The Child Wife

The thought was agony itself. It caused him to turn like a tiger upon judge and accuser, and give tongue to the wrath swelling within his bosom.

His speeches were met only with jeers and laughter.

And soon they were unheeded. Fresh prisoners were being brought in – fresh victims like himself, to be condemned over the drum!

The court no longer claimed his attendance.

He was left to Virocq and his uniformed executioners.

Two of these laying hold, forced him up against the wall, close to the corpse of the Red Republican.

He was manacled, and could make no resistance. None would have availed him.

The soldiers stood waiting for the command “Tirez!”

In another instant it would have been heard, for it was forming on the lips of the Zouave lieutenant.

Fate willed it otherwise. Before it could be given, the outer door opened, admitting a man whose presence caused a sudden suspension of the proceedings.

Hurrying across the courtyard, he threw himself between the soldiers and their victim, at the same time drawing a flag from beneath his coat, and spreading it over the condemned man.

Even the drunken Zouaves dared not fire through that flag. It was the Royal Standard of England!

But there was a double protection for the prisoner. Almost at the same instant another man stepped hastily across the courtyard and flouted a second flag in the eyes of the disappointed executioners!

It claimed equal respect, for it was the banner of the Stars and Stripes – the emblem of the only true Republic on earth.

Maynard had served under both flags, and for a moment he felt his affections divided.

He knew not to whom he was indebted for the last; but when he reflected who had sent the first – for it was Sir George Vernon who bore it – his heart trembled with a joy far sweeter than could have been experienced by the mere thought of delivery from death!

Chapter Thirty Nine.

Once More in Westbourne

Once more in the British metropolis, Mr Swinton was seated in his room.

It was the same set of “furnished apartments,” containing that cane chair with which he had struck his ill-starred wife.

She was there, too, though not seated upon the chair.

Reclined along a common horse-hair sofa, with squab and cushions hard and scuffed, she was reading one of De Kock’s novels, in translation. Fan was not master of the French tongue, though skilled in many of those accomplishments for which France has obtained special notoriety.

It was after breakfast time, though the cups and saucers were still upon the table.

A common white-metal teapot, the heel of a half-quartern loaf, the head and tail of a herring, seen upon a blue willow pattern plate, told that the meal had not been epicurean.

Swinton was smoking “bird’s-eye” in a briar-root pipe. It would have been a cigar, had his exchequer allowed it.

Never in his life had this been so low. He had spent his last shilling in pursuit of the Girdwoods – in keeping their company in Paris, from which they, as he himself, had just returned to London.

As yet success had not crowned his scheme, but appeared distant as ever. The storekeeper’s widow, notwithstanding her aspirations after a titled alliance, was from a country whose people are proverbially “cute.” She was, at all events, showing herself prudent, as Mr Swinton discovered in a conversation held with her on the eve of their departure from Paris.

It was on a subject of no slight importance, originating in a proposal on his part to become her son in-law. It was introductory to an offer he intended making to the young lady herself.

But the offer was not made, Mrs Girdwood having given reasons for its postponement.

They seemed somewhat unsubstantial, leaving him to suppose he might still hope.

The true reason was not made known to him, which was, that the American mother had become suspicious about his patent of nobility. After all, he might not be a lord. And this, notwithstanding his perfect playing of the part, which the quondam guardsman, having jostled a good deal against lords, was enabled to do.

She liked the man much – he flattered her sufficiently to deserve it – and used every endeavour to make her daughter like him. But she had determined, before things should go any further, to know something of his family. There was something strange in his still travelling incognito. The reasons he assigned for it were not satisfactory. Upon this point she must get thoroughly assured. England was the place to make the inquiry, and thither had she transported herself and her belongings – as before, putting up at the aristocratic Clarendon.

To England Swinton had followed, allowing only a day to elapse.

By staying longer in Paris, he would have been in pawn. He had just sufficient cash to clear himself from the obscure hotel where he had stopped, pay for a Boulogne boat, and a “bus” from London Bridge to his lodgings in far Westbourne, where he found his Fan not a shilling richer than himself. Hence that herring for breakfast, eaten on the day after his return.

