Part 4

My Lady Peggy winces under her wound, but she has not been Kennaston’s playfellow for naught, and as ugly pricks as this one have been her portion in the past; Chockey, nevertheless, from her nest, pales and utters a smothered shriek which is quite lost in the loud talking that follows, while Chalmers winds the kerchief Sir Percy tenders about the wrist of the wounded.

“Now to the cards, gentlemen,” cries His Grace of Escombe, pulling out his purse. “To such a gallant as our friend Sir Robin here, my fingers itch to lose ten, twenty, nay as many pounds as his skill can rid me of; for such a pretty play of the steel as his must argue a lucky throw of the dice.”

“Hear! hear! hear!” shout they all, drinking brimming mugs to the two who have lately fought, and settling themselves at the tables with a rattle and a rush of laughter and merry humor.

Lady Peggy sits, gritting her teeth at the slit in her white flesh, with her back to the door and, betwixt the uproar and clinking and shuffling, she hears footsteps coming up the stairs. Some intuition bids her be the one to respond to the rapping that presently sounds out.

“Asking your pardon,” murmurs Her Ladyship to her companions as she quits the table. When, as she opens, a new-caught street urchin speaks sharp, with saucer eyes in-peering at the quality.

“An it please yer Lordships, there’s a fine gentlemen below as his name is Sir Robin McTart.”

Peggy draws in, bangs the door in the boy’s face, squares about, and says:

“By your leave, gentlemen, a most particular messenger awaits me below; for a few moments only, I crave your indulgence for my absence. I’ll be with you in ten minutes.”

“No! no! no!” cry they all, save De Bohun, who is counting his cards, and Sir Wyatt who exclaims:

“Yes, an it be a messenger on business for a fair lady; no, an it be otherwise. Gadzooks! Sir Robin, make a half-clean breast of it. Comes Mercury from Phyllis or from a mere man?”

Peg answers: “I swear to you, Sirs, I go down on business of the gravest import to a lady,” and makes for the door.

“Pledge her! Pledge her! a bumper! a bumper!” cry they all in one voice with much pleasant laughter.

“Here’s to Sir Robin’s nameless fair! Zounds! but for so little yeared a personage to have two strings to his bow!”

V

_Wherein Lady Peggy doth encounter her flouted lover, receiveth a rapier-prick: makes acquaintance of her hated rival and of Mr. Brummell._

And much more of a like nature reaches Lady Peggy as she plunges down the stairs and presently finds herself, by the light of the lamp of his chair, a-confronting Sir Robin McTart himself!

“Nay, nay, Sir! I am not Kennaston of Kennaston,” responds Peg, looking grave, and making excellent show of her blood-stained, linen-bound wrist.

“’Tis here he dwells, and, as I know well by reputation, you are a peaceful, law-abiding man, I’d counsel you not to mount. Such a company of cut-throat, cut-purse brawlers, Sir, as would not leave a farthing in your pocket or lace upon your shirt.”

Sir Robin, as Her Ladyship had shrewdly guessed, drew back and shivered at this lively description.

“Trust me, Sir Robin: hist!” Peg’s voice sinks to a mere whisper. “I am Lady Peggy’s best friend and neighbor at home; ’twould be her will, an she stood here, that you should not adventure your precious life in the unseemly crowd with which her brother hath seen fit to surround himself.”

“Lud, Sir! Who are you,” chatters Sir Robin trembling betwixt delight and terror, “that knows so well the temper of Lady Peggy Burgoyne’s disposition? What’s your name, Sir?”

“No matter for my name, Sir, I have Lady Peggy’s best interests at heart, and yours. She bade me, did ever I encounter you in evil neighborhood, tell you, for her sake, eschew it. Hark ye! Sir Robin, out of this hole as fast as your men’s legs can carry you. Above yonder, ’s one who’s sworn to kill you!”

“Who’s he?” demands Sir Robin, one foot now in his sedan, his little eyes twinkling both ways with fright.

“Sir Percy de Bohun,” replies Peg in a hollow whisper. “Look you, Sir,” showing her bloody wrist, “there’s a taste of his quality. I warn you—’tis from Peggy’s own self—get back to Kent, whence you came, and tarry not, for your life’s at yonder desperado’s mercy while you linger up in town.”

“Is My Lady Peggy returned to Kent to her godmother?” quavers Sir Robin, now well inside his chair.

“Nay, Sir; as her brother supposes, she’s at home at Kennaston.”

