The Oxfordshire Scheme

15

The Oxfordshire Scheme

    Mrs Mayes had thought the matter over very deeply, and had hit upon a scheme which Dr Fairbrother did not neglect to inform her bore the mark of genius.

    “Well, I dunno about that, sir!” she said, shaking all over. “But it do seem to me as we shall need to be pretty tricky, if we is to outwit this grand lord! And best we are pretty nippy, as well, acos ’e’ll doubtless be on their tracks the minute ’e finds they ain’t with their old cousin, after all.”

    “Precisely,” said Dr Fairbrother, grinning all over his pleasant, irregular face.

    “The plan has the added attraction,” noted Pansy with a naughty twinkle in her eye, “of enabling Mrs Mayes to spring-clean your house after all, Dr Fairbrother.”

    “Aye!” gasped the housekeeper, going off into a wheezing fit. “Won’t it, just!”

    The other ladies were still abed, the hour being extremely early, but Miss Tarlington had risen. This could have had something to do with a small, furry paw’s being poked in her eye at about the time the sun peeked through her attic window. Giggling, she asked: “Did he not want his house spring-cleaned, Pansy?”

    “No: he never does!” she choked.

    “The woman is unstoppable,” noted Dr Fairbrother, eyeing the shaking billows of Mrs Mayes in great appreciation.

    “I think you are positively brilliant, Mrs Mayes!” cried Fliss.

    Mrs Mayes, gasping and wheezing, eventually managed to pull herself together to the point of mopping her eyes with a corner of her apron. “Thank you, me deary! Well, I shall send for Bessy and Sally immediate!”

    “Make sure they make a great fuss about their arrival, Mrs Mayes,” said Dr Fairbrother, still on the broad grin.

    “That I will, never you fear! They may come on Will’s cart with the big horse in it. and they may bring us a load of straw for the monkeys while they is at it, with young Will and Bobby to unload it! The whole street will notice ’em, mark my words!”

    “Good,” said Dr Fairbrother, patting her shoulder.

    “Now, you may take yourselves off to the dining-room and pretend you is ladies and gentlemen,” said Mrs Mayes with a grin, “and I’ll send in a nice breakfast direct. And Hyacinth had best stay in here, me love, acos with him you never knows: ’tis possible he’s got a monkey about his person as we speaks,” she said to Fliss, nodding darkly.

    Mrs Mayes’s brilliant plan was that her nieces, Bessy and Sally Mayes, should appear at the house in their print dresses and cotton sunbonnets in a very public manner. After a decent interval, two figures in print gowns and sunbonnets would duly depart, farewelled loudly by their loving aunt. At Will Mayes’s little farm they would quietly metamorphose back into Ladies Jane and Sarah Claveringham, and Will Mayes, Senior, would drive them off to meet Mr Quayle-Sturt at an agreed rendezvous point, with a carriage that that gentleman should have hired from a place out of Oxford, just in case Lord Whatsisface was a-checkin’ up on all carriages hired from Oxford. Mrs Mayes’s, clearly, was the sort of mind that thinks of every contingency, and it was little wonder that the zoologist had labelled her a genius.

    Meantime, after a certain amount of spring-cleaning had taken place, Bessy and Sally, in the guise of Lady Jane and Lady Sarah, not to say their bonnets and gowns, would lay a false trail. They and the Miss Ogilvies would depart in a carriage with a local postboy. Having changed horses (and postboys) twice, the carriage would continue with but two young ladies in it, making its way by a circuitous route back to Oxford. The second change would have left Bessy and Sally but a handy walk from their Aunty Bella’s cottage. Young Will would collect them from there in due course and unobtrusively drive them home to their parents’ farm.

    Mrs Mayes thought that was as complicated as it need be, for supposing that Lord Whatsisface picked up on the fact that two young ladies had disappeared at the second change of the horses, he would find it very difficult to track ’em to Bella’s cottage! Only she could make it trickier, if Dr Fairbrother thought it needed it? Dr Fairbrother didn’t think it did. But would not Bella’s neighbours think it odd? Shaking, Mrs Mayes had revealed that that was the cream of the jest: for it was the most isolated spot, she dared say, in the whole of the country! Not another cottage even visible! Which, considerin’ Bella’s Joe’s activities of an evening in the woods or down by the river, was probably just as well. Acos the Earl of Blefford was a hard man, and had sent many a poor fellow off to Botany Bay, for naught but the takin’ of a trout.

    Mrs Mayes dispatched young Jacky to her brother’s farm immediately, and Bessy and Sally duly appeared at Dr Fairbrother’s house, overjoyed to learn that, far from working all day as they had expected would be their fate, they were to do only a couple of hours before changing into the most beautiful gowns and bonnets they had ever seen, and going for a great long drive in a carriage!

    And Lady Jane and Lady Sarah, the former trembling very much but the latter grimly determined, got themselves into sunbonnets and print dresses, accepted baskets of cake and preserves from Mrs Mayes for her brother Will’s wife, and were handed into the cart by the Mayes boys. Both of them were something like six foot tall with girths that could have made twice of the Claveringham ladies, but nevertheless they were soon perceived to be in a state of red and grinning shyness. The which made Lady Sarah, at the least, feel very much braver.

    Delphie was a little disturbed by the plan—not by its underhandedness, for she was enough her father’s daughter to find it merely brilliant—but by the fact of not being able to see Great-Uncle Humphrey until that evening if she went with Pansy and the girls. So Fliss volunteered eagerly to take her place and, giggling very much, eagerly mounted into the carriage with Pansy and the two country girls.

    They were barely on the outskirts of Oxford before Fliss had the notion of improving on Mrs Mayes’s plan by making it seem they had set out on a shopping expedition! Pansy groaned, but agreed. Eagerly Fliss produced Dr Fairbrother’s map.

    “It’s a pity your aunt’s cottage is in the other direction entirely from Reading, for it is quite a large town,” she said sadly to Bessy and Sally.

    “Never mind, I dare say there will be sufficient shops at these other places,” said Pansy hastily.

    “Yes. And—um... I know! You may pretend you are interested in historical edifices, Pansy!”

    “Do these places have any, though?”

    “Um—well, Oxfordshire is very historical, is it not? I dare say there may well be any number of ancient buildings.”

    “Ye-es... Well, each town must have a church,” she noted dubiously.

    “That is it! You are desperately interested in old churches, and we have come merely to accompany you and to do a little shopping!”

    “That’s an excellent idea, Fliss,” Pansy conceded. “At least it will give the postboys some idea that the journey has a purpose to it.”

    “Aye: that be not half cunnin’, Miss,” agreed Bessy in admiration. “Shall us have to look at churches, too, then?”

