“If you mention Bella’s name to me again, Gil, I am likely to do you a mischief!” Sherry warned him. “I never cared the snap of my fingers for that wretched girl, and if you are not assured of that, ask her! Why, God save the mark, she may be a beauty, but give me my Kitten! Bella, with her airs and her graces, and her miffs, and her curst sharp tongue! No, I thank you! What’s more, no man who had lived with Kitten would look twice at the Beauty!”
“Then why the devil did you come to Bath, which we all know you can’t abide, only to be near her?” demanded Mr Ringwood, exasperated.
“To be near her? My God, is that what you think? You must be crazy! Nothing would have induced me to have come here, but one circumstance! When my mother asked me to go with her, I would not listen. Yes, and I told Bella if she thought she had the power to persuade me she was mightily mistaken! But something she said — or I said: I don’t recall precisely what it was — made me remember that it was to Bath that Bagshot woman had the intention of sending Kitten, to become a governess. I made sure I should find her here, in some seminary in Queen’s Square, and that is all the reason I had for coming to a place I never mean to set foot in again if I live to be a hundred!”
Mr Ringwood sat staring at him. “So that is how it was!”
“Of course that is how it was! And I saw Kitten with George almost the very instant I entered the town, and if I could have come up with him then, I’d have murdered him in cold blood! I have been trying ever since to get two words with Kitten alone, but she will not receive me in Camden Place, nor do more than accord me the civility of a stranger when we meet in public!”
“Upon my soul, Sherry, if ever there was a born fool, you are he!” exclaimed Mr Ringwood. “How the deuce was Kitten to know you had come here to search for her? Depend upon it, she believes you came only to be near Miss Milborne, and had not the least expectation of seeing her! I do not wonder that she will not speak to you!”
“But she could not think — she could not think — !” stammered Sherry.
“She!” said Mr Ringwood witheringly. “Seems to me it’s you who can’t think, Sherry! Damme if ever I knew such a fellow! It’s a very good thing I came down here, for a rare pucker you have got yourself into! What’s more, I’m not sure it ain’t too late to get you out of it.”
“What do you mean?” Sherry said quickly, fixing his eyes on his face.
Mr Ringwood met that look squarely. “Said I’d be frank with you, dear boy, didn’t I? Well, I’ve been hearing lately from my grandmother that there’s some fellow or other paying Kitten attentions.”
“There is!” Sherry said grimly.
“The old lady didn’t seem to think there was much to it yet, but she gave me a hint you’d do well to step in before it was too late. Matter of fact, I was about to write to Kitten to tell her I thought it was time she gave me leave to tell you the truth, when you went off in your mother’s train. From what I can make out, he’s a very tolerable sort of a fellow, with a nice little property, easy address, and that kind of thing. Devilish taken with Kitten, ready to do anything in his power to please her.”
Sherry was just about to favour him with his own impressions of Mr Tarleton when the justice of this description struck that innate honesty at the bottom of his nature. “Yes, damn him!” he said bitterly. “I suppose he is a tolerable sort of a fellow. Dare say he’d be a dashed sight kinder to Kitten than ever I was.”
Mr Ringwood rose from his chair. “Best thing for me to do now is to go round to Camden Place and see Kitten,” he said. “Do what I may to unravel this curst tangle you’ve made!”
Sherry grasped his hand. “Gil, you’re the best friend a man ever had!” he declared. “You’ll tell her it was to find her I came here, won’t you? Tell her I’ve been fit to blow my brains out any time since she left me! Beg her only to see me! Tell her — ”
“Don’t put yourself about! I’ll tell her everything!” promised Mr Ringwood.
But when he arrived in Camden Place, Hero had dropped into a sleep of exhaustion, from which Lady Saltash refused point-blank to rouse her. Mr Ringwood had to deliver his messages to her instead, which, however, she assured him, would answer quite as well. When he had told her the whole, she nodded, and remarked that she would have expected Sheringham to behave in just such a stupid fashion.
