The Duke, serenely unconscious of the design being hatched against him, occupied himself for the greater part of the drive to Hitchin in coaching his young companions in the roles he had decided they had better assume. He had no desire to run the gauntlet of any more criticism from innkeepers and servants, and he realized that the presence of a beautiful and unattended young lady in his company would need some explanation. The best explanation that offered itself to him was that Tom and Belinda, once more brother and sister, should be travelling to visit friends, under the escort of Tom’s tutor, and, of course, Belinda’s maid, who must have contracted some illness on the road, and been left behind. The idea of having Mr. Rufford for a tutor struck Tom as so irresistibly humorous, that for some time he would do nothing but giggle; but when he had recovered a little he bethought him that as Hitchin was uncomfortably close to Shefford, where he had escaped from his real tutor, it would be best for him to adopt some name other than his own. He and Belinda thereafter beguiled the tedium of the journey by quarrelling over the various names that suggested themselves to them. A compromise had barely been reached by the time the chaise drove up to the Sun Inn.
The landlord of the Sun accepted the Duke’s story with only faint surprise. Possibly the sotto voce altercation which was still going on between Tom and Belinda helped him to believe that they were indeed brother and sister. The Duke bespoke a private parlour, and was just congratulating himself on having cleared the first of his fences, when Tom, who had wandered off to confer with one of the ostlers, came running in with the news that a Fair had come to Hitchin, with a performing bear, a Fat Woman, a dwarf, and all manner of attractions from pony-racing to bobbing for oranges. No sooner had she heard this than Belinda clapped her hands, and, turning her sparkling eyes upon the Duke, begged him to take her there, since never in her life had she been allowed to visit a Fair. It was in vain that the Duke reminded her of their errand in Hitchin; she cared nothing for Maggie Street while she could dance for ribands, or watch the sterner sex wrestling for a cheese. Tom added his voice to hers. “Oh, pray let us go, sir! It is a splendid Fair, the ostler says, with matches at singlestick, and jumping in sacks, and a grand firework display when it is dark! And we are quite safe here, because, only fancy, the ostler said there had been a stout gentleman here searching for me, and of course that was Snape! At least, the ostler didn’t say it was for me, because he did not know that, only I could tell. And the best of it is that he did not find me here, and so now he has gone, and why should he come back? It is a famous fudge!”
The Duke was quite unable to resist the pleading looks of his protégés, and very weakly agreed to let them visit the Fair while he pursued a strict search for Maggie Street. He enjoined Tom to take care of Belinda, and not to fail to return to the Sun in time for dinner at five o’clock; and allowed them to go.
The rest of the day was spent, as far as he was concerned, in a singularly profitless fashion. He was quite unable to discover any trace of Maggie Street; and when he returned to the inn to dine, he was obliged to hire a room there for Belinda, alleging as the reason that the friends to whom he had said he was escorting her were all too full of measles to admit her into the house. After that it soon became apparent to him that if he wished to see his young friends at the dinner-table he would have to plunge into the hurly-burly of the Fair to find them. He was feeling rather too tired to be amused by the noise and the fun there, and was forced to admit to himself that amongst the advantages of rank must be reckoned an immunity from being jostled by merrymakers who all seemed to be very much too hot, and by far too friendly. He found Belinda watching a blindfold-wheelbarrow-race, in which Tom was taking part for the guerdon of a whalebone whip. She was sucking a large lollipop, and closely attended by two rustic swains, who seemed to be acting as porters, since they carried a motley collection of ribbons, oranges, sweetmeats, and toys, which they made haste to deliver up to her as soon as the Duke joined the party. Belinda thanked them sweetly, and informed the Duke that she was enjoying herself very much, her only disappointment having been the disagreeable behaviour of Tom, who had offered to draw the cork of a kind gentleman who would have taken her into one of the booths to witness a theatrical performance.
“Belinda,” said Gilly patiently, “you must not—indeed you must not!—go off with strange men just because they promise you silk dresses, or some such thing!”
“He didn’t,” replied Belinda, opening her eyes wide. “It was to see a play.”
“Yes, that is what I mean.”
