Tested

27

Tested –

By way of A Supper, Some Bears,

& Various Other Devices

    The only address at the Horse Guards for Major Norrington was care of Curwellion Hall, in Norfolk. Dom thanked Sir Francis, accepted the advice to try White’s, and took his leave. At White’s they had an address: chambers off Pall Mall. The gentlemanly person who kept the chambers explained that no, Major Norrington had once been with them, but that was some years since: he had left them the year after Waterloo. Dom swallowed a sigh at this now very familiar English form of dating events, thanked the man, and retreated.

    After chewing it over for some time he went to Boodle’s. Not in the expectation of finding there an ex-major who according to Miss Norrington was “an older gentleman,” but in the expectation that that considerably younger major, Cecil Jerningham, might be found adorning the club.

    The which indeed he was. “Norrington...” he said slowly. “Ah... Tell you who would know, dear lad: Vane!”

    Dom gulped. “Cuh-Colonel Vane, Cecil?”

    “Aye: Norrington is nigh as mad as Vane is, y’know! No, well, not mad enough to risk his career over a serving wench’s virtue, who is? But they climb dashed mountains together.”

    “Thank you vairy much, Cecil! Knew I could rely on you! And tell y’what: you must come to dinner some time, m’sister would be charmed to see you!”

    The mystified Major Jerningham allowed his hand to be wrung, and watched dazedly as Mr Baldaya hurried away.

    “Excitable,” he concluded, shaking his head. “Portuguese blood: all the same, these fellows.”

    These visits had taken up a considerable amount of time, and Dom had not started early, not wishing to alert General Sir Francis to the fact that something was up. When he reached Lumb Street the sun was making very long shadows. He was met at the street door not by the skinny little girl who had opened it to him last time, but by a scrawny woman in a grimy apron, with a tightly tied kerchief on her head.

    She glared at him, arms akimbo. “Wot yer want?”

    “I should like to speak weeth Colonel Vane, eef you please.”

    She sniffed. “H’invited, are yer?”

    “No, I merely weesh to speak to heem. Perhaps you would be so good as to take thees up?” He held out his card.

    “If you ain’t h’invited then I don’t see what you wants with ’im, at supper-time.”

    “I’m sorry, I deed not realize eet was hees supper-time,” said Dom with his charming smile.

    She sniffed again but grudgingly took the card. As she peered at it Dom realized with a little shock that she was holding it upside-down: evidently she could not read. He was, of course, very familiar with this phenomenon in India; but in England, even the country people on Hugo’s estate could at least read a little; and Susan had said that the village school was well attended. He swallowed, beginning to perceive that literacy was not after all a commonplace in England, and that Sir Hugo Benedict might have been an even better landlord than they had taken him for.

    He said quickly: “As you can see, my name ees Mr Baldaya. Pray tell Colonel Vane that I weell not detain heem, I merely weesh to have two words weeth heem.”

    She sniffed, but disappeared.

    Dom waited in dusty, dingy Lumb Street, perforce.

    “’Ullo,” said a little, high voice, and the untidy head of the skinny little girl poked round the door.

    “Hullo,” replied Dom, smiling. “I theenk we have met before, yes?”

    “Yes.” Clara Vane opened the door a little wider. “You’re ’er brother, aren’tcha?”

    “Er—you mean Lady Benedict’s?” said Dom limply.

    “Yes. ’Ave yer brung Pug?” she said hopefully, peering past him.

    “No, I am afraid not.”

    Her face fell.

    “He ees not my dog, nor indeed my sister’s: he belongs to a friend.”

    “I knows that!” she said aggrievedly.

    “Do you have no pets?” said Dom kindly.

    “No. Ma says they’ll eat you out of ’ouse and ’ome. –Mrs Minns, she’s got a cat. But Ma Thompson, ’er what owns the ’ouse next-door, well, she says she’ll put up with it as long as it earns its keep. Only if it don’t catch no more mice, it’ll ’ave to go.”

    “I see. What happens eef eet catches all the mice?”

    To his horror she suddenly turned very red and looked as if she might cry.

    “It won’t,” said a stolid voice from the dark hallway behind then. “Ma Thompson’s place is h’overrun. More than even a good mouser could cope with in one lifetime. Go on, scarper: Mr Baldaya don’t want to be pestered by no brats.”

    “No—” began Dom, but too late: with an aggrieved look at Mr Poulter, the little girl had vanished. “I’m so sorry; I deed not mean to upset her,” he said limply.

    “Don’t pay it no mind, sir. She’s gorn potty on that h’animile, and would take it orf Mrs Minns h’if she could. Got some notion she can put a string round its neck like the pug, you see. Nuffink nobody can’t say will convince ’er that cats won’t stand for that.”

    Dom bit his lip. “I see. Er—I could get een touch weeth the gentleman who supplied our friend weeth her pug—?”

    “Don’t you do that, sir. ’Er Ma don’t ’ardly know where their next bite’s a-comink from as it is.” He approached his stubbly face to Dom’s and added hoarsely, in what he might have imagined to be a whisper: “And when the Colonel leaves, which ’e will do, choose ’ow, dunno what’s to come to ’er, frankly. Acos most of ’em, they cooks for theirselves, and Mr Breckinridge, ’e don’t need ’er.”

    Dom nodded. He had no idea what the man was on about, precisely, but he murmured: “Could not the Colonel take her weeth heem?”

    Mr Poulter sucked his teeth. “Might answer: depends. Well, come on up, sir! The Colonel says as you better stay for supper, since you’re ’ere.”

    “No, really—”

    Overriding his protestations, Mr Poulter swept him upstairs.

    Somewhat to Dom’s dismay, quite a company was assembled in Colonel Vane’s sitting-room.

    The Colonel came to greet him with his hand outstretched, assured himself that Mr Baldaya was not in a particular hurry, and pressed him to stay for the meal. With a certain glint in his eye which Dom did not fancy he was imagining. It was pretty plain that Colonel Vane thought he was a poor sort of a Society fellow who would find the company at Number 16 Lumb Street very much beneath him. Dom smiled guilelessly at the dark-visaged Colonel, and prepared to pass the test with flying colours.

    Little Miss Mclnnery greeted him with shrill cries of delight at meeting her Ladyship’s brother at last; Dom sustained the shock with fortitude, and told her how much Johnny adored his Pierrot. The tiny dressmaker beamed, and asked him to assure Lady Benedict that the children’s dresses were very nearly ready.

    A middle-aged, plump woman with a wide, soft, smiling face under a large cap was revealed as a Mrs Catt: Dom had to swallow, she most certainly resembled nothing so much as a large Persian pussy!

    The sight of the very short but very wide Mr Breckinridge, wholly natty in bright yellow pantaloons, Hessians, a mauve silk waistcoat and a spotted muslin neckerchief very nearly overset him. He managed to smile and shake hands but did not manage to utter anything except: “Delighted.”

    A short, slim, older man whose miraculous coat assorted ill with his gargoyle-like features was a Mr Green. Dom was not particularly good with English accents but he thought the man’s speech indicated his class was somewhere considerably above that of Mr Poulter, yet evidently well below the Colonel’s own. The mystery of the coat was pretty soon resolved, however. On the Colonel’s introducing two much younger men, both rather pale and knobby as to the face, knees and elbows, and rather inky as to the fingers, Mr Green said on a proud note: “Now, Mr Grooby, Mr Saver: this gentleman is wearing what I calls a coat! –Mr Weston.”