    “Certainly,” said Pansy, searching in her reticule. She produced the pince-nez of her “Miss Ogilvie” days and perched them on her nose. “Girls, I desire you shall all look at churches with me, for it is most educational,” she said severely.

    Fliss gave a shriek, and collapsed in a mad fit of giggles. The Misses Mayes duly followed suit: though they did not know all of the jest, the sight of Miss Pansy looking down her up-turned nose through them eye-glasses was more than enough, by itself.

    ... “Young ladies,” explained the postboy glumly to his fellow at the first change. “Lookin’ at churches or such like, they be.”

    “Eh?”

    “Don’t ask me why,” he recommended. “Dessay they’ll be askin’ you to stop I dunno where: we turned off three times because Missy with them eye-glasses on her nose thought there might be a h’interestin’ church or some such down odd lanes.”

    “Glory,” he said numbly.

    “Ah: and you thought you was ’ard up, Ned Witherspoon, just because you ’ad to take ole Dr Percy White-Whiskers to Reading and back at three mile an hour, last week!” he noted.

    Ned Witherspoon shook his head glumly, and spat.

    “Young ladies,” he repeated glumly to his peer at the next change. “They be lookin’ at churches or some such. And if you goes more’n five mile an hour they hollers at you, acos they don’t want to miss none on the road. And that one with the pink hat, she’ll insist on visitin’ every blamed shop a place has to offer, what’s more, so don’t expect ’em back here a-wantin’ of their carriage for a whiles, neither!”

    The third postboy was of a more placid disposition than Ned Witherspoon. He just replied: “Ah.”

    ... “I hopes as your young ladies don’t want a change this instant,” said the new postboy at the next change. (The fatal change, did he but know it.)

    “This instant! Ho, you won’t ’alf be lucky!” said the placid one, roused out of his placidity.

    “Eh?”

    “Wait and see. Look, she is already sayin’ as the Blefford Arms be a old and h’extinguished buildin’: mark my words, you is for it. Wantin’ their change right away? Ho!”

    “That’s as well, for we got but two teams in the stables, and one leader’s lost two shoes. And t’other team be just a-come back from its stage, and needs restin’ before it goes on.”

    “It’ll be rested,” he noted. “Do you a goodly drop of ale here, do they?”

    “Best in the county!” he said huffily.

    “Ah.” The placid one went into the tap.

    He thus did not remark that, all four young ladies having gone off in the general direction of the church, they parted ways at the end of the street. Two of them disappeared in the direction of the church, true. The other two simply disappeared.

    … “Yes,” said the Reverend Mr Baynes ten minutes later, very happy to find a lady who was so much interested in his little church: “it is generally reckoned one of the finest Norman edifices, for its size, you know, in this part of the country!”

    “Good,” said Pansy brightly, smiling a lot and trying not to wonder how far Bessy and Sally had got and what, on the other side of Oxfordshire, was happening to Lady Jane and Lady Sarah.

    … “There is also a remarkably delightful chapel—later, of course: Elizabethan.” said Mr Baynes, having shown the ladies his church in horrendously minute detail, “up at Blefford Park.”

    “Indeed?” said Pansy brightly.

    “I am sure it would not take—well, scarce fifteen minutes’ drive to get there, you know, and you may look round it in say, half an hour,” he said hopefully. “I would be delighted to show it you. And of course the mansion is very fine—a great ornament to Oxfordshire, you know.”

    “But Pansy, we were going to have our luncheon! I’m so dreadfully hungry!” gasped Fliss, seized with pure horror at the thought of yet another hour of churches in Mr Baynes’s company on a virtually empty stomach.

    Ten minutes after that Miss Pansy Ogilvie and Miss Tarlington were seated in the front parlour of the vicarage, having slices of Mrs Baynes’s best seedy-cake pressed on them. And scarce twenty minutes after that they were all on their way, postboy, coach, Mr Baynes (on his sturdy roan) and all, to see the famous Elizabethan gilded ceiling in the famous Elizabethan chapel at Blefford Park.

    ... “Do not speak!” warned Pansy, throwing herself onto Dr Fairbrother’s sofa with a groan, hours and hours and hours after that.

    “Did it go all right, Miss Pansy?” asked Mrs Mayes. “You’re a terrible lot later home than what we reckoned.”

    “Splendidly,” she groaned. “Up until the episode of Mr Baynes and the Elizabethan ceiling of the Elizabethan chapel at Blefford Park.”

    “Eh?” said Dr Fairbrother.

    “Gilded Elizabethan ceiling, she means,” groaned Fliss, sinking limply into an easy chair by the fire. “Oh, my feet!”

    Pansy merely groaned.

    “And I think I have a crick in my neck from peering at gilded ceilings. And wopses,” said Fliss glumly, removing her pink bonnet and rubbing the back of her neck.

    Delphie came over to her. “Let me. –I think you mean apses.”

    “Wopses,” groaned Pansy. “For they leave one about as comfortable as the sting of a wasp.”

    “Why the Devil were you looking at wopses?” asked Dr Fairbrother. “Good name for ’em,” he noted by the by.

    “We thought—well, it was Fliss’s notion, and I concede a splendid one, in theory,” groaned Pansy, “that we should offer the postboys some reasonable explanation as to why we were jaunting round the countryside. Otherwise, if Lord Whatsisface were to question them, he might become suspicious, you see. So we decided it would be an expedition to view historical edifices. But as we didn’t know of any particular historical edifices in the district, we thought we had best stick to churches, since there is one in every town or village. –Unfortunately,” she noted with a heavy sigh, “there is one in every village.”

    “Nay: hamlet,” sighed Fliss.

    “Hamlet,” agreed Pansy.

    “Well, it was a great notion, though!” said Dr Fairbrother with a laugh.

    Pansy gave him a jaundiced look. “My feet do not agree with vou.”

    “Nor mine,” moaned Fliss. “Thank you, Delphie, that is helping,” she added, as Delphie massaged her neck.

    “I suppose you wouldn’t like to rub my feet?” groaned Pansy.

    “Nay, that she wouldn’t!” said Mrs Mayes with her comfortable laugh. “But you may both come along into the kitchen and soak your feet in a mustard bath, and then I’ll serve dinner right up! Pigeon pie, it be, with a gooseberry cream to follow. And mind you don’t let Percy have none of the cream.”

    “The fruit is too acid for his stomach, we think,” said Dr Fairbrother. “Doesn’t seem to be the egg in it. He will eat a Spanish cream or similar, or a meringue, with pleasure.”

