Sprig Muslin

It did not take them long to discard the trappings of convention. ‘Oh, I wish you will not call me Miss Smith!’ said Juliet. ‘Amanda!’ breathed Mr Ross reverently. ‘And my name is Hildebrand.’

‘Isn’t it odd that we should both of us have the most ridiculous names?’ said Amanda. ‘Do you find yours a sad trial?’

Struck by her rare understanding, Mr Ross told her just how sad a trial his name had been to him, and explained to her the precise circumstances which had led to his being given a name calculated to blight his scholastic career. He had never dreamed it could sound well until he heard it on her lips.

After this digression, they became more practical, and very much more argumentative. A number of schemes for Amanda’s deliverance, all of which depended upon some extremely improbable stroke of good fortune, were considered, and dismissed regretfully; and a promising new alliance was nearly ruptured by Hildebrand’s rejection of a daring suggestion that he should creep into Sir Gareth’s room, and steal from under his pillow (where there could be no doubt it was hidden) the key to Amanda’s room. In Hildebrand, an inculcated respect for convention warred with a craving for romance. The thought of the construction Sir Gareth would inevitably place on the attempted theft of the key, should he wake (as Hildebrand rather thought he would) before the accomplishment of the design, made that young gentleman blush all over his slim body. He was naturally unable to disclose to Amanda the cause of his reluctance, and so was obliged to endure the mortification of being thought a wretchedly cowardly creature.

‘Oh, well, if you are afraid – !’ said Amanda, with a disdainful shrug of her shoulders.

Her scorn sharpened his wits. The glimmerings of a plan, more daring than any that had occurred to her, flickered in his brain. ‘Wait!’ he commanded, his brows knit portentously. ‘I have a better notion!’

She waited. After a prolonged silence, pregnant with suspense, Mr Ross said suddenly: ‘Are you willing to place your honour in my hands?’

‘Yes, yes, of course I am!’ responded Amanda, agog with expectation.

‘And do you think,’ he asked anxiously, descending with disconcerting rapidity from these heights, ‘that, if I were mounted on my horse, Prince, you would contrive to leap up before me?’

‘I could, if you reached down your hand to me,’ replied Amanda optimistically.

He considered this for a daunted moment. ‘Well, I shall be holding a pistol in my right hand, and I shouldn’t think I could contrive to hold the bridle in it as well,’ he said dubiously. ‘I could try, of course, but – No, I think it would be best if I tucked the reins under my knee. And even if Prince does become restive it won’t signify, once I have you firmly gripped. All you will have to do is to set your foot on mine in the stirrup, and spring the moment I tell you to. Do you think you can do that?’

‘Are you going to ride off with me across your saddle-bow?’ demanded Amanda eagerly.

‘Yes – well, no, not precisely! I mean, I thought, if you put your arms round me, you could sit before me – just until we were beyond the reach of pursuit!’ he added quickly.

‘Yes, that would be much more comfortable,’ she agreed. ‘Of course I could do it!’

‘Well, when the notion first came to me, I thought you could, too, but now I come to think of it more particularly, I can see that it is a thing we ought to practise.’

‘No, no, I am persuaded there can be not the least difficulty!’ she urged. ‘Only think how knights in olden times were for ever riding off with distressed ladies!’

‘Yes, and in armour, too!’ he said, forcibly struck. ‘Still, we don’t know but what they may have bungled it before they acquired the habit, and it won’t do for us to bungle it. I think I had better dismount, and hold Prince while you get upon his back. Are you able to mount without assistance?’

‘Certainly I am! But what are you going to do?’

‘Hold you up on the road to Bedford!’ disclosed Hildebrand.

Amanda uttered a squeak, which he correctly interpreted as an expression of admiration and approval, and gave a little jump of excitement. ‘Like a highwayman? Oh, what a splendid scheme! Pray forgive me for not having thought you had any courage!’

‘It’s a pretty desperate thing to do, of course,’ said Hildebrand, ‘but I can see that only desperate measures will answer in this case and I would do anything to save you from your guardian! I cannot conceive why your father left you in the care of such an infamous person! It seems the oddest thing!’

‘He was deceived in him, but never mind that!’ said Amanda hastily. ‘How do you know he means to go to Bedford?’

‘I discovered it when I was waiting for an opportunity to seize this ladder! Only to think that I was wishing that groom at Jericho, when all the time I had been guided to the stables by Providence! Because the groom was arranging for the hire of a chaise for his master, and enquiring about the state of the road that runs to Bedford. It’s not a pike-road, you know, but Sir Gareth means to go by it, just to Bedford, which is only one stage. And there you are to change from this chaise, which is a shabby, old-fashioned one, and go on to London in a better one, which, of course, may readily be hired in a place like Bedford. Four horses, too! By Jove, it is another instance of Providence! For, you know, if this weren’t such a quiet place, with precious little custom, I daresay they would keep any number of fast vehicles for hire, and bang-up cattle as well, and I might have been at a stand. For I daresay I should have found it pretty hard to cover two postilions, as well as Sir Gareth. But only a pair of horses are hired for the first stage, which makes my task much easier. And I will own myself astonished if we do not find the road deserted, so early in the day! I mean, it can’t be like the pike-roads, with mails and stages going up and down at all hours.’

Amanda agreed to this, but was shaken by doubt. ‘Yes, but how will you procure a pistol?’ she objected.

‘Procure one! I have a pair of my own, in my saddle holsters,’ said Hildebrand, unable to keep a note of pride out of his voice. ‘Loaded, too.’

‘Oh!’ said Amanda, rather thoughtfully.

‘You need not be afraid that I don’t know how to handle them. My father holds that one should be accustomed to guns as soon as possible. I don’t wish to boast, but I am accounted a tolerably good shot.’

‘Yes, but I don’t wish you to shoot Sir Gareth, or even the post-boy,’ said Amanda uneasily.

‘Good God, no! Of course I shall do nothing of the sort! Lord, a pretty kick-up that would mean! I might be obliged to fire one of the pistols over the post-boy’s head, to frighten him, you know, but I promise you I shan’t do more. There won’t be the least need. I shall hold Sir Gareth covered, and you may depend upon it he won’t dare to move, with my pistol pointing at his head. He is bound to be taken quite by surprise, but you will not be, and you must lose not an instant in jumping down from the chaise, and mounting Prince. Then I shall get up behind you, and we shall be off in a trice.’ He paused, but Amanda said nothing. After a moment, he said, rather hurt: ‘You don’t care for the scheme?’

‘Yes, I do!’ she replied warmly. ‘I like it excessively, for I have always wished to have adventures, and I can see that this would be a truly splendid adventure. Except for the pistols.’