Maggie MacKeever (14 page)

On this gloomy reflection, Tabby walked into her room. She was glad no one had seen her enter the house. Tabby wanted nothing more just then than to be left alone to enjoy a good cry. She closed the door behind her and prepared to fling herself upon the bed. Then she espied an envelope propped up on her pillow. Scrawled across it was her name.

Tabby recognized Ermyntrude’s handwriting. Frowning, she opened the note. Ermyntrude’s handwriting was very precise, but her spelling was wildly original. It took Tabby several moments to understand that Ermyntrude was preparing to elope.

An elopement! Tabby sank down on the bed. Just when she’d thought that everything was going as badly as possible, matters rapidly became worse. Tabby was tempted to let the silly chit perish in her own intrigues. One might think it spring, there was so much romantic nonsense in the air. But Tabby couldn’t let Ermyntrude make the error that she must guard against herself. Though an elopement might result in a legal union, it was almost as scandalous as if it did not. Wearily, Tabby set out in search of Drusilla. It was bad enough that she must struggle with her own conscience without acting as Ermyntrude’s as well.

Drusilla was in her papa’s study, pouring over a medical book, reading about brain fever in an attempt to understand her parent’s behavior. She was glad to be interrupted and greeted Tabby with a relief that was short-lived. Perhaps Drusilla was being overly influenced by her choice of reading matter, but it seemed to her that there was an unstable quality to Tabby’s voice, a certain manic glitter in her eye. As for what she had to say, that was even queerer. “What do you want with Osbert?” Drusilla asked.

“Never mind that!” retorted Tabby. Time was of the essence if Ermyntrude’s elopement was to be aborted. Perhaps she was already too late. “Answer me, Dru!”

Drusilla had just read that it was unwise to argue with a deranged person. “His home is on the Royal Crescent. I told you he is very rich.”

Tabby almost groaned. Of course, Mr. Philpotts could not reside just around the corner, but must dwell on the city’s outskirts. Tabby thought of her sore feet. Again she was tempted to abandon Ermyntrude to her fate. Again she could not do so. “Have you any money?” she asked Drusilla, for Sir Geoffrey’s troubles had made him remiss about paying her her wage. “I must hire a hack.”

A hack? Indeed, this was madness. Furthermore, Drusilla had no funds to lend, but to thwart a person in the grip of a brain fever might well result in a paroxysm of madness. “Take Pa’s rig!” Drusilla suggested. “He won’t care. I’ll send word to the stable myself.”

So she did, as well as word to the coachman to keep a close eye on his passenger. Fortunately unaware of these latter instructions, Tabby set out in search of Mr. Philpotts. Perhaps it was unwise to involve an outsider in Ermyntrude’s escapade, but Tabby could not deal with the situation without help. She dared not apprise Sir Geoffrey of his daughter’s fit of folly, and Drusilla was too young to be of any real assistance. Tabby could only hope that Mr. Philpotts’s obvious feelings for Ermyntrude would make him discreet.

The Royal Crescent—fourteen houses built by a local architect at the expense of an Indian nabob—had only recently risen on the seafront. Although the bow fronts didn’t meet with universal approval, lodgings there were sought by the most distinguished of company. Tabby didn’t wait for the coachman’s assistance but climbed down quickly from the carriage and hastened to the front door of Mr. Philpotts’s residence.

A young footman answered her summons. “The master is not to home,” he said in dignified accents.

“Oh, no!” gasped Tabby. “Do you know where I may find him? It is most important—a matter of life and death!”

The footman had not been long at his post. Even so, he should have known better than to make free of his master’s whereabouts to every person who came knocking at the door. But this person was of the female gender, and the footman was so startled by her appearance that he spoke before he thought, and allowed that he believed Mr. Philpotts might have adjourned with friends to the Castle Tavern. Tabby thanked the man and hurried back to the carriage. The coachman was startled to receive her next directions. Still, Miss Drusilla had said only to keep an eye on his passenger, not to refuse to do her bidding, and so he obeyed her queer command.

Mr. Philpotts was indeed at the Castle Tavern, enjoying some pleasant talk and some excellent ale. The talk was all of the races that would soon take place. The best horses were brought from Newmarket and the North to run in the Brighton and Lewes Races, and immense sums of money were wagered on the outcome. Mr. Philpotts was deep in an intense conversation concerning the noblest friend of man—to be precise, the rival virtues of two specimens thereof known respectively as Jack Come Tickle Me and Kiss in a Comer—and was not pleased to be interrupted before his point had been made. When he learned that the person so insistent of speaking with him was a female, he abruptly left the room.

