Sprig Muslin

The chaise followed at a very much more sober pace, but the lane was so narrow that the post-boy found it impossible to avoid the many pot-holes. The best he could do, whenever he saw a particular large one ahead, was to rein the horses in to a walk, lessening the jolt as much as he could. But nothing could avail to make the short journey anything but a very rough one. Amanda kept an anxious eye on her bandages, terrified that the pad might shift, and the bleeding start again. So tall a man could not be laid flat in a chaise, but Amanda had clasped her arms round Sir Gareth, supporting his head on her shoulder, and trying as best she might to ease the frequent bumps for him. Under her hand she fancied that she could feel his heart faintly beating, which brought such relief to her overcharged nerves that thankful tears sprang to her eyes, and rolled unheeded down her cheeks.

Finding that the bandages were holding, her most pressing anxiety abated, and she was able to consider all the other anxieties attached to her predicament. Chief amongst these was the stringent need to rescue Hildebrand from the consequences of his folly. She was not much given to self-blame, but there could be no doubt that she had been to some extent responsible for the accident. To be sure, she had extracted from Hildebrand a promise that he would not fire his pistols, but she now saw that she should have known better than to have placed the slightest reliance on his keeping his head in emergency. And although no one (or, at any rate, no one with the smallest sense of justice) could blame her for having accepted his proffered services, she did feel that she was very much to blame in having consented to any plan that could possibly put poor Sir Gareth in danger. If she had not blackened Sir Gareth’s character, Hildebrand would never have dreamt of holding up the chaise; and that she had blackened his character now filled her with unaccustomed remorse. It really seemed more dreadful than all the rest, for as soon as he had sunk lifeless to the ground, her resentment had vanished, and she had seen him, not as a cruel marplot, but as her kind and endlessly patient protector. But this, she owned, Hildebrand could not have guessed, from anything she had told him; and however stupid it was of him not to have known, only by looking at Sir Gareth, that he was in every respect an admirable person, it was not just that he should suffer a hideous penalty for his folly. Sir Gareth had not wished him to suffer. With what might prove to have been his last word on earth he had exonerated Hildebrand. The thought of this noble magnanimity affected her so much, that she exclaimed aloud: ‘Oh, I wish I had not told those lies about you! It was all my fault!’

But Sir Gareth could not hear her, so it was useless to tell him how sorry she was. And even if he had not been unconscious, she thought, her practical side reasserting itself, repentance would not mend matters. She dared not relax her arms from about him, so she could not wipe away her tears, but she stopped crying, and forced herself to think what she ought next to do. Her arms were aching almost unbearably, but that was unimportant. The important thing was to save Hildebrand from the clutches of the law. He was stupid, he lacked resolution, but she was going to need his services.

By the time the chaise reached the little village, she had herself well in hand, and knew just what must be done. Her face might be tearstained, but the landlord of the Bull Inn, horrified by the disjointed tale jerked out by a pallid young gentleman on the verge of nervous collapse, and expecting to receive a damsel in hysterics, very speedily learned that Amanda was made of sterner stuff than Hildebrand. She might look a child, but there was nothing childlike in the way in which she assumed command over the direction of affairs. Under her jealous supervision, the landlord and the post-boy bore Sir Gareth up the narrow stairs to a bedchamber under the eaves, and laid him upon the bed there; and while they were doing it she told Hildebrand, in a fierce whisper, not to say a word, but to

leave all to her; and demanded from the landlord’s wife the direction of the nearest doctor, and upon learning that that shocked dame knew of no doctor other than Dr Chantry, who attended the Squire, and lived at Eaton Socon, instantly ordered Hildebrand to jump on his horse again, and ride like the wind to summon this practitioner to Sir Gareth’s side.

‘Yes, of course!’ Hildebrand said eagerly. ‘But I don’t know how to get there, or – or where to find the doctor, or what to do if he should not be at home!’

‘Oh, do try not to be so helpless!’ cried Amanda. ‘This woman will tell you where he lives, and if he is gone out you will follow him – and do not dare to come back without him!’ She then turned on Mrs Chicklade, and said: ‘Tell him exactly where to go, for you can see how stupid he is!’

‘I am not stupid!’ retorted Hildebrand, stung to anger. ‘But I was never in this part of the country before, and I don’t even know in which direction I should ride!’

‘No!’ retorted Amanda, already halfway up the steep stairs. ‘I don’t know either, but I wouldn’t stand there looking like a gaby, and saying how – how – how!’

With that, she sped on her way, leaving him seething with indignation, but considerably stiffened by a determination to prove to her his worth.

Amanda found the landlord tightening the bandages round Sir Gareth’s torso, and directing the post-boy to fetch up some brandy from the tap. She was thankful to perceive that in this large, stolid man she had acquired a helper who could apparently act on his own initiative, and asked him anxiously if he thought Sir Gareth would live.

