Sophia: A Romance

The cruel lesson which she had learned in her own person, the glimpse she had had of the abyss into which her levity had all but cast her, even the gratitude in which she held the brother who had protected her, rendered her feelings trebly poignant now; her view of the case trebly serious. To see the one relation she loved falling into the pit which she had escaped, and to be unable to save him; to know him committed to this fatal step, and to foresee that his whole life would be blasted by it, these prospects awoke no less pity in her breast, because her eyes were open to-day to her madness of yesterday. Something, something must be done for him; something, but what?

Often through the gloom of reflections, alien from them, shoot strange flashes of memory. "Oriana? Oriana Clark?" Sophia muttered, and she stood still, remembered. Oriana Clark! Surely that was the name of the woman in whose stead she had been arrested, the woman whose name the bailiff had read from the writ in Lane's shop. Sophia had only heard the name once, and the press of after events and crowding emotions had driven it for the time into a side cell of the brain, whence it now as suddenly emerged. Her eyes sparkled with hope. Here, at last, was a fact, here was something on which she could go. She stepped to Tom's door, and rapped sharply on it.

"Well?" he called sourly. "What is it?"

"Please, come out!" she cried eagerly. "I have something to tell you. I have, indeed!"

"Can't come now," he answered. "I'm in a hurry."

It seemed he was; or he wished to avoid further discussion, for when he appeared a few minutes later-long minutes to Sophia, waiting and listening in the outer room-he snatched up his hat and malacca and made for the door. "I can't stop now," he cried, and he waived her off as he raised the latch. "I shall be back in an hour-in an hour, and if you like to behave yourself, you-you may be at it. Though you re not very fine, I'm bound to say!" he concluded with a grudging glance. Doubtless he was comparing her draggled sacque and unpowdered hair with the anticipated splendours of his bride. He was so fine himself, he seemed to fill the little room with light.

"Oh, but, Tom, one minute!" she cried, following him and seizing his arm. "Have a little patience, I only want to tell you one thing."

"Well, be quick about it," he answered, ungraciously, his hand still on the latch. "And whatever you do, miss, keep your tongue off her, or it will be the worse for you. I'll not have my wife miscalled," he continued, looking grand, and a trifle sulky, "as you'll have to learn, my lady."

"But she is not your wife yet," Sophia protested earnestly. "And, Tom, she only wants you to pay her debts. She only wants a husband to pay her debts. She was arrested yesterday."

"Arrested!" he exclaimed.

"Yes," Sophia answered; and then, beginning to flounder, "at least, I mean," she stammered, "I was arrested-in her place. That is to say, on a writ against her."

"You were arrested on a writ against her!" Tom cried again. "On a writ against Oriana? You must be mad! Mad, girl! Why, you've never seen her in your life. You did not know her name!" He had not heard, it will be remembered, a word of her adventures on the way to Davies Street, and the statement she had just made seemed to him the wanton falsehood of a foolish girl bent on mischief. "Oh, this is too bad!" he continued, shaking her off in a rage. "How dare you, you little vixen? You cowardly little liar!" he added, pale with anger. And he raised his hand as if he would strike her.

She recoiled. "Don't hurt me, Tom," she cried.

"I'll not! but-but you deserve it, you little snake!" he retorted. "You are bad! You are bad right through!" he continued from a height of righteous indignation. "What you did yesterday was nothing in comparison to this! You let me hear another word against her, make up another of your lies, and you are no sister of mine! That's all! So now you know, and if you are wise you will not try it again!"

As he uttered the last word Tom jerked up the latch, and strode out; but only to come into violent collision, at the head of the stairs, with his landlord; who appeared to be getting up from his knees. "Hang you, Grocott, what the deuce are you doing here?" the lad cried, backing from him in a rage.

"Cleaning the stairs, your honour," the man pleaded.

"You rascal, I believe you were listening!" Tom retorted. "Is the room below stairs ready? We go at noon, mark me, and shall be back to dine at one."

"To be sure, sir, all will be ready. Does the lady come here first?"

"Yes. Have the cold meats come from the White Horse?"

"Yes, sir."

"And the Burgundy from Pontack's?"

"Yes, your honour."

Tom nodded his satisfaction, and, his temper a little improved, stalked down the stairs. Sophia, who had heard every word, ran to the window and saw him cross Clarges Row in the direction of Shepherd's Market. Probably he was gone to assure himself that the clergyman was at home, and ready to perform the ceremony.