“I’ll seek her there!” cries Sir Robin, tendering his hand. “And, Sir, my humble duty and gratitude to you for your admirable condescension. I would I knew your name and station.”

“I’m up in town incognito, Sir, for a lady’s sake,” smiles the minx.

“When I return, Sir, I’ll seek you out at White’s or Will’s. I dare be sworn so fine a gentleman must needs be a buck of the first order.”

“Seek me, Sir, and Godspeed you down to Kennaston or Kent!”

At the word, Sir Robin in his chair sets forth a-swinging round the corner, light of heart and bright of hope, while the subject and object of his thoughts and passion stands for a moment leaning, sighing, betwixt laughter and tears, against the door-frame.

My Lady Peggy’s first impulse is to cut and run; indeed her slim legs are so stretched to begin, when the remembrance of poor Chock in her garret cage comes to her mind, and, with a grimace, she turns in, jumps up the stairs, and is in the midst of the group, now well on in their cups and more hilarious than orderly in their conversation.

Peg was not her father’s girl for naught that night. To the tune of three hundred pounds, fourteen and six, was she the richer, and rewarded for the many dreary evenings she had spent at Kennaston, a-watching her father win and lose with the Vicar and the Bishop, whenever the latter came on his visits.

By dint of spilling her wine deftly under the table, she had emptied as many mugs as the best bibber among ’em, and at four in the morning found herself the only one who was sober, or even awake.

’Twas not a beautiful sight thus to behold, in the pale pink of the dawn, a dozen or so of merry gentlemen a-sprawling about on floor, tables, chairs,—a-snoring and a-tossing in their sleep; but ’twas of the fashion of the times when, to be a fine gentleman, one must be drunk, at the least, once in the twenty-four hours.

All save Sir Percy; almost at swords’ points he had quitted the company hours before, a little in his cups, but steady withal, murmuring to himself as he fumbled on the rickety stairs—Peg, leaning over the rail, unseen in the darkness, womanlike to watch lest he trip and fall, heard him:

“’Sdeath! an what that popinjay say be true, I’ll marry Lady Diana out of hand, and show the minx I’m not to be cut out of a wife by such a flea-bitten rotten-rod as Sir Robin McTart!”

“So easy taken then is my loss!” says Peggy, with a renewed fire of jealousy burning at her heart, as she returns to the scene of her winnings.

Sick at heart, for a single instant she surveys the room, and then, finger on lip, it does not take her long to signal up to Chockey, motion her down with the calf-skin box, and to begin, with shamed face, in the darkest corner, to strip off her man’s attire.

Lady Peggy has laid aside the yellow wig; Chockey weeping, praying that they may get away in safety, is spreading out the Levantine fit for her mistress to jump into it, when, for the second time within the twelve hours, Her Ladyship’s heart stands still to the patter and thump of footsteps climbing the last flight.

“Hold, Chock!” cries she, clapping on the wig. “Bundle up my duds, tie ’em tight; so! give me it; pick up the box, put on your cloak and bonnet and a bold face; follow and ape me. An you love me, Chock, an’ I thrust, thrust too! an’ I knock ’em down, follow suit! I’d sooner die, Chock, than be caught now!”

With which, My Lady Peggy flung wide the door, pushed out the Abigail, drew her weapon, and, with a rush, the two of them tumbled down the stairs, taking on their way a giant of a man who struggled and struck out, and dropped fruits and flowers and curses, and yet gave in to the splendid tweeks and pinches which the lusty Chockey dealt him on his arms and legs, and, falling headlong, on the lower stairs, darted up the street crying:

“Watch!” at the top of his lungs, nor getting any answer, for Watch was snoring in the tavern and the sun now shining broad.

“Chock,” said her mistress, “go you on before me to the King’s Arms, where we alighted, engage the seats in the coach, and hark ye, child, an aught betide I come not, get you home without me and tell His Lordship I’m gone to Kent on a sick-call from my godmother. Lud! it’s lies all the way to being a man! I’ll not walk with you, lass; ’tis not seemly, and when I reach the inn I’ll pretend I know you not, hire a room, change my clothes and slip down to you, unseen if I can. Now, off with you, quickly, for I ache to follow. Would to God I could doff these garments and into my petticoats again!” added Lady Peggy ruefully, glancing at her hastily tied up bundle and, at the same moment, with the broad of her sword, pushing Chock into the street with a will that sent her a-spinning on her way.

