Sophia, Stanley J. Weyman [new ebook reader TXT] 📗

hard as stone. "There is no best to it," she said.

"Oh, but surely in your sister's interest?" the duchess expostulated.

"Your Grace was misinformed. I have no sister," Mrs. Northey replied, her voice a trifle high, and her thin nostrils more pinched than usual. "From the moment Miss Maitland left this house in such a way as to bring scandal on my husband's name, she ceased to be my sister. Lord Northey has claims upon us. We acknowledge them."

The duchess stared, but did not answer.

"My husband has claims upon me, I acknowledge them," Mrs. Northey continued with majesty.

The duchess still stared; her manner betrayed that she was startled.

"Well, of course," she said at last, "that is what we all wish other people to do in these cases; for the sake of example, you know, and to warn the--the young. But, dear me," rubbing her nose reflectively with the corner of her snuff-box, "it's very sad! I don't know, I really don't know that I should have the courage to do it--in Betty's case now. His Grace would--would expect it, of course. But really I don't know!"

"Your Grace is the best judge in your own case," Mrs. Northey said, her breath coming a little quickly. "For our part," she added, looking upward with an air of self-denial, "Mr. Northey and I have determined to give no sanction to a connection so discreditable!"

The duchess had a vision of her own spoiled daughter laid ill in a six-shilling lodging, of a mother stealing to her under cover of darkness, and in his Grace's teeth; of a tiny baby the image of Betty at that age. And she clutched her snuff-box tightly, "I suppose the man is--is impossible?" she said impulsively.

"He is quite impossible."

"Mr. Northey has not seen him?"

"Certainly not," Mrs. Northey exclaimed, with a virtuous shudder.

"But if she--if she were brought to see what she has done in its true light?" the duchess asked weakly; her motherly instinct still impelling her to fight the young thing's battle.

"Not even then," Mrs. Northey replied with Roman firmness. "Under no circumstances, no circumstances whatever, could Mr. Northey and I countenance conduct such as hers."

"You are sure that there's--there's no mistake, my dear?"

"Not a shadow of a mistake!" madam answered with acrimony. "We have traced her to the man's lodging. She reached it after dark, and under--under the most disgraceful circumstances."

Mrs. Northey referred to the arrest by bailiffs, the news of which had reached Arlington Street through Lane the mercer. But the duchess took her to mean something quite different; and her Grace was shocked.

"Dear, dear," she said in a tone of horror; and looking instinctively at her daughter, she wished that Lady Betty had not seen so much of the girl, wished still more fervently that she had not mixed herself up with her flight. "I am infinitely sorry to hear it," she said. "Infinitely sorry! I confess I did not think her that kind of girl. My dear, you have indeed my sympathy."

Mrs. Northey, though she knew quite well what the duchess was thinking, shook her head as if she could add much more, but would not; and the duchess, her apologies made, rose to take leave; resolved to give her daughter such a wigging by the way as that young lady had never experienced. But while they stood in the act of making their adieux, Mr. Northey entered; and his dolorous head shaking, which would have done credit to a father's funeral, detained her so long, that she was still where he found her, when an exclamation from Lady Betty, who had profited by her mother's engrossment to look out of the window, startled the party.

"Oh, la, ma'am, here she is!" the girl cried. "I vow and declare she is!"

"Betty!" her Grace cried sharply. "Remember yourself. What do you mean? Come, we must be going."

"But, ma'am, she's at the door," Lady Betty replied with a giggle. And turning and thrusting her muff into her mouth--as one well understanding the crisis--she looked over it at the party, her eyes bright with mischief.

Mrs. Northey's face turned quite white. "If this--if your daughter means that the misguided girl is returning here," she cried, "I will not have it."

"It is not to be thought of!" Mr. Northey chimed in. "She would not have the audacity," he added more pompously, "after her behaviour." And he was moving to the window--while the kind-hearted duchess wished herself anywhere else--when the door opened, and the servant announced, "Sir Hervey Coke!"

The duchess gave vent to a sigh of relief, while the Northeys looked daggers at Lady Betty, the author of the false alarm. Meantime Coke advanced, his hat under his arm. "I am really no more than an ambassador," he said gaily. "My principal is downstairs waiting leave to ascend. Duchess, your humble servant! Lady Betty, yours--you grow prettier every day. Mrs. Northey, I have good news for you. You will be glad to hear that you were misinformed as to the object of your sister's departure from the house--about which you wrote to me."

"Misinformed!" Mrs. Northey exclaimed with a freezing look. "I was misinformed, sir?"

"Completely, at the time you wrote to me," Sir Hervey answered, smiling on the party. "As you will acknowledge in one moment."

"On whose authority, pray?" with a sniff.

"On mine," Coke replied. "'Twas an odd coincidence that you wrote to me, of all people."

"Why, sir, pray?"

"Because----" he began; and there he broke off and turned to the duchess, who had made a movement as if she would withdraw. "No," he said, "I hope your Grace will not go. The matter is not private."

"Private?" Mrs. Northey cried shrilly--she could control her feelings no longer. "The hussy has taken good care it shall not be that! Private, indeed? It is not her fault if there is a man in the town who is ignorant of her disgrace!"

