The Road to Paris Part 20

"That was given truly. It is Amabel." d.i.c.k was rejoiced.

"Amabel!" he repeated. "Then that is the only name by which at this moment I know you. 'Tis the loveliest name, and the most fitting one, I swear! If you would but make it needless, as far as concerns my calling you by name, that I should ever know any other! If you would but give me the right to call you by that name alone!"

"Give you the right?" said she in a low voice, and with downcast eyes.

"As how?"

"As by your mere permission."

"After what you know?" Her voice was barely audible, her manner agitated.

"What do you mean?" asked d.i.c.k.

"That I am not the person I pretended to be."

"What difference does that make? Are you any less charming? 'Fore George, what's in a name,--unless it be Amabel?"

"'Tis not a mere matter of names. You remember what you said last night--"

"Yes--whatever it was, it all meant that you were adorable, and I mean that now a thousand times over!" He took her hand, which she did not withdraw from him.

"But you said something," she went on, in a voice yet lower and more unsteady, "of married persons and single,--of not injuring a man in a matter so sacred,--you remember?"

"Why, yes,--I--"

"But you said there might be one exception--"

"Yes, I remember. Squire Bullcott, a Somerset gentleman. I owe him a very bitter revenge."

"Well, then,--if revenge and--love--both pointed to the same thing,--what then?"

He looked at her a moment; while she stood crimson, motionless, scarcely breathing, her eyes averted. Then he let go her hand.

"My G.o.d, madam, does it mean that you are--Mr. Bullcott's wife?"

"Yes," and now she spoke with rapidity and more force, "and that I have endured such treatment from him as I could bear no longer. Insolence, blows, neglect, imprisonment even, for he is as jealous as he is faithless, and has tried to hide me from all society, having me guarded by brutal servants of his own choosing, making me a captive in my own apartments, and keeping me under lock and key while he pursued his amours elsewhere. What could I do? I was an only child, without near relations: my parents died soon after arranging my marriage, which was against my own wishes. At last I learned, through some careless talk of my husband's, that Celestine was at Bath. She was my only friend. I contrived to get a letter to her, and she planned my escape. She waited at night in a private coach, near Bullcott Hall, while I got out of the house in the clothes of a chambermaid who was asleep. I ran to a place she had appointed, and there I found her footman on the park wall, with a ladder; he helped me across, and to her coach. We took a roundabout way to the London road, so as to avoid Bath; and when you met us we were on our way to Celestine's house in Oxfords.h.i.+re, intending I should keep concealed there, for I am determined to die rather than go back to my husband!"

She now stood silent, as if she had placed the situation and herself in Wetheral's hands, to dispose of as he might choose. Manifestly she had met very few men, seen nothing of the world; she was still a child, ready to entrust her whole destiny to the first flatterer whose tender speeches had won her heart.

d.i.c.k was not slow in making up his mind.

"You spoke of love and revenge, madam," said he, gently. "They are strong pa.s.sions, and I have been strongly urged by them the last few moments. But we will resist them,--not for his sake, but for yours--and mine. Before you start for Oxfords.h.i.+re, I shall have started for London.

I wish you a pleasant and safe journey, and a long and happy life.

Good-by!"

Before she could answer, there came from the corridor the noise of heavy feet rus.h.i.+ng up the stairs, and the words loudly bellowed:

"I'll find the room, never fear, that will I!"

"My husband!" whispered Amabel, the picture of sudden fright. "If he finds me here, he will kill me!"

"He'll not do that, I promise you!" said d.i.c.k. "But, ne'ertheless, he mustn't see you!"

For it was indeed this very parlor that the footfalls were approaching.

d.i.c.k led the terrified wife back into the bedchamber, and returned instantly to the parlor, in time to see Squire Bullcott burst in from the corridor. d.i.c.k had not yet closed the bedchamber door, and he now left it slightly ajar, remembering his experience in the St. Valier house in Quebec, and thinking by this negligence to disarm suspicion.

The Squire was followed by the two faithful henchmen who had used d.i.c.k violently twice in the past.

At sight of Wetheral, the Squire stood aghast. d.i.c.k was near the bedchamber door. On the floor beside him was an open portmanteau, very long, in which lay, among clothes, a dress sword of Lord George's. d.i.c.k stooped and took up this pretty weapon, as if merely to examine its jewelled hilt.

"What, you cur!" cried Bullcott, as soon as he had got breath. "So 'tis you she ran away with! So you thought to revenge yourself on me by seducing my wife!"

"Mr. Bullcott is too hasty to vilify that angelic but mistreated lady,"

said d.i.c.k, quietly, but with scorn as fine as the edge of the sword he was feeling.

"Hear the mongrel! He'd come over me with talk like a fine gentleman's in a play! The base-born impostor! He's got the woman hid somewhere about!"

"You can see for yourself that you lie!" said d.i.c.k, with a swift look around the parlor.

