But at the end of three weeks he had not tried to seduce her and she was growing worried.
She stood at the window one evening just after he had gone and traced idle patterns on the frosted pane with her finger-nail. Her lower lip stuck out and there was a scowl on her forehead.
Nan, who was lifting hot embers out of the fireplace with a pair of tongs and putting them into a silver warming-pan, glanced sideways at her. “Something amiss, mam?”
Amber swung around, giving a petulant switch to her skirt. “Yes, there is! Oh, Nan, I’m ready to run distracted! Three weeks I’ve been coursing this hare—and haven’t caught ’im yet!”
Nan closed the warming-pan and started into the bedroom with it. “But he’s getting winded, mam. I know he is.”
Amber followed her in and began to undress, but her face was gloomy and from time to time she gave an impatient ill-tempered sigh. It seemed to her that she had been trying all her life to make Samuel Dangerfield propose to her. Nan came to help her undress and stood behind her, unlacing her busk.
“Lord, mam!” she protested now. “You’ve got no cause for such vapourings! I know these formal old Puritans—I’ve worked in their houses. They think fornication’s a serious matter, let me tell you! Why, I’d bet my virginity he hasn’t laid with any woman save his wife these twenty years past! Heavens, give the gentleman leave to overcome his modesty! And what’s more, don’t forget you’ve gone to the greatest pains to make him take you for a woman of virtue. But I’ve watched him like a witch and I know he’s mighty uneasy—there’s fire in the flax and it’ll be quenched,” she added with a sage nod. “Only give ’im the right opportunity and you’ll have ’im—secure as a woodcock in a noose.” She made her two hands into a trap and put them about her own neck.
While Amber stepped out of her smock Nan whisked the warming-pan over the sheets, held back the covers and Amber jumped in, pulling them up quickly about her chin. Then she lay there in luxurious warmth and considered her problem.
This was, and she knew it, her last chance to take the world by its ears and climb on top. If she failed now—but she could not fail. She did not dare. She had seen too much at first hand of what happened to the women who, like her, made a livelihood by their wits and physical attractions but who had somehow let the years and the opportunities pass without achieving security.
Somehow, somehow, she thought desperately, I’ve got to do it; I’ve got to make him marry me!
And as she lay there thinking, it occurred to her all at once that perhaps she had been wrong, trying to make him marry her out of remorse and a sense of guilt. Why, she thought, with a sudden feeling of discovery, that would never even enter his head! Of course he’s not going to seduce me! He thinks I’m innocent and virtuous and he respects me! He’ll never marry me any way at all but from his own free will. That’s what I’ve got to do—I’ve got to get him to make me an honest proposal of marriage! Why didn’t I think of that long ago? But how can I do it—how can I do It—?
Amber and Nan put their heads together over that problem, and at last they worked out a plan.
About a week later Amber and Samuel Dangerfield set out for London in his coach. He had told her several days before that he must return and she had said that since she was leaving soon they might as well travel together; she would feel much safer riding with him. Her own coach, carrying Nan and Tansy, followed them. They had had a breakfast together at her cottage that morning—a substantial meal to prepare them for the journey—and though Amber had been gay and playful while they ate, now she had subsided into wistful and pensive quietness. From time to time she gave a little sigh.
The day was grey and dark and the rain seeped steadily down through the leafless branches of the forest. The air had a wet and penetrating chill, but they had fortified themselves against it with fur-lined cloaks and a fur-lined robe spread across their laps. Beneath their feet each one of them had a little brazier, like the ones people took to church, full of burning coals. So it was warm and moist inside the great lurching and rocking coach, and the warmth with the steam on the windows gave it a strange intimacy, making it a private little island shut off from the world.
Perhaps it was that seclusion and aloneness which made him bold enough to reach for her hand beneath the robe and say, “A penny for your thought, Mrs. St. Clare?”
For a moment Amber said nothing, and then she looked at him with her tenderest and most appealing smile. She gave a faint shrug of her shoulders. “Oh,” she said, “I was just thinking that I’m going to miss our card games and suppers and walking up to the well in the afternoons.” She gave another soft little sigh. “It’s going to seem mighty lonely now I’ve grown used to company.” She had told him how retired she lived in London, where she had no relatives, only a few friends, and was wary of making new acquaintances.
“Oh, but, Mrs. St. Clare, I hope you won’t think our friendship is over. I—Well, to be honest, I’ve been hoping we might meet sometimes in London.”
“That’s kind of you,” said Amber sadly. “But I know how busy you’ll be—and you have all your family about you.” Most of the children, she knew, grown and small alike, still lived at the great family mansion in Blackfriars.
“No, I assure you I won’t. My physician wants me to do less work and as for the matter of that, I find I’ve a taste for idleness —if it’s spent in pleasant company.” She smiled, and lowered her eyes at the compliment. “And I’d like to have you meet my family. We’re all very happy together and I think you’d like them—I know they’d like you.”
“You’re so kind, Mr. Dangerfield, to care about what—Oh! is something amiss?” she cried, as a sudden spasm of pain shot across his face.
For a moment he was silent, obviously embarrassed to be caught with an ailment at a moment so delicately romantic. But at last he shook his head. “No—” he said. “No, it was nothing.”
But presently the look of agony came again and his face flushed dark. Amber, now greatly alarmed, seized hold of his arm.
“Mr. Dangerfield! Please! You must tell me—What is it!”
He now looked wretchedly uncomfortable and was finally forced to admit that something, he could not imagine what, was causing him great abdominal discomfort. “But don’t trouble yourself for me, Mrs. St. Clare,” he pleaded. “It will pass presently, it’s only—Oh!” A sudden uncontrollable grunt escaped him.
Amber’s own face reflected sympathetic pain as she watched him. But instantly she was in practical charge of the situation. “There’s a little inn not far up the road—I remember we passed it on the way down. We’ll stop there. You must get into bed right away, and I’m sure I have some—Oh, now don’t make any objections, sir!” she said as he began to protest, and though her tone would permit no argument it was tender as a mother’s speaking to her sick child. “I know what’s best for you. Here—I’ve got some hawkweed and camomile in this little bag, I always carry it with me. Wait till I get this water-flask open so you can wash it down—”
It was not long before they reached the inn, at which Amber called out to order the coachman to stop, and Mr. Dangerfield’s gigantic footman, Big John Waterman, helped him to make his way inside. Big John offered to carry him, and no doubt could easily have done so, but he flatly refused and resented such assistance as he was forced to receive. Amber was busy as a hen with chicks. She rushed ahead to bid the hostess get a chamber ready, directed Tempest and Jeremiah which trunks to unload, ran back a half-dozen times to make sure Mr. Dangerfield was all right. At last they had him upstairs and, against his will, lying down in the great testered bed.