The Unknown Ajax (13 page)

“I should say she was a beauty!” Anthea said, slightly taken-aback.

“She has a good figure too,” added Hugo, dwelling with obvious pleasure on the vision he had conjured up.

“In that case I think you should lose no time in posting north—though it is probably too late already. Such a paragon cannot be wearing the willow!”

“I’m not afraid of that. I forgot to tell you that she’s not one to break her promise.” She eyed him suspiciously. “What is her name?”

“Amelia,” responded Hugo, adding after a reflective moment: “Melkinthorpe.” Anthea rose. “Well, I wish you very happy. Meanwhile, we haven’t yet looked at the ancestors. We must do so, you know, for Grandpapa is quite likely to ask you searching questions about them. Chiefly you must study the Van Dyck: here it is! Ralph Darracott, who was killed at Naseby; his wife, Penelope—she was pretty, wasn’t she?—holding Charles Darracott in her lap. There’s another one of Charles in later life, a Lely, over here.” The Major, having subjected Charles Darracott to a critical scrutiny, remarked that he knew what he thought of him.

“Very likely,” said Anthea. “His son, however, was extremely virtuous, as you may see for yourself. He was succeeded by his nephew, Ralph II. I daresay you may have been thinking that our ancestors were rather commonplace, but Ralph II, I assure you, made quite a noise in the world.” “He would,” said Hugo, regarding Ralph with disfavour.

“Yes, he was a beau of the first stare. His waistcoats were copied by all the smarts of his day; he had fought three duels, and killed his man, before he was five-and-twenty; and he is generally supposed to have murdered his first wife, either by throwing her out of the window, or by driving her to throw herself out of the window. Grandpapa, of course, holds by the latter theory, but the country-people know better. Her ghost walks, you know.” “What, here?”

Anthea laughed. “No, don’t be alarmed! This stirring event took place before Ralph became Lord Darracott. When he came into the country, which was seldom, he resided at the Dower House. He is said to have incarcerated his wife there, and to have ridden all the way from London one stormy night, and murdered her. Then he galloped away again, and shortly afterwards married his second wife. There can really be no doubt of the truth of this legend, for the sound of his horse’s hooves are frequently heard in the dead of night. He came to a violent end, like so many of our illustrious family.”

“I should think he ended on the gallows, that road,” observed the Major. “Nothing so vulgar!” replied Anthea. “He was murdered.” “Who murdered him?”

“They never discovered that. His body was found in the Home Wood, and from some cause or another he had so many enemies that it was thought the deed might have been committed by almost anyone.”

“.And does his ghost walk?”

“No, happily it doesn’t: we are quite free of spectres here at the Place! The portrait you are looking at now is of Lucinda Darracott. She married an Attlebridge, but that likeness was taken when she was eighteen. Several minor poets made her the subject of lyrics, but in later life she grew sadly stout. And here, cousin, we have my grandfather, surrounded by his progeny, his wife, and two dogs. The urchin leaning against his chair is your papa; mine is the infant being dandled by Grandmama. The coy damsel with the posy is Aunt Mary—Lady Chudleigh; beside her, Aunt Sarah, now Mrs. Wenlock; and the pretty one admiring my papa is Aunt Caroline, Lady Haddon. Your uncle Granville is the youth with one hand on his hip, and his riding-whip in the other; and the chubby lad is my uncle Matthew.” Hugo dutifully gazed upon this conversation piece, but made no comment. His eye was attracted by a kit-kat hanging beside it, and he exclaimed: “That’s good!” “Richmond? Yes, it’s very like,” she agreed. “Mr. Lonsdale painted it a year ago. There’s a miniature of him also, but Grandpapa keeps that in his own room.”

He stood looking up at the portrait. “Eh, he’s a handsome lad!” he, remarked. “Full of gig, too. What does the old gentleman mean to do with him?”

“I don’t know.”

He glanced down at her, and saw that the amusement had faded from her face. “Seemingly, the lad’s army-mad?”

“My grandfather will never permit him to join, however.”

“That’s a pity. I never knew any good to come of setting a lad’s nose to the wrong grindstone.”

“Oh; that won’t happen either!” she answered. “The likelihood is that he will be kept kicking his heels here. My grandfather dotes on him, you see.”

“Nay, if he dotes on him he’ll let him have his way!”