He was poor in spirits as in purse. Although Mrs Girdwood had not stated the true reason for postponing her daughter’s reception of his marriage proposal, he could conjecture it. He felt pretty sure that the widow had come to England to make inquiries about him.

And what must they result in? Exposure! How could it be otherwise? His name was known in certain circles of London. So also his character. If she should get into these, his marriage scheme would be frustrated at once and for ever.

And he had become sufficiently acquainted with her shrewdness to know she would never accept him for a son-in-law, without being certain about the title – which in her eyes alone rendered him eligible.

If his game was not yet up, the cards left in his hand were poor. More than ever did they require skilful playing.

What should be his next move?

It was about this his brain was busy, as he sat pulling away at his pipe.

“Any one called since I’ve been gone?” he asked of his wife without turning toward her.

Had he done so, he might have observed a slight start caused by the inquiry. She answered, hesitatingly:

“Oh! no – yes – now I think of it I had a visitor – one.”

“Who?”

“Sir Robert Cottrell. You remember our meeting him at Brighton?”

“Of course I remember it. Not likely to forget the name of the puppy. How came he to call?”

“He expected to see you.”

“Indeed, did he! How did he know where we were living?”

“Oh, that! I met him one day as I was passing through Kensington Gardens, near the end of the Long Walk. He asked me where we were staying. At first I didn’t intend telling him. But he said he wanted particularly to see you; and so I gave him your address.”

“I wasn’t at home!”

“I told him that; but said I expected you every day. He came to inquire if you had come back.”

“Did he? What a wonderful deal he cared about my coming back. In the Long Walk you met him? I suppose you have been showing yourself in the Row every day?”

“No I haven’t, Richard. I’ve only been there once or twice – You can’t blame me for that? I’d like to know who could stay everlastingly here, in these paltry apartments, with that shrewish landlady constantly popping out and in, as if to see whether I’d carried off the contents of our trunks. Heaven knows, it’s a wretched existence at best; but absolutely hideous inside these lodgings!”

Glancing around the cheaply-furnished parlour, seeing the head and tail of the herring, with the other scraps of their poor repast, Swinton could not be otherwise than impressed with the truth of his wife’s words.

Their tone, too, had a satisfying effect. It was no longer that of imperious contradiction, such as he had been accustomed to for twelve months after marriage. This had ceased on that day when the leg of a chair coming in contact with his beloved’s crown had left a slight cicatrice upon her left temple – like a stain in statuary marble. From that hour the partner of his bosom had shown herself a changed woman – at least toward himself. Notwithstanding the many quarrels, and recriminative bickerings, that had preceded it, it was the first time he had resorted to personal violence. And it had produced its effect. Coward as she knew him to be, he had proved himself brave enough to bully her. She had feared him ever since. Hence her trepidation as she made answer to his inquiry as to whether any one had called.

There was a time when Frances Wilder would not have trembled at such a question, nor stammered in her reply.

She started again, and again showed signs of confusion, as the shuffling of feet on the flags outside was followed by a knock at the door.

It was a double one; not the violent repeat of the postman, but the rat-tat-tat given either by a gentleman or lady – from its gentleness more like the latter.

“Who can it be?” asked Swinton, taking the pipe from between his teeth. “Nobody for us, I hope.”

In London, Mr Swinton did not long for unexpected visitors. He had too many “kites” abroad, to relish the ring of the doorbell, or the more startling summons of the knocker.

“Can’t be for us,” said his wife, in a tone of mock confidence. “There’s no one likely to be calling; unless some of your old friends have seen you as you came home. Did you meet any one on the way?”

“No, nobody saw me,” gruffly returned the husband.

“There’s a family upstairs – in the drawing-rooms. I suppose it’s for them, or the people of the house.”

The supposition was contradicted by a dialogue heard outside in the hall. It was as follows:

“Mrs Swinton at home?”

The inquiry was in a man’s voice, who appeared to have passed in from the steps.

“Yis, sirr!” was the reply of the Irish janitress, who had answered the knock.

“Give my card; and ask the lady if I can see her.”

“By Jove! that’s Cottrell!” muttered the ex-guardsman, recognising the voice.