"She's in that other room," cried Bullcott, truly. "She ain't in her own chamber, and she _is_ with you. I paid a chambermaid a guinea to tell me so, and what you pay a guinea for can't be false. Look ye, Curry!" The Squire whispered a few words to one of his followers, and that one at once left the room. "Now, Pike, go ahead and knock that rascal down, and then I'll go in and catch her. I'll show--zounds and blood! Sir Hilary Englefield!"

It was indeed the voice of the fox-hunting baronet, and as it approached the parlor door, making a great hullabaloo, it seemed to throw the formidable Bullcott into a panic.

"Did the knaves that bungled last night's business sell me out to him, I wonder?" queried Squire Bullcott of his remaining adherent. d.i.c.k had a sudden illumination. 'Twas Squire Bullcott that had persecuted Miss Englefield at Bath, planned her abduction while his own wife was availing herself of his absence to run away from him, and nearly succeeded in kidnapping his own wife by mistake! His present terror of Sir Hilary, then, arose from the possibility that Sir Hilary had learned of the Squire's design against that baronet's sister.

But that terror proved ill-grounded. When Sir Hilary bounced into the parlor, he greeted the now quaking Bullcott with a single friendly word and bow, showing he knew not yet who had instigated the kidnapping; and then turned his wrath on Wetheral. The landlord, who had tried to prevent his entrance, had followed him in, and now made futile efforts to avoid a scandalous scene.

"What the devil do you mean," cried Sir Hilary to d.i.c.k, "by sending me off on a wild goose chase after my sister, when you have her in that room? Don't deny it, you scoundrel! Put down that sword, I say! What, you'd try to run me through, would you? You'd save my sister from being carried off by some d.a.m.ned hound" (Squire Bullcott, now utterly astounded, winced at this) "and then reward yourself by trying to ruin the girl yourself?"

"So it is your sister in that room?" said d.i.c.k, standing with his back to the bedchamber door, and holding his sword in a way that accounted for the wordy hesitation of his would-be a.s.sailants. "The Squire insists it is his wife. Sure, it can't be both!"

"d.a.m.n the Squire!" cried Sir Hilary. "'Tis my sister. She's nowhere else, and I paid a chambermaid half a guinea, who told me she was here!"

"Don't be so fast about d.a.m.ning the Squire!" put in that worthy, taking heart and bristling up. "I paid a whole guinea to find out my wife was there. So it must be she! Besides, didn't the coachman that drove her send word back to me, from this inn, that she was running away? Didn't the messenger meet me at Hungerford, where I was--ah--on business? I tell you what, Sir Hilary, you and my man take that fellow's sword away, and I'll go in and see my wife!"

"Devil take your wife!" said Sir Hilary. "'Tis my sister. I see her gown at this moment through the door-crack. I know that gown. There,--she's moved backed out of sight. Sis, come out!"

"'Pon my word, gentlemen," said d.i.c.k, pretending to make light of the accusations of both, "'tis a very curious honor you are contesting for!

And one of you sees a lady's gown where none exists! I don't know what to make of you!"

But Bullcott seemed struck by Sir Hilary's a.s.serted recognition of the dress. "Oh, well," said he, "maybe I'm wrong. Sir Hilary doubtless knows what inn his sister lodged at last night. Egad, if it turns out to be her, mayhap some folk won't be so prudish after this!" The Squire grinned to think the lady who had repulsed him, and whom he had failed to carry off, might be compromised after all.

"What's that? What d'ye say?" cried Sir Hilary. "So my sister has been prudish to _you_, you old goat! Well she might! I know your ways; everybody does! Well, if it comes to that, I don't say it is my sister in that room! I don't say the landlord wasn't right, and that my sister didn't leave this inn yesterday. But I do say this, and to you, sir."

Sir Hilary spoke now to d.i.c.k. "You see how my sister's good name is at stake. If the lady in that room isn't she, then my sister is an honest girl, and doesn't deserve the least doubt against her reputation.

Whoever the lady is, 'tis evident as much can't be said for her.

Therefore, to exonerate an innocent lady, 'tis your duty the guilty one shall be made to show herself, before all in this room. That's only fair, sir! Better than two ladies suffer reproach, let the one that merits it appear and clear the other! Then we shall know whether 'tis my right or Bullcott's to fight you. For there _is_ one lady in that room, I'll swear!" Sir Hilary had become quite sober and dignified.

That Sir Hilary's sister should suffer for a moment in her reputation was, of course, a thought intolerable to d.i.c.k. Yet he must save Amabel at any cost. The actual truth, if he told it, would be taken as a lame excuse for her presence in the bedchamber. By the pig-headed Squire, the mere fact that his wife had fled to d.i.c.k's room to avoid exposure would be regarded as evidence of criminality. Yet how could such a plea as Sir Hilary's be refused?

"Come, sir!" said the baronet.