    “Good buttonholes,” contributed a red-faced, hoarse-voiced, broad-shouldered young woman.

    “Most excellent buttonholes indeed, my good Miss Gertrude, but I flatter meself, yours are as good!” smiled Mr Green.

    The red-faced Miss Gertrude thereupon beamed, and wrung Mr Baldaya’s hand painfully, breathing heavily as she did so, what time young M. Savour, with a malicious twinkle in his dark eye, said smoothly: “Do you truly patronize Mr Weston, Mr Baldaya?”

    Very naturally Dom had dressed earlier that day in order to call on General Sir Francis Kernohan at the Horse Guards rather than to drop in at Lumb Street. His oval face flushed a little but he replied courteously: “Well, yes, I have one or two coats from Weston, and thees ees one of them.”

    “Ah: what a line!” sighed Mr Green.

    “I think Mr Baldaya himself—or perhaps his Maker—is due some of the credit for the line, Mr Green,” said the Colonel with a smile in his deep voice.

    “Ah! You’d be surprized, Colonel, sir, ’ow a bad cut may ruin the line of the ’andsomest gentleman!”

    Dom grinned, and said easily: “I’m sure Weston weell be delighted to hear hees work ees appreciated, Mr Green. May I say how much I admire your own coat?”

    Mr Green was evidently highly gratified, and intimated delicately that he would be honoured to make for Mr Baldaya. Somewhat limply Dom said he would be delighted.

    “I hasten to add, Mr Green did not make this,” said the Colonel, as two more men entered, bearing jugs and tankards.

    Dom looked at his awful coat and grinned. “Never thought he did, sir!”

    With a twinkle in his eye, Colonel Vane then introduced Mr Beamish, a tall, cadaverous man with two swept-back wings of dark hair below a shiny bald pate, and Mr Robbio, a short, round, bouncy fellow with what at first seemed a full head of hair, but which after a moment the ecstatic Dom, who was considerably taller than he, realized was very much of the quality of Mr Beamish’s, though Mr Robbio had taken advantage of the fact that his curled to sweep it up and, with the aid of much pomade, artfully cover the bald spot.

    The company was now nearly all assembled, and all took a glass on the strength of it, one of Mr Beamish’s jugs having revealed itself as containing hot spiced ale. Dom did not find this a particularly attractive drink at any time, and certainly not on a warm evening, but he drank his portion manfully.

    Two neat, black-clad ladies then entering—the one tall, angular, and middle-aged, the other much younger but in all other respects virtually her twin—Miss Gertrude bounced to her feet and greeted them rapturously

    The elder saluted her broad red cheek with a kiss and asked anxiously: “’Ave you been a good girl, Gertrude?”

    “’Course I ’ave, Ma!” She began to recount some of the details of her day, in an over-excited manner, but her mother, casting an anxious glance at the company, said: “’Ush, now, dear, you can tell us later.”

    “Yes, you tell us later, Gertrude, dear,” said the younger lady, also casting an anxious glance at the company.

    “Lordy, Mrs Wotton, don’t mind us!” cried Mrs Catt comfortably. “Let ’er rattle on, bless ’er! Why, Mr Green was a-tellink us that this gentleman is wearink a coat from Mr Weston ’isself, and your Gertie’s buttonholes is just as good as what ’is is!”

    “Thank you, Mrs Catt,” said Mrs Wotton primly, “but I fear Mr Green is flatterink our poor Gertrude.”

    The Colonel at this stepped forward, laying a hand on the excited Miss Gertrude’s broad shoulder and saying quietly: “He would not do that, Mrs Wotton, for it would scarcely be to his advantage to flatter one of his own workers. Now, do you come and sit down, and you, too, Miss Wotton—that’s right, Miss Gertrude, they shall sit by you,” he agreed, as the buttonhole-maker broke into excited speech—”and let me introduce you to Mr Baldaya.”

    Dom was duly introduced. He could see that the prim Mrs Wotton and Miss Wotton were both overcome at being introduced to a gentleman whilst in the company of their boisterous relative, and thought it very sad.

    The Colonel having capably quietened Miss Gertrude down, the newcomers were supplied with refreshment, the little girl appeared, in a clean apron, and the feast began to be brought in.

    Dom of course had experienced all sorts of feasts, what with Indian holy days of various persuasions, Portuguese anniversaries, and English Christmases and so forth; and in his own home thought nothing of the sort of mixed breakfast that Nan had once caused to be set before Masters George Jeffreys and Mendoza Laidlaw: but he admitted silently to himself that this was one of the oddest suppers he had ever eaten. It was not long before he realized why: it was evidently the custom at Number 16 Lumb Street for all the guests to bring a contribution.

    There were three dishes which might have been said to form the basis of the meal. The first was an immense pot of soup, simmering on the Colonel’s fire. Dried peas, with plenty of onions and green herbs, and a large quantity of pork hocks. A meat to which Mr Baldaya was not accustomed, but which certainly gave the soup considerable body: turning it, indeed, into something more like a stew. There were also traces of another meat in it, and Colonel Vane explained with a completely straight face that they had worked out that the confit d’oie which Lady Benedict had so kindly brought to his sick-bed was probably meant to be used thus. Admittedly Dom was pretty much on his guard but he found all he was capable of in reply to this sally was a weak smile.

    Mr Breckinridge’s contribution was a giant raised pie. Cold: veal, ham and pigeon. The company greeted it with oohs and aahs: it was certainly quite magnificent in appearance, being decorated with golden-brown twists and leaves of glazed pastry. It was so substantial that clearly it must form the second of the base dishes.

    The third main dish was of an entirely different quality. As Mrs Arkwright brought it in, in a large covered white dish, and set it down carefully on the Colonel’s table, the which had been pulled forward to the centre of the circle of assorted chairs, she revealed in a grudging sort of voice: “Mrs Catt done this.”

    The company exclaimed in admiration as the lid was raised and the most wonderful smell arose. Mrs Catt, laughing pleasedly, revealed that it were nothink very much, only her Ma had once been in good service, and had taught it to her: the secret was, the rabbit had to have a little brandy added to it, and fortunate it was that Colonel Vane had had some to hand. Then you added a bottle of red wine, and she could not never have a-managed that, neither, but for the Colonel! Mr Grooby revealed happily that he had picked the mushrooms for it himself, out at his Ma and Pa’s, only this Sunday. Dom had had a very similar dish from the hand of M. Lavoisier, though the chef had admittedly used guinea fowl rather than rabbit: but this was equally delicious. He debated with himself whether saying so to Mrs Catt would be more patronising than flattering, but finally did say it. To his relief she appeared quite thrilled: her wide Persian-pussy face went very pink indeed, and she laughed and shook her large, be-capped head very much at him.

    Mr Beamish’s contribution—or perhaps more strictly speaking, his joint contribution with Mrs Arkwright, who had cooked it—was fried eel with fried parsley. Served with a lemon and butter sauce: amazingly good. There was only enough for everyone to have a taste, but everyone enjoyed it. Dom had never before encountered eel: he did not speak his first thought, which was that the pieces, which were about three inches long, must be snake.