    Miss Tarlington received without surprize the news that Percival Cummings The Second ate pudding like a Christian and allowed herself to be led off to soak her feet in the kitchen. After which the pigeon pie was consumed without waiting for Mr Quayle-Sturt: for, as Mrs Mayes noted, if he wasn’t back by now she hoped as he would have had the sense to get hisself a dinner on the road, and if he hadn’t, well, he would have to take pot-luck!

    “He is very late,” said Pansy worriedly some time later as she sat before the fire with Percy on her knee.

    “Had a way to go,” said Dr Fairbrother.

    “Where did you send him?” she asked eagerly.

    “If I don’t tell you, you can truthfully claim you don’t know,” he said placidly—not for the first time.

    “This will be him!” said Fliss as a knock was heard at the front door.

    But it was not Mr Quayle-Sturt at all: it was her brother and her Cousin Harpingdon.

    “What are you doing here?” she gasped at the sight of the latter.

    “He’s on his way to Blefford Park, of course,” replied her brother. “And I must say that is pretty cool from you, Miss! Hunted for you high and low all over Oxford, until I happened on the hotel where Harley had thought to leave a message for me. Which is more than you did!”

    “Surely you knew I would be with Dr Fairbrother?”

    “Couldn’t for the life of me recall his name. –Hullo: you are he, I gather?” he said with a grin, holding out his hand to Dr Fairbrother. “I’m Aden Tarlington.”

    “Don’t shake it, Dr Fairbrother: he’s a traitor!” cried Fliss.

    Pansy and Delphie had risen politely as the visitors came into the room: at this they looked at each other in horror.

    “Who is this gentleman, Fliss?” demanded Pansy.

    “He is our Cousin Harpingdon, and I would never have believed it of my own brother!” cried Fliss loudly, tears in her eyes.

    Pansy was still holding Percy: indeed, the little creature was clinging to her, at the sight of strangers. At this she squeezed him convulsively and poor Percy gave an indignant shriek, struggled out of her grasp, and fled to his master.

    “Come on then, poor little fellow!” said Dr Fairbrother, opening his coat. “Ssh, then: cheep, cheep, cheep! –Surprized at you, Pansy: should know better.”

    “Dr Fairbrother, do you not realize who this man is?” she cried.

    “Er—”

    “Sir, it’s Lord Harpingdon: he must have come in pursuit of them!” panted Fliss.

    “Eh? Not old enough, is he?” he said, very puzzled.

    “What? No! Not their papa! The man whom she does not wish to marry!”

    “It’s all right, calm down: he doesn’t wish to marry her, either. That was why he called on Lady Hubbel this morning.” Mr Tarlington went over to Dr Fairbrother, and said, smiling: “Marmoset, is he, sir? Will he come to me?”

    “Doubt it. Doesn’t like strangers, as a rule.” Dr Fairbrother opened his coat cautiously. “Come on then, Percy, sweetheart! Cheep, cheep, cheep!”

    “The French call ’em les ouistitis: good name, is it not?” said Mr Tarlington. “Oui-sti-ti!” he chirped at Percy. “Come along, then! Oui-sti-ti!”

    Pansy began in a low, scornful voice: “He will not—”

    But Percy had scampered up Mr Tarlington’s front and onto his shoulder and was nibbling at his ear.

    “You’ve got a knack,” said Dr Fairbrother with interest. “Have monkeys of your own, do you?”

    “No. Well, three young brothers, sir,” he murmured, eyes twinkling. “—There, now! There now! Oui-sti-ti!” he said, stroking Percy gently.

    Lord Harpingdon was looking on with a smile. Fliss swallowed and said plaintively: “Cousin Christian, is it true you have not come in pursuit of— Of anyone?” she ended lamely.

    “Too late,” noted Pansy drily.

    “Well, yes!” he said with a chuckle: “I think you have well and truly given yourself away, Cousin! But don’t worry: Aden has told me the whole. And it is as he said: I have told Lady Hubbel that any expectations she may have had were aroused without my consent.”

    “We gathered from Fliss that it was all her idea in the first place,” said Pansy with interest.

    “I think perhaps it was: yes. But Mamma and Papa certainly encouraged her to hope where they should not have.”

    “I see,” she said, nodding. “That explains a lot.”

    He smiled at her. “Indeed. –I think you must be Miss Pansy Ogilvie?”

    “Oh! I’m sorry!” gasped Fliss, hastily performing proper introductions.

    “Why are you going to Blefford Park, sir? Are you interested in Elizabethan chapels?” asked Pansy as the company seated itself and Dr Fairbrother ascertained that the gentlemen had not dined, having been too busy scouring Oxford for the young ladies, and rang for Mrs Mayes.

    “I feel I must apprise my Papa of my conversation with Lady Hubbel, Miss Pansy.”

    Pansy stared at him. “But—”

    “His papa is Lord Blefford,” said Fliss, swallowing. “I did not mention it, Pansy, because—”

    “Good gracious: the owner of the gilded Elizabethan ceiling?” she cried. “But he is a monstrous man who has cottagers transported merely for the stealing of a fish!”

    There was a short silence in the room. apart from Mr Tarlington’s murmuring: “Ssh! Ssh! Oui, oui: oui-sti-ti, n’est-ce pas? Oui-sti-ti!” to Percy.

    “Yes,” agreed Delphie bravely, going very red. “We hear that is so, sir.”

    “Only hearsay,” said Dr Fairbrother, shaking his head.

    “Hearsay!” cried Pansy angrily. “We had it from—”

    Dr Fairbrother coughed loudly.

    “Um—the relatives of a person who actually lives in the district,” said Pansy, scowling horribly.

    “My father does transport poachers: yes,” said Lord Harpingdon grimly. “I can assure you I do not agree with the practice.”

    “That’s true. What he does down at his own place—Harpingdon Manor, that is,” explained Mr Tarlington, strolling over to the fire: “is give the damned fellows cottages.”

    “That was but one instance, Aden, and there was true need in the case,” he murmured.

    Mr Tarlington eyed him affectionately. “Aye. True need.”

    Pansy thought it over. “What do you do in the other cases?” she asked Lord Harpingdon.

    “Much the same as Aden, here,” he replied, his eyes twinkling very much. “Have ’em on the mat, haul ’em over the coals. In the worst cases I have been known to consign them to the cells for a short spell. –I’m not Torquemada, Miss Pansy,” he said to her face of dawning horror: “I’m a magistrate.”

    “Oh,” said Pansy limply.

    “But in the main, I find that being found out and the subsequent confiscation of the game is the best punishment. Though my keepers now, I think, all realize that I would really rather they did not catch the poor fellows at all,” he murmured.

