Mrs. Fitz Part 25

Next to Alexander O'Mulligan's horse and his breadth of manner, his clothes call for mention. Their cut and style must be p.r.o.nounced as "sporting." In particular his waistcoat was a thing of beauty. It was a canary of the purest dye, forming a really piquant, indeed aesthetic, contrast to the delicate tint of green in his eye. The presence in that organ of that genial hue is thought by some to invite the presumption of the worldly; but according to Joseph Jocelyn De Vere Vane-Anstruther, whose humble devotion to his hero was almost pathetic, it called for a very stout fellow indeed "to try it on" with the amateur middle-weight champion of Great Britain.

Nevertheless, like every paladin of the great breed, Alexander O'Mulligan was as gentle as he was brave. He had hardly set foot in Dympsfield House, which he did somewhere about tea-time on the day of his arrival in our parish, before he captured the heart of Miss Lucinda. He straightway a.s.sumed the _role_ of a bear with the most realistic and thrilling completeness. Not only was his growl like distant thunder in the mountains, but also he had the faculty of rolling his eyes in a savage frenzy, and over and above everything else, a tendency to bite your legs upon little or no provocation. It was not until he had promised to marry her that she could be induced to part with him.

The ruler of Dympsfield House returned from Doughty Bridge, Yorks, equally felicitous in her health and in her temper. We dined agreeably _tete-a-tete_ with the aid of Heidsieck cuvee 1889. I reported that the venerable inhabitant of Bolton Street, Mayfair, was supporting her affliction with her accustomed grace and resignation; and duly received the benediction of my parents-in-law, who in the opinion of their youngest daughter had never been in more vigorous health--which is no more than one expects to hear of those who dedicate their lives to virtue.

I was in the act of paring an apple when Mrs. Arbuthnot said, with an air of detachment that was Vane-Anstruther of very good quality, "By the way, has anything been heard of that creature?"

"Creature, my angel?" said I. If my tone conveyed anything it was that the world contained only one creature, and she at that moment was balancing a piece of preserved ginger on her fruit knife.

"The circus woman."

"Circus woman?" said I, blandly. Our gla.s.ses were half empty and I filled them up. "Somehow," said I, "this stuff does not seem equal to the Bellinger that your father sends us at Christmas." Strictly speaking this was not altogether the case, but then truth has many aspects, as the pagan philosophers have found occasion to observe.

"Mrs. Fitz, you goose!"

"She has come home, I believe," said I, with a casual air, which all the same belonged to the region of finished diplomacy.

"Come home!" The fount of my felicity indulged in a glower that can only be described as truculent, but her flutelike tones had a little piping thrill that softened its effect considerably. "Come home! Do you mean to say that Fitz has taken her back again?"

"There is reason to believe he has done so."

"What amazing creatures men are!"

"Yes, _mon enfant_, we have the authority of Haeckel, that matter a.s.sumed a very remarkable guise when man evolved himself out of the mud and water."

"Don't be trivial, Odo. To think she has dared to come home. If I were a man and my wife bolted with the chauffeur, I wonder if she would dare to come home again?"

"The hypothesis is unthinkable. Freedom and poetry and romance, translated into that overtaxed, down-trodden bondslave, the registered and betrousered parliamentary voter!"

The next morning the Crackanthorpe met at the Marl Pits. All the world and his wife were there. The lawless mobs which are the curse of latter-day fox-hunting are not quite so rampant in our country as they are in that of more than one of our neighbours. Why this merciful dispensation has been granted to us no man can explain. It may be that we have not a sufficient care for the "bubble reputation." But as our reverend Vicar says, our immunity is one further proof, if such were needed, that the Providence which watches over the lowliest of G.o.d's creatures is essentially beneficent: certainly a very becoming frame of mind for a humble-minded vicar in Christ who keeps ten horses in his stables and hunts six days a week.

Bra.s.set in a velvet cap winding the horn of his fathers is a figure for respect. Even the Nimrods of the old school, who feel that his courtesy and his care for the feelings of others are beneath the dignity of the chase, accord to his office a recognition which they would be the last to grant to his merely human qualities. This morning the n.o.ble Master was esquired by his distinguished guest. The O'Mulligan of Castle Mulligan, pride of the Blazers, possessor of the straightest left in the western hemisphere, was immediately presented to the mistress of Dympsfield House.

That lady, mounted so expensively, that her weakling of a husband was deservedly condemned to bestride a quadruped that Joseph Jocelyn De Vere Vane-Anstruther publicly stigmatised as "an insult to the 'unt,'"

was instantly prepossessed, as her daughter had been, in favour of the amateur middle-weight champion. Certainly his blandishments were many.

Grinning from ear to ear, revealing two regular and gleaming rows of white teeth, his bearing had both grace and cordiality. His smile in itself was enough to take the bone out of the ground, and he had all the charming volubility of his nation. As for his aide-de-camp, he too deserves mention. Having done very well at "snooker" the previous day, my relation by marriage was looking very pleasant and happy in the most perfectly fitting coat that ever embellished the human form. He was mounted on Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, the _piece de resistance_ of his stable.

