The Unknown Ajax

“I’m not in need of that, lass, for I’m getting one,” he interpolated ruefully.

“No, no!—At least—Oh, dear, I daresay it sounds foolish to you, and I know I told you I was mercenary, but I’m not, Hugo! Only think how it would appear to everyone! As though I had been determined before ever I saw you not to let your odious fortune slip through my hands!”

He patted her consolingly. “You needn’t worry about that, love. When people see you wearing the same bonnet for years on end they’ll never think you married me for my fortune.”

“As nothing would induce me to wear the same bonnet for years on end—”

“You’ll have to,” he said simply. “I’m a terrible nipfarthing. Sare-baned, we call it. It’ll take a deal of coaxing to get as much as a groat out of me. I hadn’t meant to tell you, but I wouldn’t want to take advantage of you, and if you were thinking I’m not one to cut up stiff over the bills, or—”

“If you knew what I was thinking, you’d never hold up your head again!” she told him. “You seem to forget that you wished to purchase the moon for me!”

“Nay, I don’t forget that! The thing is I can’t purchase it, so there was no harm in saying it. Now, if I’d said I’d like to give you a diamond necklace, or some such thing, you might have taken me up on it. I remembered that just in time to stop myself,” he explained, apparently priding himself on his forethought.

“I should like very much to have a diamond necklace,” said Anthea pensively.

“Wouldn’t a paste one do as well?” he asked, in a voice of great uneasiness.

She had been so sure that he would fall into the trap that she was taken, for an instant, off her guard, and looked up at him with such a startled expression on her face that his deep chuckle escaped him, and he lifted her quite to her feet, and kissed her.

Scandalized by such impropriety, Miss Darracott commanded him to set her down immediately, on pain of never being spoken to by her again. This threat cowed him into obedience, and Miss Darracott, considerably flushed and ruffled, was just about to favour him with her opinion of his conduct when Claud walked into the room, thus saving his large cousin from annihilation.

Claud had come in search of him, the news of his affluence having by this time reached him. He could scarcely have been more delighted had he himself suddenly inherited a fortune, for he instantly perceived that now more than ever would Hugo need a guiding hand, particularly in the choice of a suitable town residence, and its furnishings. He had a great turn for such matters, and had, indeed, so unerring an eye for colour, and such exquisite taste in decoration, that his advice was frequently sought by ladies of high fashion who desired to bestow a new touch on their drawing-rooms. Since he lived modestly in two rooms in Duke Street, there was little scope for his genius in his own abode: a circumstance which made him look forward with intense pleasure to the prospect of being able to lavish his skill not merely on a drawing-room or a saloon, but on an entire house, from attics to basement. “It’ll be something like!” he assured Hugo. “Just you leave it to me, old fellow! No need for you to worry yourself over it! You dub up the possibles, and I’ll lay ’em out to the best advantage. Yes, and don’t, on any account, enter into a treaty for a house behind my back! You’d be diddled, as sure as check, because it stands to reason you can’t know your way about in London. Anthea don’t know either, so it’s no use thinking you can leave it to her. As likely as not she’d land you in Russell Square, all among the Cits and the bankers, or Upper Grosvenor Street, miles from anywhere.”

This was a little too much for Miss Darracott. “Have no fear!” she said coldly. “Indeed, I can’t conceive why you should suppose I should wish to choose a house for Hugo!”

“Dash it, you’re going to marry him, aren’t you?” said Claud. “We all know that! ”

“You know nothing of the sort!” she declared hotly. “The only thing you know is that Grandpapa desires it, and if you imagine that I care a rush for—”

“No, dash it!” interrupted Claud. “Never thought about the old gentleman at all! Well, what I mean is, it’s as plain as a pikestaff! You can’t go about smelling of April and May, the pair of you, and then expect to gull people into thinking you don’t mean to get riveted! A pretty set of gudgeons you must think we are!”

“That’s dished me!” said the Major fatalistically.

