Sylvester (8 page)

‘That doesn’t signify,’ interrupted Miss Battery. ‘Did
he
behave as though he thought it so?’

‘Oh, no! He is so much accustomed to such flattery that he doesn’t appear even to heed it. Being civil to poor little dabs of females who have neither beauty nor conversation is one of the tiresome duties his exalted situation obliges him to perform.’

‘Well, if I were you, my dear, I wouldn’t fly into a pucker yet awhile,’ said Miss Battery with strong commonsense. ‘Seems to me you don’t know anything about him. One thing you can depend on: if he’s coming here to make you an offer he won’t treat you with cool civility!’

‘Even if he did not—oh, he must have changed indeed if I were to like him well enough to marry him!’ declared Phoebe. ‘I
could
not,
Sibby!’

‘Then you will decline his offer,’ said Miss Battery, with a conviction she was far from feeling.

Phoebe looked at her rather hopelessly, but said nothing. She knew it to be unnecessary. No one understood more thoroughly the difficulties of her situation than her governess; and no one was better acquainted with the ruthlessness of Lady Marlow’s imperious temper. After a few moments’ reflection Miss Battery said: ‘Speak to your father. He wouldn’t wish you to be forced into a marriage you disliked.’

This advice was repeated, in substance, by young Mr Orde, upon the following day, when Phoebe, knowing her mama to be out of the way, rode over to the Manor House to confer with him.

Thomas was the only child of the Squire of the district, a very respectable man, who contrived to maintain thirty or more couples of hounds, a score of hunters for himself, his son, and his huntsmen, several coach-horses and cover-hacks, half a dozen spaniels, and upwards of a hundred gamecocks at walk, on an income of no more than eight thousand pounds a year, and that without being obliged to stint his lady of the elegancies of life, or to allow to fall into disrepair the dwellings of his numerous tenants. His family had been established in the county for many generations, most of its members having been distinguished for their sporting proclivities, and none of them having made any particular mark in the world. The Squire was a man of excellent plain sense, much looked up to as a personage of the first consequence within his circle. While perfectly aware of his own worth, his way of life was unpretentious; although he employed, besides his huntsman, several grooms, a coachman, a gamekeeper, an experienced kennel-man, and a cocker, he was content, when he travelled any distance from Somerset, to hire postilions; and his household boasted no more than three indoor menservants.

He was a fond as well as a judicious parent, and had his son shown the least leaning towards academic pursuits he would have sent him up to Oxford upon his leaving Rugby, whatever retrenchments this might have entailed. That they must have been heavy he knew, for it was impossible for such a thoroughgoing sportsman as Tom to maintain a creditable appearance at Oxford on a penny less than six hundred pounds a year, setting aside such debts as the Squire thought him bound to incur. A sense of what was due to his heir enabled him to face the necessity of reducing his stable and disposing of his cocks without grumbling or trying to impress Tom with the notion that he was fortunate to possess so generous a father; but he was not at all displeased when Tom said that he thought it would be a great waste of time for him to go up to Oxford, since he was not bookish, and would very likely be ploughed there. What with cocking and coursing, fishing and flapper-shooting in the summer, hunting and pheasant-shooting through the winter, acquiring a knowledge of farming from the bailiff, and learning how to manage the estates, he thought he would be much better employed at home. He was allowed to have his way, the Squire resolving to arrange for him to be given a little town polish when he should be rather older.

Except for one or two visits to friends living in a different part of the country he had been at home for a year now, enjoying himself very much, and justifying his father’s secret pride in him by taking as much interest in crops as in hounds, and rapidly becoming as popular with the villagers as he was with the neighbouring gentry.

He was a pleasant youth, sturdy rather than tall, with a fresh, open countenance, unaffected manners, and as much of the good sense which characterized his father as was to be expected of a young gentleman of nineteen summers. From the circumstances of his being an only child he had from his earliest youth looked upon Phoebe, just his own age, as a sister; and since she had been, as a child, perfectly ready to engage with him on whatever dangerous pursuit he might suggest to her, besides very rapidly becoming a first-rate horsewoman, and a devil to go, not even his first terms at Rugby had led him to despise her company.

When Phoebe divulged to him her astonishing tidings, he was as incredulous as Susan had been, for, as he pointed out with brotherly candour, she was not at all the sort of girl to achieve a brilliant marriage. She agreed to this, and he added kindly: ‘I don’t mean to say that I wouldn’t as lief be married to you as to some high flyer, for if I was obliged to marry anyone I think I’d offer for you rather than any other girl I know.’