“Oh!” said Belinda, thoughtfully licking her lollipop.
The Duke could not feel that he had made much impression on her, but as her attention had become fixed on the closing stage of the race it was plainly of no use to persevere. She did not seem to bear Tom any ill-will, for as soon as it was apparent that he would win the blindfold race she dropped all her fairings to clap her hands in delight. He soon came over to them, brandishing the whip, and with his face smeared with the treacle which had coated a number of buns hung on strings for which competitors had been expected to bob. He said that it was the jolliest day of his life, and that he would come back to the inn as soon as he had collected his various purchases and prizes,
“And we may come back to see the fireworks, may we not?” he begged.”
“Yes, yes, and the dancing!” cried Belinda, clasping her hands ecstatically.
With two pairs of imploring eyes fixed on him, the Duke found himself quite unable to say no, much as he would have liked to. He had seen many firework displays, and had not the smallest desire to see this one. He was tired from walking about the town in the search for Mrs. Street; and he disliked crowds. He realized, with a slight feeling of shame, that between himself and Mr. Dash of Nowhere in Particular there were several points of difference. He told himself that he was by far too nice in his tastes, and did his best to respond to Tom’s suggestion with becoming enthusiasm. Tom then darted away to retrieve his prizes, and the Duke drew Belinda’s hand through his arm, and led her out of the Fairground, towards the inn. Neither of them noticed the unobtrusive figure of Mr. Shifnal; and this sapient gentleman took care never to place himself in the line of Belinda’s vision.
Upon reaching the Sun Inn, they found that the usual bustle attendant upon a private chaise’s arrival was in full swing. An elegant chaise-and-four had pulled up to change horses, and the fresh team was just being led out of the stable. Belinda, fondly clasping the Duke’s arm with both hands, gazed wistfully at this equipage, and said that she wished she might travel in a chaise-and-four, clad in a silk gown, and with a ring upon her finger. The Duke could not help laughing a little at what appeared to be the sum of her ambitions, but there was such a sad note in her voice that he was impelled to pat one of the little hands on his arm. Fortunately for his peace of mind, he was uninterested in the post-chaise, and did not so much as glance at its occupants, so that he failed to observe the strange effect the sight of himself had upon them. They were two ladies, one a stout dowager, the other a smart young woman, with crimped curls, and a high complexion, who no sooner clapped eyes on the Duke than she gave a gasp, and exclaimed: “Mama! Sale! Look!”
The dowager began to deliver a reproof to her daughter on the hoydenish nature of her behaviour in bouncing up in her seat, but the words died on her lips as she brought her hawk-like gaze to bear upon the Duke and his fair companion.: “ Well! ” she ejaculated, her pale eyes showing an alarming tendency to start from their sockets.
The Duke and Belinda passed into the inn. “Well!” said Lady Boscastle again. “I would not have credited it! Not two days after that notice in the Gazette! ”
Miss Boscastle giggled. “Poor dear Harriet! I wonder if she knows of this? Did ever you see such a lovely creature, Mama? Poor dear Harriet.”
“One can only trust,” said Lady Boscastle obscurely, “that it will be a lesson to Augusta Ampleforth, with her odious pretensions. I always said, and I always shall say that Sale was entrapped into it, for I am sure no man would look twice at Harriet, for she is nothing out of the ordinary; indeed, a squab little figure of a girl, and with far too much reserve in her manner. What a shocking thing it would be if Sale were to declare off now!”
Both ladies dwelled beatifically for some moments on this thought. Miss Boscastle said inconsequently: “Well, we shall be seeing Harriet in Bath, Mama, for she is gone to stay with old Lady Ampleforth, you know.”
By this time the change of horses had been effected, and the chaise was on the move again, before Lady Boscastle had time to prosecute any enquiries at the Sun Inn. She resettled herself in the corner of the chaise, remarking that she hoped Harriet would not be found to be putting on airs to be interesting, and that Augusta Ampleforth would be all the better for a sharp set-down.
