‘My dear good fellow,’ replied his lordship, ‘you have no more notion of where we are than I have. Here we will stop. I like the place.’

The village seemed asleep in the moonlight, not a soul stirring. But the sound of carriage wheels brought the landlord out of the inn, all anxiety to oblige. Lord Stavely, alighting from the chaise, said: ‘Arcadia, I presume. Tell me, what is the time?’

The landlord, slightly taken aback, said that it lacked but ten minutes to the hour.

‘But what hour?’ asked his lordship.

‘Why, nine o’clock, sir!’

‘How shocking! Am I anywhere in the neighbourhood of Melbury Place?’

‘Melbury Place?’ repeated the landlord. ‘Yes, that you are, sir; it lies only a matter of ten miles from here, though the road’s tricky, as you might say.’

‘After the experiences of today, I should probably use a more forceful epithet. I imagine it will take me nearly an hour to reach the place. Obviously it behoves me to dine here. Or am I too late for dinner?’

The landlord was not one to turn away distinguished custom from his door. This gentleman, with his high crowned beaver hat, his driving coat of many capes, worn negligently open over a neat blue coat, a cut Venetian waistcoat, and the palest of fawn pantaloons, was plainly a member of the Quality. He assured Lord Stavely that, if he would step into the coffee-room, dinner should be served him in a very few minutes. A qualm then attacked him, and he faltered: ‘I’m sorry I can’t show your honour to a private parlour, but there’s only Mr Tom in the coffee-room, after all.’

‘Then if Mr Tom does not take exception to me, I shall do very well,’ said his lordship. ‘I wonder if I should remain here for the night? Shall I endear myself on my host by presenting myself at past eleven o’clock at night?’

‘They do keep very early hours up at the Place, by what I hear, sir,’ offered the landlord hopefully. ‘Was the Squire expecting of you, sir?’

‘He was, and I trust still is. Your manner leads me to fear that he will not be pleased by my tardy arrival?’

‘Well, sir, begging your pardon, Squire is that pernickety in his ways, and—in a manner of speaking—a testy gentlemen—not meaning any disrespect, I’m sure!’

‘In fact, I shall not endear myself to him by arriving famished on his doorstep at dead of night. Very well. I’ll put up here, then.’

The landlord, mentally resolving to have the best sheets instantly put on the bed in the larger of his two guest chambers, ushered his lordship into the coffee-room.

It had only one occupant, a young gentleman who sat in the window embrasure, with a bottle of brandy on the ledge beside him, and a glass in his hand. The landlord, casting a rather worried glance at the bottle, murmured that Mr Tom would not object to a gentleman’s dining in the coffee-room. Mr Tom blinked at Lord Stavely, and inclined his head with dignity. He then resumed his scrutiny of the moon-washed street.

His lordship returned the civility by a slight bow, and a smile hovering about his mouth, but made no attempt to lure Mr Tom into conversation. It was apparent to him that care sat upon the young gentleman’s brow. It would have been apparent to someone far less acute than Lord Stavely that Mr Tom was, very properly, drowning his troubles in brandy. He might have been any age between nineteen and twenty-five; he was certainly not older. Leanings towards dandyism were betrayed by the intricate but not entirely successful arrangement of his cravat, and by the inordinate height of his shirt collar, whose starched points reached almost to his cheekbones. But there was little of the dandy in his sturdy figure and fresh-complexioned countenance. He looked like the son of a country gentleman, which, indeed, he was, and as though he would be very much at home in the hunting-field, or with a gun over his shoulder.

In a short time the landlord laid a simple but very tolerable meal before his new guest, and himself waited upon him. Lord Stavely pronounced the fare to be excellent, commended the burgundy, and tactfully declined the only port offered him on the score that he did not wish to encourage a tendency to the gout. He did not look as though he suffered from gout, or any other ailment; in fact, he looked as healthy as any other man of thirty-five; but the landlord did not question his words. He merely swept away the covers and set a bottle of old cognac before him.

For some minutes past Lord Stavely had been aware that the young gentleman in the window was subjecting him to an intent scrutiny. He knew well what was engaging this fixed attention, and when the landlord had withdrawn, he said gently: ‘I call it the Nonchalent. It is not very difficult, once you acquire the knack of it.’

‘Eh?’ said the young gentleman, starting.

‘My cravat,’ explained Lord Stavely, smiling.

The young gentleman coloured and stammered that he begged pardon.

‘Not at all,’ said his lordship. ‘I’ll show you how to tie it, if you like.’

‘Will you?’ exclaimed the young gentleman eagerly. ‘I tie mine in an Osbaldeston, but I don’t like it above half.’

Lord Stavely waved one hand invitingly towards a chair at the table. ‘Won’t you join me?’

‘Well—thank you!’ The young gentleman got up and crossed the floor circumspectly. He brought his glass and the bottle with him, and set both down on the table. ‘My name,’ he announced carefully, ‘is Hatherleigh.’

‘Mine is Stavely,’ returned his lordship.

They exchanged bows. Only a purist would have said that Mr Hatherleigh was drunk. He could, by taking only reasonable pains, walk and speak with dignity, and if his potations had had the effect of divorcing his brain a little from the normal, at least it was perfectly clear on all important matters. When Lord Stavely, for instance, touching lightly on the country through which he had driven, said that he should suppose it to be good hunting country, young Hatherleigh was able to expatiate on the subject with enthusiasm and really remarkable coherence. The cloud lifted from his brow, his eyes brightened, and he became quite animated. Then the cloud descended again abruptly, and he fetched a sigh, and said gloomily: ‘But that is all at an end! I dare say I may think myself lucky if ever I get a leg across a good hunter again.’

‘As bad as that?’ said his lordship sympathetically.