The girl watched him out of sight; then she dried her tears. "I mustn't cry!" she murmured. "I must do something! I must do something!"

But there was only one thing she could do, and that was a thing that would cost her dear. Only by returning to Arlington Street, at once, that moment, and giving information, could she prevent the marriage. Mr. Northey was Tom's guardian; he had the power, and though he had shirked his duty while the thing was in nubibus, he would not dare to stand by when time and place, the house and the hour were pointed out to him. In less than ten minutes she could be with him; in half as many the facts could be made known. Long before the hour elapsed Mr. Northey might be in Clarges Row, or, if he preferred it, at Dr. Keith's chapel, ready to forbid the marriage.

The thing was possible, nay it was easy; and it would withhold Tom from a step which he must repent all his life. But it entailed the one penance from which she was anxious to be saved, the one penalty from which her wounded pride shrank, as the bleeding stump shrinks from the cautery. To execute it she must return to Arlington Street; she must return into her sister's power, to the domination of Mrs. Martha, and the daily endurance, not only of many an ignoble slight, but of coarse jests and gibes and worse insinuations. An hour earlier she had conceived the hope of escaping this, either through Tom's mediation, or by a voluntary retreat to Chalkhill. Now she had to choose this or his ruin.

She did not hesitate. Even in her folly of the previous day, even in her reckless self-abandonment to a silly passion, Sophia had not lacked the qualities that make for sacrifice-courage, generosity, staunchness. Here was room for their display in a better cause, and without a moment's delay, undeterred by the reflection that far from earning Tom's gratitude, she would alienate her only friend, she hurried into the bedroom and donned Lady Betty's laced jacket and Tuscan. With a moan on her own account, a pitiful smile on his, she put them on; and then paused, remembering with horror that she must pass through the streets in that guise. It had done well enough at night, but in the day the misfit was frightful. Not even for Tom could she walk through Berkeley Square and Portugal Street, the figure it made her. She must have a chair.

She opened the door and was overjoyed to find that the landlord was still on the stairs. "Will you please to get me a chair," she said eagerly. "At once, without the loss of a minute."

The man looked at her stupidly, his heavy lower lip dropped and flaccid; his fat, whitish face evinced a sort of consternation. "A chair?" he repeated slowly. "Certainly. But if your ladyship is going any distance, would not a coach be better?"

"No, I am only going as far as Arlington Street," Sophia answered, off her guard for the moment. "Still, a coach will do if you cannot get a chair. I have not a moment to lose."

"To be sure, ma'am, to be sure," he answered, staring at her heavily. "A chair you'll have then?"

"Yes, and at once! At once, you understand."

"If you are in a hurry, maybe there is one below," he said, making as if he would enter the room and look from the windows. "Sometimes there is."

"If there were," she retorted, irritated by his slowness, "I should not have asked you to get one. I suppose you know what a chair is?" she continued. For the man stood looking at her so dully and strangely that she began to think he was a natural.

"Oh, yes," he answered, his eyes twinkling with sudden intelligence, as if at the notion. "I know a chair, and I'd have had one for you by now. But, by gole, I've no one to leave with the child, in case it awakes."

"The child?" Sophia cried, quite startled. The presence of a child in a house is no secret as a rule.

"'Tis here," he said, indicating a door that stood ajar at his elbow. "On the bed in the inner room, ma'am. I'm doing the stairs to be near it."

"Is it a baby?" Sophia cried. "To be sure. What else?"

"I'll stay with it, then," she said. "May I look at it? And will you get the chair for me, while I watch it?"

"To be sure, ma'am! 'Tis here," he continued, as he pushed the door open, and led the way through a tiny room; the outer of two that, looking to the back, corresponded with Tom's apartments at the front. He pushed open the door of the inner room, the floor of which was a step higher. "If you'll see to it while I am away, ma'am, and not be out of hearing?"

"I will," Sophia said softly. "Is it yours?"

"No, my daughter's."

Sophia tip-toed across the floor to the bed side. The room was poorly lighted by a window, which was partially blocked by a water-cistern; the bed stood in the dark corner beside the window; Sophia, turning up her nose at the close air of the room, hesitated for an instant to touch the dirty, tumbled bed-clothes. She could not see the child. "Where is it?" she asked, stooping to look more closely.