She thanked him.

‘Yes, but I’m not a fashionable duke,’ he pointed out. ‘Besides, I’ve known you all my life. I’m dashed if I understand why this duke should have taken a fancy to you! It isn’t as though you was a beauty, and whenever your mother-in-law is near you behave like a regular pea-goose, so how he could have guessed you ain’t a ninnyhammer I can’t make out!’

‘Oh, he didn’t! He wishes to marry me because his mama was a friend of mine.’

‘That
must
be a bag of moonshine!’ said Tom scornfully. ‘As though anyone would offer for a girl for such a reason as that!’

‘I think,’ said Phoebe, ‘it is on account of his being a person of great consequence, and wishing to make a suitable alliance, and not caring whether I am pretty, or conversible.’

‘He can’t think you suitable!’ objected Tom.’ He sounds to me a regular knock-in-the-cradle! It may be a fine thing to become a duchess, but I should think you had much better not!’

‘No, no, but what am I to do, Tom? For heaven’s sake don’t tell me I have only to decline the Duke’s offer, for you at least know what Mama is like! Even if I had the courage to disobey her only think what misery I should be obliged to endure! And don’t tell me not to regard it, because to be in disgrace for weeks and weeks, as I would be, so sinks my spirits that I can’t even
write
!
I know it’s idiotish of me, but I can’t overcome my dread of being in her black books! I feel as if I were withering!’

He had too often seen her made ill by unkindness to think her words over-fanciful. It was strange that a girl so physically intrepid should have so much sensibility. In his own phrase, he knew her for a right one; but he knew also that in a censorious atmosphere her spirits were swiftly overpowered, none of her struggles to support them alleviating the oppression which transformed her from the neck-or-nothing girl whom no oxer could daunt to the shrinking miss whose demeanour was as meek as her conversation was insipid. He said, rather doubtfully: ‘You don’t think, if you were to write to him, Lord Marlow would put the Duke off?’

‘You know what Papa is!’ she said simply. ‘He will always allow himself to be ruled by Mama, because he can’t bear to be made uncomfortable. Besides, how could I get a letter to him without Mama’s knowing of it?’

He considered for a few moments, frowning. ‘No. Well—You are quite
sure
you can’t like the Duke? I mean, I should have supposed anything to be better than to continue living at Austerby. Besides, you said yourself you only once talked to him. You don’t really know anything about him. I daresay he may be rather shy, and that, you know, might easily make him appear stiff.’

‘He is not shy and he is not stiff,’ stated Phoebe. ‘His manners are assured; he says everything that is civil because he places himself on so high a form that he would think it unworthy of himself to treat anyone with anything but cool courtesy; and because he knows his consequence to be so great he cares nothing for what anyone may think of him.’

‘You
did
take him in dislike, didn’t you?’ said Tom, grinning at her.

‘Yes, I did! But even if I had not, how could I accept an offer from him when I made him the villain in my story?’

That made Tom laugh. ‘Well, you needn’t tell him that, you goose!’

‘Tell him! He won’t need telling! I described him
exactly
!’

‘But, Phoebe, you don’t suppose he will
read
your book, do you?’ said Tom.

Phoebe could support with equanimity disparagement of her person, but this slight cast on her first novel made her exclaim indignantly: ‘Pray, why should he not read it? It is going to be
published
!’

‘Yes, I know, but you can’t suppose that people like Salford will buy it.’

‘Then who will?’ demanded Phoebe, rather flushed.

‘Oh, I don’t know! Girls, I daresay, who like that sort of thing.’

‘You liked it well enough!’ she reminded him.

‘Yes, but that was because it was so odd to think of your having written it,’ explained Tom. He saw that she was looking mortified, and added consolingly: ‘But I’m not bookish, you know, so I daresay it’s very fine, and will sell a great many copies. The thing is that no one will know who wrote it, so there’s no need to tease yourself over
that
.
When does the Duke come to Austerby?’

‘Next week. It is given out that he is coming to try the young chestnut. He is going to hunt too, and now Mama is trying to decide whether to dish up all our friends to entertain him at a dinner-party, or to leave it to Papa to invite Sir Gregory Standish and old Mr Hayle for a game of whist.’

‘Lord!’ said Tom, in an awed tone.