“I’ll tell you what!” said Claud, engrossed in his vicarious schemes, “we’ll take a bolt to the village next week, and see what’s to be had! No reason why you and my Aunt Elvira shouldn’t come too, Anthea. You can put up at —”

“Nay, we’ll do no such thing!” intervened Hugo, in some haste. “I’m off to Huddersfield next week.”

Anthea, making a dignified exit, looked back involuntarily. “Going away! Oh—oh, are you? Will you be making a long stay at Yorkshire?”

“Not a day longer than I must,” replied Hugo, smiling at her so warmly that she felt herself blushing, and retired in shaken order.

In all but one quarter, the news of Hugo’s wealth was very well received, Ferring, in particular, becoming so puffed-up that his uncle felt obliged to snub him severely. My lord came to dinner in a mood of unprecedented amiability; and Mrs. Darracott told her affronted daughter that fortune was the one thing needed to make dear Hugo wholly acceptable.

“Mama, how can you!” exclaimed Anthea.

“Well, my love, it is a great piece of nonsense to pretend that life is not very much more comfortable when one can command its elegancies, and always be beforehand with the world, because it is!” replied Mrs. Darracott, with one of her disconcerting flashes of common-sense. “I liked Hugo from the outset, but although I very soon perceived that he was just the man to make you happy, I could not wish you to marry him when I believed it meant that you would be obliged to live here, dependent on your grandfather! But he has been telling me about his scheme to refurbish up the Dower House, if you should not dislike it—and I can’t think why you should, dearest, for he says the ghost is nothing more than Spurstow, trying to keep everyone away, which wouldn’t surprise me in the least, for I always disliked that man, and even if there is a ghost it cannot possibly be more disagreeable to live with than your grandfather! I should not find it so, at all events, and only think, Anthea! dear Hugo wishes me to live there too! Of course I said I should not, but I was very much affected: indeed, I cried a little!” She paused to dry the tears that were again rolling down her cheeks. “He couldn’t have been kinder if he had been my own son!” she disclosed. “You must not suppose I wasn’t devoted to your poor Papa, my dear, but no one could call him a dependable man, and oh, what a comfort it is to one to have a creature like Hugo to turn to! Say what you will, my love, there is something about very big, quiet men! So ridiculous, too!” she added, with a rather shaky laugh. “He says if you won’t marry him he will want me more than ever to live at the Dower House, to keep house for him! I was obliged to laugh, though naturally I gave him a scold for talking such nonsense. And although I wouldn’t press you for the world, my dearest child, I did tell him that nothing could make me happier than to see you married to him—and it is of no use to take a pet, because if you are not in love with him, all I can say is that you are a most shocking flirt, which I should be sorry to think of any child of mine! And as for not marrying him because he is much wealthier than we knew, I never heard anything so absurd in my life!”

Miss Darracott made no attempt to defend herself; but, revolted by the knowledge that the better part of her family was apparently waiting in hourly expectation of receiving the news of her betrothal, she roundly informed her suitor next day that nothing would induce her to gratify a set of persons whom she very improperly described as vulgar, prying busybodies.

The Major received this declaration with perfect equanimity, even going so far as to say that he would be very well suited to postpone the announcement of the engagement until (as he phrased it) they were shut of his Uncle Matthew’s family. “That won’t be long after I get back from Huddersfield, from what my Aunt Aurelia was saying t’other evening. I’ll have to go there, love, because when I was recalled, before Waterloo, I’d no time to do more than pitch all my affairs back into Jonas Henry’s lap, as you might say. Ay, and that puts me in mind of another thing! He hired Axby House from me when my grandfather died, and I’ve a notion he’d be glad if I’d sell it to him outright. Now, tell me, love: shall I do it, or have you a fancy for it?”

“I think you should do exactly as you wish.”

“Nay, love!” expostulated the Major.

“I only meant that—well, how could I have a fancy for a house I’ve never seen?” said Anthea. “Though I own I should like to see that place where you were born.”

“Well, I wasn’t born at Axby House, so that settles it,” said the Major cheerfully. “Tell me another thing! Do