Tabby was waiting in the hallway. Her appearance there was so unexpected that Mr. Philpotts stopped dead in his tracks. Of course, it had been foolish to hope that Ermyntrude would burst into the tavern and demand to see him. “Miss Minchin, you should not be here! Is anything amiss?”

“Naturally something is amiss!” retorted Tabby. Her rudeness may perhaps be forgiven her in light of the fact that she was having an absolutely wretched day. “We cannot talk here! Pray come with me, sir.”

Mr. Philpotts was not of an adventurous nature. Ordinarily, he would have been startled to receive such an invitation from a scarce-known female. On this occasion, however, he had a rather nasty presentiment and therefore followed Tabby with reluctance. “It’s Ermy, isn’t it?” he asked, when they arrived in the street.

Tabby paused. She was taking a great risk in trusting this seemingly pleasant young man. “Forgive me, but there is a good reason for my question. You care a great deal for Ermyntrude, do you not?”

Mr. Philpotts’s presentiment worsened. “I would go to the devil for her,” he said.

Tabby sought to ignore the ignoble pang of envy that struck her at these words. “Then I must trust you.” She handed Osbert Ermyntrude’s note.

He frowned at it, then turned pale. “You came here to tell me that Ermy has set out to make herself a viscountess? I’d much rather you had not! I knew that she had a preference for St. Erth; everyone did! But I did not realize that
he—”

“He doesn’t! interrupted Tabby. “At least that anyone has seen. I believe that this so-called elopement is something that Ermy has dreamed up without any encouragement from St. Erth. We are wasting time, Mr. Philpotts! You must help me prevent Ermy from landing herself in the scandal-broth—if it is not already too late.”

Mr. Philpotts had suffered a severe blow and still was not reasoning clearly. “I don’t see what we can do. Ermy must be allowed to make her own choice.”

“Ermyntrude,” Tabby said bluntly, “is a fine headstrong miss who can be trusted only to indulge herself in some shockingly irregular misconduct! What you may do, sir—if possible—is help me prevent her going from bad to worse. We are not accomplishing anything standing here like this! If you will not come with me, then at least tell me St. Erth’s address.”

Mr. Philpotts had meant to explain to Miss Minchin that he would not be so presumptuous as to condemn Ermyntrude for her conduct, no matter how miserable he might be made as a result of it. Upon hearing her words, he looked rather astonished instead.
“You
mean to call on St. Erth?” he asked.

“I mean to do something!” snapped Tabby. “If you will not help me, then I must myself somehow contrive to extricate Ermyntrude from her foolishness. Good day, Mr. Philpotts! Pray forgive me for taking you away from your friends.” She turned toward the waiting carriage.

Her scornful words stung. Osbert realized he had not acquitted himself well. He realized also that he could not in good conscience allow Miss Minchin to set out unaccompanied to the rescue. Ermyntrude must be more important to him than the outcome of a horse race, after all. Even if she was in the process of eloping with someone else. “Miss Minchin, wait! I wish to accompany you!” He hurried after her, gave the coachman an address.

The carriage clattered through the streets. “Perhaps it’s all a hum,” ventured Mr. Philpotts. “Ermy’s so high-spirited, she might have done it for a lark.”

“No,” Tabby responded unsympathetically, “she did it to win a wager. I only hope we are not too late to save her from the consequences of her foolishness. Thank God! Here is the hotel.”

A brief argument ensued. Mr. Philpotts thought he should be the one to confront the viscount, and Tabby had no intention that the confrontation should take place without her there. In the end, they both entered the hotel. “Wager?” Osbert inquired.

“It was nothing!” Tabby responded tersely. “A bargain with her sister concerning the disposition of their grandmama’s pearls. We have no time to stand here gossiping, Mr. Philpotts! You must take me to St. Erth.”

Looks were definitely deceiving, decided Osbert; no one would guess at first glance that Miss Minchin should be such a gorgon. She put him strongly in mind of a governess of his own, who had more than once made him wish to run away. Not that he could blame Miss Minchin for Ermyntrude’s elopement or for her current distress. Osbert had wished himself, sometimes, that Ermyntrude would refrain from rushing into certain trouble, and he wished now that he was not such a dull stick as to preclude her ever thinking of involving him in her escapades. He could not help but admire her reckless daring. Without another word of argument, he escorted Tabby to the rooms hired for the summer by Viscount St. Erth.