The answer was the dull jar of the door as it closed behind her; a sound that was followed by the click of a bolt driven home in the socket. She turned swiftly, her heart standing still, her brain already apprised of treachery. The man was gone.

Sophia made but one bound to the threshold, lifted the latch, and threw her weight against the door. It was fastened.

"Open!" she cried, enraged at the trick which had been played her. "Do you hear me? Open the door this minute!" she repeated, striking it furiously with her hands. "What do you mean? How dare you shut me in?"

This time the only response was the low chuckling laugh of the clock-maker as he turned away. She heard the stealthy fall of his footsteps as he went through the outer room; then the grating of the key, as he locked the farther door behind him. Then-silence.

"Tom!" Sophia shrieked, kicking the door, and pounding it with her little fists. "Tom, help! help, Tom!" And then, as she realised how she had been trapped, "Oh, poor Tom!" she sobbed. "Poor Tom! I can do nothing now!"

While Grocott, listening on the stairs, chuckled grimly. "You thought you were going to stop my girl's marriage, did you?" he muttered, shaking his fist in the direction of the sounds. "You thought you'd stop her being my lady, did you? Stop her now if you can, my little madam. I have you like a mouse in a trap; and when you are cooler, my Lady Maitland shall let you out. My lady, ha! ha! What a sound it has. My Lady Maitland!"

Then reflecting that Hawkesworth, whom he hated, and had cause to hate, had placed this triumph in his grasp-and would now, as things had turned out, get nothing by it-he shook with savage laughter. "Lady Maitland!" he chuckled. "Ho! ho! And he gets-the shells! The shells, ho! ho!"

CHAPTER X

SIR HERVEY TAKES THE FIELD

In his rooms at the corner house between Portugal Street and Bolton Street, so placed that by glancing a trifle on one side of the oval mirror before him he could see the Queen's Walk and the sloping pastures of the Green Park, Sir Hervey Coke was being shaved. A pile of loose gold which lay on the dressing-table indicated that the evening at White's had not been unpropitious. An empty chocolate cup and half-eaten roll stood beside the money, and, with Sir Hervey's turban-cap and embroidered gown, indicated that the baronet, who in the country broke his fast on beef and small beer, and began the day booted, followed, in town, town fashions. To-day, however, early as it was-barely ten-his wig hung freshly curled on the stand, and a snuff-coloured coat and long-flapped waistcoat, plainly laced, were airing at the fire; signs that he intended to be abroad betimes, and on business.

Perhaps the business had to do with an open letter in his lap, at which the man who was shaving him cocked his eye inquisitively between strokes. Or perhaps not, for Sir Hervey did not seem to heed this curiosity; but the valet had before had reason-and was presently to have fresh reason-to know that his taciturn master saw more than he had the air of seeing.

Suddenly Sir Hervey raised his hand. Watkyns, the valet, stood back. "Bring it me!" Coke said.

The man had heard without hearing, as he now understood without explanation. He went softly to the door, received a note, and brought it to his master.

"An answer?"

"No, sir."

"Then finish."

The valet did so. When he had removed the napkin, Sir Hervey broke the seal, and, after reading three or four lines of the letter, raised his eyes to the mirror. He met the servant's prying gaze, and abruptly crumpled the paper in his hand. Then, "Watkyns," he said, in his quietest tone.

"Sir?"

"About the two guineas you-stole this morning. For this time you may keep them; but in the future kindly remember two things."

The razor the man was cleaning fell to the floor. His face was a sickly white; his knees shook under him. He tried to frame words, to deny, to say something, but in vain. He was speechless.

"Firstly," Coke continued blandly, "that I count the money I bring home-at irregular intervals. Secondly, that two guineas is a larger sum than forty shillings. Another time, Watkyns, I would take less than forty shillings. You will understand why. That is all."

The man, still pale and trembling, found his tongue. "Oh, sir!" he cried, "I swear, if you'll-if you'll forgive me-"

Coke stopped him. "That is all," he said, "that is all. The matter is at an end. Pick that up, go downstairs, and return in five minutes."

When the man was gone, Sir Hervey smoothed the paper, and, with a face that grew darker and darker as he proceeded, read the contents of the letter from beginning to end. They were these: -

"Dear Sir,

"The honour you intended my family by an alliance with a person so nearly related to us as Miss Maitland renders it incumbent on me to inform you with the least possible delay of the unfortunate event which has happened in our household, an event which, I need not say, I regret on no account more than because it must deprive us of the advantage we rightly looked to derive from that connection. At a late hour last evening the misguided (and I fear I must call her the unfortunate) girl, whom you distinguished by so particular a mark of your esteem, left the shelter of her home, it is now certain, to seek the protection of a lover.