Indifferent then, as though the outgoing damsel were no concern of hers, presently, with a swagger, yet ill-concealing the anxiety she felt afresh as now sobs and female voices assailed her ears, the mock Sir Robin McTart emerged upon the street.

There halted a chair between the posts. In the chair sat Lady Diana Weston accompanied by her woman. Both wept and trembled, while still afar the stout lungs of the terrified giant shouted:

“Watch!”

Peg stood still and stared; all the jealous blood in her burned in her cheeks. Lady Diana here! and wherefore? and at such an untoward hour; veil displaced, eyes red, but still most undeniably handsome, nay beautiful.

“Oh Sir!” cried Lady Diana beseechingly, raising two imploring hands outside the chair door toward Lady Peggy.

“I pray of your honor!” whimpered the Abigail in concert.

“I implore your protection, Sir, as you are a gentleman and man of honor, as your mien disposes me. I came here but now and sent my footman up to the rooms of a—a friend, who is ill, Sir,—with a token of regard in the shape of fruit and flowers, when the man must have been set upon by thieves and beaten, for he—”

“I heard him,” finishes Peg, stepping nearer to the chair. “And I assure you, Madam, I put the varlet who attacked him to his pace with a prick. If I can serve you further, command me.”

As My Lady bows low, she is conscious that it now behooves her to state concisely her name and station; and, loathing and hating the deception more than she could express, she still adds (her motive not unmixed with the natural curiosity to discover who is the object of Lady Diana’s morning call):

“Sir Robin McTart of Robinswold, Kent, at Your Ladyship’s service.”

Diana bows, blushes, almost ogles, minx that she is, noting well the fine eyes and beautiful mouth of the gallant at her side.

“Lady Diana Weston, Sir Robin, daughter to the Earl of Brookwood, at your service.”

Peg bows, hat in hand, bundle under arm. Swift as youth’s impulse ever is, says she, taking lightning-like measure of her chance and determined to probe matters to their core:

“Your Ladyship’s name was on the lips above,” nodding up at Kennaston’s windows. “I drank the toast with a will, I do assure you, and would double it now. Surely, if you’ll allow me to say so, Sir Percy de Bohun’s a gentleman of a rare good taste, likewise Lord Kennaston, Sir Wyatt Lovell, half-a-dozen more a-pledging Your Ladyship to the tune of _nonpareil_ all night long.”

“You flatter, Sir, I do protest!” cried the lady in the chair, blushing like the reddest rose that grows, but who might say for whose sake? since Peg had named so many.

“Oh, Sir,” Lady Diana’s voice now lowered. “Your countenance is one to inspire confidence. I pray you judge me not harshly if I venture to inquire, since you were of their company, how fares poor Sir Percy de Bohun? The fruits and flowers I fetched were for him, since I am informed he pines, eats nothing, droops, mopes, and no longer is to be enticed among the fair. Can you give me news of him?—or of—Lord Kennaston?” adds Lady Diana wilily and with another magnificent accession of color. Thus did Slyboots pursue inquiry on that lame horse which is named Subterfuge.

“Aye, Madam, that can I. ’Tis as you say; but as you yourself, if report speak true, be the cause of his distemper, methinks you should know how to effect the cure. I see Your Ladyship’s man returning; there is no more danger. I take my leave of you, Madam,” hand to heart, bundle sticking out under other arm. “It is to me one of the most fortunate chances of life to have had this encounter,” bending sweet eyes, which Diana returns with a will. “Fear nothing! the cut-throats have long since made off by a rear alley. The shouter is doubtless ere this at his cover. Did you need my further protection, ’twould be yours.”

“From my heart, Sir, I thank you,” cries Lady Diana very sweetly. “May we meet again, and soon!”

Peggy bowing, walks quickly off, her pretty teeth gritted together.

“May we meet again! Never! Fruits and flowers! forsooth! Pines and droops! forsooth! ’Slife! and how the minx reddened at his name. A-seekin’ of him out like that at cock-crow too! Lud! an these be town fashions and morals I’ll be glad to get home! No I won’t! No I won’t!” spake out Lady Peggy’s heart fit to burst bonds. “Percy’s here, and my soul’s here, and ’tain’t no use to talk about having a spirit, and a-stoppin’ lovin’ when you ain’t loved! You can’t do it!”

Peggy, recking not of her path, eyes glued to ground, paced on, having forgot the whole world else, in the misery of her discovery of Lady Diana’s passion for Sir Percy.

