It seemed a little hard to Phoebe that she should be accused of having crotchets when she was taking such pains to appear cheerful. She only once begged to be allowed to go back to Austerby; and since this lapse was the outcome of her grandmother’s complaining that she had allowed Mrs. Newbury to over-persuade her, it was surely pardonable. ‘Pray, pray, ma’am don’t let us go to Paris on my account!’ she had said imploringly. ‘I only said I would go because I thought you wished it! And I don’t think Tom cares for it either, in his heart. Let him take me home instead!’

But the Dowager had been pulled up short by this speech. She was not much given to considering anyone but herself, but she was fond of Phoebe. Her conscience gave her a twinge, and she said briskly: ‘Fiddle-de-dee, my love! Of course I wish to go, and so I shall as soon as the weather improves!’

It began to seem, on the fifth day, that they were doomed to remain indefinitely at Dover, for the wind, instead of abating, had stiffened, and was blowing strongly off-shore. Tom’s waterfront acquaintances assured him that he couldn’t hope for a better to carry him swiftly across the Channel, but Tom knew that it would be useless to repeat this to the Dowager, even if she had not been keeping her bed that day. She was bilious. Sea air, said Muker, always made my lady bilious, as those who had waited on her for years could have told others had they seen fit to ask.

So Phoebe, having the parlour to herself, tried for the fourth time to compose a letter to Sylvester that should combine contrition with dignity, and convey her gratitude for past kindness without giving the least hint that she wished ever to see him again. This fourth effort went the way of its predecessors, and as she watched the spoiled sheets of paper blacken and burst into flame she sank into very low spirits. It was foolish to fall into a reminiscent mood when every memory that obtruded itself (and most of all the happy ones) was painful, but try as she would to look forward no sooner was she idle than back went her thoughts, and the most cheerful view of the future which presented itself to her was a rapid decline into the grave. And the author of all her misfortunes, whose marble heart and evil disposition she had detected at the outset, would do no more than raise his fatal eyebrows, and give his shoulders the slight, characteristic shrug she knew so well, neither glad nor sorry, but merely indifferent.

She was roused from the contemplation of this dismal picture by Tom’s voice, hailing her from the street. She hastily blew her nose, and went to the window, thrusting it open, and looking down at Tom, who was standing beneath it, most improperly hallooing to her.

‘Oh, there you are!’ he observed. ‘Be quick, and come out, Phoebe! Such doings in the harbour! I wouldn’t have you miss it for a hundred pounds!’

‘Why, what?’

‘Never mind what! Do make haste, and come down! I promise you it’s as funny as any farce I ever saw!’

‘Well, I must put on my hat and pelisse,’ she said, not wanting very much to go.

‘Lord, you’d never keep a hat on in this wind! Tie a shawl over your head!’ he said. ‘And don’t dawdle, or it will all be over before we get there!’

Reflecting that even being buffeted by a cold wind would be preferable to further reverie, she said that she would be down in a trice, shut the window again, and ran away to her bedchamber. The idea of tying a shawl round her head did not commend itself to her, but the Dowager had bought a thick travelling cloak with a hood attached for her to wear on board the packet, so she fastened that round her throat instead, and was hastily turning over the contents of a drawer in search of gloves when she was made to jump almost out of her skin by hearing herself unexpectedly addressed.

‘May I make so bold as to inquire, miss, if you was meaning to go out?’

Phoebe looked quickly round, exclaiming: ‘Good gracious, what a start you gave me, Muker! I never heard you come in!’

‘No, miss?’ said Muker, standing with primly folded arms on the threshold. ‘And was you meaning to go out, miss?’

Her tone was very much that of a gaoler. It nettled Phoebe, but although she flushed a little she said only: ‘Yes, I am going for a walk,’ because she knew that Muker’s dislike of her arose from jealousy, for which she was more to be pitied than blamed.

‘May I ask, miss, if her ladyship is aware of your intention?’