    “I see. You are not a bad man at all, then,” she said, sighing.

    “No,” agreed Fliss. ‘‘And—and Mamma says Aden is much too lax with the local people, so—”

    ‘‘So that proves he is not a bad man, either!” said Pansy with a laugh. “But indeed, we know it already, sir!” she said, smiling at him. “The villagers at Guillyford Bay, though properly despising their cousins ‘up to the Place, like,’ who are not fisherfolk, have nothing but good words for ‘the young master’.”

    “Thank you, ma’am,” he said with a grin. “So Christian and I are to be—er—accepted back amongst the company, are we?”

    “Aden, that is horrid!” cried Fliss.

    “Ssh, you’ll upset the ouistiti,” he said, grinning.

    Pansy got up. “Is there a French dictionary in your study?” she asked Dr Fairbrother. He nodded, and she went out with a determined expression on her face.

    “It’s not very good. The French notion of lexicography seems to be somewhat sporadic,” he murmured.

    “What about the Encyclopédie?” said Mr Tarlington, grinning.

    “That is quite a different case.” Dr Fairbrother winked.

    “Does it have les ouistitis in it?” asked Lord Harpingdon with interest.

    “Can’t tell you that, Lord Harpingdon: never looked. Did not know the word to look under.” He winked again, as Harpingdon collapsed in helpless sniggers.

    “Then you cannot have known what to look under in the French dictionary, either,” said Delphie crossly. “Or is it an English-French dictionary?”

    “No,” he said simply, grinning.

    At this Mr Tarlington suddenly also collapsed in helpless sniggers.

    “That is not amusing,” said Fliss grimly to Delphie.

    “No,” she agreed with a frown.

    Dr Fairbrother had preserved his calm remarkably well up until this point but at this he, too, collapsed in sniggers.

    When Mrs Mayes bustled in looking hot and bothered the three gentlemen were still sniggering and the two ladies were continuing to glare at them. Or rather, the more the two ladies glared, the more the gentlemen’s eyes streamed. Percy had taken refuge on the mantelpiece. “Well, and they says girls is gigglers!” she said, rolling her eyes. “Miss Delphie, will gentlemen eat pigs’ ears?”

    “Yes! I have eaten far worse in the Peninsula!” gasped Mr Tarlington.

    “Um—well, they are nourishing and tasty,” said Delphie on a weak note.

    “Won’t they take too long to cook, though, ma’am?” asked Mr Tarlington, blowing his nose.

    “No, acos they is done and cold. I only has to butter and crumb ’em and put them to the fire.”

    Lord Harpingdon also blew his nose. “They sound most delicious.”

    “Aye: might have one meself,” decided Dr Fairbrother.

    “Well, you won’t, acos the other gentleman may be wantin’ it, and we has but three!” she said smartly.

    “Er—one three-eared pig?” he murmured.

    Mrs Mayes sniffed.

    “One two-eared, and one one-eared pig?” suggested Lord Harpingdon, eyes twinkling.

    “Rats. Three one-eared pigs: they breed ’em hereabouts, have you never heard of the one-eared pigs of Oxfordshire, Harpy?” said Mr Tarlington briskly.

    Lord Harpingdon promptly collapsed in renewed sniggers.

    Mrs Mayes glared. “Young Jacky had the other to his supper, acos the pigeon pie was for the young ladies.”

    “I think that was self-evident,” said Delphie in a weak voice.

    “Yes!” squeaked Fliss. Suddenly she and Delphie went into helpless paroxysms.

    Mrs Mayes took a deep breath.

    “Pigs’ ears will be splendid for the gentlemen. And—um—dare say they will eat any vegetable,” said Dr Fairbrother hurriedly.

    Mrs Mayes sniffed. “I dessay as I might manage a few eggs with them greens.”

    “A salad would be better for them, you know.”

    “Gents as has been travellin’ all day does not want to eat raw greens like a cow, Dr Fairbrother!” she retorted sharply.

    “Er—no. Well, that and a few potatoes perhaps, Mrs Mayes.”

    “It all sounds wonderful, Mrs Mayes,” said Lord Harpingdon quickly, smiling at her.

    She sniffed, but allowed: “They’ve ate all the gooseberry cream, sir, only there be plenty of gooseberries left, so I could manage a tart, if you ain’t too particular.”

    “Too particular? I adore gooseberry tart!”

    “That’s good,” noted Dr Fairbrother. “And let them have some of that cheese Will’s Mary sent.”

    “Gentry don’t eat cheese,” she replied repressively.

    “But Mrs Mayes, it is a lovely cheese!” said Delphie quickly.

    “I for one am very fond of cheese,” said Harpingdon.

    “Well, I suppose you could try it, sir. Only I never did hear of a gentleman what ate cheese with his tart,” she said, shaking her head. “Come along, Miss Delphie, and you too, Miss Fliss: you may give me a hand, acos them gooseberries won’t top and tail theirselves!”

    Meekly Miss Ogilvie and Miss Tarlington accompanied her to the kitchen.

    “You are fated to consume this cheese with your tart, Harpy,” concluded his cousin.

    “So it seems,” he said, smiling.

    “Just don’t give Percy any tart,” said Dr Fairbrother, repeating his theory as to the acidity of the fruit.

    The gentlemen sat down and began to ask him with interest about Percy, and his research. After a little Wynn Fairbrother, perceiving that they were neither ignorant nor humouring him, two attitudes which he had encountered in the past and which he had discovered also were not mutually exclusive, relaxed and produced a bottle of Madeira which his brother-in-law had sent him.

    In the kitchen Delphie and Fliss, swathed in Mrs Mayes’s aprons, topped and tailed industriously. Jacky, who kept early hours, had crawled into his trundle bed under the big kitchen table, and Mrs Mayes considerately left him there. In the study Pansy, who had become absorbed, read the French dictionary. In the sitting-room Dr Fairbrother, pouring hospitably, urged the gentlemen to call him Wynn…

    Everybody jumped when there was a knock at the front door.

    “Hope to God that is only Harley,” said Mr Tarlington.

    “Not half so much as I do,” admitted Dr Fairbrother, rising to answer it. “I tell you what, Aden: if it’s Lord Whatsisface, you can explain the thing to him!”

    “Lost your bottle, Wynn?” asked Mr Tarlington, grinning.

    “Never had any!” he admitted with a loud laugh, going out.

    “That is not quite true, I think,” murmured Lord Harpingdon.

    “No, indeed. Not one fellow in ten thousand would have taken those young women’s part, once he discovered who their father was.”

    “‘Lord Whatsisface’,” he murmured, smiling. “Er—I suppose he does know, Aden?”

