The Talisman Ring

Ludovic took it into his head to do, Clem would help him to, no matter what.’

Eustacie turned to her cousin. ‘You should not have brought his clothes!’

‘Nonsense!’ said Shield. ‘Ludovic must leave his bed sooner or later. He’ll take no hurt.’

‘That is all very well,’ said Miss Thane, ‘but even though he might get up, I can see no reason for him to go into Hugh’s room. I have a great value for Hugh, but I cannot feel that he is the man to keep a momentous secret. Nye, you should have intervened.’

Nye smiled somewhat wryly. ‘It’s plain you don’t know his lordship, ma’am. No sooner was he dressed than what must he do but walk out of his room just to see how his legs would carry him. While he was showing Clem how well he could manage, Sir Hugh (who’d been pulling his bell fit to break it, according to what he told me) put his head out of his room to shout for Clem. By what I can make out from Clem, Sir Hugh and Mr Ludovic got into conversation right away, Sir Hugh not seeming to be surprised at finding another gentleman in the house, and Mr Ludovic, of course, as friendly as you please. “Oh, are you Sir Hugh Thane?” he says. “My name’s Lavenham” – oh yes, ma’am, he came out with that quite brazen! That’s Mr Ludovic all over. “Well,” says Sir Hugh, “I can’t say I call your face to mind at the moment, but if you know me I’m devilish glad of it, for I’ve had more than enough of my own company. Do you play piquet?” Well, that was quite sufficient for Mr Ludovic, and before Clem rightly knew what was happening, he’d been sent off downstairs to fetch up a couple of packs of cards and a bottle of wine. By the time I was back in the house there was no doing anything, ma’am, for they was both in Sir Hugh’s room, as thick as thieves, as the saying is.’

The ladies looked at one another in consternation. ‘I had better go upstairs and see what is happening,’ said Miss Thane resignedly.

It was, however, just as Nye had described. Lord Lavenham and Sir Hugh Thane, both attired in dressing-gowns, were seated on opposite sides of a small table drawn close to the fire in Sir Hugh’s bed-chamber playing piquet. A glass of wine was at each gentleman’s elbow, and so absorbed were they in the game that neither paid the least heed to the opening of the door, or, in fact, became aware of Miss Thane’s presence until she stepped right up to the table. Sir Hugh glanced up then, and said in an abstracted voice: ‘Oh, there you are, Sally!’ and turned his attention to the cards again.

Miss Thane laid her hand on Ludovic’s shoulder to prevent his rising, but remarked significantly: ‘What if I had been the Beau, or an Exciseman?’

‘Oh, I’m well prepared!’ Ludovic assured her, and in the twinkling of an eye had whisked a small, silver-mounted pistol from his pocket.

‘Good God, I hope you don’t mean to fire on sight!’ said Miss Thane.

Sir Hugh put up his glass to look at the pistol. ‘That’s a nice little gun,’ he observed.

Ludovic handed it to him. ‘Yes, it’s one of Manton’s. I’ve a pair of his duelling-pistols, too – beautiful pieces of work!’

Sir Hugh subjected the pistol to a careful inspection. ‘Myself I don’t care for silver sights. Apt to dazzle the eye.’ He sighted along the pistol. ‘Nice balance, but too short in the barrel. No accuracy over twelve yards.’

Ludovic’s eye gleamed. ‘Do you think so? I’ll engage to culp a wafer at twenty!’

‘With this gun?’ said Sir Hugh incredulously.

‘With that gun.’

‘I’ll lay you a pony you don’t.’

‘Done!’ said Ludovic promptly.

‘And where,’ inquired Miss Thane, ‘do you propose to hold this contest?’

‘Oh, in the yard!’ said Ludovic, receiving the pistol back from Sir Hugh.

‘That, of course, will be very nice,’ said Miss Thane politely. ‘The ostlers will thus be able to see you. I forbid you to encourage him, Hugh. Let us admit that he is a crack shot, and be done with it.’

‘Well, I am a crack shot,’ said Ludovic, smiling most disarmingly up at her.

‘Talking of crack shots,’ said Sir Hugh, ‘what was the name of the fellow who put out all the candles in the big chandelier at Mrs Archer’s once? There were fifteen of them, and he never missed one!’

‘Fifteen?’ said Ludovic. ‘Sixteen!’

‘Fifteen was what I was told. He did it for a wager.’

‘That’s true enough, but I tell you there were sixteen candles!’

Sir Hugh shook his head. ‘You’ve got that wrong. Fifteen.’

‘Damn it, I ought to know!’ said Ludovic. ‘I did it!’

‘You did it?’ Sir Hugh regarded him with renewed interest. ‘You mean to tell me you are the man who shot the wicks off fifteen candles at Mrs Archer’s?’

‘I shot the wicks off sixteen candles!’ said Ludovic.