    Little Miss Mclnnery’s offering had to be finished quickly downstairs in the kitchen, and she and the little girl rushed out to do so. Bread slices fried in butter, topped with anchovy fillets and Cheshire cheese, and grilled. And rushed back upstairs piping hot. To the company’s cries of: “Mm!” and: “Most savoury!” and: “Tasty, indeed!” the little dressmaker produced the modest disclaimer that it was “but a whet.”

    Mr Poulter’s personal contribution, in its turn, was prepared before their very eyes: flame-grilled sausages. Very savoury and good.

    Mr Robbio offered a delicate dish of soft-boiled eggs set in buttered sorrel: the company congratulated him sincerely on it.

    Mrs Wotton had made the most deliciously subtle burnt cream. It was flavoured with orange-flower water: Dom sighed over it and, without even thinking of the effect he might be making, told her about some of the Portuguese creams he had eaten as a boy. Mr Grooby’s contribution was almost as delicious: perhaps more so to some palates: a gooseberry fool made with gooseberries from his ma’s own garden. M. Savour rather shyly produced a strawberry tart which his maman had made: it was to the French taste, he was not sure if English persons— The English persons disposed of it rapidly, so presumably it was very much to their tastes.

    The most surprizing of the dishes offered that evening were the contributions of Miss Wotton, Mr Green, and Miss Gertrude Wotton.

    Miss Wotton’s dish, presented in a charming shallow blue and white bowl, was what Mrs Catt recognized, beaming, as “’er special.” Fried borage leaves. Apparently Miss Wotton grew the leaves in pots on her windowsill. Dom ate them dazedly: light, elegant and delicious.

    Mr Green's offering was truly astounding. Truly astounding. He explained that he had not made large portions, for the guests might find it odd: it was a receet his Ma had had orf a sailorman who had lived much in the Americas, and since it was a party, he had thought they might like to try it. It was a small casserole of chicken, cooked in, incredibly, a chocolate sauce. Not sweet, certainly, but very, very rich. Dom had had something similar at the Portuguese Embassy: Senhora Carvalho dos Santos had claimed it was a Brazilian dish and he would not get anything like it in England. He found he was telling the company this in a stunned voice. Colonel Vane smiled a little and said placidly that that would be right, for after all, the cocoa bean originated in the Americas, did it not? Dom had no idea: he merely looked at him limply.

    Miss Gertrude's contribution was simply green Hyson tea. She made it herself while the company looked on. It was light, refreshing and, after the richness of cream, butter, cheese, chocolate and the heavy meats, exactly what was called for. Dom congratulated her on it with complete sincerity and the red-faced buttonholer gave a loud laugh, went redder than ever, and did not know where to look.

    The party broke up shortly after that, Mr Green being the first to take his leave, explaining that he had a waistcoat which must be finished tonight. The reason for the celebration was then made apparent to Dom, the little tailor shaking young Mr Grooby’s hand and congratulating him on his preferment.

    The Colonel closed his door after the last of the departing guests and turned slowly. “Sure you will not take something?”

    “Actually I would not half like another drop of that green tea, eef there be any, sir."

    Colonel Vane nodded and went to his cupboard. "She makes it well, does she not? That and buttonholes are her only accomplishments. But unlike most of humanity, what she does do, she does to a very high standard.” He set the kettle over the fire. “I dislike black tea, but I find the occasional cup of this pleasant.”

    “Eet ees vairy sad,” said Dom abruptly.

    The Colonel measured tea carefully. “Miss Gertrude's affliction?”

    “Yes.” He swallowed. “Not only that, the way her relatives are clearly embarrassed by her.”

    “Perhaps. But hers might have been a much worse fate: they have set her to a useful trade in which she is happy and busy, and they keep her with them, instead of abandoning her to the workhouse, or worse.”

    “Yes,” said Dom, biting his lip.

    “I think you mistake,” said the Colonel evenly, “in attributing to Miss Gertrude the sensations which would be yours in her place. I doubt very much that she perceives the gêne that she causes her relatives.”

    Dom swallowed. “I am sure you are right, sir. I— Eef you weell permit me to say so, I theenk you treat her most admirably.”

    Colonel Vane poured water into his teapot carefully before speaking. “Do you?” he said at last. “Then let us hope I have deceived her with equal success.”

    Dom gulped. “Do you mean she—she does embarrass you, sir?”

    “Yes.” He sat down. “Not only that, I feel that I fumble ineptly when I try to deal with her.”

    “Eet doesn’t show,” said Dom limply.

    “Good. –So, what did you think of the rest of the company, Mr Baldaya?”

    “I liked them vairy much,” said Dom with a defiant look on his pleasant face. “Een fact I envy you such simple-hearted, happy, uncomplicated acquaintances, sir.”

    The Colonel smiled a little. “I am glad you liked them. And I suppose, in many ways, they are uncomplicated, as much as any human soul is ever that. But don't make the mistake of thinking they do not have the same measure of trouble in their lives as the rest of humanity. Mrs Catt, for example, lost her husband, her two sons and her brother-in-law all in one fell swoop at Trafalgar. And the late Mr Wotton was killed in an horrific street accident when Miss Gertrude was a baby: a heavy dray turned over on him. He was carrying the baby; it was a miracle she escaped relatively unscathed.”

    “Oh, Lord, ees that why she’s like that?” he said numbly.

    “Mm.”

    Dom shuddered a little.

    The Colonel eyed him not entirely unkindly and added: “You did not meet our Mr Venables, for he keeps himself to himself. But there are similar sorrows in his life: his wife and two little daughters were drowned when a ferry overturned. That was over twenty years ago, but Mr Venables has never cared to re-marry. And M. Savour's parents, as perhaps you may have realized, are French émigrés who lost everything during the Terror. That “maman” who baked the delicious tarte à fraises had never so much as set foot in a kitchen before they fled to England. –Possibly that does not seem so terrible,” he noted drily. “But it was to her.”

    “Yes.”

    The Colonel poured green tea. “Mrs Arkwright's late husband was killed at Waterloo. Clara is a posthumous child. There were two older brothers: they died in infancy from smallpox.”

    Dom just nodded mutely.

    “She is lucky, however, in that she has Poulter to care about her. –Drink up.”

    Dom picked up his cup numbly, now too upset to consider his words. “Yes, but he said she would not know how to go on, when you leave, sir!”

    There was a short silence.

    Colonel Vane picked up his cup. “When did he say that, Mr Baldaya?”

    “When I arrived. When he let me een. I—I was asking the leetle girl eef she had no pets; I thought she might like a pug puppy of her own: and—and Poulter said her mother could not afford to feed eet, and then he said that.”

    “You did not make the offer in front of the child herself, I trust?”

    “No!” he said indignantly.

    The Colonel smiled faintly. “Of course not; I beg your pardon. Well, it is true that I may have to leave Lumb Street in the near future, but I have no intention of abandoning Mrs Arkwright. Poulter is apt to—er—build up immensely detailed scenarios in his own mind on the basis of a false assumption. They receive so many factual accretions that he never pauses to examine whether the original assumption might be invalid.”

    “Mm,” agreed Dom, not knowing whether to smile or not. “S’pose he’s not alone of humanity een that, sir.”

    “No, indeed,” said the Colonel with a twinkle in his hard grey eye.

    The boy gave him a relieved smile and Lewis Vane said in a kindly tone: “So what did you wish to see me about, Mr Baldaya?”