“He deserves to be kept on tenterhooks, and if I had my way he should be,” she said severely. “However, it is high time this nonsensical situation was put an end to, for if I do not mistake the matter, my friend, Jasper Tarleton, has lost his heart more entirely than I was prepared for.” She considered for a moment, drumming her fingers on the table under her hand. “You may tell Sheringham, from me, that if he chooses to dine in my house tonight, he will not find me at home. I am dining with some friends in Laura Place, and it is not the sort of party to amuse his wife. He may come round at seven o’clock precisely. I shall keep the child in bed for the rest of the day, for I have not the least notion of letting her show Sheringham a wan face, I can tell you!”
“But will she consent to his coming, ma’am? Are you positive of that?” Mr Ringwood asked anxiously.
She gave a dry chuckle. “Oh, she will consent, never fear!”
“Beg pardon, ma’am, but you’ll not fail to deliver Sherry’s messages to her, will you? Can’t but see that he has given her a great deal of cause not to be wishful of seeing him!”
“Tell him so!” recommended her ladyship. “And you need not tell him that she is ready to fall upon his neck, Gilbert! Let him come in a humble frame of mind! I dare say it will be for the first, and very likely the last, time in his life!”
Mr Ringwood promised that he would say nothing to Sherry that would puff him up in his self-esteem, left his compliments for Hero, and went back to the Royal Crescent.
This time, the dowager having returned from the Cross Bath, Sherry took him into the dining-parlour on the ground floor and eagerly demanded to know how he had sped. His face fell when he heard that Mr Ringwood had not had speech with Hero herself, but his spirits rose mercurially when he learned that he would find her alone that evening, and he wrung Mr Ringwood’s hand fervently, quite forgetting that there had ever been a moment when he had not been in perfect charity with him.
As for Hero, when her hostess recounted to her the morning’s interview with Mr Ringwood, her feelings so far overcame her that she bounced up in her bed, cast her arms round Lady Saltash, and ruthlessly hugged her, to the gross disarrangement of her ladyship’s second-best wig. Called to order, she at once became very docile, even promising to remain quietly in her bed during the afternoon, if Lady Saltash would but instruct her cook to prepare for dinner all Sherry’s favourite dishes. She then lay and watched the clock until she could bear it no longer, when she rang for her maid, and had herself dressed in a gown Sherry had once commended. She flitted restlessly about the house after that, until Lady Saltash complained that she gave her the fidgets. Bath hours not being as late as those fashionable in London, her ladyship set forth for her dinner-party at six o’clock, prosaically reminding her protégée not to forget to see that Pug had his usual run.
It was Hero’s custom to lead this animal out to take the air for a few minutes before Lady Saltash’s dinner-hour; and when Lady Saltash had driven away in her barouche she thought that she would fill in the lagging time in this fashion. Accordingly, she put on her hooded cloak, took Pug’s leash in her hand, and let herself out of the front door. It was growing dark by this time, but there was still light enough to make a short walk round the Upper and Lower Place unobjectionable. It was, besides, so select a neighbourhood that there was little or no fear of her meeting any undesirable persons. She tripped along, Pug snorting at her heels, her thoughts winging ahead to the magic hour of seven o’clock. So lost in these thoughts was she that she barely noticed a vehicle drawn up in Lower Camden Place. She did indeed perceive its outline, vague in the gathering gloom, but she did not even wonder at it until there suddenly loomed up before her the figure of a man in a caped greatcoat and a tall beaver hat. She gave a gasp then of fright, but she had no time to do more before she was caught up into a strong embrace. She made a frantic attempt to free herself, and tried to cry out. Her captor prevented this by setting his lips to hers and passionately kissing her. She had a glimpse of a loo-mask covering the upper half of his face, and quite suddenly she thought that she knew who it was who had waylaid her, and she got an arm free, and flung it up round his neck, returning his embrace with the utmost fervour. The sound of leisured footsteps approaching in the distance made the masked gentleman sweep her off her feet, bear her in three swift strides to the waiting post-chaise, and toss her up into it. Since she was still unconsciously clinging to Pug’s leash, this lethargic animal was swung up willy-nilly after her, and had much ado to scramble into the chaise before the door was shut on him.