There were few abroad at that early hour. Some market wagons leisuring to the city; an occasional chariot full of gallants getting home after the night’s frolic; and just now, at the cross of two streets, a handsome coach thrown open-windowed, with a gentleman, the very pink and model of all elegance, lolling back amid the cushions.

By the lead of his eyes ’twas plainly to be seen he had not slept for forty-eight hours or so, but otherwise his aspect was as if newly out of a perfumed bandbox. Suddenly his gaze caught Peggy at the crossing, fixed itself upon the lace cravat at her throat, and then, with a spring as alert as that of any monkey throwing himself out of tree by his tail, this mirror of fashion thrust his head out at window, jerked his coachman’s arm, said in a voice not loud, but piercing:

“Worthing, run down the young gentleman at the crossing; don’t hurt him, but run him down an’ I’ll give you twenty shillings!” He then sank back again amid the pillows.

No sooner said than done.

Just at the instant when Peggy recalled her position and was bewilderedly wondering where she had wandered to, clutching her bundle and all of a muddle, click! grazed coach-wheels against her shins, cock went her hat into the puddle, but, heaven be praised! her wig clung, and she clung to her bundle; out of coach the pink brocade gentleman, down from the rumble his footman, pick up Lady Peggy, hat and all, rubbing the mud out of her silk stockings, clapping her hands; yet relented she not from the bundle, and all a-breath the loller cries:

“Into my coach, Sir! I do humbly crave pardon, Sir, I do indeed. I’ll not take no for an answer, Sir, not by my oath! Such a damage from one gentleman to another, Sir, demands all the reparation possible, Sir,” and forthwith Peggy is lifted into the splendid coach and the splendid gentleman springs in after her, and the footmen jump up and the whip cracks, and off they whirl before she can open her mouth.

“Mr. Brummell at your service, Sir,” continues he, feeling of Peg’s palm, noting the wound at her wrist, and the pallor of her face which shines even though the coffee stains. “We’re en route to Peter’s Court where my surgeon shall attend you. ’Slife! Sir, you’re not hurt, I’m sure. I told Worthing not to endanger a hair of your head and it’s impossible he should have disobeyed me!”

Peggy hears this singular string of speeches and, although stunned a bit and not a little alarmed in her mind, she has country breeding at her back and such a robust constitution as rallies on the spot.

“I’d be obliged, Mr. Brummell, if you’d set me down at once, Sir! I’m none the worse, and I’ve business of import calling me far hence, and with dispatch.”

“Never, Sir, never!” returns Beau Brummell, with an impressive wave of his jeweled hand. “Zounds! Sir, I had you spilled to get me the pattern and fashion of tying your cravat from you! and split me! if I let you go until I’ve mastered that adorable knot! I’ve my reputation at stake, Sir, for the tying of ’em. You’ve outdone me at your throat, Sir, and ’tis Beau Brummell, the best dressed and worst imitated man in Europe, that has the honor of telling you so. Come, come, Sir,” continues this nonesuch, famed alike at Court and brawl for his finery and drollery, “out with your name, Sir, I beg, and render me your eternally grateful.”

Lady Peggy’s gaze falls inadvertently on the bundle across her knees; it begins to bulge and burst the paper and string, indeed a tape of her petticoat is oozing out even now as she pokes it back, hiding its tell-tale under the skirt of her coat.

“’Slife!” says Peggy to herself in a terrible heat. “An I must stop a man, I must. God’s will—or the Devil’s, as dad says—be done!” and forthwith she tucks up her knee, lays hand on sword-hilt, laughs quite merrily and answers:

“Sir Robin McTart of Robinswold, Kent, at your service, Mr. Brummell. I do protest, upon my oath! ’twas a marvelous device to spill me to borrow my tie. ’Tis yours, Sir, and the fashion of it, an you’ll do me the honor to accept a lesson.”

“Sir Robin McTart!” echoes the Beau delightedly, “my old friend Sir Hector’s son and heir? I swear, boy, you favor not your sire. Peace to his soul, ’twas an ugly gentleman, while you, Sir,—Zounds! The ladies’ll make hay for you, I promise you. Where do you stop? Are you up in town long? What letters do you bring?”

“The King’s Arms, Sir, in the Strand,” replies Peg glibly, while the Beau frowns. “I’m arrived but yesterday. I brought not a letter, Sir. There you have my history.”

“No King’s Arms for Sir Hector’s son. You’ll home with me, lad; and I’ll show you what town life is. I’ll put you up at the best clubs, introduce you to the Prince; present you at Court; dine, wine, mount you,—Gadzooks, Sir Robin, the man that invented that tie of the lace!” tipping his finger at Lady Peggy’s home-made cravat, “deserves all and more than Brummell can do for him!”