“How little you know Grandpapa! His affection for Richmond is perfectly selfish: he likes to have Richmond with him, and so it will be. The excuse is that Richmond’s constitution is sickly. He is as tough as whitleather, in fact, but his childhood was sickly, and that is enough for Grandpapa. Do you wish to look at any more portraits, or have you had your fill?” “I was forgetting that you’re throng this morning,” he apologized. “I’ve had my fill, and I’m reet grateful to you.”

“I’ll take you down the old stairway,” she said, moving towards the door at the end of the gallery. “This end of the house is not used nowadays, but when the third Granville Darracott started building he added so much that the earlier part became nothing more than a wing. Take care how you tread on these stairs! Much of the timber is rotten.” He came down cautiously behind her, but paused on the half-landing to look about him, at damp-stained walls, dry wood, and crumbling plaster. “It’ll take some brass to put this in order!” he remarked.

“Money? Oh, it would cost a fortune, if it could be done at all! I daresay no one would think it worth it, for none of the rooms are handsome, and most of the panelling is sadly worm-eaten. It has been going to rack for nearly a hundred years.” She showed him one or two of the parlours bare save for lumber, and he shook his head, pursing his lips in a silent whistle. She smiled. “Does it throw you into gloom? The only time anyone gives it a thought is when the windows are all cleaned. We can get back to the main part of the house through this door, if you don’t object to going past the kitchens and the scullery.” When they reached the main hall of the house again, their arrival coincided with that of Vincent and Richmond, who had just come in from the stables. Richmond was looking pleased, for although he had had to endure some stringent criticisms on his handling of the ribbons, his Corinthian cousin had said that at least he had good light hands. Vincent, wearing a blue Bird’s Eye neckcloth, and a coat with shoulder-capes past counting, rarely looked pleased, and just now looked bored. He was bored. He was quite fond of Richmond, but teaching a stripling how to drive a team in style was a task he found wearisome. He had offered the lesson on impulse, because it had nettled him to see Richmond so much inclined to take Hugo’s part against himself; and it annoyed him still more to know that he could be nettled by such a trivial matter. There was a pronounced crease between his brows as he set his hat down on a table, and began to draw off his gloves, and it deepened as he looked at Hugo and Anthea.

“How did you acquit yourself?” Anthea asked her brother. “Was your teacher odious or kind?”

“Oh, odious!” replied Richmond, laughing. “I’m a mere whipster, with no more precision of eye than a farmhand, but at least I didn’t overturn the phaeton!”

Vincent, whose penetrating glance little escaped, put up his glass and levelled it at the hem of Anthea’s dress. “It seems unlikely,” he said, “but one might almost be led to infer that you had been sweeping the carpets, dear Anthea, or even clearing ash out of the grates.” She looked down, and gave an exclamation of annoyance. “How vexatious! I thought I had taken such pains to hold my skirt up, too! No, we have not yet been reduced quite to that: I have been showing the East Wing to our cousin here, and the floors are filthy.” “The East Wing?” said Richmond. “What the devil for? There’s nothing to be seen there!” “Oh, Grandpapa desired me to take him to the picture-gallery, and when we had reached the end of it I thought it a good opportunity to show him the original part of the house. He certainly ought to see it, but I’m sorry I did take him there now, for I must change my dress again.”

“You don’t mean to say you dragged poor cousin Hugo all over the tumbledown barrack?” “No, of course not. I let him see the parlours, that’s all—and quite enough to bring on a fit of the dismals, wasn’t it, cousin?”

“Well, it’s melancholy to see the place falling into ruin,” Hugo admitted. “Still, I’d like to go all over it one day.”

“You had better not,” Richmond advised him. “The last time I went to rummage amongst the lumber for something I wanted I nearly put my leg through a rotten floorboard in one of the attics. At all events, don’t venture without me! I’

ll show you over, if you’re set on it. Then, if you go through the floor, and break a limb, I can summon all the able-bodied men on the estate to come and carry you to your room!” “It ’ud take a tidy few,” agreed Hugo, grinning.

“Why this desire to inspect a ruin?” enquired Vincent. “Pride of prospective possession, or do you perhaps mean to restore it, in due course?” “Nay, I don’t know,” Hugo said vaguely.

