My Lady Caprice Part 16

"Probably this!" I answered, slipping it around her again.

"But you must get away at once," whispered Lisbeth; "if Mr. Selwyn should see you--"

"I intend that he shall. Oh, it will be quite simple; while he is talking to me you can get back to the--"

"Hus.h.!.+" she whispered, laying her fingers on my lips; "listen!"

"Hallo, Mr. Selwyn!" came in the Imp's familiar tones.

"Why, good Heavens!" exclaimed another voice, much too near to be pleasant, "what on earth are you doing here--and at this time of night?"

"Looking for base varlets!"

"Don't you know that all little boys--all nice little boys--should have been in bed hours ago?"

"But I'm not a nice little boy; I'm a Knight-errant; would you like to get a lance, Mr. Selwyn, an' break it with me to the glory of my Auntie Lisbeth?"

"The question is, what has become of her?" said Mr. Selwyn. We waited almost breathlessly for the answer.

"Oh! I 'specks she's somewhere looking at the moon; everybody looks at the moon, you know; Betty does, an' the lady with the man with a funny name 'bout being bald, an'-"

"I think you had better come up to the house," said Mr. Selwyn.

"Do you think you could get me an ice cream if I did?" asked the Imp, persuasively; "nice an' pink, you know, with--"

"An ice!" repeated Mr. Selwyn; "I wonder how many you have had already to-night?"

The time for action was come. "Lisbeth," I said, "we must go; such happiness as this could not last; how should it? I think it is given us to dream over in less happy days. For me it will be a memory to treasure always, and yet there might be one thing more--a little thing Lisbeth--can you guess?" She did not speak, but I saw the dimple come and go at the corner of her mouth, so I stooped and kissed her. For a moment, all too brief, we stood thus, with the glory of the moonlight about us; then I was hurrying across the lawn after Selwyn and the Imp.

"Ah, Mr. Selwyn!" I said as I overtook them, "so you have found him, have you?" Mr. Selwyn turned to regard me, surprise writ large upon him, from the points of his immaculate, patent-leather shoes, to the parting of his no less immaculate hair.

"So very good of you," I continued; "you see he is such a difficult object to recover when once he gets mislaid; really, I'm awfully obliged." Mr. Selwyn's att.i.tude was politely formal. He bowed.

"What is it to-night," he inquired, "pirates?"

"Hardly so bad as that," I returned; "to-night the air is full of the clash of armour and the ring of steel; if you do not hear it that is not our fault."

"An' the woods are full of caddish barons and caitiff knaves, you know, aren't they, Uncle d.i.c.k?"

"Certainly," I nodded, "with lance and spear-point twinkling through the gloom, but in the silver glory of the moon, Mr. Selwyn, walk errant damozels and ladyes faire, and again, if you don't see them, the loss is yours." As I spoke, away upon the terrace a grey shadow paused a moment ere it was swallowed in the brilliance of the ball-room; seeing which I did not mind the slightly superior smile that curved Mr.

Selwyn's very precise moustache; after all, my rhapsody had not been altogether thrown away. As I ended, the opening bars of a waltz floated out to us. Mr. Selwyn glanced back over his shoulder.

"Ah! I suppose you can find your way out?" he inquired.

"Oh, yes, thanks."

"Then if you will excuse me, I think I'll leave you to--ah--to do it; the next dance is beginning, and--ah--"

"Certainly," I said, "of course--good-night, and much obliged--really!"

Mr. Selwyn bowed, and, turning away, left us to our own resources.

"I should have liked another ice, Uncle d.i.c.k," sighed the Imp, regretfully.

"Knights never ate ice cream!" I said, as we set off along the nearest path.

"Uncle d.i.c.k," said the Imp suddenly, "do you 'spose Mr. Selwyn wants to put his arm round Auntie Lis--"

"Possibly!"

"An' do you 'spose that Auntie Lisbeth wants Mr. Selwyn to--"

"I don't know--of course not--er--kindly shut up, will you, Imp?"

"I only wanted to know, you know," he murmured.

Therewith we walked on in silence and I fell to dreaming of Lisbeth again, of how she had sighed, of the look in her eyes as she turned to me with her answer trembling on her lips--the answer which the Imp had inadvertently cut short. In this frame of mind I drew near to that corner of the garden where she had stood with me, that quiet, shady corner, which henceforth would remain enshrined within my memory for her sake which--

I stopped suddenly short at the sight of two figures--one in the cap and ap.r.o.n of a waiting maid and the other in the gorgeous plush and cold braid of a footman; and they were standing upon the very spot where Lisbeth and I had stood, and in almost the exact att.i.tude--it was desecration. I stood stock still despite the Imp's frantic tugs at my coat all other feelings swallowed up in one of half-amused resentment.

Thus the resplendent footman happened to turn his head, presently espied me, and removing his plush-clad arm from the waist of the trim maid-servant, and doubling his fists, strode towards us with a truly terrible mien.

"And w'ot might your game be?" he inquired, with that supercilious air inseparable to plush and gold braid; "oh, I know your kind, I do--I know yer!"

"Then, fellow," quoth I, "I know not thee, by Thor, I swear it and Og the Terrible, King of Bashan!"

"'Ogs is it?" said he indignantly, "don't get trying to come over me with yer 'ogs; no nor yet yer fellers! The question is, wo't are you 'anging round 'ere for?" Now, possibly deceived by my pacific att.i.tude, or inspired by the bright eyes of the trim maid-servant, he seized me, none too gently, by the collar, to the horrified dismay of the Imp.

"Nay, but I will, give thee moneys--"

"You are a-going to come up to the 'ouse with me, and no blooming nonsense either; d'ye 'ear?"

"Then must I needs smite thee for a barbarous dog--hence--base slave--begone!" Wherewith I delivered what is technically known in "sporting" circles as a "right hook in the ear," followed by a "left swing to the chin," and my a.s.sailant immediately disappeared behind a bush, with a flash of pink silk calves and buckled shoes. Then, while the trim maidservant filled the air with her lamentations, the imp and I ran hot-foot for the wall, over which I bundled him neck and crop, and we set off pell-mell along the river-path.

"Oh, Uncle d.i.c.k," he panted, "how--how fine you are! you knocked yon footman--I mean varlet--from his saddle like--like anything. Oh, I do wish you would play like this every night!"

"Heaven forbid!" I exclaimed fervently.

Coming at last to the shrubbery gate, we paused awhile to regain our breath.

"Uncle d.i.c.k," said the Imp, regarding me with a thoughtful eye, "did you see his arm--I mean before you smote him 'hip and thigh'?"

"I did."

"It was round her waist."

"Imp, it was."

"Just like Peter's?"

"Yes."