    “Oh!” said Dom, jumping, and flushing up. “Um—well, eet’s—eet’s somewhat confidential, sir: I trust you weell forgive me eef I cannot tell you all the details.”

    “Go on,” said the Colonel unemotionally.

    Glancing at him uncertainly, Dom continued: “I urgently need the address of a Major Norrington; I theenk you are acquainted weeth heem?”

    “Ursa Norrington?” he said feebly. “What the deuce do you want with him?”

    “I—I am not sure…” faltered Dom. “The name of the Major Norrington I mean ees William, sir.”

    “Er—yes. I beg your pardon. His name is William. He is a hirsute fellow who looks something like a bear: he was dubbed Ursa when he joined, and the name has stuck.”

    Dom’s jaw had sagged.

    After a moment Colonel Vane cleared his throat. “Getting his majority could only clinch it, I must admit.”

    Dom went into a helpless paroxysm, wheezing: “Ursa—major? Ow—help!”

    Lewis Vane grinned at him and said when he was over it: “I can give you an address from which they may forward a letter, but I am afraid for the moment that is all I can do: Ursa is on a walking tour of the Austrian alps.”

    Dom's jaw sagged again. Finally he said feebly: “The—the Embassy een Vienna?”

    The Colonel shrugged a little. “He is not the sort of fellow to take much account of formalities. I accompanied him on one of those tours not very long after Waterloo: we entered France very properly, wandered into Belgium less properly, entered Austria officially and ended up back in France unable to explain to the authorities how the Devil we’d got there. I think it was only Ursa’s being with the Army of Occupation that prevented our both being thrown into jail immediately.”

    Dom nodded limply. “When ees he due back, sir?”

    The Colonel grimaced. “He is due to meet up with an acquaintance in Dieppe in early July, and—er—sail back to England rather slowly.”

    “Oh.”

    “There is nothing much to call him back to England: he has sold out, I don’t know if you—? Yes.” He looked thoughtfully at the young man's dismayed face. “I do not in the least wish to pry, and you must send me to the rightabout if you prefer, but perhaps I could suggest something to help, if you could tell me what's up?”

    Dom looked at him dubiously, biting his lip.

    “Er... Would it help if I promised that, no matter what the provocation, I will not call anyone out?”

    “Y—Um— Well, eet would, sir, only can you promeese not to let heem call you out?”

    “Yes. What have you got yourself embroiled in?” said Lewis Vane very grimly indeed.

    Dom gulped, but told him the whole.

    There was a sufficiently long silence

    “Curwellion,” said Lewis slowly.

    “Yes: that’s why—”

    “I think he is generally reckoned the finest swordsman in England. I have had the privilege of seeing him fence once or twice at Fioravanti’s. –I own,” he said with a twinkle in his eye, “it would be an honour to find oneself up against him; but don’t worry, I don’t volunteer for suicide missions!”

    “Not half!” said Dom loudly and bitterly, forgetting himself.

    The Colonel, raised his eyebrows slightly. “Oh?”

    Dom reddened. “I beg your pardon. Aden Tarlington was telling me sometheeng of when you was een the regiment, sir.”

    “He would have been well fitted to judge, having been a wet-behind-the-ears subaltern during most of that time.”

    “Well, he ain’t now,” said Dom on an obstinate note.

    “No,” Lewis allowed with a little smile. “That’s true. But I am no longer a hot-headed youth: those tales go back twenty years. I promise you I shall neither call Curwellion out nor allow him to provoke me into accepting his challenge. Indeed, I think we had best both steer well clear of him, and I must extract the same promise from you, Mr Baldaya.”

    “Yes, of course,” he said, going very red. “I promeese.”

    Lewis rubbed his chin slowly. “I’ll write post-haste to the Embassy in Vienna for you, but I doubt very much that Ursa will bother to call in to see if there be any mail for him. In the meantime, who is to look after the girl?”

    Dom licked his lips. “I shall support her financially, sir, and Nan says she weell take her down to the country. Never been to the place, but Ferdy Sotheby assures me eet’s vairy obscure. Well, he and his father and brothers would bathe een the leetle bay een broad daylight weethout no fear of any ladies happening on them!”

    “Good,” he said, heroically not laughing.

    “I suppose we had best get her out of London as soon as may be.”

    “Ye-es... I scarcely know Curwellion, but he is said to be extremely acute. Did he not once accost your sister at the play, with the expectable result? It is possible,” he said slowly, “that in the wake of his daughter’s flight, Curwellion may look around to see who of his acquaintance who, let us say, have no cause to love him, have left London unexpectedly.”

    Dom gaped at him in horror.

    “He may not, of course; but it is certainly what I should do,” said the Colonel calmly.

    “You do not half have a tortuous mind!” said Dom in tones of unalloyed admiration.

    “Mm.”

    “Aye, but does he?”

    Lewis Vane shrugged. “He has that reputation.”

    “Then—then would eet be better to—to keep the girl clapped up een the house and leave London at the end of the Season, as we planned?”

    “From that point of view, yes. But can you, firstly, keep her clapped up; secondly, stop that houseful of girls from chattering; and thirdly, stop unexpected visitors from walking in on her?”

    Dom winced. “No.”

    “You had best persuade your sister to let you escort Miss Smith and the old lady to the country immediately. –No?” he said, as Mr Baldaya scowled.

    “No: the theeng ees, sir, eef we let Mrs Urqhart get hold of her she won’t give her up; and that ain’t fair, for eet was Susan what eenseested on having her up een the coach een the first place: eet weren’t nothing to do weeth the old lady!”

    “I see. And Susan is your—your sister?”

    “No, my step-niece, but eet amounts to the same theeng,” he said glumly.

    Colonel Vane gave him a very kind look indeed, which Dom, who was glaring at his feet, did not perceive. “Then of course it is your responsibility.

    “Aye. And Mrs Urqhart’s done far too much for us already. Nan ees absolutely determined we shall not dump Miss Smeeth onto her.”

    “No, well, quite right. Well, the other older lady who is staying with you?”

    “Mrs Stewart. She deed support Susan, only eet were all Susan's idea to start off. But I can’t ask her, sir: she ees supposed to be going home to Scotland thees summer, eet would be an eemposition. Um... I might persuade Sita to go.”

    “Who is that?”

    “Nan’s— Um, you would call her a maid, sir.”

    “Would I?”

    “Yes, but she ain’t quite: ayah. We has ’em, een India. She was Nan’s nurse—and mine too, and Daphne’s and Dicky’s. And now Nan ees grown up she ees her maid.”

    “So she is not a young woman?”

    “No. Well, she could do eet. But she don’t speak much English, sir. Can’t see her coping on her own een the country weeth shopping for provisions, and so forth.”

    “I see.” Colonel Vane looked at him calmly.

    Dom frowned over it. “I have eet! Hughes! He’s our groom, sir: well, he was Hugo’s man, y’see, and would come weeth us when we left Blythe Hollow, couldn’t stand the thought of workin’ for damned Everard Benedict. He’s an older fellow, vairy responsible, and since we ain’t brought all our carriages to town, has not nearly enough to do. Aye, the vairy theeng!”

    “That certainly seems the best solution. But you will escort them yourself?”

    “Aye. And how ees thees: we could dress Miss Smeeth up as a maid!”

