In this same Her Ladyship’s mount is shotdead under her in Epstowe Forest, andshe makes off on Tom Kidde’s horse.

In this same Her Ladyship’s mount is shot

dead under her in Epstowe Forest, and

she makes off on Tom Kidde’s horse.

This young gentleman now stood looking from a window of his uncle’s house, upon all the dewy leafing beauty of the Park at May. His brow was knit, his lips tight shut, his hand amid his ruffles clenched.

At the table sat Kennaston, inky-fingered, scribbling; eyes now rolling to the ceiling, now roving hither and yon.

“Ah!” sighs this one. “If the critics do not find this canto to their taste, may I be damned!”

“You’re like to go to Court to the Devil, I’mthinking then, dear lad,” speaks de Bohun over his shoulder.

“Fame! Fame!” cries the young poet, pushing back in his chair, wig awry and quill poised in air. “I’ll hunt thee to my dying hour, and if thou escap’st me then, ’twill all be Lady Diana’s fault.”

“How’s that?” asks Percy, with, however, but small ring of interest in his voice.

“Oh!” exclaimed Peg’s twin, “the minx mocks me! ’Tis Monday, kindness and all smiles, to wake on Tuesday for indifference; pouts on Wednesday; lure-me-ons o’ Thursday; forgetfulness for Friday; radiance for Saturday, and all a-jumble, sweets-and-frowns! showers! sunshine! what you will!—and will not!—for my Sunday fare.”

Percy sighs and smiles.

“Percy, sometimes I think Diana does love you!”

“No, Sir, never. We’re like brother and sister, nothing else, save my uncle’s absurd, obstinate (now-cured) whim, since childhood, to match his heir with Brookwood’s heiress. Odzooks! Ken,you’re like every other swain that ever sighed, always looking for a rival to be jealous of! Lady Di cares for you; an you doubted it before, ’tis time to take up hope, since you are asked to Brookwood for a visit, and go popping off to-night, with me left home to think alone on Peggy.”

“Zounds! Sir, ’tis not you only that’s thinking of her!” cries the young man rising and crossing to the fire. “But, what would you! if I call out the bell-man, publish her disappearance in the newspapers; get word to my father and my mother; what comes of’t all, but scandal? and like as not dad an apoplexy, and My Lady mother a set of fits and a death-bed!”

“Ken, I’m a damned fool ever to stop inside of doors or to cease pacing streets, haunting inns, shadowing Sir Robin McTart, until I find her!”

“Fie, Sir, if she’s gone off with Sir Robin McTart, ’tis, I promise you, with a wedding-ring on her finger, and not else! An she loves him, what’s to be said or done, if he’s her lawful lord?”

“Naught. I myself went down to Kennaston yesterday. I said nothing to you, Ken,” he adds,noting the other’s surprised and reproachful start, with a hand upon his junior’s shoulder.

“I thought I’d not interrupt the epic and your frenzies about Lady Di, with my troubles.”

“Well, what news of Peg? Any?” asks her twin anxiously.

“None. I saw Chockey, and only got from her what Grigson had, the positive assurance that her mistress had gone up to London. ‘Of her own free will?’ I asked. ‘Yes, Sir Percy,’ said she. ‘Alone?’ I inquired. ‘No, Sir Percy,’ was her answer, nor could I force, frighten, or buy the baggage into any further confidence. She did beg of me, however, seek out Her Ladyship, if I could, and find how she fared.”

“Gad’s life, Sir! She has eloped. ’Tis clear as crystal!”

“One thing more, I asked Chock: Had Her Ladyship money in her purse? ‘Lawk, Sir Percy! cried she, ‘two hundred pounds I know of!’”

“‘Two hundred pounds!’” repeats Peg’s twin in vast amazement. “’Tis sure more’n she ever saw before in our whole lives put together. Oh, the girl’s safely wedded, Sir, beyond a doubt!”

“Sir!” says Percy, sitting at the table, with his head low in his hands. “The blackguard’s won her from me!”

“I fear so, Sir.” The two men’s hands meet and grasp in the silent fashion of their sex: ofttimes more eloquent than any words e’er speeched.

“Would I had made a hole in his heart that night in Lark Lane!” cried Sir Percy next.

“Sir Robin’s nimble, Sir, and knows a trick or two with steel, as well as dice.”