    “Oh, he knows,” said Mr Tarlington.

    Pansy shot out of the study into the hall with a poker in her hand as Dr Fairbrother opened the front door.

    “Oh, it’s you,” they said simultaneously.

    “Yes: whom were you expecting?” replied Harley Quayle-Sturt calmly.

    “Lord Whatsisface,” they chorused.

    “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I have not yet been elevated to the peerage,” he said, coming in smiling.

    “Did you get them away safely?” asked Pansy eagerly.

    “Yes, indeed. It all went without a hitch. Mrs Mayes is a very smooth organizer.”

    “Where was it you left them?” she asked artlessly.

    “Ignore that, Harley. She thinks you’re as green as you’re cabbage-looking,” said Dr Fairbrother, grinning.

    Pansy sniffed. “Well, how was Lady Jane when you left her, sir?”

    “Bearing up very well. In fact, she ate a decent nuncheon at Will Mayes’s farm, and when I left them at their destination, which was around five o’clock this afternoon, she was sitting up in bed with a cup of hot soup, protesting that she was being coddled!”

    Pansy smiled but said: “You left them as early as five o’clock? Would that have got them far enough away for safety?”

    “It’s a very secure and—er—reliable location,” said Dr Fairbrother.

    “Yes, indeed!” agreed Harley, smiling.

    Pansy looked cross. “Well, where is it?”

    “A considerable drive from Oxford, do not worry. I rode cross-country after I had returned the carriage, and made quite good time, though it may not seem so,” he said, glancing at the clock in the hall.

    “I hope you didn’t ride straight here,“ she said with a worried look.

    Mr Quayle-Sturt laughed. “I’m not such a gudgeon, even if I am cabbage-looking! I left the horse at my hotel, and walked here.” He looked at the zoologist with an uncomfortable expression. “Er—and that reminds me, Wynn—”

    “Mm? Oh: run out of gelt? Dare say I can find a guinea or two,” he said, feeling in his pockets.

    “No, no! My dear fellow: nothing like that. Er…”

    “There is no need to shelter me from anything unpleasant: I am neither a child nor an imbecile,” said Pansy grimly.

    “No: I beg your pardon, Miss Pansy. Well, I did not stay overlong at the hotel, being in a hurry to report here, but I fear Lord Hubbel is there: the staff were very full of it: evidently he is kicking up a great dust and has had messengers running to and fro all over town for the last several hours.”

    Pansy swallowed but said gamely: “Just as well we got them away today, then.”

    “Quite,” agreed Dr Fairbrother. “Come on in the warm, Harley. Oh—those other fellows are here.”

    “Other— Oh: is Aden back?”

    “Aye. And his—uh—cousin, I think he is. A very good fellow.” Dr Fairbrother led him into the sitting-room and poor Mr Quayle-Sturt was turned to stone to find the other fellow was Lord Harpingdon.

    Explanations were quickly offered, however—though not by Dr Fairbrother—and very soon the three travellers were sitting down to their dinners. Mr Quayle-Sturt disgraced himself by trying to steal Mr Tarlington’s pig’s ear while that gentleman was concentrating on his poached eggs with greens, but this merely served to make Mrs Mayes, who was ostensibly dishing up but actually listening avidly to all Mr Quayle-Sturt had to report, shake with gratified chuckles.

    “Ah,” she said at the end of his report with a deep sigh. “So they be safe, poor lambs.”

    “Safe at the far side of Oxfordshire: mm,” he said with a glance at Pansy and Fliss, both of whom had tried yet again to get precise details out of him.

    Pansy did not jump at the bait: she merely said grimly: “Next I collect we may expect Lord Whatsisface to come down upon us.”

    “He’ll have to pick up their trail yet, Miss Pansy: that’ll take him a day or two!” said Mrs Mayes confidently.

    “Er—I fear, from what I heard at the hotel, that he may rather be upon Aden’s trail,” murmured Mr Quayle-Sturt apologetically.

    “Hell! Never thought to cover my tracks!” said that gentleman in dismay.

    “You mean to say,” said Mr Quayle-Sturt in horror: “that you went to see Lady Hubbel and then came straight back down here?”

    “Well!” said Mrs Mayes in disgust.

    “I—er—didn’t think. Well, I went to Tall Oaks first, because I assumed—”

    “Laying a trail a mile wide as you did so,” noted Dr Fairbrother, cracking a nut for his pet. “Come on, Percy! Cheep, cheep, cheep!”

    Mr Tarlington swallowed.

    “Well, what can’t be cured must be endured,” said Mrs Mayes, giving him a hard look. “Only it’s as well that some has a head on their shoulders!”

    “Aye,” he said ruefully. “I’m damned sorry, Wynn. Well, I suppose I did not quite blaze a trail to your door, for I had difficulty finding you, but—”

    “But them horses you had hitched up in your fancy carriage when you druv it up to our door was from the Mitre, eh?” pursued the relentless Mrs Mayes.

    “Um—yes.”

    “Aden, really!” cried Fliss.

    “He was not aware of the situation,” murmured Lord Harpingdon, beginning to lose control of his mouth.

    “He might have deduced it, though!” cried his sister.

    “Yes. –Stop laughing, damn it, Harpy! I suppose I might,” admitted Mr Tarlington glumly.

    Mrs Mayes sniffed. No other comment was necessary, really.

    At the far side of Oxfordshire, Lady Jane and Lady Sarah were both asleep in the narrow little beds which belonged to the lock-keeper’s children. Downstairs, the lock-keeper was smoking a last pipe and smiling over Dr Fairbrother’s note, before retiring himself.

    The lock-keeper was an old and trusted friend of Dr Fairbrother’s, a man with whom he had grown up and, though his present station in life belied it, in fact the son of Wynn Fairbrother’s late father’s agent. He had tried various occupations, and had at one time been at sea for a considerable period—though not until he had been up at the university and done a degree every bit as good as Wynn Fairbrother’s own. But he had never wished for any of the professions his father had urged upon him. He had discovered the lock when he was following the occupation of bargee, and discovered also the lock-keeper’s daughter. There was nothing particularly unusual about Martha Venn: she was a simple, ruddy-checked country lass. But she had a good heart and a generous spirit and George Hanley felt he could do worse. So he had married her—or perhaps it would have been more accurate to say, gone through a form of marriage with her, for he had other wives in other parts of the world—and after a little adventuring together on the waterways of England they had settled down to take over her father’s lock. Doubtless the authorities, who were very strict in such matters, were not aware of the new lock-keeper’s history: they accepted him as the old lock-keeper’s son-in-law, and vouched for by the old lock-keeper.