“Sir Robert Cottrell” was upon the card brought in by the maid-of-all-work.

“Show him in?” whispered Swinton to the servant, without waiting to ask permission from Fan; who, expressing surprise at the unexpected visit, sprang to her feet, and glided back into the bedroom.

There was a strangeness in the fashion of his wife’s retreat, which the husband could scarce help perceiving. He took no notice of it, however, his mind at the moment busied with a useful idea that had suddenly suggested itself.

Little as he liked Sir Robert Cottrell, or much as he may have had imaginings about the object of his visit, Swinton at that moment felt inclined to receive him. The odour of the salt herring was in his nostrils; and he was in a mood to prefer the perfume that exhales from the cambric handkerchief of a débonnaire baronet – such as he knew Sir Robert to be.

It was with no thought of calling his quondam Brighton acquaintance to account that he directed the servant to show him in.

And in he was shown.

Chapter Forty.

A Cautious Baronet

The baronet looked a little blank, as the open parlour door discovered inside a “party” he had no intention of calling upon.

Accustomed to such surprises, however, he was not disconcerted. He had some knowledge of the ex-guardsman’s character. He knew he was in ill-luck; and that under such circumstances he would not be exactingly inquisitive.

“Aw, Swinton, my dear fellaw,” he exclaimed, holding out his kid-gloved hand. “Delighted to see you again. Madam told me she expected you home. I just dropped in, hoping to find you returned. Been to Paris, I hear?”

“I have,” said Swinton, taking the hand with a show of cordiality.

“Terrible times over there. Wonder you came off with a whole skin?”

“By Jove, it’s about all I brought off with me.”

“Aw, indeed! What mean you by that?”

“Well; I went over to get some money that’s been long owing me. Instead of getting it, I lost what little I carried across.”

“How did you do that, my dear fellaw?”

“Well, the truth is, I was tempted into card-playing with some French officers I chanced to meet at the Mille Colonnes. It was their cursed écarté. They knew the game better than I; and very soon cleared me out. I had barely enough to bring me back again. I thank God I’m here once more; though how I’m going to weather it this winter, heaven only knows! You’ll excuse me, Sir Robert, for troubling you with this confession of my private affairs. I’m in such a state of mind, I scarce know what I’m saying. Confound France and Frenchmen! I don’t go among them again; not if I know it.”

Sir Robert Cottrell, though supposed to be rich, was not accustomed to squandering money – upon men. With women he was less penurious; though with these only a spendthrift, when their smiles could not be otherwise obtained. He was one of those gallants who prefer making conquests at the cheapest possible rates; and, when made, rarely spend money to secure them. Like the butterfly, he liked flitting from flower to flower.

That he had not dropped in hoping to find Mr Swinton, but had come on purpose to visit his wife, the craven husband knew just as well as if he had openly avowed it. And the motive, too; all the more from such a shallow excuse.

It was upon the strength of this knowledge that the ex-guardsman was so communicative about his financial affairs. It was a delicate way of making it known, that he would not be offended by the offer of a trifling loan.

Sir Robert was in a dilemma. A month earlier he would have much less minded it. But during that month he had met Mrs Swinton several times, in the Long Walk, as elsewhere. He had been fancying his conquest achieved, and did not feel disposed to pay for a triumph already obtained.

For this reason he was slow to perceive the hint so delicately thrown out to him.

Swinton reflected on a way to make it more understandable. The débris of the frugal déjeuner came to his assistance.

“Look!” said he, pointing to the picked bones of the herring with an affectation of gaiety, “look there, Sir Robert! You might fancy it to be Friday. That fine fish was purchased with the last penny in my pocket. To-morrow is Friday; and I suppose I shall have to keep Lent still more austerely. Ha! ha! ha!”

There was no resisting such an appeal as this. The close-fisted aristocrat felt himself fairly driven into a corner.

“My dear fellaw!” said he, “don’t talk in that fashion. If a fiver will be of any service to you, I hope you will do me the favour to accept it. I know you won’t mind it from me?”