We were accepting the hospitality of the Reverend, an agreeable function that was rendered necessary by the fact that his parsonage is within a mile of the tryst, when portentous toot-toots accompanied by prodigious gruntings a.s.sailed our ears.

"I say, Jo," said Alexander O'Mulligan in an aside to his admiring camp-follower, "here comes ould Fizzamagig."

This elegant pseudonym veiled the ident.i.ty of the most august of her s.e.x. The famous fur coat and the bell-shaped topper converged upon the Rectory gravel, at the instance of a worn-out dust distributor whose manifold grunts and wheezes all too clearly proclaimed that it belonged to an early phase of the industry.

It was the broad light of day, I was in the midst of friends and brother sportsmen, but once again the chill of apprehension went down my spine. For an instant I had a vision of pink satin. Mrs. Catesby accepted the gla.s.s of brown sherry and the piece of cake respectfully proffered by the Church. But while she discoursed of parochial commonplaces in that penetrating voice of hers, it was plain that her august head was occupied with affairs of state. Her grave grey eye travelled to the middle of the lawn, where the n.o.ble Master was sharing a ham sandwich with Halcyon and Harmony; thence to the inadequately mounted Member for the Uppingdon Division of Middles.h.i.+re; thence to the Magnificent Youth and the heroic O'Mulligan. Finally in contemplative austerity it rested upon the trim outline of the lady whose habit had not a fault, although there is reason to believe that in the eyes of one it erred a little on the side of fas.h.i.+on, who with the aid of the Parsoness and Laura Glendinning was engaged in putting the scheme of things in its appointed order.

Once again I was undergoing the process of feeling profoundly uncomfortable, when we were regaled with an incident so pregnant with drama that a mere private emotion was swept away. An imperious vision in a scarlet coat, mounted on a n.o.ble and generous horse, came in at the Parson's gate. She was accompanied by the son-in-law of Ferdinand the Twelfth.

"What ho, the military!" murmured Alexander O'Mulligan.

To the sheer amazement of all, save three of his followers, the Master of the Crackanthorpe was the first to greet Mrs. Fitz. A recent incident was fresh in the minds of all. It was pretty well understood that "the circus rider from Vienna" and her cavalier entered the Rectory grounds without an invitation, for the Fitzwaren stock stood lower than ever in the market. It was expected of our battered and traduced chieftain that at least he should withhold official recognition from these lawless invaders. He was expected to vindicate his office and maintain what was left of his dignity by looking a.s.siduously in another direction. But he did nothing of the sort.

In the most heedless and tactless manner the n.o.ble Master proceeded to forfeit the sympathy, the esteem, and the confidence of those who had hitherto dispensed those commodities so lavishly. It would be hard to conceive a more grievous affront to the feminine followers of the Crackanthorpe than was furnished by the Master's personal reception of the lady in the scarlet coat. The grave, yet cordial humility of his bearing, admirably Christian in the light of too-recent history, received no interpretation in the terms of the higher altruism.

"He will have to resign," breathed the august Mrs. Catesby in the ear of the outraged Laura Glendinning.

It was a relief to everybody when a move was made to the top cover.

Without loss of time the question of questions was put. Was the famous ticked fox at home? Was that almost mythical customer, whose legend was revered in three countries, in his favourite earth?

In a half-circle, each thinking his thoughts, and with a furtive eye for his neighbour, we waited.

A succession of silvery notes from the pack at last proclaimed the answer to the question. As usual the father of cunning had set his mask for Langley Dumbles. One of the stiffest bits of country in the s.h.i.+res lay stretched out ahead. Two distinct and well-defined courses were immediately presented to the field. The one was pregnant with grief yet fragrant with glory. The other, if not the path of honour, was certainly more appropriate to the married man, the father of the family, and the county member, particularly if the wife of the member has a weakness for three-hundred-guinea hunters. There was also a middle course for those who, while retaining some semblance of ambition, have learned to temper it with prudence, observation, and sagacity. It was to the middle course that nature had condemned old Dobbin Grey and his rider.

Not for us the intemperate delights of the thruster. Crash through a bullfinch went Alexander O'Mulligan, the pride of the Blazers. Almost in his pocket followed the lady in the scarlet coat. Almost in hers followed Mrs. Arbuthnot. Laura Glendinning and little Mrs. Josiah P.

Perkins were obviously hardening their hearts for prodigious deeds of gallantry. It was already clear as the sun at noon that if our old and sportsmanlike friend, whose jacket had the curious ticking, only kept to the line it generally pleased him to follow, some very jealous riding was about to be witnessed among the feminine followers of the Crackanthorpe Hounds.

"My G.o.d, they call this 'untin'!" said Joseph Jocelyn De Vere Vane-Anstruther, who to his disgust had allowed himself, in the preliminary scuffle for places, to be nonplussed by the unparalleled ardour of these Amazons.