    Life at the lock did not fall within the definition of idyllic, and Martha Hanley was in no wise perfect: she might be good and generous, but George could not precise/y hold a conversation with her. But there was no spite in her, and as George, who was no Romantick, had expected no more than he had got, he was content with his lot. So Martha was content, too.

    Over the years George and Wynn had kept in touch, largely by way of correspondence, and George had lately taken up the breeding of parrots: when he sold one, which admittedly was seldom, it was quite a profitable hobby.

    “Read it out again, George!” urged his elderly father-in-law, who was rocking in his usual chair by the fire. Grinning, George read out:

Dear George,

    This is to recommend two young ladies in need of shelter to you. Someone will collect them in a short while. I don’t think you had better know their names, so you can call them Jane and Sarah. They are not in trouble with the law, so you may be easy on that score, which I know would have much disturbed you.

    This was a bit that old Mr Henry Venn had been waiting for: he went into a wheezing fit over it. George waited, grinning, until the fit had passed, and continued:

    You will wish for news of Portia Parrot. She seems determined to hatch the egg, so with luck we will have a baby in a short time. Dare say we may name it anything, as Chauncey and Portia Person have not produced offspring.

    More wheezing from Mr Henry Venn.

    The fellow who is escorting the girls is a very good sort of man and you need not fear any prying questions from him. We saw Mrs Mayes’s brother-in-law Joe just lately: he asked after you and sent his regards, with the message that if you happen to come up river, around say the first week in June, there could be a fat pheasant waiting for you. Apparently they fall out of the trees round his way, an interesting scientific phenomenon: I wonder if it has been recorded?

    Yet more wheezing from Mr Henry Venn.

    Seriously, dear man, I should be very grateful for your help in this matter. The girls’ family is trying to marry one of them off to a man she cannot care for. There is a safe haven waiting for them in another part of the country. Tell Martha not to worry that they look a pair of niffy-naffy ladies, for Mrs Mayes assures me that though they may seem nice in their ways their hearts are in the right place: I don’t think one could hope for a higher recommendation! They will be happy with whatever you can provide, and if Martha can set them to a useful task, so much the better: they need to have their minds taken off their troubles.

    Don’t know if I will be able to get over myself, but in any case you may expect a messenger soon. And I dare say we may see you in early June?

    Strangely, this mild aside of Dr Fairbrother’s caused old Mr Henry Venn to go into the greatest wheezing fit yet.

    All the best, dear fellow, and give Martha and the children a hearty kiss from me. Percival Cummings the Second sends his regards.

Wynn Fairbrother.

    “He be a one!” gasped the old man.

    “Aye, he is that. What do you think, though, Pa?”

    Mr Venn rubbed his chin. “Ah. Well, we is out of the way, enough, here. And gentlefolk won’t be looked for along the river.”

    “No, I don’t think they will. And from the sounds of it, their friends will have laid a splendid false trail.”

    “Aye!” he wheezed, shaking.

    “I think it’s safe enough. But I’ll tell Martha to put ’em into a couple of her dresses, so as folk on the river won’t notice a thing.”

    “Aye: and set ’em to cleanin’ fish!” he wheezed.

    George got up, grinning. “That would certainly be an excellent disguise.”

    “Did you see the liddle paws on ’em?” asked the old man, heaving himself to his feet.

    George came to put a hand under his elbow. “On the ladies?”

    “Ah. Liddle pink paws. Like a new-born. Ain’t never done a day’s work in their lives.” he noted, shaking his head.

    “Cleaning fish will do them good, then,” said George, grinning.

    Mr Venn shook all over as he allowed his son-in-law to assist him to his box-bed in the single downstairs room. At the moment the foot of it was occupied by two rosy-cheeked grandchildren, but he merely remarked: “If they kicks, I’ll kick back.”

    “Yes: do that, Pa!” said George, chuckling.

    “S’pose there wouldn’t be a reward for them ladies, do you reckon, George?” he said as George was carefully banking up the fire.

    “Yes: I reckon it’d be the gallows, or transportation!” he replied strongly.

    “Not that, y’fool! No, what if that Peter Banks comes sniffin’ round?”

    This was a point. Peter Banks was known as one that would sell his grandmother for sixpence. “I think,” said George Hanley slowly, “that the minute you set eyes on him, then, Pa, you’d best pick a quarrel with him and get rid of him. Can you do that. do you reckon?”

    “Aye! I reckon!” he gasped, going into a final wheezing fit.

    “Good. And thanks, Pa,” he said, taking up his candle and going over to the simple ladder that led to the upper floor.

    “That’ll be my pleasure!” grinned the old man.

    George went thankfully up to bed. For he was not unaware that, had the old lock-keeper kicked up a fuss about it, Wynn Fairbrother’s plan would have come to naught. Mr Venn might be retired, but his word was still pretty much law in the lock-keeper’s house.

    Mr Quayle-Sturt and Mr Tarlington had gone for a walk in the sunshine: they were dreamily watching the river flow by.

    “I’ve worked it out,” said Mr Tarlington dreamily. “Wynn has got the lower classes standin’ solid against the nobility.”

    Mr Quayle-Sturt goggled at him.

    “Think of it,” said Mr Tarlington dreamily. “What with the sturdy yeoman, Mayes—one presumes he is sturdy?”—Harley’s eyes had begun to dance: he nodded.—“Aye: and Aunt Bella, née Mayes, and the poacher husband, on the one hand; and then the lock-keeper and his family on the other: you see?”

    “Aye!” he choked. “But the lock-keeper is not precisely from the lower orders, dear boy.”

    “No, you said,” he agreed. “But he may count as such, for he appears to have ranged himself definitely with them. And the old father-in-law most certainly sounds like solid peasant stock!”

    “Absolutely. He took one look at Lady S., and said: ‘You won’t know how to pickle cabbage, I s’pose, Missy?’ The poor girl was able only to shake her head in reply. Whereupon the old fellow ups and says: ‘Ah. That be just as well, acos it ain’t the season for cabbages!’ And goes into a terrific choking fit!”

    Mr Tarlington also went into a choking fit, but when he was over it, said: “Well? Do you see what I’m getting at?”

    “Yes, indeed. The English peasantry does not, in general, precisely love its so-called betters: I think Lord Whatsisface will not stand a chance.”

    “So do I!” he said with a laugh, clapping him on the back. “Come on!” They strolled on slowly in the sun.

    Perhaps it was as well they had had this interval of peace and relaxation, for the moment they returned to Mr Tarlington’s hotel, the landlord of the Mitre in person hurried up to inform him that he had an august visitor who had been waiting for him for some time.

