“Enough to make me doubt my opinion but no . . . You are in a position to prevent her making this match.”
“I fear any prevention on my part might lead her to a different, and in my own view worse, mistake. I would not agree to her marrying you under any circumstances.”
“I know you hate me. It is jealousy, of course. I hate you, too. Always have. You’re so . . .” Romeo stopped and looked at his host with unveiled hate.
“Spit it out.”
“When I struggle to be brief, I become obscure.”
“Quoting Horace today, are we?”
“I enjoy to wander in the groves of academe.”
“And carry back the fruits to enliven your chatter. But you surely didn’t come to bring me this basket of quotations.”
“Ah, I see you have got that dreadful forgery patched together again. Are you interested in the original?”
“No, I have come to admire my broken forgery. Is it Art we are to discuss?”
“Art and Love—the two eternal verities. You have given me your views on my Beloved, now we shall discuss Art. You mentioned once being interested in procuring my portrait of Aphrodite. It happens I require ready cash. Do you still want it?”
“I’m interested if the price is right.”
“I make a gift of it to you, for the nominal sum of one hundred pounds.”
“Magnanimous,” Clivedon replied, with unsteady lips. “You’re not likely to be long in need of ready cash, with such gifts.”
“It was a gift that occasioned the shortage. I have discharged my mistress and gave her a hundred. It has left me short for my trip.”
“How soon do you plan to leave?”
“Right after . . . Tomorrow, I think.”
“Returning to Greece, are you?” Clivedon asked, settling down to an appearance of friendliness.
“Ultimately. My
psychë
cannot long endure this alien climate.”
“You will want to visit your parents before leaving.”
Lord Clivedon found it a strange experience to see that innocently open face try to assume a veneer of cunning. “I didn’t say I was going home. It happens I have other business in the country. Some orders for—for Grecian artifacts.”
“You’ll have to have yourself drawn and quartered for removing them from the country of their origin The Clitias vase too, that you peddle so assiduously, will be a loss.”
“I ought not to let it out of the country, really. The fact is, the Greeks do not appreciate their heritage. Plenty of owls in Athens, of course, if you follow my allusion. But these baubles I speak of are not on the scale of the marbles stolen by Elgin. Do you think he would be susceptible to a plea to return them?”
“I wouldn’t suggest you waste a moment on the project. They were stolen at a price of thirty-five thousand pounds.”
“I haven’t time to raise that kind of money. I daresay it would take days.”
“Maybe even a week,” Clivedon agreed blandly.
“You wouldn’t care to consider setting up a fund . . . No, I see you would not. I’ll send the painting around. Can I have the money now?”
“I will give it to your man when he delivers the painting.”
“Is it that you don’t trust me, or that you don’t have the sum, and are embarrassed to say so?”
“How have you survived so long, I wonder,” Clivedon said, arising to show his caller out the door.
There were a number of calls at Clivedon House that day, every one of them handled in a manner displeasing to the master. Ellingwood dashed to Cavendish Square to ask where he might find Lord Clivedon, which got Lady Withers over to Grosvenor Square within the half hour. Smythe went to inform his employer his sister wished to see him, most urgently, and had his ears scorched for saying he was at home. “Tell her I am out, and will be out all day.”
“I have already intimated you are at home.”
“Then you had better unintimate it. And before you make any more of these colossal blunders, I am also not home if Lady Barbara should call. Do you think you can remember that, Smythe, or shall I have a sign painted and hang it around your neck?”
“I shall undertake to remember it, milord.”
It was not unnatural in the face of this confusion that Smythe should turn a mere acquaintance away, but he was dressed down nevertheless for not allowing Mr. Empey entrance. The portrait was delivered within the hour. Taking no chances, Mr. Smythe, with ill-concealed impatience, told his employer that he had asked the man to wait, till he discovered whether or not Lord Clivedon was home at that particular instant.
“Ass. Give him a hundred pounds, and bring me the portrait at once.”
The painting was brought in, and for the next half hour Clivedon tilted back his chair, locked his door, and sat gazing at it, with a musing smile on his face. Smythe, with the worrisome chore of announcing Lady Millington, tapped nervously at the door, and was told in a shout quite audible to the waiting lady to get rid of her. And if he pestered him again, he may consider himself discharged, and write himself up a checque for a week’s wages.