"While the least doubt on this point remained, I believed myself justified in keeping the matter even from you, but I have this morning learned from a sure source-Lane, the mercer, in Piccadilly-that she was set down about nine o'clock last night at a house in Davies Street, kept by a man of the name of Wollenhope, and the residence-alas, that I should have to say it! – of the infamous Irishman whose attentions to her at one time attracted your notice.

"You will readily understand that from the moment we were certified of this we ceased to regard her as a part of our family; a choice so ill-regulated can proceed only from a mind naturally inclined to vice. Resentment on your account no less than a proper care of our household, dictates this course, nor will any repentance on her part, nor any of those misfortunes to which as I apprehend her misconduct will surely expose her, prevail on us to depart from it.

"Forgive me, dear sir, if, under the crushing weight of this deplorable matter, I confine myself to the bare fact and its consequence, adding only the expression of our profound regret and consideration.

"I have the honour to remain,

"Dear sir,

"Your most obedient, humble servant,

"J. NORTHEY."

"A d-d cold-blooded fish!" Sir Hervey muttered when he had finished, and he cast the letter on the table with a gesture of disgust. Then he sat motionless for several minutes, gazing at nothing, with a strange expression of pain in his eyes. Perhaps he was thinking of the old mansion in Sussex, standing silent and lonely in its widespread park, awaiting-still awaiting, a mistress. Perhaps of plans late made, soon wrecked, yet no less cherished. Perhaps of a pale young face wide-browed and wilful, with eyes more swift to blame than praise; eyes which he had seen seeking-seeking pathetically they knew not what. Or perhaps he was thinking of the notorious Lady Vane-of what she had been once, of what Sophia might be some day. For he swore softly, and the look of pain deepened in his eyes. And then Watkyns returned.

Sir Hervey stood up. "You'll go to Wollenhope's," he said without preface. "Wollenhope's, in Davies Street, and learn-you'll know how-whether the young lady who alighted there last night from a chair or coach is still there. And whether a person of the name of Hawkesworth is there. And whether he is at home. You will not tell my name. You understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"You've half an hour."

The man slid out of the room, his face wearing a look of relief, almost of elation. It was true then. He was forgiven!

After that Coke walked up and down, his watch in his hand, until the valet returned. In the interval he spoke once only. "She is but a child!" he muttered, "she's but a child!" and he followed it with a second oath. When his man returned, "Well?" he said, without looking round.

"The young lady is not there, sir," Watkyns replied. "She arrived at eight last evening in a chair, and left a little after nine with a young gentleman."

"The person Hawkesworth?"

"No, sir."

"No?" Sir Hervey turned as he spoke, and looked at him.

"No, sir. Who it was the landlord of the house did not know or would not tell me. He was not in the best of tempers, and I could get no more from him. He told me that the young gentleman came in with his lodger about a quarter to nine."

"With Hawkesworth?"

"Yes, sir, and found the young lady waiting for them. That the two gentlemen quarrelled almost immediately, and that the young lady went off with the young gentleman. Who was very young, sir, not much more than a boy."

"What address?"

"I could not learn, sir."

"Watkyns!"

"Yes, sir."

"You may take two guineas."

The man hesitated, his face scarlet. "If you please, sir," he muttered, "I'll consider I have them."

"Very good. I understand you. Now dress me."

It took about five minutes, as London then lay, to walk from Bolton Street to Davies Street, by way of Bolton Bow and Berkeley Square. At that hour, it was too early for fine gentlemen of Sir Hervey's stamp to be abroad, and fine ladies were still abed, so that he fell in with no acquaintances. He had ascertained from Watkyns in what part of the street Wollenhope's house was situate, and, well within the prescribed space of time, he found himself knocking at the door. It was opened pretty promptly by Mrs. Wollenhope.

"Does Mr. Hawkesworth lodge here?" Sir Hervey asked, without preamble.

"Yes, sir, he does," the good woman answered, curtseying low at the sight of his feathered hat and laced waistcoat; and instinctively she looked up and down the street in search of his chair or coach. "But he is out at present," she continued, her eyes returning to him. "He left the house about half an hour ago, your honour."