Meanwhile, the Duke and Belinda had mounted the stairs to his private parlour, and Belinda had cast off her bonnet, and run her fingers through her luxuriant ringlets, saying, with a grateful look at her protector: “I am so very glad you took me away from Mr. Liversedge, sir! I wish you was my guardian! I am so happy!”
He was too much touched to point out to her the slight inaccuracy contained in this speech. “My poor child, I wish indeed that you had some guardian to take care of you! Or that I could find your friend, Mrs. Street. But I have enquired at the receiving-office, and at upwards of twenty shops, and no one can give me the least intelligence of her. In fact, the only Street living in Hitchin is an old man, who is stone deaf, and knows nothing of your Maggie! Can you not—”
He was interrupted. Belinda broke into a peal of merry laughter. “Oh, but she is not Mrs. Street!” she told him. “How came you to think she was, dear sir? She was Maggie Street when she worked at Mrs. Buttermere’s establishment, but then, you know, she was married!”
For one horrifying moment, the Duke recognized in himself an affinity with Mr. Liversedge, who had boxed Belinda’s ears. Then the absurdity of it most forcibly struck him, and he began to laugh. Belinda regarded him in faint surprise, and Tom, entering the room at that moment, instantly demanded to be told what the jest might be.
The Duke shook his head. “Nothing! Tom, if you would please me, go and wash your face!”
“I was just about to do so,” said Tom, with great dignity, and even greater mendacity. “By Jupiter, I never wanted my dinner more! I am quite gutfoundered!”
On this elegant expression, he vanished, leaving the Duke to ask Belinda, in a failing voice, if she knew what her friend’s surname might now be. He was by this time sufficiently well acquainted with Belinda to feel no surprise at her reply.
“Oh, no! I daresay she may have told me, but I did not attend particularly, you know, for why should I?”
“Then what,” demanded Gilly, “are we to do?”
He had no very real expectation of receiving an answer to this question, but Belinda,—assuming an expression of profound thought, suddenly said: “Well, do you know, sir, I think I would as lief marry Mr. Mudgley after all?”
The introduction into his life of this entirely new character slightly staggered the Duke. He said: “Who, Belinda, is Mr. Mudgley?
Belinda’s eyes grew soft with memory. “He is a very kind gentleman,” she sighed.
“I am sure he is,”agreed the Duke. “Did he promise you a purple silk gown?”
“No,” said Belinda mournfully, “but he took me to see his farm, and his mother, driving me in his own gig! And he said he was wishful to marry me, only Uncle Swithin told me I should go away with him, and be a real lady, and so of course I went.”
“Of course,” said the Duke. “Did you know Mr. Mudgley when you lived in Bath?”
“Oh, yes! And he has the prettiest house, and his mother was kind to me, and now I am sorry that I went with Uncle Swithin, for Mr. Ware didn’t marry me, and he didn’t give me a great deal of money either. I was quite taken in!”
Here the door opened to admit both Tom and the waiter. While the latter laid the covers for dinner, Tom plunged into an animated account of his activities at the Fair, and displayed for the Duke’s admiration the Belcher handkerchief he had won in the sack race. He was with difficulty deterred from knotting this about his neck at once. The waiter set the dishes on the table, and withdrew, and the Duke was again able to touch upon the question of Belinda’s destination. He asked her if Mr. Mudgley lived near Bath. She replied, after her usual fashion: “Oh, yes!” but seemed unable to supply any more detailed information. Tom, surprised, demanded enlightenment, and upon being told that Belinda had forgotten Maggie Street’s married name, said disgustedly: “You are the most hen-witted girl! I daresay she don’t live at Hitchin at all, but at Ditchling, or—or Mitcham, or some such place!”
Belinda looked much struck, and said ingenuously: “Yes, she does!”
The Duke was in the act of conveying a portion of braised ham to his mouth, but he lowered his fork at this, and demanded, “Which?”
“The one Tom said,” replied Belinda brightly.
“My dear child, he said Ditchling or Mitcham! Surely—”
“Well, I am not quite sure,” Belinda confessed. “It was some place that sounded like those.”
The prospect of travelling about England to every place that sounded faintly like Hitchin was not one which the Duke found himself able to contemplate for as much as a minute. He said rather fatalistically: “Mr. Mudgley it must be!”