“What can have happened to Larry?” Agnes wondered, when she returned to Cavendish Square. “The very day of your ball, and Ellingwood not allowed in to see him. We wished to announce the engagement tonight. I shall give him permission myself, Barbara. I am your chaperone, after all, and it is not as though Larry will object. He will think it an excellent match for you. I can’t imagine where he is gone. Chasing off after some piece of horseflesh, I expect.”
“You had better wait and let Clivedon decide,” Barbara suggested. “He will be here for dinner before the ball, and Charles can speak to him then.” Barbara felt strangely listless. Her desire to become Lady Ellingwood was not acute enough that she worried about Clivedon’s breaking the appointment. In fact, she was rather relieved to have the sealing of her fate delayed a little. Was it possible Clivedon meant to insist she pass another Season in London? There was no possible way she could make any other match in so short a time as the week that remained of the Season. It was likely this uncertainty that made her feel so wretched. “I have a headache, and seem to be running a little fever. I am going to lie down to be recovered for tonight,” she told her chaperone.
It was exactly the sort of nuisance that was bound to crop up, that the star of the evening should fall ill, with four hundred guests invited. All of a piece with the cream curdling and the servants spilling a batch of grease on the carpet in the dining room. She was strongly advised to go to bed at once and stay there till she felt quite well. Lying down had not the least good effect. The headache worsened, but by late afternoon, groggy with laudanum and determined not to miss her ball, she got up from bed and went to her window to sit looking out on the little rose garden, which Romeo called “their” garden. She opened the casement window and brought a chair to it. The cool breeze felt good against her feverish cheeks. For half an hour she sat on, sipping a cup of tea, and imagining she felt somewhat better. She mentally compared Romeo and Charles, not at all pleased with the prospect of spending the rest of her life with either, but determined not to go to Drumbeig with a hired companion.
While she sat having her tea, a call came from below that Lord Clivedon wished to see her. She didn’t feel up to it. She knew Lady Withers was at a meeting of one of her charity organizations, and knew that Clivedon was aware of it, for she had complained a dozen times of the inconvenience of having to go out on that particular afternoon.
He wished to badger and pester her some more with his incomprehensible and ever-shifting views on her marriage. She was so weary she was afraid she'd do whatever he suggested, only to be rid of him. She felt so drained she would even marry Romeo, if that was what he wanted today. After he left, the green Italian crepe was brought to her door, with a note from Clivedon, succinct and offensive:
Babe: l wouldn’t want you to have your last fling in too modest a gown. You have my permission to wear this one. Save me a waltz, if your toes are in a dancing mood. Clivedon.
Her toes were not in the mood; neither was her head. She ripped the note to bits and threw the gown on the bed, then sat on it. He expected her to do something outrageous tonight—even the gown would outrage Lady Anstrom and Lady Nathorn. She was determined to show him she had changed. She put on the white crepe de chine agreed upon with her hostess, added the gaudy, unattractive corsage sent by Charles—pink roses with an excess of lace and ribbons—had her hair carefully arranged, not in coils. Her color was high, too high, from the fever, and her eyes held a febrile glaze as well, which in no way detracted from their beauty.
How could she look so vibrant, when she felt as limp as a dishrag? She was too upset to be much surprised or disappointed when Clivedon sent a note excusing himself from the dinner party. Something had come up, but be would be at the ball. What could this mysterious something be? Not chasing after a new horse, for he had come here this afternoon. Whatever it was, it would prevent Charles from speaking to him before the ball. Her engagement would not be announced that night.
Clivedon ate at home alone, in thoughtful silence. It was the more usual custom for Smythe to accompany him at the table on those rare occasions when he took dinner at home alone, but, to the secretary’s relief, no invitation came to him this evening. Cook's nose was out of joint when a nearly full plate was returned to the kitchen. The butler tried the claret himself to insure it was not corked, for his lordship had not finished even one glass. His valet examined his clothing with a nervous eye, for a charge of carelessness to this paragon had been issued on the last occasion when Clivedon left his dinner on his plate. No such charge was laid this evening.
