Penshurst Castle Part 8

'Nay, Doll, you must have a cup of spiced wine ere you go, we cannot spare you yet.'

'It is plain I am not wanted, so I can well be spared,' was the reply, with a disagreeable laugh and a jerk of the head in the direction of the settle.

Lucy now sprang up, saying,--

'I, too, must crave leave to bid you good evening, Mistress Ratcliffe. I have to settle plans with my sister before I sleep to-night, and the evening shadows are falling.'

'If you must leave us, Mistress Forrester,' Mistress Ratcliffe said stiffly, 'I may as well inform you, with regret, that the plan proposed by my sons for asking you to bear me company to London in a useful capacity, cannot be fulfilled. I take my niece with me, and two serving-men on the second horse, hence--'

'Oh! madam,' Lucy said, 'there is no need of excusations. I go to London in the next week as waiting-woman to my lady the Countess of Pembroke. It may be that I shall see you there, and I shall be sure to know you and Mistress Dorothy, and make you my proper reverence, even if you have forgotten me.'

'The impudent little hussy!' Mistress Ratcliffe murmured, but she retained her feelings, and said,--

'It is fortunate for you, Mistress Forrester, that you will be under due control in London, for in good sooth you will need it. If you must go, good evening.'

Lucy turned at the door and made a profound curtsey, then, drawing her kerchief closer to her throat, she left the room, George following.

'I don't set much store by Mistress Forrester's manner, Aunt Ratcliffe,'

Dorothy said; 'an ill-bred country child, who, of course, is ignorant, so we will pardon her.'

'Ignorant, yes,' Mistress Ratcliffe said, 'but her pretty face.'

'Pretty!' Dorothy screamed, 'Pretty! Nay, aunt, you cannot call that baby-faced chit pretty. No air; no breeding; mere dairymaid's beauty. It makes me laugh to think how proud she was of her fine gown and cap, which only showed her awkward gait the more.' And Mistress Dorothy fingered her Flemish lace and the string of beads round her short, thick neck, with profound belief in her own charms.

If Lucy's beauty was that of a milkmaid, Dorothy's was decidedly of a different character. Her complexion was sallow and pale; her hair, which was by no means abundant, was of the sandy hue, which she tried to persuade herself was like the Queen's. Her eyes were of a greenish colour, and deeply set under a heavy forehead, and her figure was angular and ungraceful.

Fine feathers do not always make a fine bird, and Dorothy Ratcliffe, although with what in those days was considered to be a fortune at her back, did not find fervent suitors for her favour. She was, therefore, very ready to fall in with Mistress Ratcliffe's wishes, and take pains to ingratiate herself with George, failing Humphrey, whose position as one of Mr Sidney's esquires, made him the more desirable of the two brothers.

Dorothy Ratcliffe was the child of George's uncle, who was a recluse living at Tunbridge. He was a scholar and a pedant, and concerned himself but little about his only child, whose fortune was inherited from her mother.

Marriages in those days were generally settled for the people princ.i.p.ally concerned, with or without their consent, as it happened, and Master Ratcliffe and George's mother had a sort of tacit understanding with each other that Dorothy should take herself and her fortune to Hillbrow Place.

Dorothy was not unwilling to find herself mistress there, but she had always a lingering hope that Humphrey would at last be a victim to her charms, and then it would be easy to throw George over.

But things did not look very promising, and Dorothy asked, in an irritable tone, before she parted with her aunt for the night,--

'Is Humphrey so taken up with the grand folk that he cannot find the time to pay his dutiful respects to you, aunt?'

'He was here late the last evening,' Mistress Ratcliffe said, 'and is, with George, anxious to furnish Mr Sidney with the pick of the horses in the stable. Humphrey can scarce stir from Mr Sidney.'

'So it seems,' Dorothy said. 'Methinks, where there's a will there's a way; but we shall have his company in London.'

'Yes, and George's also. You will favour my poor boy's suit, Doll.'

'Your poor boy! nay, aunt, he is not worthy of pity, when he wins favour from a peerless beauty like Mistress Forrester. But let be, it will not break my heart if he gives you this fair country maid for your daughter, who has not--so I have heard--so much as a bra.s.s farthing to call her own.'

Deeply chagrined, and with an uneasy suspicion that Dorothy might be right in what she said, Mistress Ratcliffe left her niece to repose, saying to herself, 'She has a tongue and a temper of her own, but we will soon tame her when we get her here.'

CHAPTER IV

THE HAWK AND THE BIRD

'So doth the fox the lamb destroy we see, The lion fierce, the beaver, roe or gray, The hawk the fowl, the greater wrong the less, The lofty proud the lowly poor oppress.'

JOHN DAVIES, 1613.

When George left Lucy at the door of Ford Place, she ran quickly through the kitchen, where Mistress Forrester was resting on the settle after the labours of the day.

Things had not gone well with the sick lambs, both were dead, and one of the cart-horses had gone lame, and the eggs of the pea-hen were addled.

These circ.u.mstances were not likely to sweeten Mistress Forrester's temper, and Lucy, who never bore malice, received a sharp answer in reply to her inquiries as to the condition of the lambs.

'They are dead, and much you care, flaunting off with your lover instead of turning your hand to help at home.'

'I could not have saved the lambs' lives,' Lucy said, 'but I am sorry they are dead. I am sorry when any creature dies.'

'I dare say! Be off to bed, for I am locking up in a minute.'

'Where is Mary?' Lucy asked.

'A-bed. That boy has cut his little finger, or some such thing. Lor'! she was like to swoon with terror when she saw the blood; the child himself was not such a coward.'

Lucy hastened upstairs, and found Mary by the window in her favourite seat.

A book lay open on her knee, and, when Lucy came in, she held up her hand, and, pointing to the bed, said,--

'Hus.h.!.+ he is asleep.'

'What has happened?' Lucy said. 'Is the boy hurt?'

'He cut his hand with an old knife, and the blood poured forth. Oh, Lucy, if aught were to befall him, I scarce dare think of what would become of me.'

Lucy thought of the strange encounter she had had with the man on the hill path, and wondered whether it were kind to raise her sister's fears about Ambrose.

'Come and sit by me, sweetheart,' Mary said, making room for her sister on the deep window seat. 'I am troubled to-night with a shadow of coming grief. Sure I have had enough, and I am young yet. Twenty-five is young, though I dare to say I seem old to you, little sister. I am perplexed in mind, and tossed about with doubt. Can you think of me as a merry, light-hearted maiden, donning my smartest gown to go at Lady Mary's bidding to the Park, where great festivities were held in honour of the Queen's visit? Ah, child, it was then soft words and flattery turned my head, and I--well, I have rued it to this hour. Thus, dear Lucy, when I think of your going forth in my Lady Pembroke's train, I fear for you. I will pray also, and pray G.o.d may watch over you.'

'Then I may go,' Lucy said. 'I may really go. Oh, Mary, Mary, I am so happy!'

Then, remembering her encounter with the stranger she said,--

'I met a man on the hill path as I went to Hillbrow. He scared me a little bit, but George Ratcliffe came up, and he made off and like a ghost vanished.'

'A man!' Mary exclaimed, in a low voice of suppressed fear. 'What man?'

'He was clad in a long cloak, with a cap pulled over his brow. He had evil eyes--dark, piercing eyes.'