“Aye: a gallant every inch; ’tis for that I hate him all the more; and yet, Ken, sometimes, lad, when I’ve been a-staring at him from afar, I’ve caught something in his countenance resembling Peg, and it’s that’s made me halt like a chit at provoking of him further.”

Kennaston nods. “Aye: I’ve remarked it; but held my peace, Percy, for ’tis said man and wife often grow to look alike, and I doubt not, sometimes begin after the same pattern.”

Sir Percy sighs again: turns up the room with drooped lids; in silence getting that grip upon his soul which noblest natures insist on with themselves, even in crises like his. ’Tis a bitter battle,closer fought and quicker, too, than any won or lost with swords and guns. The struggle’s writ upon his face as he goes; but when he comes his victory’s writ there too.

“Kennaston,” says he, very quiet and off-hand, “I’m thinking I’ll go to the Colonies, to Virginia.”

“What! no!” ejaculates the poet, placing a hand on either of his friend’s shoulders.

“Yes, Ken, dear lad, I could not live in England without her; perhaps yonder, over the sea, in the new land that’s growing up, I may learn to lead a new, better life, just for her sake that’s lost to me forever. At the least I can strive, at such a distance, to serve my country and my King like a man—until the end I’ll pray for comes.”

Kennaston turns off, with tears in his eyes.

“Mostly,” says he brokenly, “were not Peggy my twin, I’d be in a ripe mood for a-cursing of her! When, Percy?” asks he, after a pause.

“As soon as may be,” is the reply. “I’ve the promise of a commission by my uncle’s influence! Come, come, lad o’ my heart,” laughs he through his own misty eyes. “The wind’s not in my ship’s sails yet. I promised Mr. Brummell for his expeditionto Ivy Dene for the morrow, and I’ll hardly be ready in all points to get under way before you’re back in town from your visit to Brookwood; whence I foresee you’ll fly with Diana’s ‘yes’ betwixt her kiss on your cheek.”

’Twas now Mr. Brummell’s famous and long-talked-about party to Ivy Dene this very next day that dawned.

Now, Her Ladyship had vowed to herself that, come what might, she would avoid this, even did Fate keep her in London. ’Twas no part of her program, although she could do it as well as any sporting squire, to make for her future any such memory as riding a horse astride for thirty miles out and back, in the company a half-score of gentlemen must furnish; yet, so is each of us rather the creature of circumstance than will, that the hour appointed found Peg mounted on a gray with blood in his veins, and a-pacing down Piccadilly to the White Horse beside Beau Brummell’s bay.

She could not, with Sir Robin’s murderous pact in her perpetual view, make up her mind to omit a company that should include Sir Percy.

It seemed to her that any day spent by him out of her sight might prove fatal; that Sir Robin’s hirelings might conceive it better to their purpose to put an end to their intended victim before the Sunday. So, aching with an insane but not unnatural impulse to pull rein and confess all; burning with shame to remember ’twas of Lady Diana’s sweetheart she was thinking; mortified beyond belief every time her saddle grazed her breeches; intent lest an unsuspected sword should flash from the hedge-rows, the sheep-cotes, or the shadows of Epstowe Forest, which they traversed on their way; My Lady Peggy, wishing amidst all this that she had never come to town, yet contrived to display a very cheerful mien, to laugh as loud as she dared, keeping her high notes cautiously to herself, as she had in her speech ever since the night, as Sir Robin, she had made her first appearance in Lark Lane—to join in jest, quip, prank, such as a gay cavalcade of jovial gentlemen were then wont to indulge in.

Such are some of the strange vicissitudes incident to being that most amazingly delicious compound, a wilful and withal true-hearted woman.

As Mr. Brummell had planned, they halted for refreshment at the Merry Rabbit at Market Ossory, and left, after a game of bowls on the green, to pursue their way. Percy lingered a bit in the rear: truth to tell, his reflections were none of the gayest, and the presence of the supposed Sir Robin McTart, and the conclusion, which, together with Ken, he had been forced to reach, that Lady Peggy had run off with the Baronet, did not by any means conspire to the lightening of his spirits. As he watched his presumed rival, heard the ringing laugh, the brilliant jest: noted the careless air, and thought of this cavalier as Lady Peggy’s lord, his choler knew no bounds, and it appeared to him that, come what might, he must invent cause of quarrel, and one or the other of ’em be left cold on the field.