“Yes, but I dare not go back to Bath,” objected Belinda. “Because, you know, if Mrs. Pilling were to find, me she would very likely put me in prison for having broken my indentures.”
The Duke had no very clear idea of what the laws were governing apprentices, but it had occurred to him that in Bath he would find Lady Harriet. She might not be the bride of his choosing, but she was one of the friends of his childhood, and never in any childish exploit had she failed to lend him a helping hand whenever it had lain in her power to do so. That she might not feel much inclination to extend this hand to Belinda he did not consider. It seemed to him that since he had been forced into the position of Belinda’s protector, and could not find it in his heart to abandon her, he must find for her (failing Mr. Mudgley) a suitable chaperon. He could think of none more suitable than Harriet, and he began to feel that he had been a great simpleton not to have carried Belinda to Bath at the outset. Tom interrupted these meditations with a demand to know whether the proposed trip to Bath would preclude his being taken to London. If, he said, that were so, he thought he should be well-advised to leave the party, and to make his own way either to London, or to some likely seaport. As it was obvious that the merest hint of returning him to his parent would drive him into precipitate flight, the Duke refrained from making this suggestion, but assured him that although he must certainly write to Mr. Mamble from Bath, he should beg to be allowed the pleasure of his son’s company on a visit to the Metropolis. Tom seemed a little doubtful about this, but allowed himself to be overborne. Belinda reiterated her fear of Mrs. Pilling, and the Duke wondered whether his Harriet would also be able to deal with this awe-inspiring lady. He was just about to say that he would hire a post-chaise to take them all to Cheyney on the morrow, when it suddenly occurred to him that his arrival at any one of his houses, accompanied by Belinda, would give rise to more scandalous comment than he felt at all able to face. He decided to seek out the quietest inn in Bath, and to lose no time in calling upon Harriet, in Laura Place.
While he and his young friends were eating their dinners, Mr. Liversedge and Mr. Shifnal were taking counsel together. Mr. Shifnal’s suggestion that Mr. Liversedge should also hire a room at the Sun, and should smother the Duke in his bed at dead of night, was ill-received by his partner, who demanded to know how that could serve any good purpose. He said that even supposing that Mr. Shifnal were there to give his assistance it was hardly to be supposed that they could smuggle out of a busy inn an unconscious guest. Mr. Shifnal, a little damped, was still trying to think out an alternative scheme when the Duke’s party issued forth from the inn, and began walking in the direction of the Fairground. Protected by the tilt of the cart, the confederates watched them go, and could scarcely believe their good fortune.
“Sam,” said Mr. Shifnal, “if we can’t nabble that Dook while everyone’s watching the fireworks we don’t deserve no thirty thousand pounds!”
The Fair, when the Duke reached it again, was the scene of even denser crowds than it had been during the daylight hours. All the shopkeepers of Hitchin seemed to have thronged there, and although the open-air competitions were over, the various booths were packed with people, either staring at some monstrosity, or taking part in wrestling, boxing, or single-stick bouts. A large prize was offered to any sportsman able to knock out a professional bruiser with a broken nose and a cauliflower ear, and it was with difficulty that the Duke dissuaded Tom from instantly throwing his hat into the Ring. He took him instead to witness a stirring drama, entitled Monk and Murderer! or The Skeleton Spectre, which gave both him and Belinda the maximum amount of fearful enjoyment. Belinda was obliged to cling tightly to the Duke’s arm from the moment of the Mysterious Monk’s first appearance in Scene 2 (The Rocks of Calabria), to the Grand Combat with Shield and Battle-Axe in Scene 6, but upon being asked rather anxiously if she liked the piece, nodded her head very vigorously, and heaved a tremulous sigh.
