The Unknown Ajax

“Then who is, sir?” demanded Anthea.

“A weaver’s brat!” he replied, his voice vibrant with loathing.

“Oh, dear!”said Mrs. Darracott, breaking the stunned silence that succeeded his lordship’s announcement.

The hopeless inadequacy of this exclamation dragged a choke of laughter out of Anthea, but it caused his lordship’s smouldering fury to flare up. “Is that all you have to say? Is that all, woman? You are a wet-goose—a widgeon—a—take yourself off, and your daughter with you! Go and chatter, and marvel, and bless yourselves, butkeep out of my sight and hearing! By God, I don’t know how I bear with you!”

“No, indeed!” said Anthea instantly. “It is a great deal too bad, sir! Mama, how could you speak so to one so full of compliance and good nature as my grandfather? So truly the gentleman! Come away at once!”

“That’s what you think of me, is it, girl?” said his lordship, a glint in his eyes.

“Oh, no!” she responded, dropping him a curtsy. “It’s what I say, sir! You must know that my feather-headed Mama has taught me to behave with all the propriety in the world! To tell you what I think of you would be to sink myself quite below reproach! Come, Mama!”

He gave a bark of laughter. “Tongue-valiant, eh?”

She had reached the door, which Chollacombe was holding open, but she looked back at that. “Try me!”

“I will!” he promised.

“Oh, Anthea, pray—.’” whispered Mrs. Darracott, almost dragging her from the room. She added, as Chollacombe closed the door behind them: “My love, you should not! You know you should not! What, I ask you, would become of us if he were to cast us off?

“Oh, he won’t do that!” replied Anthea confidently. “Even he must feel that once in a lifetime is enough for the performance ofthat idiocy! I collect that the weaver’s son is the offspring of the uncle we are never permitted to mention? Who is he, and what is he, and—oh, come and tell me all about it, Mama! You know we have leave to marvel and chatter as much as we choose!”

“Yes, but I don’t know anything,” objected Mrs. Darracott, allowing herself to be drawn into one of the saloons that opened on to the central hall of the house. “Indeed, I never knew of his existence until your grandfather threw him at my head in that scrambling way! And I consider,” she added indignantly, “that I behaved with perfect propriety, for I took it with composure, and I’m sure it was enough to have cast me into strong hysterics! He would have been well-served if I had fallen senseless at his feet. I was never more shocked!”

A smile danced in her daughter’s eyes, but she said with becoming gravity: “Exactly so! But a well-bred ease of manner, you know, is quite wasted on my grandfather. Mama, when you ruffle up your feathers you look like a very pretty partridge!”

“But I am not wearing feathers!” objected the widow. “Feathers for a mere family evening, and in the country, too! It would be quite ineligible, my love! Besides, you should not say such things!”

“No, very true! It was the stupidest comparison, for whoever saw a partridge in purple plumage? You look like a turtle-dove, Mama!”

Mrs. Darracott allowed this to pass. Her mind, never tenacious, was diverted to the delicate sheen of her gown. She had fashioned it herself, from a roll of silk unearthed from the bottom of a trunk stored in one of the attics, and she was pardonably pleased with the result of her skill. The design had been copied from a plate in the previous month’s issue of The Mirror of Fashion, but she had improved upon it, substituting some very fine Brussels lace (relic of her trousseau) for the chenille trimming of the illustration. Her father-in-law might apostrophize her as a wet-goose, but even he could scarcely have denied (had he had the least understanding of such matters) that she was a notable needlewoman. She was also a very pretty woman, with a plump, trim figure, large blue eyes, and a quantity of fair hair which was partially concealed under a succession of becoming caps. From themoment when she had detected a suspicion of sagging under her jaw she had made her caps to tie beneath her chin or (more daringly) her ear, and the result was admirable. She was neither learned nor intelligent, but she contrived to dress both herself and her daughter out of a meagre jointure, supplying with her clever fingers what her purse could not buy, and she had never, during the twelve years of her widowhood, allowed either her father-in-law’s snubs or the frequent discomforts of her situation to impair the amiability of her disposition. Her temper being cheerful, and the trend of her mind optimistic, she seldom fretted over the major trials which were beyond her power to mend. Her daughter, of whom she was extremely fond, was twenty-two years of age and still unwed; her spirited young son, whom she adored, was kept kicking his heels in idleness to serve his grandfather’s caprice; but although she recognized that such a state of affairs was deplorable, she could not help feeling that something would happen to make all right, and was able, without much difficulty, to put such dismal thoughts aside, and to expend her anxiety on lesser and more remediable problems. Anthea’s quizzing remark brought one of these to her mind. Smoothing a crease from the purple-bloom satin, she said very seriously: “You know, dearest, it will be excessively awkward!”