The viscount was in. He had not planned to be, had been engaged with friends for a gentlemen’s whist party, to be followed by a little music and a cold chicken and some sandwiches afterward. However, fate had contrived that he should pass his time otherwise. This circumstance annoyed him greatly. It was with a savage expression that he flung open his door. “Hah!” he said.
“Hah!
I had expected you sooner—not that it would have accomplished you anything! I’m no pigeon for anybody’s plucking, and so I told that little baggage, and so I will also tell you!”

Mr. Philpotts did not care to hear Ermyntrude spoken of a baggage. He would have stepped forward had not Tabby taken firm hold of his coat sleeve. “Wait!” she hissed. “Sir, am I to take it that Ermyntrude has been here?”

“Been here?” echoed the viscount. “I should say she has. She gained entry by disguising herself as a page. But you already know that! Why else should
you
be here? You were to burst in and find us in a compromising position, and then I would be honor bound to do the proper thing! Don’t bother to deny it; the chit confessed as much!” His handsome face was almost feral. “I had my man take her home. So now you may leave also, because you are too late!” Without waiting for a response, he closed the door in Tabby’s face.

She deemed it safe, now, to release Mr. Philpotts’s sleeve. “What a wretched child she is!” Tabby sighed. “I suppose we must be glad that she is safe. I shall have a few words to say to her, I promise you, sir. I know that I may trust you to say nothing of this. I only hope St. Erth will be as closemouthed.”

“He will.” Osbert accompanied Tabby to her carriage. “He wouldn’t want his part in it to become known. The thing is, Miss Minchin, if it does—well, you’re in a bit of a spot yourself. You shouldn’t have come to
the
Castle looking for me, and you shouldn’t have been in St. Erth’s rooms.”

This observation struck Tabby as the height of absurdity. But it would be unkind to scoff at Mr. Philpotts, especially after she had taken him from his friends to accompany her on a wild-goose chase. “I wasn’t in his rooms, but in the hallway!” she pointed out. “And it is Ermyntrude’s good name that we are concerned about, not mine.”

Osbert didn’t wish to think of Ermyntrude’s good name, which she had tried so hard to cast away. “Ermy,” he retorted, “at least had the foresight to put on a disguise so no one would know her if she was seen. You made no attempt to disguise yourself. It could be very embarrassing if you were recognized.”

Embarrassing for whom? Tabby wondered if Mr. Philpotts’s concern was for her own reputation or for his own. Then she thought that she misjudged him. Mr. Philpotts was not one to put selfish considerations first.

Tabby held out her hand. “You have been very good,” she said. “Thank you for accompanying me. I should not have asked you—but we had no way of knowing things would work out as they have. May I return you to your tavern? No? I must go home now and read Ermyntrude a dreadful scold, and so I will say good-bye!”

Osbert had taken Tabby’s proffered hand. Now he released it. “I wish you would not,” he said. “You will just make her even more contrary by putting obstacles in her road.”

Tabby thought Mr. Philpotts seemed to understand Ermyntrude very well. It was a pity Ermyntrude’s wager didn’t concern him rather than St. Erth. Although Tabby couldn’t imagine Osbert lending himself to an elopement. He helped her into the carriage. “Good day!” she said to him, and to the coachman, “Elphinstone House!”

Chapter Sixteen

Despite Mr. Philpotts’s advice to the contrary, Tabby had every intention of reading Ermyntrude a tremendous scold. She rehearsed her speech on the way back to Elphinstone House. If Ermyntrude uttered one objectionable word, Tabby would shake her till the teeth rattled in her head. In Tabby’s opinion, Sir Geoffrey’s elder daughter would benefit greatly from being turned across someone’s knee and having her backside warmed with a hairbrush. Tabby regretted that she could not presume to take such direct action. St. Erth had said he sent Ermyntrude home. She hoped Ermyntrude had stayed there. Tabby dismissed the coachman and entered Elphinstone House.

The house was very quiet. Tabby was uneasy when no footman met her at the door. Had some fresh disaster taken place in her absence? She hurried down the hallway, in search of some member of the family. Then she espied the footman outside the drawing room. He had a fascinated expression on his face, and his ear pressed to the closed door.