‘There’s no saying, miss,’ he replied unencouragingly. ‘He ain’t slipped his wind yet, but I’d say he’s lost a deal of claret. We’ll see if we can get a drop of brandy down his throat.’

But when the post-boy came back with this restorative, closely followed by Mrs Chicklade, it was found to be of no avail, for it ran out of the corners of Sir Gareth’s mouth. The landlord thought this a shocking waste of good liquor, and set the glass down, saying that there was nothing for it but to send for the doctor. When Amanda disclosed that Hildebrand had already sped forth on this errand, the post-boy was loud in his disapproval. He said that the young varmint would never be seen again, and at once launched into a graphic description of the hold-up.

Until that moment, the Chicklades knew no more than they had learnt from Hildebrand, which was very little. So strange a story as was now recounted immediately convinced Mrs Chicklade that she had been only too right when she had strongly counselled her husband not to have anything to do with a desperately wounded man. She had known from the moment of clapping eyes on Hildebrand that there was something havey-cavey about him; and as for Amanda, she would like to know, she said, how she came to be hand-in-glove with such a murdering young rascal.

‘I wish you will stop thinking he is a highwayman!’ said Amanda. ‘It was all make-believe – just funning!’

‘Funning?’ gasped Mrs Chicklade.

‘Yes, I tell you! He never meant to fire his pistol: indeed, he promised me he would not!’

‘What did he want to take and cock it for, if he wasn’t meaning to fire it, miss?’ demanded the post-boy shrewdly.

‘Oh, that was in case you would not pull up!’ explained Amanda. ‘To fire over your head, and put you in a fright. And although I didn’t wish him to do so at first, I must say I am excessively sorry now that he didn’t, because if only he had there would have been no harm done.’

‘I never did!’ exclaimed Mrs Chicklade. ‘Why, you’re as bad as he is! I believe the pair of you was in a plot to rob the poor gentleman, and what I want to know is how you came to wheedle yourself into his company, which it’s as plain as a pikestaff you must ha’ done, and very likely too, for a bolder piece I never did see, not in all my days!’

‘Easy, now!’ interposed the landlord, in his deep voice. ‘I’ll allow it’s a queer-sounding business, but you’ve no call to speak so rough to the young lady, my dear. Who is the gentleman, missie?’

‘I can tell you that!’ said the post-boy officiously. ‘He’s Sir Gareth Ludlow, and a bang-up tulip, and him and her was putting-up in Kimbolton last night. He hired me for to carry them to Bedford.’

The landlord looked Amanda over thoughtfully. ‘Well, now, miss, you ain’t his wife, because you’ve got no ring on your finger, and he don’t look to me old enough to be your pa, nor yet young enough to be your brother, so what’s the game?’

‘Ah, answer that if you can!’ said Mrs Chicklade.

‘He is my uncle,’ replied Amanda calmly. ‘And also he is Mr Ross’s uncle. Mr Ross is the man who shot him, but quite by accident. In fact, Mr Ross and I are cousins, and it is true that we were hand-in-glove, but only to play a trick on Sir Gareth. But Sir Gareth recognized him, and I daresay he knew that he was not at all to be trusted with a pistol, because he told him not to brandish it about, and said he was a young fool. Didn’t he?’

‘Ay,’ responded the post-boy reluctantly. ‘But –’

‘And then you got off your horse, and of course my cousin thought you meant to attack him, which was the cause of the accident. Because that put him in a fluster. And then his horse began to be very restive, and in the middle of it all the gun went off. He never, never meant to fire it at Sir Gareth! He wasn’t even looking at him!’

‘He said to the gentleman, If you come a step nearer, I’ll fire! he said. Yes, and he threatened to blow the head off my shoulders, what’s more!’

‘It seems to me a great pity that he didn’t do so!’ said Amanda. ‘I am quite tired of talking to anyone so stupid! If you had a particle of commonsense you would know that if he had wished to escape he might have done so when you were helping me to bind the neckcloths round Sir Gareth! And if he had meant to shoot Sir Gareth, he wouldn’t have fallen down in a swoon, in that silly way, which you know very well he did!’

‘Swooned off, did he?’ said the landlord. ‘It don’t surprise me. He was looking just about as sick as a cushion when he came bursting in here. Seems to me it’s likely as not it happened the way you say it did, miss, but there’s no sense in arguing, whatever the rights of it may be. Martha, my dear, you take the young lady to the other bedchamber, where she can wash the blood off her hands, and put on a clean gown. When you’ve done that, you can pop a brick in the oven, because the gentleman’s powerful cold. And as for you, young fellow, you can fetch up his baggage, and help me get the clothes off him, so as he can be laid between sheets, comfortable.’