“Why,” a thousand times he asked himself, “this mystery regarding her marriage? Why not have wedded Sir Robin from her father’s home, and with her father’s blessing, since,” Sir Percy reluctantly admitted, “no fault could be found with so fine a young gentleman; and his fortune, he knew to be considerable.”

He was aware that Her Ladyship was romantic to a degree, and he could but decide that this predilection had caused her to elope and to preserve the matter in a wrapping of secrecy for a time; no doubt even now from her retirement looking forward to the hour when she should emerge as Lady McTart!

Sir Percy gritted his teeth together and struck his spurs so deep that his horse gave a plunge which brought him up, neck and neck, with the gray of the supposed Baronet, and the black of Mr. Chalmers.

“To the rescue, Sir Percy!” cried this one jocularly. “Your assistance I beg, and the loan of your wits in our argument.”

“With all my heart!” answers Percy, scenting a possible chance to worst his rival, even in a battle of words. “What’s the subject?”

“A truce to ’t!” exclaims the Beau, with an expressive shake of his head at Mr. Chalmers, who, however, seldom notes any obstacle to the pleasure of his present moment.

“No truce at all, Mr. Brummell!” answers he gaily. “’Tis—”

“’Tis nothing whatever, Sir Percy,” interrupts Lord Escombe, putting his hand on Chalmers’s rein, and adding in an undertone: “Gadzooks! man, hold your peace. The matter’s like tow and tinder betwixt Percy and McTart.”

“’Pon my soul, Gentlemen!” now cries Percy, “I insist upon Jack’s being allowed to proceed with his remarks. If he wants my counsels, they’re his. Come, Sir, speak.”

“’Tis but this,” says Mr. Chalmers. “I say to Sir Robin that since the world’s busy with rumors of his secret marriage to Lady Peggy Burgoyne; since as I learn (by my man, who had it at the gate of the very best authority—Gad! Sirs, ’tis a fact, even if we don’t relish it, the gist of our gossip comes from below stairs, up!) that Lady Peggy is from home, her father believing her in Kent at her godmother’s!” Mr. Chalmers smiles, “her mother being in York, believing her safe at Kennaston, I say, My Lords and Gentlemen, it behooves Sir Robin confide the matter to his best friends, and give them chances to congratulate him and the Lady. Have I the right of’t, Percy, yes or no?”

Percy is silent for a moment: it seems to him a desecration of the sweet, modest and womanly girl he has so long adored, thus to hear even her name, much less a discussion of her most private matters, made into mirthful subject on a morning’s ride.

His anger, too, is great that the man whose name is coupled with hers has not already put a stop to such a conversation, even were it at the point of the sword.

Shall he, here and now, so reply to Mr. Chalmers as shall breed an instant retort from Sir Robin, and a challenge on the spot? The wild thought even flashes through his brain that Sir Robin might, by the grace of God! be left dead on the ground, and that some time in the dim future he might win Peggy back to himself.

But, with a tightening rein, he checks himself, as well as his horse, as he answers.

“Mr. Chalmers, the Lady you name is one whom I honor most deeply, and it seems to me if she has seen fit to go into seclusion, or to marry secretly, that, while I may wish to God it had been in open church! I must continue to respect her preferences, until she elects to change them;” withwhich, breaking the little pause of silence which follows, Sir Percy gallops ahead, joining Mr. Brummell, who has put himself quickly out of the commotion he had foreseen as likely to arrive.

Meantime, it may be correctly imagined that Her Ladyship, with all her sex’s exquisite ingenuity at plaguing itself whenever it possibly can, had seized upon those words of Sir Percy’s most easily twisted into a means of self-torture.

“I wish to God it had been in open church!” instantly stuck itself in her thoughts beside “Consents;” the two forming just that species of flagellation which ladies so situated in mind are wont to inflict upon themselves.

The supposed Sir Robin, from this on, until the arrival of the party at Ivy Dene, became taciturn, even morose, and not a syllable could be got from him in answer to the wildest gibes.

Her eyes intent upon Sir Percy, who now kept to the fore with his host, My Lady Peggy, on the keen lookout for the possible assassin, and to the tune of “consents,” and its running-mate, “I would to God it had been in open church!” put in a very dolorous twenty miles; but, on dismountingat Mr. Brummell’s doorstep, she endeavored to infuse a little joyousness into her looks and speech.