‘You may ask, but I don’t know why you should, or why I should answer you,’ replied Phoebe, her temper rising.

‘I shouldn’t consider it consistent with my duty, miss, to permit you to go out without her ladyship was aware of it.’

‘Oh, wouldn’t you?’ retorted Phoebe, by this time roused to real wrath. ‘Try if you can stop me!’

Muker, thrust with some violence out of the way, followed her from the room, two spots of colour flaming on her cheekbones. ‘Very well, miss! Very well! Her ladyship shall hear of this! I should have thought she had enough to worrit her, poor dear, without-’

‘How dare you speak to me in that insolent way?’ Phoebe interrupted, pausing at the head of the stairs to look back. ‘If my grandmother should wish to know where I am gone, you will please tell her that she need have no anxiety, since I am with Mr. Orde!’

‘Hurry, Phoebe!’ said Tom, from the hall below. ‘It will be too late soon!’

‘I’m coming!’ she answered, running down to join him.

‘What an age you’ve been!’ he said, pushing her through the doorway into the street. ‘You had better hold that cloak tightly round you, or you’ll be blown away. What’s the matter?’

‘That odious Muker!’ she fumed. ‘Daring to tell me she would not permit me to go out!’

‘Oh, never mind her!’ said Tom, limping along as fast as he could. ‘Sour old squeeze-crab! You wait till you see the pantomime in the harbour! I shouldn’t wonder at it if we find the whole town’s turned out to watch it by the time we get there. Lord, I hope they haven’t got the thing aboard yet!’

‘What thing?’ demanded Phoebe.

‘Some sort of a travelling carriage,’ replied Tom, with a chuckle.

‘Oh, Tom, you wretch, is that all?’

‘All! It’s no ordinary carriage, I can tell you. It belongs to some fellow who has chartered a schooner to take his coach and his family to Calais, and there’s him, and a little chitty-faced fellow that looks like a valet, and- But you’ll see! When I left they were all arguing whether it oughtn’t to be got aboard in slings, and there was a string of porters carrying enough champagne and hampers of food for a voyage to India! There! what did I tell you? Half the town at least!’

If this was an exaggeration there was certainly a crowd of people watching with deep interest the activities of those preparing to get a large travelling carriage aboard the Betsy Anne. The little man described by Tom as a valet was keeping a vigilant eye on this astonishing vehicle, every now and then darting forward to ward off the urchins who wanted to look inside it, and saying in a tearful falsetto: ‘I forbid you to lay your greasy hands on it! Go away! Go away, I say!’

His agitation was pardonable, for never was there so glossy and so exquisite a chariot, double-perched, slung high between high wheels, fitted with patent axles, and embellished with a gilded iron scrollwork all round the roof. The body was painted a bright tan, with the wheels and the panels of sky-blue; and the interior, which, besides a deeply cushioned seat, included a let-down table, appeared to be entirely lined with pale blue velvet.

‘Cinderella’s coach!’ said Phoebe promptly. ‘Who in the world can have ordered such a ridiculous thing?’

On board the schooner all was bustle and noise, the crew being much impeded in their tasks by the number of porters who got in their way, and voicing their disapproval in loud and frank terms.

‘Getting ready to set sail,’ said Tom. ‘I should laugh if they were to miss the tide!’

As Phoebe’s amused eyes ran over the crowded deck they alighted on the figure of a small boy, who was critically observing the various activities in progress. For one instant she stared unbelievingly, and then she clutched Tom’s arm, exclaiming: ‘Edmund!’

‘Eh?’ said Tom. He saw that she was looking at the small boy as though she saw a ghost. ‘Now what’s the matter?’ he demanded.

‘Edmund Rayne! Salford’s nephew!’ she stammered. ‘There-on the boat!’

‘Is it?’ said Tom, glancing at the child. ‘Are you poz?’

‘Yes, yes, how could I mistake? Oh, Tom, I have the most dreadful fear- What was he like, the man who owns that coach?’