Clivedon donned his satin knee breeches and white silk stockings without the usual tirade against this antique outfit, shrugged himself into the close-fitting black coat, selected from the case held out to him a discreet diamond tie pin, all without a single word. “I'll be late,” he said just as he stepped from the room. Then he turned back to add, “Tell Smythe I want him at home this evening. I may have need of him.”
This titillating speech caused a good deal of discussion after his lordship had left. Was it a matter of a challenge having been issued? Nothing else of sufficient importance to account for the day’s unusual proceedings occurred to any of the hirelings who sat around the kitchen table arguing the matter. Smythe wasted half an hour cleaning and oiling his dueling pistols, and the valet went through closets selecting a suitable dark coat, choosing his own least favorite, in case of bullet wounds.
While this went forth, Lady Barbara sat at dinner with Lord Ellingwood, who found her an unusually silent partner. “Do you not feel well, Barbara?” he asked.
“I feel perfectly wretched. I hope I am not going to be ill.”
To forestall this, she went to the little study after dinner, to sit alone and rest. She turned the lamps down low; the bright light hurt her head. With the door closed behind her, she first sat on the sofa, but had soon put her feet up, arranged a pillow under her head, and was carefully arranging her gown to prevent unnecessary creasing. She was still perfectly uncomfortable, and felt that in some way it was all Clivedon’s fault. She began to wonder if he was ill too, as he hadn’t come to dinner. She found it impossible to picture him ill, or any other way but in perfect command of the situation.
She decided he had stayed away on purpose to prevent Ellingwood’s speaking to him, so he didn’t know whether he was going to allow the match or not. She was not pleased or angry. She didn’t feel up to either being engaged or giving a refusal. It was too much bother. She closed her eyes, and when she felt sleep creeping in on her, she succumbed gladly to it. Maybe a half hour’s rest would cure her of this lethargy.
In less than half an hour, she was rudely awakened. The lamps had either gone out or been extinguished. She lay in darkness, hearing furtive footsteps, feeling a cool blast from the open door that led to the garden. The footfalls came closer. “Who is it? Who’s there?” she asked, not greatly alarmed, but annoyed at the stupidity of servants, to be bungling about in the darkness instead of lighting a lamp.
A hand was clamped over her mouth, while a second person grabbed her hands and tied them in bands that felt, incredibly, as smooth as silk. The gag soon being tied over her mouth too was soft and rich, even scented, with a tangy, delicious perfume. Still weak, she hardly put up a fight. She was lifted in strong arms, while the second figure, seen to be smaller in the dim light from the moon at the doorway, held the door. The first man was seen to be wearing livery. She thought it was the dark green livery of Lord Clivedon’s household, but it was the wrong design.
No, it was the gray of the Duke of Stapford’s servants. Soon all doubt was removed. In the garden, smiling softly on her, stood Lord Romeo, with a soft woolen shawl to throw over her. “Rejoice, we are victorious!” he greeted her. “I am sorry to have to do it in this manner, my dear heart. I have arranged all to provide you as much comfort as possible, but we really must elope now. I’m afraid Clivedon suspects. It was necessary for me to see him today. He positively forbade our marriage, so he knows I must use force.”
Speaking was impossible in her condition; she could only look a look that attempted to express her wrath, and kick her feet. All the rest of her body was confined by the silken bands and the man’s strong arms. “Don’t vex your delicate feet, my dear,” Romeo told her, then held a foot, as though it were a hand, while she was carried out the gate that separated the rose garden from the yard backing it. The strange party hastened into the dark shadows between two houses to see her abductor’s carriage waiting in the street. A door was held open while she was placed inside, amidst a heap of flowers. Romeo got in beside her, the door was closed, the servants took their perch above, and the team of four bolted away, while she writhed to get out of her bonds.
“Flowers for my lady,” Romeo said, taking a rose (with thorns) from the seat and placing it on her lap. “A conceit on my part—a whimsy if you like—to greet you with flowers. A pity they don’t show in the darkness. It looked lovely this afternoon.”