“Sir Robert, it is too kind. I – I – ”

“Don’t mention it. I shouldn’t think of offering you such a paltry trifle; but just now my affairs are a little queerish. I dropped a lot upon the last Derby; and my lawyer is trying to raise a further mortgage on my Devonshire estate. If that can be effected, things will, of course, be different. Meanwhile, take this. It may pass you over your present difficulty, till something turns up.”

“Sir Robert, I – ”

“No apology, Swinton! It is I who owe it, for the shabby sum.”

The ex-guardsman ceased to resist; and the five-pound note, pressed into his palm was permitted to remain there.

“By the bye, Swinton,” said the baronet, as if to terminate the awkward scene by obliging the borrower in a more business-like way, “why don’t you try to get something from the Government? Excuse a fellaw for taking the liberty; but it seems to me, a man of your accomplishments ought to stand a chance.”

“Not the slightest, Sir Robert! I have no interest; and if I had, there’s that ugly affair that got me out of the Guards. You know the story; and therefore I needn’t tell it you. That would be sure to come up if I made any application.”

“All stuff, my dear fellaw! Don’t let that stand in your way. It might, if you wanted to get into the Household, or be made a bishop. You don’t aspire to either, I presume?”

The ex-guardsman gave a lugubrious laugh.

“No!” he said. “I’d be contented with something less. Just now my ambition don’t soar extravagantly high.”

“Suppose you try Lord – , who has Government influence? In these troublous times there’s no end of employment, and for men whose misfortunes don’t need to be called to remembrance. Yours won’t stand in the way. I know his lordship personally. He’s not at all exacting.”

“You know him, Sir Robert?”

“Intimately. And if I’m not mistaken, he’s just the man to serve you; that is, by getting you some appointment? The diplomatic service has grown wonderfully, since the breaking out of these revolutions. More especially the secret branch of it. I’ve reason to know that enormous sums are now spent upon it. Then, why shouldn’t you try to get a pull out of the secret service chest?”

Swinton relit his pipe, and sat cogitating.

“A pipe don’t become a guardsman,” jokingly remarked his guest. “The favourites of the Foreign Office smoke only regalias.”

Swinton received this sally with a smile, that showed the dawning of a new hope.

“Take one?” continued the baronet, presenting his gold-clasped case.

Swinton pitched the briar-root aside, and set fire to the cigar.

“You are right, Sir Robert,” he said; “I ought to try for something. It’s very good of you to give me the advice. But how am I to follow it? I have no acquaintance with the nobleman you speak of; nor have any of my friends.”

“Then you don’t count me as one of them?”

“Dear Cottrell! Don’t talk that way! After what’s passed between us, I should be an ungrateful fellow if I didn’t esteem you as the first of them – perhaps the only friend I have left.”

“Well, I’ve spoken plainly. Haven’t I said that I know Lord – well enough to give you a letter of introduction to him? I won’t say it will serve any purpose; you must take your chances of that. I can only promise that he will receive you; and if you’re not too particular as to the nature of the employment, I think he may get you something. You understand me, Swinton?”

“I particular! Not likely, Sir Robert, living in this mean room, with the remembrance of that luxurious breakfast I’ve just eaten – myself and my poor wife!”

“Aw – by the way, I owe madam an apology for having so long neglected to ask after her. I hope she is well?”

“Thank you! Well as the dear child can be expected, with such trouble upon us.”

“Shall I not have the pleasure of seeing her?”

The visitor asked the question without any pretence of indifference. He felt it – just then, not desiring to encounter her in such company.

“I shall see, Sir Robert,” replied the husband, rising from his chair, and going toward the bedroom. “I rather suspect Fan’s en dishabille at this hour.”

Sir Robert secretly hoped that she was. Under the circumstances, an interview with her could only be awkward.

His wish was realised. She was not only en dishabille, but in bed – with a sick headache! She begged that the baronet would excuse her from making appearance!

This was the report brought back from the bedroom by her go-between of a husband. It remained only for the visitor to make good his promise about the letter of introduction.

He drew up to the table, and wrote it out, currente calamo.

He did not follow the usual fashion, by leaving the envelope open. There was a clause or two in the letter he did not desire the ex-guardsman to become acquainted with. It concluded with the words: “Mr Swinton is a gentleman who would suit for any service your lordship may be pleased to obtain for him. He is a disappointed man…”

Wetting the gum with the tip of his aristocratic tongue, he closed the envelope, and handed the epistle to his host.