"Nay, ma'am, softly, if you please," Sir Hervey interposed, with the least touch of sternness in his tone. "You go too far."

Mrs. Northey glared at him; she was pale with anger. "What?" she cried. "Hoity-toity! do you think I shall not say what I like about my own sister?"

"But not about my wife!" he answered firmly.

She stepped back as if he had aimed a blow at her, so great was her surprise. "What?" she shrieked. "Your wife?" While the others looked at him, thunderstruck; and Lady Betty, who, on the fringe of the group, was taking in all with childish dilated eyes, uttered a scream of delight.

"Your wife?" Mr. Northey gasped.

"Precisely," Coke answered. "My wife."

But Mrs. Northey could not, would not, believe it. She thought that he was lending himself to some cunning scheme; some plan for bringing about a reconciliation. "Your wife?" she repeated. "Do you mean that Sophia, my sister----"

"Preferred a quiet wedding à deux," he answered, helping himself to a pinch of snuff, and smiling slightly, as at the recollection. "Your Grace will understand," he continued, turning with easy politeness to the duchess, "how it amused me to read Mrs. Northey's letter under such circumstances."

But Mrs. Northey was furious. "If this be true," she said hoarsely, "but I do not believe it is, why did you do it? Tell me that? Until I know that I shall not believe it!"

Sir Hervey shrugged his shoulders. "Mr. Northey will believe it, I am sure," he said, with a look in that gentleman's direction. "For the rest, ma'am, it was rather Lady Coke's doing than mine. She heard that her brother was about to make a ruinous marriage, and discovered that he was actually in the company and under the influence of the Irishman, Hawkesworth, whom you know. There were those who should more properly have made the effort to save him, but these failed him; and the result of it was, thanks to her, he was saved. Thanks to her, and to her only," Sir Hervey repeated with a look, beneath which Mr. Northey quailed, and his wife turned green with rage, "since, as I said, those who should have interfered did not. But this effected, and Keith, who should have married her brother, being in attendance--well, we thought it better to avail ourselves of his services. 'Twould have been a pity, your Grace, to lose a guinea," Coke added, his eyes twinkling, as he turned to the duchess. "It was the best instance I've ever known of 'a guinea in time saves ninety!'"

The duchess laughed heartily. "'Twas cheap at any rate, Sir Hervey," she said. "I am sure for my part I congratulate you."

"I don't!" Mrs. Northey cried, before he could answer. "She has behaved abominably! Abominably!" she repeated, her voice quivering with spite. For, strange human nature! here was the match made, on making which she had set her heart; yet so far was she from being pleased, or even satisfied, she could have cried with mortification. "She has behaved infamously!"

"Tut, tut!" Sir Hervey cried.

But the angry woman was not to be silenced. "I shall say it!" she persisted. "I think it, and I shall say it."

"Of Miss Maitland, as often as you please," he retorted, bowing. "Of Lady Coke only at your husband's peril. Of course, if you do not wish to receive her, ma'am, that is another matter."

But on this Mr. Northey interposed. "No, no," he cried, fussily. "Mrs. Northey is vexed, if I may say so, not unnaturally vexed by the lack of confidence in her, which Sophia has shown. But that--that is quite another thing from--from disowning her. No, no, let me be the first to wish you happiness, Coke!" And with an awkward essay at heartiness, and an automaton-like grin, he shook Sir Hervey by the hand. "I'll fetch her up," he continued, "I'll fetch her up! My dear, ahem! Congratulate Sir Hervey. It is what we wanted from the first, and though it has not come about quite as we expected, nothing could give us greater pleasure. It's an alliance welcome in every respect. Yes, yes, I'll bring her up."

He hurried away, while the duchess hastened to add a few words of further congratulation, and Mrs. Northey stood silent and waiting, her face now red, now pale. She had every reason to be satisfied, for except in the matter of Tom--and there Sophia had thwarted her selfish plans--all had turned out as she wished. But not through her, there was the rub! On the contrary, she had been duped, she felt it. She had been tricked into betraying how little heart she had, how little affection for her sister; and bitterly she resented the exposure.

But even her face cleared in a degree when Sophia appeared. As the girl moved forward on Sir Hervey's arm--who went gallantly to the door to meet her--so far from exhibiting the blushing pride of a woman vain of her conquest, glorying in the trick she had played the world, she showed but the timid, frightened face of a shrinking child. Her eyes sought the floor, nervously; her bearing was the farthest removed from exultation it was possible to conceive. So different, indeed, was she from all they had looked to see in the new Lady Coke, the heroine of this odd romance, that even Mrs. Northey found the cold reconciliation on which her husband was bent more feasible, the frigid kiss more possible than she had thought; while to the duchess the bride's aspect seemed so unnatural, that she drew Sir Hervey aside and questioned him keenly.

"What have you done to her?" she said. "That a runaway bride? Why, if she had been dragged to the altar and sold to a Jew broker she could hardly look worse, or more down-hearted! Sho, man, what is it?"

"She's troubled about her brother," Coke