“Obviously you don’t. The cost of restoring it—a singularly useless thing to do, by the by!—would very soon run you off your legs.”

“Happen you’re reet,” said Hugo amicably. “I’m just by way of being interested in out first-ends. It’s early days to be making plays.”

“Just so!” said Vincent, with so much meaning in his voice that Richmond intervened quickly, asking Hugo if he had seen the Van Dyck.

“He means the portrait of the first Ralph Darracott,” explained Vincent smoothly. “An unnecessary piece of information, Vincent!” said Anthea.

“Ay, so it is,” nodded Hugo. “Now, wait a piece, while I cast my mind back! Ay, I have it! That was the picture of the gentleman with the long curls. What’s more,” he added, with naive pride in this feat of memory, “it’s the one my cousin told me I must look at particularly. Van Dyck would be the man who painted it. I’ve heard of him before, think on.” Richmond hurried into speech. “I don’t know much about pictures myself, or care for them, but I like Ralph!. He was a great gun! Most of our ancestors were either ramshackle fellows, or dead bores. Did Anthea tell you about the second Ralph? Not that she knows the half of it! If ever there was a loose fish—! A regular thatch-gallows!”

“Yes!” Anthea interrupted. “And isn’t it mortifying to reflect on the number of Darracotts who look like him? You favour the first Ralph, and so did Oliver, a little; but Uncle Granville, and Papa, and Aunt Caroline, and Grandpapa himself are clearly descended from Ralph II, while as for Vincent—”

“—you have only to place a powdered wig on his head and no one would know them apart,” supplied Vincent. “Thank you, my love! I must derive what consolation I may from the knowledge that at least I resemble one of my forebears!”

At this point a welcome interruption occurred. Claud, hearing voices in the hall, came out of one of the saloons, and, addressing himself to Hugo, said severely: “Been looking for you all over!”

“What’s amiss?” Hugo asked.

“Just what I expected!” said Claud. “Didn’t I tell you the odds were my grandfather would blame me if you was to vex him? Dash it if he hasn’t told me he shall hold me responsible for you!”

“Ee, that’s bad!” said Hugo, shaking his head. “If I were you, I’d make off back to London as fast as ever I could, lad.”

Claud looked a little doubtful. “Well, I could do that,” he admitted. “A least—No, it wouldn’t fadge. Don’t want my father to take a pet, and he would, because he don’t want to offend the old man. There’s another thing, too.”

He paused, and it was evident from his darkling brow that he was brooding over a serious affront. His brother, halfway up the stairs, stood looking down at him contemptuously. “Don’t keep us in suspense!” he begged. “What inducement has been held out to you?” “He didn’t hold out any inducement. No inducement he could hold out. I haven’t swallowed a spider! I don’t haunt Pontius Pilate’s doorstep! I don’t have to hang on my grandfather’s sleeve!” He perceived that Vincent had turned and was about to descend the stairs again, and temporized. “Well, what I mean is, I haven’t yet! No saying when I might have to, of course!”

“Fighting shy, brother?” said Vincent.

“I’m not fighting at all,” replied Claud frankly. “I don’t say I wouldn’t like to see someone plant you a facer because I would, but I don’t care for boxing myself, never did! Besides, I’m not up to your weight”

“Remember that, and don’t crow so loudly, little dunghill-cock!” said Vincent, resuming his progress upstairs,

“One of these days,” said Claud, as soon as Vincent was out of earshot, “somebody will do Vincent a mischief!”

“Gammon!” retorted Richmond. “It was you who stirred the coals, not Vincent! Cutting at him like that!”

“Well, I’ve been vexed to death!” said Claud. “I don’t mind it when my grandfather comes the ugly. I don’t mind his cursing me. I don’t mind it when he says I’ve got no brains. I don’t mind his calling me a fribble, or a popinjay, or a Bartholomew baby. But when he tells me I look like a demi-beau—a demi-beau!—”

“Claud!” breathed Anthea, deeply shocked. “He did not say that?”

“Oh, yes, he did! To my face! Said he didn’t want Hugh tricked out to look like me, too. Said I could mend Hugh’s speech, but he wouldn’t have me teaching him to look like a counter-coxcomb! That to me! He must be queer in his attic!”

“Depend upon it, that’s it!” she said. “If I were you I wouldn’t stay another day where you have been so insulted!”