrong way, she said. Lord Hartledon resumed.
"It is an awful shame of those seaside lodging-house people! Did you hear the particulars, Maude? After the Ashtons concluded their visit in Wales, they went for a fortnight to the seaside, on their way home, taking lodgings. Some days after they had been settled in the rooms they discovered that some fever was in the house; a family who occupied another set of apartments being ill with it, and had been ill before the Ashtons went in. Dr. Ashton told the landlady what he thought of her conduct, and then they left the house for home. But Mrs. Ashton's maid, Matilda, had already taken it."
"Did Miss Ashton give you these particulars?" asked Maude, toying with a late rose that lay beside her plate.
"Yes. I should feel inclined to prosecute the woman, were I Dr. Ashton, for having been so wickedly inconsiderate. But I hope Matilda is better, and that the alarm will end with her. It is four days since I had Anne's letter."
"Then, Lord Hartledon, I can tell you the alarm's worse, and another has taken it, and the parish is up in arms," said the countess-dowager, tartly. "It has proved to be fever of a most malignant type, and not a soul but Hillary the surgeon goes near the Rectory, You must not venture within half-a-mile of it. Dr. Ashton was so careless as to occupy his pulpit on Sunday; but, thank goodness, I did not venture to church, or allow Maude to go. Your Miss Ashton will be having it next."
"Of course they have advice from Garchester?" he exclaimed.
"How should I know? My opinion is that the parson himself might be prosecuted for bringing the fever into a healthy neighbourhood. Port, Hedges! One has need of a double portion of tonics in a time like this."
The countess-dowager's alarms were not feigned--no, nor exaggerated. She had an intense, selfish fear of any sort of illness; she had a worse fear of death. In any time of public epidemic her terrors would have been almost ludicrous in their absurdity but that they were so real. And she "fortified" herself against infection by eating and drinking more than ever.
Nothing else was said: she shunned allusion to it when she could: and presently she and Maude left the dining-room. "You won't be long, Hartledon?" she observed, sweetly, as she pa.s.sed him. Val only bowed in answer, closed the door upon them, and rang for Hedges.
"Is there much alarm regarding this fever at the Rectory?" he asked of the butler.
"Not very much, I think, my lord. A few are timid about it; as is always the case. One of the other servants has taken it; but Mr. Hillary told me when he was here this morning that he hoped it would not spread beyond the Rectory."
"Was Hillary here this morning? n.o.body's ill?" asked Lord Hartledon, quickly.
"No one at all, my lord. The countess-dowager sent for him, to ask what her diet had better be, and how she could guard against infection more effectually than she was doing. She did not allow him to come in, but spoke to him from one of the upper windows, with a cloak and respirator on."
Lord Hartledon looked at his butler; the man was suppressing a grim smile.
"Nonsense, Hedges!"
"It's quite true, my lord. Mrs. Mirrable says she has five bowls of disinfectant in their rooms."
Lord Hartledon broke into a laugh, not suppressed.
"And in the courtyard, looking towards the Rectory, as may be said, there's several pitch-pots alight night and day," added Hedges. "We have had a host of people up, wanting to know if the place is on fire."
"What a joke!" cried Val--who was not yet beyond the age to enjoy such jokes. "Hedges," he resumed, in a more confidential tone, "no strangers have been here inquiring for me, I suppose?"
He alluded to creditors, or people acting for them. To a careless man, as Val had been, it was a difficult matter to know whether all his debts were paid or not. He had settled what he remembered; but there might be others. Hedges understood; and his voice fell to the same low tone: he had been pretty cognizant of the embarra.s.sments of Mr. Percival Elster.