    “That might be a wise precaution, yes.”

    “And I’ll tell Sita to sleep een her bed,” he decided. “That weell make eet proper; make the girl feel safer, too.”

    Colonel Vane's eyes twinkled at this thoughtful detail, but he did not comment, merely nodded.

    Dom was looking much brighter but he suddenly relapsed into  gloom and said: “Nan won’t never agree, though.”

    “I cannot see why not. Unless she does not care to be deprived of her maid during the Season?'“

    “Oh, Lord, no: she won’t give a toss about that!”

    Thus far Lady Benedict’s appearance had not given Lewis Vane any reason to suppose she was a woman who did not give a toss for her dress: he raised his eyebrows a trifle but said nothing.

    “No: theeng ees, she has determined to take the girl down to the country herself.”

    “Then you must persuade her otherwise, Mr Baldaya.”

    Dom sighed. “Somehow, when eet comes to puttin’ eet to her, eet won’t seem logical or sensible, or any of those, at all!”

    Colonel Vane swallowed a smile. But after all, the boy had done damned well so far; and his whole attitude had been entirely admirable and honourable. “If you think it might help,” he said carefully, “I will speak to her.”

    Dom went very red. “You are vairy good, sir, but I deed not come here to off-load my responsibilities onto your shoulders.”

    “I am aware of that, or I should not have offered. Perhaps if you try to persuade her; and then, if you have no luck, I could speak to her?”

    Dom demurred but was eventually persuaded.

    “Ho!” said Mr Poulter, once Mr Baldaya had been shown out.

    Colonel Vane looked at him enquiringly.

    “H’alps, h’is it?” he said awfully.

    “Not this time. Poulter, for I have not the slightest notion where Major Norrington may have headed for, and the Austrian alps cover a considerable area.”

    “One mercy,” he muttered. “So what next?”

    “Nothing,” he said tranquilly. “It is Mr Baldaya’s business, not  mine.”

    Mr Poulter retired, baffled. Though far from defeated.

    Nan leant on General Sir Francis Kernohan’s arm and smiled up at him guilelessly.

    “Bears?” said the gallant soldier numbly,

    Nan nodded, looking up at him hopefully, eyes wide.

    “Er—I can understand your desire that the little ones should have a treat... But it would be quite ineligible, I fear, my dear.”

    Nan sighed, but did not persist. She leant on his arm and smiled ruefully at him.

    General Sir Francis wavered for an instant: but no, it would not do, at all. Should there indeed be bears, he was in no doubt that she and the children would all insist on getting out of the carriage. and— No.

    “General Sir Francis warned me you was about to try thees one on,” said Dom grimly.

    “But Dom, eet would be so harmless!”

    “No. Eef he says eet ain’t proper, then no. And I have warned Mrs Urqhart, and ordered Hughes to eegnore any orders you give heem, and to refer all such matters to me or Mrs Urqhart. And Albert likewise: don’t theenk you ees going to leap eento any more hackney carriages weeth heem! And the meenute you try to go out walking weeth any of the brats, Sita and Rani and Nurse ees to report eet eenstantly.”

    “Dom BALDAYA!” shouted Nan, now positively puce. “What do you eemagine you are at, I am not a child!”

    “No, you’re a peeg-headed female, that’s worse,” replied her brother with some satisfaction.

    Nan changed tack. She was not unaware she was doing so, but on the other hand, it was natural to her to do it. “Please, Dom? There would be no harm, you know. No-one would recognise me: I could wear a veil. And the leetle ones—”

    Dom held up his right hand, fingers spread. “See thees here?”

    Nan looked at it sulkily.

    “Eef you does not weesh to feel eet laid across your bottom,” said her brother awfully: “kindly say more to me on thees subject.”

    “You are TOO MEAN!” she shouted.

    Dom shrugged.

    Nan burst into furious tears.

    Dom just shrugged again.

    “Bears?” croaked Noël.

    Cherry nodded, looking at him hopefully. “Dear Nan is very keen to go, and the children would so love it! I thought, if we had a gentleman to escort us—?”

    “She put you up to this, I collect?”

    Cherry looked up at him doubtfully. “We were merely chatting, sir, and she said how much the children wished to go, but of course we could not, without a gentleman to escort us. So I—” She blushed.

    Noël's sherry-coloured eyes danced. “My dear, she was winding you around her little finger!” he said with a smothered laugh.

    “Oh,” said Cherry numbly.

    “I would wager anything you like that she has already asked her brother and he has told her in no uncertain terms that the thing's beyond the pale, and that—yes, ninety to one—that she has asked Kernohan and he has refused to take her, also!”

    Cherry swallowed. “So it would not be the thing?” she asked sadly.

    “No. Oh, Lor’, did you have a fancy to see a dancing bear?”

    She nodded silently, biting her lip a little.

    “My dear,” said Noël in a very kind voice: “I do not think you would like it, an you saw it. For the fellows who train these animals are not always very kind to them. you know; and then, the bear is always muzzled.”

    Cherry looked at him in horror.

    “Mm,” said Noël, very pleased that his suspicions were right and the innocent Miss Chalfont had never truly envisaged what the state, not to say plight, of a trained bear might be.

    “I—no, it would not be a pleasant sight,” she said in a low voice.

    “No,” said Noël, pressing her hand very hard into his side. “It would not, my love.”

    Cherry turned the colour of her name and gazed fixedly across the Park.

    They walked on slowly, Cherry with a thudding heart and Noël also, though he was not quite yet admitting it to himself, with a considerably increased pulse rate.

    Nan twirled, smiling, in her Cousin Keywes’s arms in the waltz.

    Robert was not displeased to find his disconcerting cousin in such a pliant, amenable mood. Though he did not admit to himself that the immediate pliancy in the waltz was considerably affecting his attitude towards her.

    “I would wager my one miserable string of pearl beads, no single bead of which, mark, is half so fine as the things she has had sewn onto that pink satin creation, that she is about to ask Cousin Keywes to escort her to see the dashed bears,” said Lilias grimly.

    “Well, yes,” Iris agreed on a sour note. “It won’t work, though: Robert’s too much of a prude.”

    Sure enough, Lord Keywes informed his cousin, gently but firmly, that a visit to see some dancing bears on a common street would be quite ineligible.

    Miss Tarragona Kernohan, once they were alone in the curricle which Mr Llewellyn-Jones had hired for the occasion, burst into impassioned speech.

    The Reverend Ambrose Llewellyn-Jones replied quietly: “I think you must see, my dear Miss Tarry, that it would not do. If we all lived in isolation from our kind, I would not hesitate to recommend it. But that is not so, is it? We all must live in society. Any lady must consider such matters as the reaction of others before she embarks on a course of action which may make her remarked. –It is not,” he added before the reddening Tarry could speak. “that I do not see that many of our social proscriptions are meaningless and even silly: I do. But in order to exist comfortably as part of society, it is only sensible to conform to those which do not conflict with our sense of what is right and good."

    After a moment Tarry said in a small voice: “I see exactly what you mean, sir. And—and I shall speak to Nan, and—and try to put it that way to her."

    Mr Llewellyn-Jones nodded tranquilly and did not express his thought that a pretty and spoilt little lady like Lady Benedict, though he did not doubt that in this instance sufficient intelligence was present to allow the point to be grasped, would not grant the point that she should allow her will to be curbed by mere social proscriptions.