Indeed, ’twas difficult; yet no more so to-day than any other since she had been coerced by circumstances into an acceptance of the Beau’s hospitality. Every mouthful of bread and meat Peggy ate well-nigh choked her, as she remembered ’twas meant for Sir Robin McTart. She felt herself a trickster, a villain of the deepest dye, and yet saw no way out of her usurped character with honor and repute; no way of keeping in it save by the deeper dyeing of her soul in sin, which she promised herself, and heaven, to expiate as soon as Percy should be safe from Sir Robin’s men.

The afternoon was spent as had been planned; the country cook’s dinner was voted a perfect success: Mr. Chalmers, slightly raised by wine, even going so far as to send her down, with his compliments, his favorite ruby heart-pin: when, on the spot, not a gentleman present but whipped out a jewel from ruffle, finger, pocket or fob, and Peggy herself tying ’em up in a pocket-napkin lacedwith Brussels and perfumed like the civet-cat, sent them down to the astonished lass in the kitchen.

A game of cards was in order after the repast: a tilt at politics: a wager on the question of tea in the Colonies; Lady Peggy and Sir Percy keeping, by the grace of each, well apart in all these encounters; and at twelve o’clock, just as the moon was rising behind a bank of splendid star-fringed clouds, Mr. Brummell and his guests set forth on their homeward road.

The beauty of the night was such as soothes and casts its own mantle of peace over even those unquiet spirits which may be abroad.

It reminded Lady Peggy, as she rode along, of just such another when she and Percy had wandered up and down together in the weedy gardens at Kennaston. Of that identical night Percy also was thinking, and of his wilful Lady’s bright sallies, quick smiles, frowns; yea, even of one little touch of her red lips, light as thistledown, which now he seemed to feel the ghost of, on his forehead.

The cavalcade had left the highway some distancebehind; the moon was fast being overtaken by the clouds whence she had, an hour or more ago, emerged; the dews fell thick, and the scent of the hawthorn was sweet in the air as they plunged into Epstowe Forest.

“Ah, Gentlemen,” cried out Mr. Brummell, snapping his whip, “by Gad, Sirs, what a night for Tom Kidde and his merry men! the skies dark, the moon playin’ hide and seek, fifteen watches and purses, and as many rings, pins and seals between us as you left not at Ivy Dene with my cook Elizabeth!”

“Ha! ha! ha! No fears of Tom Kidde, an he knows our caliber, jumping out upon us!” laughs Lord Wootton.

“’Slife! Sir, he’s the sort of highwayman to jump out on the best mettle that strides horse-flesh or carries gold. The young devil’s afraid of nothing that breathes, and has been the terror of travelers now these three or four years gone,” says Vane.

“He’s not above one-and-twenty, smooth-faced as a girl, those say who’ve caught a glimpse of him under his mask; dresses like a macaroni, voicedlike a choir-singer, and nimble as an Indian monkey!”

“Frequents he this neighborhood?” queries Lady Peggy, who at mention of the word “highwayman” has tightened her rein, clapped a hand on her holster, and felt her heart thump, as she involuntarily connects it with possible danger to Percy.

“That he does,” said Mr. Chalmers. “His den, or one of ’em’s somewhere in the depths of Epstowe; and no one can tell when or where he’s like to turn up next.”

“When did he turn up last?” says Sir Wyatt, laughing.

“I can tell you,” returns Vane. “’Twas about Candlemas. I was down at home on a visit from town, when the news came, almost frightening my mother out of her wits, and setting the maids a-shivering like so many poppies in a storm. Tom Kidde had pounced on Lord Brookwood not a mile from his own gates, lifted him off his mount in the politest fashion imaginable, rifled His Lordship’s pockets, appropriated his weapons, and ridden off on his victim’s horse, leaving His Lordship tied to a tree at the roadside, where he was foundby Biggs, the J.P., the next morning, a-bellowin’ and a-cursin’ like a wild bull.”

A hearty laugh greets Mr. Vane’s description.

“Yes, but that ain’t all of’t, My Lords and Gentlemen,” continues he.

“By no means!” cries Beau Brummell, out of his fit of hilarity. “I recall now, that I rode over from Lauriston Castle, where I was visiting, that very morning, and heard the adventure from Brookwood himself. I fancy he had the laugh, or will have it some day, on Tom, or some of his men, for the stolen mare was none other than His Lordship’s famous ‘Homing Nell.’”