    “Shall I leave you, dear boy?” said Mr Quayle-Sturt solicitously.

    “You dare!”

    The two friends went into Mr Tarlington’s private parlour arm-in-arm, grinning. A sight not best calculated to gladden Lord Hubbel’s heart.

    “There you are, you dog!” he cried.

    “Good morning, sir: I hear you’ve been waiting for me?” returned Mr Tarlington courteously.

    Lord Hubbel’s bosom swelled. “Insolent cur!”

    “He do insist on the canine motif, don’t he?” drawled Mr Quayle-Sturt, raising his eyebrows.

    “Mm. Not altogether flattering, one feels. Though personally I am quite fond of dogs.”

    “That’s enough of your damned insolence, Tarlington!” spluttered his Lordship. “You are not dealing with a woman now! Where are my daughters?”

    “I have no idea, sir,” he said courteously.

    “By God, I’ll have the truth out of—”

    “I don’t think you will, you know, sir. Or not that way!” said Mr Quayle-Sturt, getting behind the enraged Earl and grasping his elbows firmly before he could throttle the life out of Mr Tarlington.

    Mr Tarlington stepped back, settling his neckcloth with an annoyed expression. “I say, it may not be a Waterfall, y’know, but I spent ten minutes arrangin’ this neckcloth this morning.”

    “Puppy!” shouted Lord Hubbel. “Where are my DAUGHTERS?”

    “Lor’, do you want ’em back, sir?” drawled Mr Tarlington.

    “That would be surprizing,” said Harley, still grasping his Lordship firmly. “For London society in general has the impression that you don’t give a damn whether they live or die.”

    “Yes: the impression is very widespread, indeed,” said Mr Tarlington, nodding.

    “Oh, quite. Quite general,” agreed Mr Quayle-Sturt.

    “Let go of me!” shouted Lord Hubbel. “How dare you? Let go of me, sir!”

    “This instant. Or he will throttle you, Harley,” warned his friend, inspecting his neckcloth in the mirror over the mantelpiece.

    “Speak, you devil!” gasped Lord Hubbel, trying to shake loose and failing. “Where are my daughters?”

    “I might speak, Lord Hubbel, if you’d stop hurling insults at my head,” replied Mr Tarlington calmly. “I could have let your wife remain in ignorance of whether her daughters were alive or dead—and such is that general impression of which my friend has just spoken, y’know, that I was very tempted to do so.”

    Lord Hubbel, now purple in the face, made a spluttering noise.

    “Aye: it is generally—agreed!” panted Harley, tightening his grasp, “that your wife don’t give a damn whether they live or die, either!”

    “Precisely,” said Mr Tarlington coldly. “Are you going to stop shouting and listen quietly, sir, or shall we continue to pinion you?”

    Mr Quayle-Sturt gave the Earl’s arm an experimental twist and he yelped.

    “Learned that in the Peninsula, y’know. Off a damned Portugee. There was some as said he were an inquisitor in his public life, only he was always very decent to me,” he noted.

    “Oh, yes,” recalled Mr Tarlington. “I remember that fellow well: Senhor—what was it? Forget: some name like Menendez. Never saw a couple of fellows speak up so fast as that pair of Spaniards the senhor took into that cottage for a private word just outside of... Where was that, Harley? Badajos?”

    “No: the senhor had lost his temper outside Badajos, and them two Spaniards died before they had hardly spoken a word. Think the time you are thinkin’ of may have been—”

    “That is ENOUGH!” shouted Lord Hubbel.

    There was a short silence.

    “Well, is it?” said Mr Tarlington mildly.

    “I— Very well, say what you have to say. And leave GO of me, dammit!” he shouted over his shoulder.

    Mr Quayle-Sturt released him, and Lord Hubbel rubbed his right upper-arm with a resentful look on his florid countenance.

    Calmly Mr Tarlington explained: “I encountered Lady Jane and Lady Sarah—er—the day before yesterday, around dinner-time, at an inn on the Oxford road. They were heading for a house called Tall Oaks which I understood was the property of an elderly relative. As it was too dark and the weather too inclement for them to continue on that night, I arranged for them to sleep at the inn and to travel on the following morning in my coach. That was the last I saw of them, sir, as l returned to London that night.”

    Lord Hubbel made a spluttering noise.

    “I did call in at Tall Oaks yesterday, but they were not there. The impertinent fellow who was there had no idea where they might have gone.”

    “They came on towards Oxford, and YOU know where they are hiding!” he shouted.

    “I do not. Perhaps you not aware, sir, that I drove down yesterday in the company of my cousin Harpingdon: he will vouch for our not having seen your daughters.”

    Lord Hubbel’s jaw sagged. Finally he said weakly: “It’s a conspiracy.”

    “Why would I have an interest in entering a conspiracy against you, Lord Hubbel? I met your daughters by chance, I did what any humane person would have done, seeing the agitated state they were in, and that is all. I suggest you seek amongst your relatives for some person who may be sheltering them.”

    “Dare say they have gone off to Lucas at old Henry Kenworthy’s place,” offered Harley.

    “That would seem a logical move, if the old cousin has died,” he agreed.

    Lord Hubbel drew a deep breath.

    “Pray do not apologize, sir: I quite understand: the agitation of the moment and so forth,” said Mr Tarlington courteously.

    “I— Thank you, Tarlington,” he said stiffly.

    “Not at all. I regret I cannot furnish you with any further information.”

    “No—uh— Why are you in Oxford?” he floundered.

    Mr Tarlington raised his eyebrows slightly but said: “My sister and I have escorted  some connections to see an elderly uncle who is dying.”

    “Oh,” he said, coughing. “Er—sorry to hear it. Well—uh—least said, soonest mended, eh?”

    “Not at all,” said Mr Tarlington, bowing.

    The Earl coughed again, said: “Yes—well. Thanks again, then,” bowed stiffly, and went out.

    The friends looked at each other in amaze, eyes wide.

    “Is that all?” hissed Harley.

    “Not sure. Think he may become suspicious, when he thinks it over. We had better not lead him to Wynn’s,” he murmured.

    “No. –By Jove, though! Takin’ a stiff-rumped line was the trick, Aden!”

    “Ssh! Aye: it worked well, did it not?” he said, wrinkling his straight nose. “I would rather have rammed his teeth down his gullet for him, the old devil!”

    “Just as well you didn’t: he may have smelled a rat.”

    Mr Tarlington nodded, grinning. “Twisted his arm good and proper, did you, Harley?”

    “Aye!” he yelped.

    “Ssh!”

    The friends gripped hands tightly, grinning all over their faces.