‘Like a counter-coxcomb!’ replied Tom. ‘I never saw such a quiz!’

She turned pale. ‘Fotherby! Then Lady Henry must be aboard. Did you see her? Very fair-very beautiful?’

‘No, I only saw the dandy, and the valet, and that fellow over there, whom I take to be the courier. Why, you don’t mean to say you think they’re eloping?’

‘I don’t know that, and I don’t care! They are kidnapping Edmund, and-oh, Tom, it is my fault! I am going aboard!’

He detained her. ‘No, you don’t! How could it be your fault, pray? I wish you won’t fall into such distempered freaks, Phoebe!’

‘Don’t you see, Tom? I told you what it was that made my book so particularly abominable!’

‘I haven’t forgotten. But your book ain’t to be blamed for Lady Henry’s running off with that Jack-a-dandy. If you’ve got some notion of trying to interfere, let me tell you, I shan’t let you make such a cake of yourself! It’s none of your business.’

She said with determined calm: ‘Tom, if it is as I believe, and Lady Henry is taking that child out of England, I am so much to blame that I think I shall never hold up my head again. I put the scheme into her head! It was never there before she read my book. Oh, she told me herself how much struck she was by the end of it, and I never guessed, never suspected-!’

‘Took the scheme out of a trumpery novel? She couldn’t be such a greenhead!’

‘She is just such a greenhead! I don’t know how it will be, if they get Edmund to France, whether it will be possible for Salford to recover him, or even to find him, but only think what it must mean! More trouble, more scandal, and all to be laid at my door! I can’t bear it, Tom! You must let me go aboard that boat! Perhaps, if I could prevent this, he-people-might not think so badly of me. Tom, I’ve wished the book had never been written over and over again, but I can’t unwrite it, and don’t you think that this-if I could stop it-would be a sort of-of atonement?’

He was struck by her earnest manner, and even more by the expression in her eyes, which was almost tragic. After a moment he said: ‘Well-if you think you should, I suppose- Come to think of it, if the boy is being taken out of the country without his guardian’s leave it’s against the law! So we have got some right to meddle. I only hope we don’t catch cold at it, that’s all!’

But Phoebe had already stepped on to the gangway. As she reached the deck Sir Nugent Fotherby emerged from a doorway behind the ladder leading to the quarterdeck, and at once perceived her.

After looking at her through his quizzing glass for a minute he came forward, bowing, and saying in a pleased voice: ‘Miss Marlow! How-de-do? ‘Pon my soul, I take it very kind in you to have called, and so, I venture to say, will her la’ship! Happy to welcome you aboard! Tidy little craft, ain’t she? Chartered her, you know: couldn’t take her la’ship on the common packet!’

‘Sir Nugent, will you have the goodness to lead me to Lady Henry?’ said Phoebe, ignoring these civilities.

‘Greatest pleasure on earth, ma’am! But-you won’t take it amiss if I give you a hint?-not Lady Henry!’

‘I see. I should have said Lady Fotherby, perhaps?’

‘No,’ replied Sir Nugent regretfully. ‘Not Lady Fotherby. Lady Ianthe Fotherby. I don’t like it as well, but her la’ship informs me that to be called Lady Ianthe again makes her feel ten years younger, which is a gratifying circumstance, don’t you think?’

At this point they were interrupted. Master Rayne had approached, and he planted himself squarely before Sir Nugent, demanding: ‘When are we going to see the circus?’

Master Rayne had to look a long way up to Sir Nugent’s face, but his gaze was stern and unwavering, and under it Sir Nugent was visibly embarrassed. ‘Oh-ah-the circus!’ he said. ‘Precisely so! The circus!’

‘You said we were going to the circus,’ said Edmund accusingly. ‘You said if I didn’t kick up riot and rumpus I should go to the circus.’

‘Did I?’ said Sir Nugent, eyeing him uneasily. ‘Said that, did I?’