One thing was obvious. Old Dobbin Grey and his rider were a little too near the centre of the picture. Let us blush to relate it, but at the obsequious promptings of memory we moved down the hedgerow of that wide and heavy pasture, yea, even unto its uttermost left-hand corner where a gate was known to lurk. But alas! Nemesis lurked also in that corner of the landscape. For we were doomed to discover that the eternal standby of the lover of the middle course, nay the indubitable emblem of it, the goodly handgate, had been removed of malice prepense, and in lieu thereof was a stiff and upstanding post and rails, freshly planted and painted newly!

It was a great shock to the old horse. It was also a crisis in the life of his rider. The rails looked terribly high and stout; we had lost so much time already that every second was priceless if we were to see hounds again. It was hard on the old horse, yet it really seemed that there was only one thing to be done. However, before resolve could be translated into action, other lovers of the middle course bore down upon us; no less a pair than Mrs. Catesby mounted upon Marian.

"It was my intention not to speak to you again, Odo Arbuthnot," said the august rider of Marian, "but if you will give us a lead over that post and rails we will follow."

"_Place aux dames_," said I, with ingrained gallantry. "Besides, you are quite as competent to break that top rail as we are."

"Out hunting," said the high-minded votary of Diana, "you must behave like a gentleman, even if at the Savoy----"

With due encouragement the old horse really did very well indeed, hitting the top rail fore and aft it is true, describing in his descent a geometrical figure not unlike a parabola, but landing on his legs and gathering himself up quite respectably in the adjoining fifty acres of ridge and furrow. With a little pardonable condescension, I turned round to look how Marian would behave with her resolute-minded mistress. It is no disparagement to the Dobbin to say that Mrs.

Catesby's chestnut is a cleverer beast than he ever was, also she has youth on her side; and she is taller by a hand. She grazed the rail with her hind legs, but her performance was quite good enough to be going on with.

Mrs. Catesby can ride as straight as anybody, but now she is "A Mother of Seven" who writes to the _Times_ upon the subject of educational reform, and she has taken to sitting upon committees--in more senses than one--she feels that she owes it to the mothers of the nation that she should set them an example in the matter of paying due respect to their vertebrae. The negotiation of the post and rails had put us on excellent terms with ourselves, if not with each other, and side by side we made short work of the fifty acres of ridge and furrow; popped through a sequence of handgates and along a succession of lanes; and made such a liberal use of the craft that we had painfully acquired in the course of more seasons than we cared to remember, that in the end it was only by the mercy of Allah that we did not head the fox!

The fortune of war had placed us in the first flight, but the celebrated customer was still going so strong that we should have to show cause if we were going to remain there.

The n.o.ble Master was looking very anxious. Well he might, for between him and his hounds was the lady in the scarlet coat. Mounted upon the most magnificent-looking bay horse I have ever seen she seemed fully prepared to hunt the pack. And I grieve to relate that following hard upon her line, and as close as equine flesh and blood could contrive it, was Mrs. Arbuthnot on her three-hundred-guinea hunter.

"Look at Mops," quoth a disgusted voice. "Clean off her rocker. Hope to G.o.d there won't be a check, that's all!"

Jodey soared by us, taking a fence in his stride.

On the contrary, old Dobbin Grey was beginning devoutly to hope that a check there would be. But, as game as a pebble, the old warrior struggled on. It would never do for him to be cut out by Marian, and in that opinion his rider concurred. Luckily we found an easy place in the fence, but all too soon a more formidable obstacle presented itself. It was Langley Brook. Very bold jumping would be called for to save a wet jacket; and it is an open secret that, even in his prime, the Dobbin has always held that the only possible place for water is a stable bucket.

We decided to go round by the bridge. A perfectly legitimate resolution, I am free to maintain, for ardent followers of the middle course. Having arrived at this statesmanlike decision there was time to look ahead. It was not without trepidation that we did so. In front was a welter of ambitious first flighters. Yet, as always, the one to catch the eye was the lady in the scarlet coat. Utterly heedless, she went at the Brook at its widest, the n.o.ble bay rose like a Centaur and landed in safety. Sticking ever to her, closer than a sister, was Mrs. Arbuthnot. I shuddered and had a vision of a broken back for the three-hundred-guinea hunter, and a ducking for its rider.

Happily, if you are a member of the clan Vane-Anstruther, the more critical the moment the cooler you are apt to be; also you are born with the priceless faculty of sitting still and keeping down your hands. The three-hundred-guinea hunter floundered on to the opposite bank, threatened to fall back into the stream, by a Herculean effort recovered itself and emerged on _terra firma_.

It was with a heart devout with grat.i.tude that I turned to the bridge.

To my surprise, for as all my attention had been for the Brook I had had none to spare for the field as a whole, I found myself cheek by jowl with Jodey. In the hunting field I know no young man whom nature has endowed so happily. His air of world-weariness is a cloak for a justness of perception, which apparently without the expenditure of the least exertion generally lands him there or thereabouts at the finish.

"The silly blighters!--don't they see they have lost their fox?"