    “It’s all very well,” said Mrs Mayes doubtfully when the conspirators were gathered at Great-Uncle Humphrey Ogilvie’s, as the safest venue. “Only once ’is brain starts to work he must spot that if the young ladies all went down along to that Tall Oaks in a body, and continued along to Oxford all together, then—”

    “Then we must know something of what became of his daughters: yes,” agreed Pansy, nodding.

    “Aye. We must be prepared! Dr Fairbrother, you ain’t to let the girls out of your sight, and Miss Delphie, my love, you ain’t to come runnin’ off here to your uncle by yourself. For Lord knows ’e don’t want you, it appears!”

    “No: he says he will speak to all of us when my Aunt Parker arrives,” said Pansy.

    “I don’t like to desert him, though,” faltered Delphie.

    Mrs Mayes decided one of the gentlemen could accompany her.

    “I’ll do it,” said Mr Quayle-Sturt briskly.

    “Right,” she agreed. “When Lord Harpingdon comes back from that Blefford Park you can share it atween you. And Mr Tarlington, if your sister wants to a go a-shoppin’, you is to go with her!”

    “Um—look, it might be better if I took you home, Fliss.”

    “No! I am having such a lovely time with Dr Fairbrother! And I cannot go before Portia’s egg hatches!”

    “’Course she can’t,” agreed the zoologist.

    “And besides, Aunt Parker will expect to see you here, sir, when she comes,” added Pansy.

    “Er—yes,” Mr Tarlington recognised weakly. “So she will. Yes, very well, Fliss, we’ll stay.”

    Fliss clapped her hands, beaming.

    “Now, what about Ladies Jane and Sarah?” said Dr Fairbrother.

    Everyone looked at Mrs Mayes.

    “Hm. Look, Mr Tarlington, can you find out if their father has got them Bow Street Runners upon the case? Acos likely he has, bein’ a rich lord an’ all, and in that case the roads will be watched.”

    “Yes, I think I may do that. I will have to go up to London, though.”

    “That is all right, I do not absolutely need to go shopping,” said Fliss bravely.

    “Good girl!” he said with a laugh.

    “Aye...” said Mrs Mayes slowly to herself. “They’re snug enough where they are, no need to do anythin’ for a week or so. See if the fuss dies down.”

    “Mm. And if he has the Runners on the job?” said Dr Fairbrother. “How the deuce are we to get ’em down to Guillyford Bay?”

    “Easy. Send ’em by water,” she said briefly.

    He chuckled. “By God! Of course! But look: can we?”

    “We can get ’em away that way, yes. Downriver as far as London’s easy enough.”

    “But not all the way to Guillyford Bay, surely?”

    “We have a friend with a large yacht,” said Mr Quayle-Sturt. “I think he might be prepared to help out if we can get the ladies to London. Though I’m afraid the yacht is moored in the Bristol Channel.”

    “What: not Noël Amory?” said Mr Tarlington.

    “Yes, of course.”

    “Er—well, she ain’t, he’s having her sailed round to Brighton for the summer. Only I doubt he would, old man.”

    “But he’s a decent fellow! And he has known Lucas Claveringham forever: surely—!”

    Pansy’s cheeks were very red. She swallowed. “Sir Noël Amory has a large yacht?”

    “Yes. Lovely thing,” said Mr Tarlington briefly.

    “And he is a most obliging fellow, Miss Pansy,” said Mr Quayle-Sturt eagerly.

    Mr Tarlington cleared his throat. “He’s in a damned funny mood, Harley. Last time I saw him he was takin’ a dashed chair to go half a dozen streets on a perfectly fine morning. But I’ll speak to him. The adventure may be just what he needs. And I can always ask him if he’d lend us the boat, if he don’t care to join in himself.”

    “Yes: pray do,” said Pansy grimly. “For in battle, one needs always a contingency plan on which to fall back if need be.”

    So it was agreed. And as Mrs Mayes and Dr Fairbrother were to escort the young ladies back to the zoologists’ house the gentlemen felt it safe to take their leave.

    They were almost back at the Mitre when Mr Quayle-Sturt said: “Look, Aden: this may be dashed good fun and so forth—”

    “Ain’t it, though?” he said, his long grey eyes dancing.

    The former Captain Quayle-Sturt recognized, with something of a sinking feeling, the look that had been visible on Major’s Tarlington’s face as he led his brigade into battle. “Mm. But have you thought about its implications? How are the ladies to live, if they have cut themselves off from their parents?”

    “Uh—oh. Damn,” he muttered.

    “I think we should do our best to see that a reconciliation is effected between them and Lord Lady H. Perhaps if we speak to Broughamwood?”

    “Harley, he’s been damned ill, y’know,” he said uneasily.

    “I know. But he seems very well this year. I feel it would be better to have someone in the Claveringham family on our side in this, Aden.”

    Mr Tarlington thought it over. “You’re right. From every point of view.”

    “Shall I speak to Broughamwood, or would you prefer to?”

    “I think we had better bring Harpy in on it. He knows Broughamwood well. And I’ll write to Lucas C. He ain’t got much sense,” said Mr Tarlington with a grin, “but his old uncle Henry Kenworthy’s got more than enough for two!”

    “Good,” said Harley, tucking his hand in his arm.

    “What do you think, then, Harley? Go on with the downriver scheme?”

    Mr Quayle-Sturt bit his lip. “It is tempting, isn’t it?”

    “Aye. But not only that: if Hubbel doesn’t come round—or doesn’t come round in a hurry, the which I think is likelier—those two young women would be better off down at Guillyford Bay where at least I can keep an eye on them, than immured in some damned lock-keeper’s damp hut!”

    “Yes. Yes, you’re right, by God! Yes: let’s carry on with the scheme, Aden, while we work on Broughamwood and Lucas at the same time.”

    “Right,” said Mr Tarlington, his eyes lighting up again. “We’ll do that! –Here, are you much of a sailor, Harley?”

    “Dreadful. You’re not getting me on that thing of Noël’s: I’d be sick before it left the damned harbour.”

    Mr Tarlington merely nodded: but inwardly he was raising an eyebrow or two. How important was boating to Miss Pansy Ogilvie? We-ell... Such things were not always significant in a permanent relationship. But a man who cast up his accounts before leaving harbour? Oops. Well, he wouldn’t mention it to the girl, for Harley was a damned decent fellow, and he wouldn’t like to see him dismissed before he had barely started.

    For Mr Tarlington was in no doubt that, whatever the outcome of the Oxford expedition might be, at least one result was clear, and Sir Noël Amory now had a rival for the affections of Miss Pansy Ogilvie in the person of Harley Quayle-Sturt.

Next chapter:

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