“What will be awkward? The weaver’s son?”

“Oh, him—! No, poor boy—though of course it will be! I was thinking of your Aunt Aurelia. I am persuaded she will expect to see us in mourning. You know what a high stickler she is for every observance! She will think it very odd of us to be wearing colours—even improper!”

“Not at all!” replied Anthea coolly. “By the time my grandfather has demanded to be told what cause she has to wear mourning for my uncle and my cousin, and has made her the recipient of his views on females rigging themselves out to look like so many crows, she will readily understand why you and I have abstained from that particular observance.”

Mrs. Darracott considered this rather dubiously. “Well, yes, but there is no depending on your grandfather. I think we should at least wear black ribbons.”

“Very well, Mama, we will wear whatever you choose—at least, I will do so ifyou will stop teasing yourself about such fripperies and tell me about the weaver’s son, and the uncle who must not be mentioned.”

“But I don’t know anything!” protested Mrs. Darracott. “Only that he was the next brother to poor Granville, and quite your grandfather’s favourite son. Your papa was used to say that that was what enraged Grandpapa so particularly, though for my part I can’t believe that he held him in the slightest affection! Never, never could I bring myself to disown my son! Not though he married a dozen weaver’s daughters!”

“Oh, I think we should be obliged to disown him if he married a dozen of them, Mama!” Anthea said, laughing. “It would be quite excessive, and so embarrassing! Oh, no, don’t frown at me! It don’t become you, and I won’t fun any more, I promise you! Is that what my uncle did? Married a weaver’s daughter?”

“Well, that’s what I was told,” replied Mrs. Darracott cautiously. “It all happened before I was married to your papa, so I am not perfectly sure. Papa wouldn’t have spoken of it, only that there was a notice of Hugh’s death published in the Gazette, and he was afraid I might see it, and make some remark.”

“When did he die, Mama?”

“Now that I can tell you, for it was the very year I was married, and had just come back from my honeymoon to live here. It was in 1793. He was killed, poor man. I can’t remember the name of the place, but I do know it was in Holland. I daresay we were engaged in a war there, for he was a military man. And I shouldn’t be at all astonished, Anthea, if that is what makes your grandfather so determined Richmond shan’t enter the army. I don’t mean Hugh’s being killed, but if he had not been a military man he would never have been stationed in Yorkshire, and, of course, if he had not been stationed there he would never have met that female, let alone have become so disastrously entangled. I believe she was a very low, vulgar creature, and lived in Huddersfield. I must own that it is not at all what one would wish for one’s son.”

“No, indeed!” Anthea agreed. “What in the world can have possessed him to do such a thing? And he a Darracott!”

“Exactly so, my love! The most imprudent thing, for he cannot have supposed that your grandfather would forgive such a shocking misalliance! When one thinks how he holds up his nose at quite respectable persons, and never visits the Metropolis because he says it has grown to be full of mushrooms, and once-a-week beaux—! I must say, I never knew anyone who set himself on such a high form. And then to have his son marrying a weaver’s daughter! Well!”

“And to be obliged in the end to receive her son as his heir!” said Anthea. “No wonder he has been like a