She then kissed his lordship’s cheek, and patted him in a motherly way, told him to sit down and be comfortable, and turned again to Kitty. “He has told you about us, I don’t doubt, and I can see you’ve not come here to tell me our marriage would be unsuitable. Well, I’m sure there’s no need for anyone to do so, for I’m no fool, and I know it. But I mean to marry him, for all that, only how to bring it about is more than I can see.”
Dolphinton, who had been watching her with an expression of dog-like devotion, sighed heavily.
“But his Mama cannot prevent the marriage, if he is set upon it!” Kitty said. “Dolph, you are twenty-seven years old! Could you not be resolute?”
He looked frightened, and began to stammer. Miss Plymstock took his hand, and sat patting it. “Don’t be in a taking, Foster!” she said kindly. “Your Mama shan’t know of it until I have you safe, and so I promise you.”
The servant came in just then with a tray, which he set on one of the tables. Miss Plymstock rose, and said: “Now, you shall have a glass of the Madeira wine you like, and sit drinking it by the fire, while I take Miss Charing to my bedchamber. Sister’s out, so no one will come in to disturb you, and if your Mama should ask you about your visit here you may say that Miss Charing and I went off together and left you alone, and she will be satisfied.”
Kitty, feeling that in her own way Miss Plymstock wss quite as masterful as Lady Dolphinton, meekly went with her up two pairs of stairs to her bedroom at the back of the house.
“You’ll excuse my bringing you hene,” stated Hannah, putting forward a chair for her. “I was wishful to talk to you, and I don’t care to speak out before Foster, because it makes him nervous, poor fellow!”
“If only one could prevail upon him to be firm with that odious woman!” Kitty exclaimed. “I own, I am a little afraid of her myself, but there is nothing she can do to him, after all!”
“Yes, there is, Miss Charing, and she don’t scruple to hold it over his head. She and that precious doctor of hers! A pretty pair, and it would do me good, it would indeed! to tell them what I think of them! If he don’t do what she bids him, she threatens she’ll have him under lock and key, and tell everyone he’s mad.”
“Oh, no! She could not!” Kitty cried, horrified. “He is not! Not mad!”
“No, he’s not, but no one could deny he hasn’t all his wits,” said Miss Plymstock dispassionately. “However, there’s no harm in him, and I warrant you if he had me to look after him he would be a great deal better than he is now. For one thing, I don’t mean to let his Mama come scaring him out of his senses; and for another, I think it will suit him much better to live in this Irish place of his than to be racketing about town, the way he’s made to. He can have his horses, and though I daresay I shall find it a damp, ramshackle place, I don’t care for that, because I’ve always had a taste for the country, and I don’t doubt I shall soon set it in order.”
Kitty did not doubt it either. Regarding her hostess with a fascinated eye, she faltered: “I beg your pardon, but—but— do you love Dolph?”
The question in no way discomposed Miss Plymstock. She replied camly: “I collect that you mean to ask me if I have fallen in love with him. Well, I have not, and I don’t suppose anyone could. I like him very well, and I shall like to be the Countess of Dolphinton, and to be a married lady. My brother don’t favour him, and he don’t wish me to marry him, but I don’t heed him. I’m not pretty, like you, and I have no fortune. It isn’t likely I shall receive another offer.” She met Kitty’s eyes squarely, and said in her forthright way: “I’m not his equal in station, and I don’t pretend I am; but you might say he wasn’t fit to marry anyone. I promise you this: I mean to take good care of him, and to make him happy, poor Foster!”
Kitty stared at her, her brain working swiftly. Secluded though her life had been, she was well aware that there was perhaps no one amongst Dolphinton’s relations who would not be shocked by such an alliance as this. Even Freddy, good-natured though he was, would frown upon it, she thought, recalling his disparaging remarks about the late Mr. Yalding. In the eyes of society, Dolphinton’s peculiarities were outweighed by his birth; the enjoyment of a substantial fortune was the only thing that could render Miss Plymstock eligible, and she had no fortune at all. But Kitty, looking at that homely countenance, could see poor, bewildered Dolphinton happily ambling round his Irish bog, ruled certainly, but kindly, and as certainly protected from his mother’s disturbing influence. She drew a breath, and said: “I’ll help you!”
Miss Plymstock’s already high colour deepened to a rich beetroot. “You’re very obliging! I’m not one to wrap things up in clean linen, so I’ll tell you I know how he was made to offer for you, and what you said when you rejected him, and it made me think you was a nice girl, and one I’d be glad to meet. Once his ring’s on my finger I shall know what to do, for I’m not afraid of any of them; but the thing is, how to get it there? You must know, Miss Charing, that he’s got a set of spies round him, that carry tales to his Mama. I don’t doubt she’s told them he’s a trifle queer in his head. Well! If Sam —that’s my brother!—would lend me his aid, I could maybe do the thing, but he won’t, for he don’t like Foster, and he would be glad to match me with a friend of his own, if he could do it. What he says is, an Earl’s all very well if he’s affluent, but one like Foster, with a weak head and no fortune, is a bad bargain. But to my way of thinking he’s a better bargain than a tea-merchant, with snuff all over his waitcoat, and one foot in the grave—even if Mr. Muthill was to offer for me, which I’ll lay my life he don’t mean to!”
“Exactly so!” said Kitty faintly.
“I’ve thought of Gretna Green,” pursued Miss Plymstock, “because banns won’t serve. If her ladyship didn’t discover we had put ‘em up, Sam would, for he keeps a close watch on me. I know it ain’t the thing to be married across the Border—”
“No, pray do not do that!” Kitty interrupted, much shocked.
“I can’t do it, because it would cost a deal of money, and her ladyship don’t allow Foster more than a pittance. And it wouldn’t be good for Foster to be chasing to Scotland for as much as three days, I daresay, thinking all the time his Mama was on his heels,” replied Miss Plymstock, with unshaken calm.
“Oh, I am persuaded it would be very bad for him! We must think of a better scheme than that.”
“But can you?” asked Miss Plymstock.
“Yes, between us we must be able to do so. I own, I do not immediately perceive how it is to be contrived, but I mean to think very particularly about it. It will be best if Lady Dolphinton believes him to be obedient, I think. She is the most absurd creature! I daresay you are aware that she has compelled him still to angle for me! Should we not turn this to account? Recollect, if she knows him to be in my company she will be satisfied! Something may suggest itself: it must do so! If you do not object, I will encourage him to be a great deal in my company; and—though it will go sorely against the grain with me!—I’ll let her think I am not wholly averse from his suit.”
“I’m agreeable,” said Miss Plymstock. “But maybe this cousin Freddy of Foster’s won’t like it?”
“Freddy? It has nothing—I mean,” Kitty corrected herself hastily, “he will have not the least objection, I assure you!”
Chapter XI
In pursuance of her aims, Miss Charing allowed herself, with real heroism, to be inveigled by Lady Dolphinton into visiting the Dolphinton house in Grosvenor Place, a locality which her ladyship described disparagingly as quite out of the way, and this in so scornful a voice that Kitty quaked to think of what she might have said of so unmodish a quarter as Keppel Street.