Mr Hatherleigh nodded, and poured himself out some more brandy. ‘I’m eloping with an heiress,’ he announced dejectedly.

If Lord Stavely was startled by this intelligence, he managed to conceal his emotions most creditably. His lip did quiver a little, but he said in the politest way: ‘Indeed?’

‘Yes,’ said Mr Hatherleigh, fortifying himself with a deep drink. ‘Gretna Green,’ he added.

‘Forgive me,’ said his lordship, ‘but do you feel this to be a wise step to take?’

‘No, of course I don’t!’ said Mr Hatherleigh. ‘But what is a fellow to do? I can’t draw back now! You must see that!’

‘I expect it would be very difficult,’ agreed Lord Stavely. ‘When one has persuaded an heiress to elope with one—’

‘No such thing!’ interrupted Mr Hatherleigh. ‘I dare say I may have said it would be rare sport to do it, if only to kick up a dust, but I never thought Annabella would think I really meant it! But that is Annabella all over. In fact, I think she’s devilish like her father! Let her but once take a notion into her head, and there’s no persuading her to listen to reason! Mind, though,’ he added, bending a sudden, minatory scowl upon his auditor, ‘you are not to be thinking that I wish to back out! I have loved Annabella for years. In fact, I swore a blood-oath to marry her when we were children. But that isn’t to say that I want to drive off to the Border with her—and just now, too!’

‘The moment is not quite convenient?’

Mr Hatherleigh shook his head. ‘My uncle has invited me to Yorkshire for the grouse shooting!’ he said bitterly. ‘Only think what a splendid time I could have had! I have never tried my hand at grouse, you know, but I am accounted a pretty fair shot.’

‘You could not, I suppose, postpone the elopement until after the shooting season?’ suggested his lordship.

‘No, because if we waited there would be no sense in eloping at all, because very likely Annabella will be tied up to the old fogy her father means her to marry. Besides, the moon’s at the full now.’

‘I see. And who is this old fogy? Is he very old?’

‘I don’t know, but I should think he must be, wouldn’t you, if he’s a friend of Sir Walter?’

His lordship paused in the act of raising his glass to his lips. ‘Sir Walter?’

‘Sir Walter Abingdon. He is Annabella’s father.’

‘Oh!’ said his lordship, sipping his brandy. ‘I collect that he does not look with favour on your suit?’

‘No, and my father does not either. He says we are too young, and should not suit. So very likely I shall be cut off with a shilling, and be obliged to enter a counting-house, or some such thing, for Sir Walter will certainly cut Annabella off. But of course females never consider anything of that nature! They have not the least common sense, beside thinking that it is perfectly easy to hire a chaise for midnight without making anyone suspicious! And it is not!’ said Mr Hatherleigh, a strong sense of grievance overcoming him. ‘Let alone the expense of it—and that, let me tell you, has pretty well made my pockets to let! I have had to go twenty miles to do it, because a rare flutter I should have set up if I’d bespoke a chaise to go to Scotland at the George, or the Sun! Why, my father would have had wind of it within the hour!

‘And then I had to rack my brains to think how best to meet it, because it would never do to have it driving up to my home to pick me up, you know. Luckily old Thetford here is very much attached to our interests, so I told the post-boys in the end to come to this inn at half-past ten tonight. Annabella thinks everyone will be asleep by half-past eleven, or twelve at latest, and she is to meet me in the shrubbery. Shrubbery at midnight!’ he repeated scornfully. ‘I can tell you, it makes me feel like a great cake! Such flummery!’

He picked up the bottle again as he spoke, and poured some more brandy into his glass. Some of the liquor spilled on to the table. Mr Hatherleigh glared at it, and set the bottle down with precision.

‘Do you know,’ said Lord Stavely conversationally, ‘if I were going to elope at midnight I believe I would not drink too much brandy at ten o’clock?’

Mr Hatherleigh eyed him austerely. ‘If you think I’m foxed,’ he enunciated, ‘you’re wrong! I have a very hard head.’

‘I’m sure you have,’ said his lordship. ‘But if Miss Annabella were to detect the fumes on your breath she might not be quite pleased.’

‘Well, she shouldn’t have insisted on eloping with me!’ retorted Mr Hatherleigh.

‘She must be very much attached to you?’

‘Of course she is. Why, she’s known me all her life! All the same, she never would have taken this silly notion into her head if that peppery old fool hadn’t asked this fellow to stay, and told her she was to marry him. I must say, I was shocked when Annabella told me of it. I dare say he must be fifty at least, and a dead bore! Besides, she has never clapped eyes on him! I quite saw that as a gentleman I must rescue her, though I never thought then that my uncle would invite me to stay with him in Yorkshire.’

‘But surely even the most peppery of parents cannot in these days marry his daughter out of hand? Must you really elope?’ said Lord Stavely.

‘Annabella says so, and of course I am bound in honour to oblige her,’ replied Mr Hatherleigh grandly. ‘I dare say I shan’t dislike being married so very much, once I get used to it.’

‘I feel very strongly that you are making a mistake,’ said his lordship, gently moving the bottle out of reach. ‘Perhaps the dead bore will not wish to marry Annabella!’

‘Then why is he coming to stay with the Abingdons?’ demanded Mr Hatherleigh. ‘I expect Sir Walter has it all arranged, in his famous style! My father says he is the most meddlesome, managing old fool in the county.’ He drained his glass defiantly. ‘

‘T all events,’ he pronounced, ‘it’ll be something to overset his precious plans!’


Half an hour later, the landlord, coming in to inform Mr Tom that his chaise was at the door, found that young gentleman stertorously asleep, with his head on the table.

‘I don’t think,’ said Lord Stavely, ‘that Mr Tom is in a fit case for travel.’