    It was entirely unfortunate that Dom’s telling Nan of his plan to take Ruth down to the country should have come so hard on the heels of their confrontation over the bears. Crossly Nan declared that Lord Curwellion would never guess they were sheltering his daughter, and there was no reason they should not all leave London directly. Angrily Dom pointed out that Curwellion was aware she had no cause to love him, and scores of people must know their relatives had been at the party at Marlow. Who was to say Curwellion had not already found out Ruth had been headed that way? Nan rubbished this, and the argument, sad to say, devolved into a shouting match.

    “She ees eempossible, Colonel!” he reported hotly.

    “Mm. I cannot entirely see why she is being so obdurate. Is she customarily not open to reason?”

    Dom sighed. “When she’s got her dander up, she ain’t, no. Well, you may laugh eef you weesh, sir, and eet ees rideeculous: she wants me to take her on an expedition to see some damned dancing bears—well, claims they weell dance: dare swear the creatures weell not do more than stagger when they ees beaten—”

    He told it in full. Lewis refrained from criticizing his decision, though he himself did not see any harm at all in the expedition—and if the lad’s sister did not care if Society found out and sneered at her for it, well, good for her.

    “So you see, she was mad weeth me already. But thees ees really serious,” Dom ended, very flushed, “and I cannot make her see reason!”

    “I shall be happy to speak to her on your behalf, but I cannot guarantee I will persuade her where you have failed.”

    Dom wrung his hand forthwith. The Colonel reflected wryly that if, as it appeared, the boy had not himself put forward the point that his fate would be sealed if Curwellion should happen to get wind his family was involved, he would but have to hint at it to clinch the thing with Lady Benedict.

    It was not precisely easy, once Lewis had made up his mind to do it, to find an opportunity for private speech with Lady Benedict. He could call at the house; but almost certainly other members of the household would be present. Of course, the thing would be to roll up in a natty phaeton, drivin’ randem—preferably a high-perch phaeton like that damned ridiculous thing of Bobby Amory’s—but unfortunately he was out of phaetons, just at present. Call and invite her for an elegant saunter in the Park? God. But he could not, in the end, think of a better scheme: so he did it.

    Mrs Urqhart eyed him with huge enjoyment. “She’s gorn out. Dessay she might be back within the next two hours, if so be as you fancies a-sitting here with me and Daphne, Colonel.”

    Colonel Vane did not fail to note that at this point the little dark girl shot the old thing a bitter look. Smoothly he replied: “I am afraid I must forgo that pleasure: I have a committee meeting later this afternoon. I shall call tomorrow morning. I trust you will find it consonant with your rôle of stern duenna, ma’am, to apprise her Ladyship of the fact. Good-day. Good-day, Miss Baldaya.” He bowed formally.

    Choking helplessly, Mrs Urqhart merely flapped a hand in farewell.

    Colonel Vane waited in the downstairs salon for some time.

    The door finally opened and Lady Benedict said breathlessly: “Good morning, Colonel Vane. I’m so sorry to have kept you waiting! I hope you do not mind eef we take Johnny and Rosebud.”

    “Of course not,” he said with a smile. “Hullo, Johnny: so you are coming for a walk with us?”

    “Yes,” said Johnny, nodding very hard.

    “And Rosebud, too! Look at you walking, Rosy-Posy Rosebud!” he smiled, squatting by her.

    Instead of shrinking into her mother’s skirts Rosebud immediately held out her arms to him.

    Colonel Vane rose with her, smiling. “Shall we, Lady Benedict?”

    “Yes,” said Nan limply.

    He offered her his free arm, and they exited in the most domestic manner in the world.

    In the street Nan found herself incapable of speech. Oh, dear: this was dreadful! Why on earth he had suddenly arrived, after all those weeks when she had looked for him and—

    “What is it?” he murmured, glancing at her glowing cheeks.

    “Notheeng,” said Nan firmly, staring ahead.

    Johnny tugged at her hand. “Mamma! Where’s Pug?”

    “What? Oh. Well, Cherry has taken heem out thees morning, Johnny.”

    Johnny appeared to accept this. They strolled on gently.

    “We do not usually go vairy far,” murmured Nan.

    “I can walk!” cried Master Edwards aggrievedly.

    “Of course. But Rosebud cannot walk vairy much. And she ees getting to be a beeg girl, she ees quite heavy for me to carry,” she said, smiling at her on the Colonel’s shoulder.

    “Go a walk,” said Miss Rosebud Benedict obligingly. If not precisely, in her own case, accurately.

    Her elders having duly admired this speech, they strolled on. Johnny chattered excitedly, pointing out vehicles, horses, and dogs. Nan and Colonel Vane responded somewhat stiltedly.

    “Lady Benedict,” said the Colonel finally, drawing a breath, “I fear I have called under false pretences."

    “What?” said Nan blankly, staring.

    “Er—this was no mere morning call. I am in the position of your brother’s deputy.”

    After a moment, in which her ears rang incredulously, Nan took an amazed and angry breath.

    “No, please—” he began.

    “I would have thought you had more sense!” she cried crossly. “Eet ees the most harmless theeng!”

    “Lady Benedict, your brother may not have cared to mention it to you, but believe me, if the thing should be suspected, the outcome could be disastrous.”

    “What? Of course Dom has not said that: he does not take me for a neenny, eef you do! The theeng ees a mere treeviality: I do not understand what you are talking about!” she cried impatiently.

    “Er—what are you?” said the Colonel limply.

    “The bears, of course! And he might have spared you the trouble, no-one weell take me een any case, and he has set the whole household to spy upon me, I cannot take a step outside my own room weethout eet’s being reported!”

    “I want to see the bears!” cried Johnny loudly.

    “Good God,” said the Colonel feebly. “Look, I’ll take you all to see the damned bears, if you can find no better escort. But for God’s sake don’t tell your brother!”

    “Now?” she gasped.

    “Er—well, no. I should like Clara to come, if that will not discommode you?”

    “Oh, no! Of course she must come! I am so glad to see you theenking of her!” she cried.

    “Are you, ma’am?” he asked, startled.

    “Yes! Eet ees so right een you!” she said, squeezing his arm.

    “I’m flattered,” said Lewis Vane, with a strange light in his eyes which Nan did not perceive. The more so as Johnny was pulling on her hand, jumping, and crying loudly: “Bears, bears! Huzza!”

    “Yes: bears, Johnny! –Shall eet be soon?” she asked, looking up at the Colonel and smiling.

    “Tomorrow, if you wish.”

    Nan nodded eagerly.

    They walked on, she starting to look very disconcerted and he completely expressionless.  “Why?” she gulped at last.

    “Dare I say, because you wish it, Lady Benedict?”

    “Do not be rideeculous!” she said strongly, very flushed.

    “I suppose I could advance many reasons, no one of which would represent the entire truth,” he said thoughtfully. “Of course I am doing it in part because I wish to please you, let us not pretend that I am any more nor less than the rest of mankind in that respect. And perhaps I am doing it, to a lesser degree, because I wish to flout convention. Though I do not really think that I care sufficiently about convention to be inspired with any strong desire to flout it,” he mused.

    “I—I would not have said so,” she faltered, now very off-balance.