"Can you tell me where he may be found?"

"No, sir, I have no notion," Mrs. Wollenhope answered, wiping her hands on her apron.

"Still," Sir Hervey rejoined, "you can, perhaps, tell me the name of the young gentleman who was here last evening and took a lady away."

Mrs. Wollenhope raised her hands. "There!" she exclaimed. "I said we should hear of it again! Not that we are to blame, no, sir, no! Except in the way of saving bloodshed! And as for the name, I don't know it. But the address now," dropping her voice and looking nervously behind her, "the young gentleman did give an address, and-" with a sudden change of manner. "Are these with you, sir?"

Coke, following the direction of her gaze, turned about, and found two rough-looking men standing at his elbow. "No," he said, "they are not. What do you want, my men?"

"Lord, your honour, no hurry, we can wait till you've done," the foremost answered, tugging obsequiously at the uncocked flap of his hat; while his companion sucked his stick and stared. "Or after all, what's the odds? Time's money, and there's many go in front of us would rather see our backs! Is the lady that came last night in the house, mistress?"

Sir Hervey stared, while Mrs. Wollenhope eyed the speaker with great disfavour. "No," she said, "if that's what you want, she is not!"

The man slowly expectorated on the ground. "Oh," he said, "that being the case, when did she leave? No harm in telling that, mistress!"

"She left within the hour," Mrs. Wollenhope snapped. "And that's all I'll tell you about her, so there! And take yourself off, please!"

"If the matter of half a crown, now-?"

Mrs. Wollenhope shook her head vigorously. "No!" she cried. "No! I don't sell my lodgers. I know your trade, my man, and you'll get nothing from me."

The bailiff grinned and nodded. "All right," he said. "No need to grow warm! Easy does it. She gave us the slip yesterday, but we're bound to nab her by-and-by. We knew she was coming here, and if we'd waited here yesterday instead of at the coach office, we'd have took her. Come, Trigg, we'll to the Blue Posts; if she's had a coach or a chair we'll hear of it there!" And with a "No offence, your honour!" and a clumsy salute, the two catchpolls lounged away, the one a pace behind the other, his knobby stick still in his mouth, and his sharp eyes everywhere.

Coke watched them go, and a more talkative man would have expressed his astonishment. He fancied that he knew all that was to be known of Sophia's mode of life. She might have spent a little more than her allowance at Margam's or Lane's, might have been tempted by lace at Doiley's, or ribbons at the New Exchange. But a writ and bailiffs? The thing was absurd, and for a good reason. Mr. Northey was rich, yet not so rich as he was penurious; the tradesman did not exist, who would not trust, to the extent of his purse, any member of that family. Coke was certain of this; and that there was something here which he did not understand. But all he said was "They are bailiffs, are they?"

"For sure, sir," Mrs. Wollenhope answered. "I've a neighbour knows one by sight. All day yesterday they were hanging about the door, probing if the young lady was come. 'Twas on that account she surprised me, for I'd been led to look for a fine spendthrift madam, and when she came-Lord ha' mercy, my husband's coming down! If you want the address," she continued in a lower tone, as Wollenhope appeared at the foot of the stairs, "'twas in Clarges Row, at Grocott's."

"Thank you," Coke said.

"Grocott's," she repeated in a whisper. Then in a louder tone, "No, sir, I can't say when he will be at home."

"Thank you," Sir Hervey said; and having got what he wanted he did not stay to waste time with the man, but made the best of his way to Charles Street, into which the north end of Clarges Row, now Clarges Street, opened at that date. Deeply engaged with the paramount question in his mind, the identity of the young man in whose company Sophia had left Hawkesworth's lodgings, he forgot the bailiffs; and it was with some annoyance that, on reaching the Row, he espied one of them lurking in a doorway in Charles Street. It was so plain that they were watching him that Sir Hervey lost patience, turned, and made towards the man to question him. But the fellow also turned on his heel, and retreating with an eye over his shoulder, disappeared in the square. To follow was to be led from the scent; Coke wheeled again, therefore, and meeting a potboy who knew the street, he was directed to Grocott's. The house the lad pointed out was one of the oldest in the Row; a small house of brick, the last on the east side going north. Sir Hervey scanned the five windows that faced the street, but they told him nothing. He knocked-and waited. And presently, getting no answer, he knocked again. And again-the pot-boy looking on from a little distance.