When this stirring drama came to an end, the last daylight had faded, and the Fairground was lit by flares and cressets. The crowd was wending its way towards the open space where the fireworks were to be let off. The Duke, with Belinda still hanging on his arm, joined the general throng, and managed to secure good places for her and Tom on one of the forms set up in tiers round the field. He gave up his own place to a stout and panting dame, who sank thankfully down beside Belinda. With this bulwark on one side of his charge, and Tom on the other, the Duke thought that he might safely relax his vigilance, and retire from the crowd. He made his way between the forms to the back of the field, and was idly watching the struggles of determined citizens to push their way to the fore when a respectful voice said softly, yet with urgency, a little behind him: “My lord Duke!”
Instinctively he looked round. A neat man in a sober riding-dress, who had something of the look of a head-groom, touched his hat to him, and said: “I ask your Grace’s pardon for intruding, but I have a message for your Grace.”
Without giving himself time to consider that his cousin could not possibly have received the letter he had posted to him in Baldock that morning, the Duke leaped to the conclusion that the neat man must have come to him from Gideon. There was nothing at all alarming in Mr. Shifnal’s appearance: indeed, he ascribed much of his success to his respectable air. The depth of his bow was exactly as it should have been; his manner was a nice mixture of deference and the assurance of a trusted personal servant. He glanced deprecatingly at the persons within easy earshot, and moved suggestively in the direction of one of the tents that were dotted about the edge of the field. The Duke followed him. “Well?” he said. “What do you want with me?”
“I beg your Grace’s pardon,” Mr. Shifnal said again, “but I was told—by your Grace perhaps knows who—to deliver my message into your Grace’s private ear.”
The Duke was a little amused, but still unsuspicious. Gideon must be hard-pressed, he thought, to have sent to him. Possibly Lord Lionel had arrived in London, and was threatening to cut his son off with a shilling unless he divulged his cousin’s whereabouts. Mr. Shifnal was standing in the deep shadow cast by the now deserted tent; the first of the rockets went up in a glorious burst of stars; the Duke came up to Mr. Shifnal, and repeated: “Well, what do you want?”
He did not feel the blow that struck him down, for Mr. Liversedge, sliding out of the murk behind him, was leaving nothing to chance. The Duke dropped where he stood; and Mr. Liversedge, thrusting his cudgel out of sight under the tent-wall, instantly bent over him in an attitude of tender solicitude. A man, who had been staring up at the bursting rocket, glanced over his shoulder, and Mr. Liversedge at once called peremptorily to Mr. Shifnal: “You, sir! Would you have the goodness to assist me to carry my nephew to my carriage? He has fainted from this excessive heat and these crowds! My sister’s son: a very delicate young man! I told him how it would be, but these young sparks! They will never listen to older and wiser heads!”
The stranger watching the fireworks at once drew near, offering his aid. Mr. Liversedge thanked him profusely, and agreed that the poor young man did indeed look pale. “Sickly from birth!” he confided. “I have known him to swoon for as much as an hour on end! But I beg you will not put yourself to the trouble of coming with me! This gentleman will perhaps help me to my carriage: ah, I thank you, sir!”
Mr. Shifnal, who had picked up the Duke’s hat and malacca cane, here joined his confederate, and offered to take the poor gentleman’s legs. One or two people began to be interested in what was going on, but Mr. Liversedge was spared the trouble of repeating his story by the first gentleman, who very kindly retailed it for him. While he was doing this, Mr. Liversedge and Mr. Shifnal made haste to remove the Duke to where they had left Mr. Mimms’s cart, outside the field. A particularly fine display of pyrotechnics diverted the attention of those who had shown faint interest in the Duke’s swoon, and as he and his bearers had disappeared from view when they again had leisure to look round they troubled themselves no further in the matter.
The Duke’s inanimate body was soon hoisted into the back of the cart, and laid upon the boards. Mr. Liversedge scrambled in beside him, adjuring Mr. Shifnal to make haste and drive off before any meddling busybody could come poking and prying. He slid his hand under the Duke’s coat, feeling for his heart, and was relieved to feel it beating. He was not, as he had told his friend, a man of violence, and he had suffered quite a horrid revulsion of feeling when the Duke had gone down under the blow of his cudgel. He decided, privately, that if it should become necessary to dispose of the Duke someone other than himself would have to undertake that task: probably Nat, who had little sensibility, and none of the gentlemanly qualms that troubled his friend.