    “No. I certainly do not see any harm in the expedition. And I feel that something that the children would like very much, and that is harmless in itself, need not be denied them because some social nicety that is without rhyme nor reason insists it is not the proper thing for the sons and daughters of gentlefolk.”

    Nan smiled, hugged his arm and nodded very hard. “I knew you were a man of common sense!”

    “Mm. Possibly,” he said drily, eyeing her straw bonnet, fetchingly decked with white silk bows and a small bunch of cherries. “Though the frivolous bows and cherries on that charming bonnet must surely count for something in the matter.”

    Nan gulped. She found she did not dare to ask which, then, of his possible reasons weighed the heaviest with him.

    The Colonel glanced down at her: she was staring at the pavement and, since she was very much shorter than he, the frivolous bonnet successfully shielded her face from him. After a moment he said evenly: “Now that I have dangled the treat in front of you, I am very much tempted to use it in order to blackmail you into agreeing to the point which is the true object of my call this morning.”

    “Whuh-what?" she faltered, looking up at him, very flushed, her heart suddenly pounding.

    “As I said, I am your brother’s deputy. Not in the matter of the bears but in the matter of a young lady who is known in your household, I believe, as Miss Smith.”

    Nan just goggled at him.

    “I think— Yes, Rosebud, big doggie!” he said as Miss Benedict suddenly became very excited indeed.

    “Help!” gasped Nan, shrinking against him.

    Colonel Vane was very much amused; though also considerably moved. “That is a Great Dane: is it not a magnificent creature? –Look, Johnny: see the great big dog?”

    To his relief, Johnny was too little to experience the alarm his mamma was evidently feeling: he laughed and pointed.

    “Do not disturb yourself, Lady Benedict, the owner has it well under control,” Lewis murmured.

    They walked on a little, Johnny looking back at the Great Dane.

    Eventually Nan said very limply indeed: “Oh, dear, I theenk we have become quite side-tracked. Deed you say that Dom has spoken to you about Miss Smeeth, Colonel Vane?"

    “Yes. I was trying to say before, when the subject of—uh—B,E,A,R,S came up, that I grant you it is unlikely that Lord C. will guess you are involved. But recollect that if he does, your brother’s life will be in jeopardy.”

    “Oh, good God!” said Nan in dismay. “You must theenk… Oh, dear, I have been so—so heedless and—and selfish and untheenking!”

    “Yes? I would have said, unthinking, perhaps,” he murmured.

    “No: I was so angry weeth heem over the bears, I deed not stop to theenk, just rubbeeshed every word he said to me!”

    “I understand,” he said calmly.

    “I do not theenk you do, sir!” she gulped.

    “Of course I do. You had lost your temper and did not pause to think through the implications of the situation. Who am I to criticize you for that? Given my own demonstrated intemperateness in the matter of—er—slaps on the face with cabochon sapphire rings?”

    “Oh. Yes,” said Nan numbly.

    The Colonel eyed her mockingly. She was staring straight ahead. “I collect you were in the expectation of a fatherly—or at the least an avuncular—sermon?"

    She looked up at him quickly, her mouth sagging open.

    “I have no desire to stand in the place of a father or uncle to you,” he said evenly. “Nor even to play the part of mentor.”

    “No!” she gulped.

    “Can we agree that we are but two human souls, as rudderless on the sea of life as any other specimens of humanity, neither of us particularly fit to reproach the other about any aspect of his or her conduct at all?”

    Nan swallowed hard.

    “Well?” he murmured.

    “I—I can agree; but can you?” she said hoarsely.

    His lips twitched a little. “I admit I am a deal your eider. And I suppose I may be said to have the habit of command, from my Army days: is that what you mean?"

    She nodded silently.

    “I shall try very hard," said Lewis Vane dulcetly.

    Nan rolled her lips together very tight and stared straight in front of her again.

    “Don’t be cross: I could not resist,” he murmured.

    “I know,” she croaked.

    “Well?”

    She gulped, failed to control herself, and broke down in  helpless laughter. “Oh!” she gasped finally. “I'm so sorry! Pray forgive me. But eet was the way you said eet! I theenk you are what ees called a complete hand, Colonel Vane!”

    There was a little silence. Nan was afraid she had said the wrong thing. She looked up at him nervously.

    “I confess myself highly relieved to know you've realized it,” he said calmly.

    Nan broke down in helpless laughter again.

    ... “But all the same," she concluded, when he had returned them to the house, bowing them in very properly, and, Johnny having run upstairs very fast to tell Nurse, Polly and Rani of the Great Dane, she was following in his wake more slowly with Rosebud on her shoulder: “Colonel Vane ees a vairy hard man to understand, no, Rosy-Posy?”

    Whether Miss Benedict had grasped the implications of this speech was open to doubt. She returned happily: “Gray Vane. Go a walk.”

    “Gr— Great Vane?” gulped Nan. “No: Great Dane, darling, and Colonel Vane.”

    “Gray VANE!” she shouted.

    “Mm,” said Nan limply. “Great Vane.”

    Colonel Vane found his party already assembled in the front hall of Mr Urqhart’s house.

    “Good morning, Great Vane! How truly delightful!” said Iris brightly before anyone else could utter.

    The Colonel looked blankly at the handsome young woman who was making so free with his name.

    “Gray Vane! Gray Vane!” cried Rosebud shrilly from her mamma’s shoulder.

    “I see,” he said, grinning.

    Managing not to shrink or shriek, Iris replied: “I rather hoped you would! How do you do, Colonel? We have met, one day when Nan and I were walking in the Park, though you may not remember me: I’m Iris Jeffreys, Nan’s cousin; and, I hasten to add, quite in the secret!”

    “We all are,” agreed Mina.

    “Yes, and how we are ever to stop Johnny and Rosebud from geeving eet away when we return, I do not know!” said Nan distractedly

    “It will no longer matter when we return,” said Iris soothingly.

    “No, that’s what I thought,” agreed the Colonel, straight-faced. “Well, are you quite ready, my dears?” he said to Mina and Amrita. The little girls assured him they were, and he took a hand of each. They immediately tugged him out.

    Iris looked at her cousin with a little smile, raising her eyebrows slightly.

    Very pink, Nan said firmly: “Do, pray, go before me, Cousin.”

    Iris had now been informed of the existence of Clara Vane, so she was not surprized to see an untidy little head, in an extremely crushed bonnet, poke out of the shabby hire carriage which was waiting round a corner for them, or to hear a shrill little voice cry: “’Ere they is! Come on, Miss, ’urry up!”

    But she was rather surprized by the blue-chinned, burly, one-eyed fellow who hoisted Johnny into the coach, and then put a very firm hand under her own elbow and more or less hoisted her in, too.

    And very surprized indeed by the tiny, excited person whom she found in the coach with Clara.

    “Miss McInnery!” cried Nan. “So you are coming to see the bears, too?”

    Iris Jeffreys of course immediately perceived that the hunchbacked little dressmaker was there in the rôle of chaperone. She fancied, from a certain sardonic look in the Colonel’s eye, that he had guessed that Nan must have extended the invitation to her humble spinsterish self for very much the same reason.

    But Iris was not entirely correct. And Lewis Vane, percipient though he was, did not discern the full reasons for Nan’s having included her cousin, either. Nan had found herself, at the prospect of undertaking a journey in the company of Colonel Vane—even if it were only to another part of London—filled with a strange trembling sensation. Which was part excitement, part fear, though she could not have said of what, precisely, and part—part something else which she could not define. When Iris had accepted her invitation she had been swamped by relief. But also, perversely, by disappointment.