Phoebe gave a giggle. ‘
That
will teach him to come to Austerby in this odious, condescending way!’ she observed, with satisfaction. ‘What is more, Mama does not approve of newfangled fashions, so his grace will find himself sitting down to dinner at six o’clock, which is not at all the style of thing he is accustomed to. And when he comes into the drawing-room after dinner he will discover that Miss Battery has brought Susan and Mary down. And then Mama will call upon me to go to the pianoforte—she has told Sibby already to be sure I know my new piece thoroughly!—and at nine o’clock Firbank will bring in the tea-tray; and at half-past nine she will tell the Duke, in that complacent voice of hers, that we keep early hours in the country; and so he will be left to Papa and piquet, or some such thing. I wish he may be heartily bored!’

‘I should think he would be. Perhaps he won’t offer for you after all!’ said Tom.

‘How can I dare to indulge that hope, when all his reason for visiting us is to do so?’ demanded Phoebe, sinking back into gloom. ‘His mind must be perfectly made up, for he knows already that I am a dead bore! Oh, Tom, I am
trying
to take it with composure, but the more I think of it the more clearly do I see that I shall be forced into this dreadful marriage, and I feel sick with apprehension already, and there is no one to take my part, no one!’

‘Stubble it!’ ordered Tom, giving her a shake. ‘Talking such slum to me! Let me tell you, my girl, that there’s not only me to take your part, but my father and mother as well!’ She squeezed his hand gratefully. ‘I know you would, Tom, and Mrs Orde has always been so kind, but—it wouldn’t answer! You know Mama!’

He did, but said, looking pugnacious: ‘if she tries to bully you into this, and your father don’t prevent her, you needn’t think I shall stand by like a gapeseed! If the worst comes to the worst, Phoebe, you’d best marry me. I daresay we shouldn’t think it so very bad, once we had grown accustomed to it. At all events, I’d rather marry you than leave you in the suds! What the devil are you laughing at?’

‘You, of course! Now, Tom, don’t be gooseish! When Mama is so afraid we might fall in love that she has almost forbidden you to come within our gates! She wouldn’t hear of it, or Mr Orde either, I daresay!’

‘I know that. It would have to be a Gretna Green marriage, of course.’

She gave a gasp. ‘Gretna Green? Of all the hare-brained—No, really, Tom, how can you be so tottyheaded? I may be a hoyden, but I’m not abandoned! Why, I wouldn’t do such a shocking thing even if I were in love with you!’

‘Oh, very well!’ he said, a trifle sulkily. ‘
I
don’t want to do it, and if you prefer to marry Salford there’s no more to be said.’

She rubbed her cheek against his shoulder. ‘Indeed, I am very much obliged to you!’ she said contritely. ‘Don’t be vexed with me!’

He was secretly so much relieved by her refusal to accept his offer that after telling her severely that it would be well if she learned to reject such offers with more civility he relented, owned that a runaway marriage was not quite the thing, and ended by promising to lend his aid in any scheme she might hit on for her deliverance.

None occurred to her. Lady Marlow took her to Bath to have her hair cut into a smarter crop, and to buy a new dress, in which, presumably, she was to captivate the Duke. But as Lady Marlow considered white, or the palest of blues and pinks, the only colours seemly for a debutante, and nothing showed her to worse advantage, it was hard to perceive how this staggering generosity was to achieve its end.

Two days before the arrival of Lord Marlow and the Duke it began to seem as if one at least of the schemes for his entertainment was to be frustrated. Lord Marlow’s coachman, a weatherwise person, prophesied that snow was on the way; and an item in the
Morning Chronicle
carried the information that there had been heavy falls already in the north and east. A hope, never very strong, that the Duke would postpone his visit wilted when no message was brought to Austerby from its master, and was speedily followed by something very like panic. If the Duke, who was coming ostensibly to see how he liked the young chestnut’s performance in the hunting-field, was undeterred by the threat of snow he must be determined indeed to prosecute his suit; and if there were no hunting to remove him during the hours of daylight from the house he would have plenty of opportunity to do it. Try as she would Phoebe could not persuade herself that the weather, which had been growing steadily colder, showed any sign of improvement; and when the Squire cancelled the first meeting of the week, and followed that up by going away to Bristol, where some business had been for some time awaiting his attention, it was easy to see that he, the best weather-prophet in the district, had no expectation of being able to take his hounds out for several days at least.