“I know,” said he, “Lord A – will be glad to serve you. You might see him at the Foreign Office; but don’t go there. There are too many fellaws hanging about, who had better not know what you’re after. Take it to his lordship’s private residence in Park Lane. In a case like yours, I know he’d prefer receiving you there. You had better go at once. There are so many chances of your being forestalled – a host of applicants hungering for something of the same. His lordship is likely to be at home about three in the afternoon. I’ll call here soon after to learn how you’ve prospered. Bye, my dear fellaw! good-bye!”

Re-gloving his slender aristocratic fingers, the baronet withdrew – leaving the ex-guardsman in possession of an epistle that might have much influence on his future fate.

Chapter Forty One.

A Scene in Park Lane

In Park Lane, as all know, fronting upon Hyde Park, are some of the finest residences in London. They are mansions, mostly inhabited by England’s aristocracy; many of them by the proudest of its nobility.

On that same day on which Sir Robert Cottrell had paid his unintentional visit to Mr Richard Swinton, at the calling hour of the afternoon an open park phaeton, drawn by a pair of stylish ponies, with “flowing manes and tails,” might have been seen driving along Park Lane, and drawing up in front of one of its splendid mansions, well-known to be that of a nobleman of considerable distinction among his class.

The ribbons were held by a gentleman who appeared capable of manipulating them; by his side a lady equally suitable to the equipage; while an appropriate boy in top-boots and buttons occupied the back seat.

Though the gentleman was young and handsome, the lady young and beautiful, and the groom carefully got up, an eye, skilled in livery decoration, could have told the turn-out to be one hired for the occasion.

It was hired, and by Richard Swinton; for it was he who wielded the whip, and his wife who gave grace to the equipage.

The ponies were guided with such skill that when checked up in front of the nobleman’s residence, the phaeton stood right under the drawing-room windows.

In this there was a design.

The groom, skipping like a grasshopper from his perch, glided up the steps, rang the bell, and made the usual inquiry.

His lordship was “at home.”

“You take the reins, Fan,” said Swinton, stepping out of the phaeton. “Keep a tight hold on them, and don’t let the ponies move from the spot they’re in – not so much as an inch!”

Without comprehending the object of this exact order, Fan promised to obey it.

The remembrance of mare than one scene, in which she had succumbed to her husband’s violence, secured compliance with his request.

Having made it, the ex-guardsman ascended the steps, presented his card, and was shown into the drawing-room.

Chapter Forty Two.

The Power of a Pretty Face

It was the front room of a suite into which Mr Swinton had been conducted – a large apartment furnished in splendid style.

For a time he was left alone, the footman, who officiated, having gone off with his card.

Around him were costly decorations – objects of vertu and luxe– duplicated in plate-glass mirrors over the mantel, and along the sides of the room, extending from floor to ceiling.

But Mr Swinton looked not at the luxurious chattels, nor into the mirrors that reflected them.

On the moment of his being left to himself, he glided toward one of the windows, and directed his glance into the street.

“It will do,” he muttered to himself, with a satisfied air. “Just in the right spot, and Fan – isn’t she the thing for it? By Jove! she shows well. Never saw her look better in her life. If his lordship be the sort he’s got the name of being, I ought to get an appointment out of him. Sweet Fan! I’ve made five pounds out of you this morning. You’re worth your weight in gold, or its equivalent. Hold up your head, my chick! and show that pretty face of yours to the window! You’re about to be examined, and as I’ve heard, by a connoisseur. Ha! ha! ha!” The apostrophe was soliloquised, Fan was too far off to hear him.

The chuckling laugh that followed was interrupted by the re-entrance of the footman, who announced in ceremonial strain: “His lordship will see you in the library.” The announcement produced on his lordship’s visitor the effect of a cold-water douche. His gaiety forsook him with the suddenness of a “shot.”

Nor did it return when he discovered the library to be a somewhat sombre apartment, its walls bedecked with books, and the windows looking into a courtyard at the back. He had anticipated an interview in the drawing-room that commanded a view of the street.