    It was scarcely possible to make polite conversation during the journey: the children were all noisy and excited, and Colonel Vane, though responding to them easily enough, made very little attempt to converse with the ladies. Iris was considerably intrigued; and also considerably astounded to see that her charming cousin’s fancy had apparently alighted on a man so manifestly wanting in prettiness. Of either manner or countenance! thought Iris to herself, smothering a grin, and hurriedly agreeing with Johnny that those were very big horses indeed.

    “Clydesdales,” said the Colonel unemotionally.

    Iris leapt where she sat. “Yes,” she said feebly.

    Knowing very little of the Vane family, Iris had no idea that she was travelling in the company of the man who was Viscount Stamforth’s heir. She did reflect, however, that Colonel Vane did not strike as a man who was hanging out for a rich wife! Or, indeed, as a man who would at all fancy being the poor husband of a fortune. She bit her lip a little and stared blankly out at a view of grimy, unenticing London streets.

    The venue was duly reached, and the bears soon discovered. It did not occur to any of the ladies that this was due to the Colonel’s having dispatched Mr Poulter to reconnoitre the previous day.

    Very fortunately—though perhaps this was not a coincidence, either—the bears were due to perform shortly after their party arrived: a small crowd was already gathering. The two bears duly danced, and rolled barrels, and walked on barrels, perhaps the greatest excitement of all; and were duly applauded. Naturally their party had to stay until there was no chance of so much as a glimpse of bears, any more.

    “We could adjourn to that hostelry,” noted the Colonel neutrally. “But I fear it would not be suitable for you ladies.”

    “It looks all right,” said Iris, equally neutral. “Are you sure you do not mean, that we ladies would not be suitable for it?”

    “It’s the bonnet, Miss Jeffreys,” he said apologetically.

    Grinning, Iris replied simply: “I had to wear it, or my brother would have suspected me.”

    “Not a fellow who approves of bears, then?”

    “Good Lord, no: did not Nan tell you? He is not only not a fellow who disapproves of bears: he is one of the very fellows who have refused to take her to see ’em!”

    “I see,” he said, more neutral than ever.

    Oh, Lor’, thought Iris: foot in mouth, Jeffreys! Now he thinks she’s been playing him and Robert off against each other! Not that she would have put that past her charming cousin. She was conscious of a certain feeling of sympathy towards Colonel Vane, and allowed him, Miss McInnery and Nan to decide that they should enter the inn without involving herself further in the matter.

    The day was now sufficiently advanced for certain persons who were also patronising this hostelry apparently to consider it the dinner hour. The children watched eagerly as, to the accompaniment of the most enticing meaty odours, a party at the next table to theirs was served.

    “Look: ain’t that a slap-up dinner?” said Clara Vane.

    “Meat,” agreed Amrita wistfully.

    “I wonder what the bears have to eat?” said Miss McInnery brightly.

    This diversionary tactic, though much admired by one or two of those present, did not work: Amrita and Mina proceeded to tell the dressmaker of the ordinary they had eaten with Mr Laidlaw on the thrilling occasion of the twins’ return from school.

    “Our neighbours een Bath,” said Nan to the Colonel in the sort of airy voice commonly used by a mother trying to gloss over a faux pas by her small responsibilities.

    “I can do no less than offer them the ordinary, then.”

    “No!” she gasped, turning very red.

    “I think it would be suitable.’

    “Eet—eet ees too early,” said Nan weakly.

    “Well, it is not too early for Clara and myself: we have been up since five, have we not?” he said cheerfully, signalling to the waiter.

    “’E gets up early when ’e ’asn’t been to that there ’Ouse, Miss,” explained Clara Vane.

    “I see. And you also get up early, Clara?”

    “’E’s a-making me do sums.” she explained aggrievedly.

    “I see! So you had your lesson early thees morning, because of the treep to see the bears?” said Nan, all smiles.

    “Yes. Ma, she says as sums ain’t no good to a girl.”

    “Clara Vane has an excellent mathematical ability,” said the Colonel evenly. “What would people like to drink? Miss McInnery? Miss Jeffreys?”

    Once the discussion over who should drink what had been satisfactorily resolved—or as satisfactorily as possible, given that Mina and Amrita both declared their intention of drinking porter, like Mr Poulter—Nan took a deep breath and said firmly: “Colonel Vane, I theenk the meal should be my treat, seence you have so kindly given us the treat of the journey to see the bears.”

    “Nonsense,” replied Colonel Vane firmly.

    “No, I eenseest.”

    “But I insist you shall not, Lady Benedict.”

    “It’s a question of honour, Cousin,” drawled Iris. “Be thankful you are not a gentleman: your hat and wig would be in danger.”

    “Mamma does not wear a wig!” cried Mina in astonishment.

    “Leetle peetchers,” said Nan grimly to her infuriating cousin.

    “Where in God’s name did you pick that one up?” she said limply.

    “From Miss Gump.”

    “She says it all the time,” explained Mina glumly. “I think it’s stupid.”

    “So do I!” cried Amrita.

    “And I,” agreed Colonel Vane tranquilly.

    Certain persons jumped.

    “That’s settled, then,” he said into the silence.

    Iris looked at her cousin’s face, and smiled a little. “It does appear to be,” she murmured.

    Various sated small persons having been at last returned to their distracted governess, the cousins repaired to the downstairs sitting-room. To Iris’s relief, it was empty: she did not fancy having to witness any recriminations that might result from their expedition.

    Immediately Nan directed a glare at her. “Why were you so horreed about the meal?”

    Iris shrugged. “My horrid nature? But I don’t think I was all that bad, was I?”

    “Saying een front of heem eet was a question of honour?” cried Nan indignantly.

    “He didn’t mind that!” said Iris with a grin.

    “He deed not mind your referring to the stupeed duel, no: but you are vairy much meestaken eef you imagine he deed not care to have hees poverty paraded before us in that way!”

    “Nan,” said Iris pointedly: “you were the one that tried to insist on paying for the meal.”

    “I—” She broke off.

    “Well?”

    “Yes: eet was wrong een me,” she said in a stifled voice. “But eef you saw that, why deed you have to make it worse?”

    Iris shrugged. “Damned if I know. Thought if I turned it into a joke, um, it might ease the tension? Though I suppose I was needling the pair of you, to a certain extent. I’m sorry: my motives appear to have been diametrically opposed, don’t they? Well, you must conclude either that, or that I’m an habitual liar,” she said, wrinkling her nose.

    “No,” said Nan with a sigh. “For my own motives are often vairy mixed, also: eendeed, just as contradictory. Though I have never yet met anyone else who would admit to thees!” she ended with a smile.

    Iris smiled back, very relieved. “Nor I.”

    There was a little pause. Iris eyed her cautiously. “Er—Nan?”

    “Yes?”

    “When you—uh—give these besotted admirers of yours those big doe-eyed looks from those big doe-eyes—?”

    “I am always at least part genuine,” said Nan with tremendous dignity.

    Iris broke down in a spluttering fit. Though in the midst of it she could not help wondering whether Colonel Vane had the—not the wits, no, but rather, the temperament, to support such a revelation with equanimity.