At which Peggy laughed the more heartily, as that she felt the paper beneath her coat skirts crack wider, and was spent wondering what she should do when they should reach Peter’s Court, and when she might be able to get into her Levantine once again.

VI

_In the which Sir Percy de Bohun’s own man goes on his master’s errand to Kennaston Castle, crossing Sir Robin McTart on the road._

Somewhat later in the day, as the sun peeped in at the narrow windows of Kennaston’s garret in Lark Lane, it shone straight down upon the face of Peg’s twin, and also upon that of Sir Percy de Bohun, just returned, after a tub and a grooming at the hands of his faithful man Grigson, who even now was performing like offices for the young host. The other gentlemen had long since been set upon their legs and fetched off to their homes by their men.

Percy held his chin between his palms, his elbows resting upon the table where cards and glasses still littered.

“’Sdeath, Kennaston,” cries he, without moving. “I can live this fashion no longer! To be shot like a partridge would be better. Flouted by Peggy, derided by this upstart Sir Robin, who, by my life! is a pretty fellow all said and done, is past endurance! Give me a pistol, Grigson, and I’ll put an end of myself now and here.”

To this passionate declaration, Kennaston merely makes answer by lifting an arm above the tub, waving it in the air, and, as Grigson scrubs him down, wagging his wet head and remarking:

“Don’t be damned ridiculous, Percy, and pray hold your peace, since I am at this moment composing an ode to my mistress’s smile.”

“Your mistress be hanged, Sir! What know you of love to sit in a tub and make verses to her?”

“I know enough of’t,” sighs the host, “to have been in like case with yourself any time this twelve-month! and ’tis a monstrous thing for you to thus impeach me, when ’tis you whom My Lady Diana favors rather than myself.”

“Lady Diana be damned!” cries Percy rising. “She’s a coquette, Sir, and at bottom adores you, as does the fish the bait the while she plays and sidles ’round it, being sure in th’ end she’ll swallow it, hook and all.”

“Very fine, i’ faith, yet while I sigh, you’re the one she smiles upon. Oh, Percy! Had I but a fortune! Could I but make my name in letters! Then perchance I’d stand my chance; but as ’tis,”—Peg’s twin fetches a sigh that sends the water splashing about the wine-stained floor.

“As ’tis, Sir, counsel me, an you love me. Shall I hie me to Kennaston and wait upon your sister?”

“Write her a letter of fire and sword, and blood and famine; stuff it full of oaths, protests, suicides, murders, as is a Christmas pudding of plums! There’s quill, ink and paper to your hand.”

“I’ll do it and send it by Grigson on my fastest horse this day. I should have the answer before Friday?”

“Aye, you should,” allows the host with an evident reservation. “Now, for God’s sake, Sir, stop cackling and let me finish my ode.”

Which he did a-sitting in his bath, while Grigson dressed his wig.

The toilet, and the letter, and the poem, were all three finished at once, and, without more ado, Sir Percy dispatched his man with the missive to Lady Peggy.

“Come not back until you deliver it in person,” quoth the lover; “an you show yourself minus an answer, I’ll ship you to the Colonies by the next packet.”

After seeing him off the two young men repaired to the coffee-house they frequented, and there the first news that greeted them was an account, exaggerated to the last degree, as was the fashion of those times as well as these, of “Lady D—— W——’s adventure with footpads in Lark Lane, where her chair crossed en route to her mantua-maker’s; of how Sir R——n McT——t had rescued Her Ladyship and Her Ladyship’s Abigail from the clutches of these villains at the hazard of his own life; had, single-handed, put the whole gang to flight; and this, although suffering from a severe wound in the right wrist, the which this gallant young scion of a noble name had received in an affair of honor with Sir P——y de B——n only that very night previous.” In point of fact gossip cried, and print set forth, that “the town was ringing with the valor of Sir R——n McT——t, whose fame as a buck and man of fashion was no less than his expertness at the saving of Beauty in distress. For be it known that no other personage than the renowned Beau B——l had set his seal upon Sir R——n’s mould by begging from him the pattern of his cravat and the mode of his knot. That Sir R——n was now a guest at Mr. B——l’s home, and, being up in town for the season, let ladies fair beware and set their most adorable caps, for ’twas well understood so fine a young gentleman was nowhere else to be met with, nor one of such courage and skill at cards, saddle, or the dance.”