“Is it possible!” exclaims Sir Percy, “the mare that’s been taken off a hundred miles, let loose, and finds her way home again; the mare that’s been sold and ridden fifty miles away, and then, when she felt a hand at her mouth she could master, has taken the bit between her teeth, and the one in the saddle’s only sometimes been able to keep his seat, and let her take him straight back whence she came?”

“The very same ‘Homing Nell.’ Brookwood’ssure of her getting back sooner or later,” says the Beau.

“They’ll never catch Tom, though,” cries Escombe.

“If they do,” remarks Vane, “he’ll hang not two hours after he’s bagged; his death-warrant’s been lying signed in Mr. Biggs’s pocket-book any time this twelvemonth; and there’s still a gibbet standing on the hill above Brook-Armsleigh Village!”

“Zounds! Sirs!” exclaims Mr. Chalmers, “what a life ’t must be, tho’; sleep o’ days, wake o’ nights, prowling under the branches, harkening for game from dusk till dawn, all seasons the same, one’s heart in one’s mouth, till the hoof’s heard, and then a masking dash, a brawl, a thrift quick as the lightning’s flash; a corpse or two, and your purse the heavier by as many guineas as the game’s had under cover—and all to the tune of the owl’s cry, and I doubt not for some sweet Maid Marian’s sake!”

“’Slife! hear the boy!” cries Mr. Brummell. “One would think him sired by a Jack Sheppard rather than by the gentlest Sir that ever lived.For your froward tendencies, Sir, you shall pay a penalty.”

“Yea, yea! a penalty! a penalty!” cry they all.

“In what kind?” returns Jack, waving his hat over his head.

“A song! a song!” they answer.

“Which one?” asks he, nothing loath, for his lungs are lusty and his reputation for singing above the ordinary.

“What you will,” they answer.

“Well, then, what say you to ‘Lady Betty Takes the Air,’ since all can join me in the chorus?”

“Good!”

“Percy,” says Jack, “you’ve a pretty pipe in your throat; give me the key, will you? not too high, you rascal, I’m not vainglorious at my music. So, and, so—there,” as Percy does as he is asked.

When all the May is deck’d aboutWith hawthorn bud and blow;When pinkly shows the heather’s tip,And harebells nod a-row—Lady Betty takes the air,Sing ah fa, la-la-la!With a rush hat on her hair:Sing ah fa, la-la-la!When all the brown earth thrills to green,When rivers laugh and sing;When lark and thrush cajole and coax,And all the wood’s a-wing—Lady Betty takes the air, etc.When Corydon most sad, forlorn,With wrinkled hose, distraught,All flouted by his worshiped Fair,Walks forth as one that’s daft,Lady Betty takes the air, etc.When, at the turn-stile next the park,The sad swain stops to sigh—“No lady ever lived so dearAs she for whom I’d die!”Lady Betty takes the air, etc.When, as the sun walks up the glade,And as the milkmaid hiesAcross the paddock with her pails,And as the lark doth rise—Lady Betty takes the air, etc.Cries Betty, flaunting past, “Oh fie!A gallant all unkempt,Such ungenteel and woful sightKind fortune me exempt!”Lady Betty takes the air, etc.When speaking thus, the May-breeze blewHer rush hat o’er the stile,And Corydon caught quick the gaze,And swift his sigh turned smile,Lady Betty takes the air, etc.Thus, when the May is deck’d aboutWith hawthorn bud and blow,Sweet Betty ties her hat-strings fast,A gallant in the bow!Lady Betty takes the air, etc.’Twas ever thus, dear maids and men,Whene’er ye walk abroad—’Tis e’er the little breeze that blowsEach lady to her lord!Lady Betty takes the air, etc.

When all the May is deck’d aboutWith hawthorn bud and blow;When pinkly shows the heather’s tip,And harebells nod a-row—

When all the May is deck’d about

With hawthorn bud and blow;

When pinkly shows the heather’s tip,

And harebells nod a-row—

Lady Betty takes the air,Sing ah fa, la-la-la!With a rush hat on her hair:Sing ah fa, la-la-la!

Lady Betty takes the air,

Sing ah fa, la-la-la!

With a rush hat on her hair:

Sing ah fa, la-la-la!

When all the brown earth thrills to green,When rivers laugh and sing;When lark and thrush cajole and coax,And all the wood’s a-wing—Lady Betty takes the air, etc.

When all the brown earth thrills to green,

When rivers laugh and sing;

When lark and thrush cajole and coax,

And all the wood’s a-wing—