Arabella Read online

  Lord Bridlington chose, unwisely, to intervene at this point. ‘No doubt it is just as you say, ma’am, but this is hardly a topic for my mother’s sitting-room! Let me beg of you –’

  Arabella turned on him like a flash, her eyes bright with tears, her voice unsteady with indignation. ‘I will not be silenced! It is a topic that should be discussed in every Christian lady’s sitting-room! Oh, I mean no disrespect, ma’am! You have not thought – you cannot have thought! Had you seen the wounds on this child’s body you could not refuse to help him! I wish I had made you come into my room when I had him naked in the bath! Your heart must have been touched!’

  ‘Yes, but, Arabella, my heart is touched!’ protested her afflicted godmother. ‘Only I don’t want a page, and he is much too young, and such an ugly little thing! Besides, the sweep will very likely claim him, because, whatever you may think, if the boy is apprenticed to him, which he must be –’

  ‘You may make your mind easy on that score, ma’am! His master will never dare to lay claim to him. He knows very well that he is in danger of being taken before a magistrate, for I told him so, and he did not doubt me! Why, he cringed at the very word, and backed himself out of the house as fast as he could!’

  Mr Beaumaris spoke at last. ‘Did you confront the sweep, Miss Tallant?’ he asked, an odd little smile flickering on his lips.

  ‘Certainly I did!’ she replied, her glance resting on him for an indifferent moment.

  Lady Bridlington was suddenly inspired. ‘He must go to the Parish, of course! Frederick, you will know how to set about it!’

  ‘No, no, he must not!’ Arabella declared. ‘That would be worse than anything, for what will they do with him, do you suppose, but set him to the only trade he knows? And he is afraid of those dreadful chimneys! If it were not so far away, I would send him to Papa, but how could such a little boy go all that way alone?’

  ‘No, certainly not!’ said Lord Fleetwood. ‘Not to be thought of!’

  ‘Lord Bridlington, surely, surely you would not condemn a child to such a life as he has endured?’ Arabella begged, her hands going out in a pleading gesture. ‘You have so much!’

  ‘Of course he wouldn’t!’ declared Fleetwood rashly. ‘Now, come, Bridlington!’

  ‘But why should I?’ demanded Frederick. ‘Besides, what could I do with the brat? It is the greatest piece of nonsense I ever had to listen to!’

  ‘Lord Fleetwood, will you take Jemmy?’ asked Arabella, turning to him beseechingly.

  His lordship was thrown into disorder. ‘Well, I don’t think – You see, ma’am – Fact of the matter is – Dash it, Lady Bridlington’s right! The Parish! That’s the thing!’

  ‘Unworthy, Charles!’ said Mr Beaumaris.

  The much goaded Lord Bridlington rounded on him. ‘Then, if that is what you think, Beaumaris, perhaps you will take the wretched brat!’

  Then it was that Mr Beaumaris, looking across the room at Arabella, all flushed cheeks and heaving bosom, astonished the company, and himself as well. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I will.’

  Nine

  These simple words struck the ears of his audience with stunning effect. Lord Fleetwood’s jaw dropped; Lady Bridlington’s and her son’s rather protuberant eyes started at Mr Beaumaris; and Arabella stared at him in amazement. It was she who broke the silence. ‘You?’ she said, the incredulity in her tone leaving him in no doubt of her opinion of his character.

  A rather rueful smiled twisted his lips. ‘Why not?’ he said.

  Her eyes searched his face. ‘What would you do with him?’ she demanded.

  ‘I haven’t the smallest notion,’ he confessed. ‘I hope you may be going to tell me what I am to do with him, Miss Tallant.’

  ‘If I let you take him, you would throw him on the Parish, like Lord Fleetwood!’ she said bitterly.

  His lordship uttered an inarticulate protest.

  ‘I have a great many faults,’ replied Mr Beaumaris, ‘but, believe me, you may trust my pledged word! I will neither throw him on the parish, nor restore him to his master.’

  ‘You must be mad!’ exclaimed Frederick.

  ‘You would naturally think so,’ said Mr Beaumaris, flicking him with one of his disdainful glances.

  ‘Have you considered what people would be bound to say?’ Frederick said.

  ‘No, nor do I propose to burden my head with anything that interests me so little!’ retorted Mr Beaumaris.

  Arabella said in a softened voice: ‘If you mean it indeed, sir, you will be doing the very kindest thing – perhaps the best thing you have ever done, and, oh, I thank you!’

  ‘Certainly the best thing I have ever done, Miss Tallant,’ he said, with that wry smile.

  ‘What will you do with him?’ she asked again. ‘You must not be thinking that I mean you to adopt him as your own, or anything of that nature! He must be brought up to a respectable trade, only I do not know what would be the best for him!’

  ‘Perhaps,’ suggested Mr Beaumaris, ‘he has views of his own on the subject. What, Jemmy, would you choose to do?’

  ‘Yes, what would you like to do when you are a man?’ said Arabella, turning to kneel beside Jemmy’s chair, and speaking in a coaxing tone. ‘Tell me!’

  Jemmy, who had been following all this with an intent look in his face, had no very clear idea of what it was about, but his quick, cockney mind had grasped that none of these swells, not even the stout, cross one, intended any harm to him. The scared expression in his eyes had given place to one of considerable acuteness. He answered his protectress without hesitation. ‘Give ole Grimsby a leveller!’ he said.

  ‘Yes, my dear, and so you shall, and I hope you will do the same by everyone like him!’ said Arabella warmly. ‘But how would you choose to earn your living?’

  Mr Beaumaris’s lips twitched appreciatively. So the little Tallant had brothers, had she?

  Lady Bridlington was looking bewildered, and her son disgusted. Lord Fleetwood, accepting Arabella’s unconsciously betrayed knowledge of boxing-cant without question, looked Jemmy over critically, and gave it as his opinion that the boy was not the right build for a bruiser.

  ‘Of course not!’ said Arabella. ‘Think, Jemmy! What could you do, do you suppose?’

  The urchin reflected, while the company awaited his pleasure. ‘Sweep a crossing,’ he pronounced at last. ‘I could ’old the gen’lemen’s ’orses, then.’

  ‘Hold the gentlemen’s horses?’ repeated Arabella. Her eye brightened. ‘Are you fond of horses, Jemmy?’

  Jemmy nodded vigorously. Arabella looked round in triumph. ‘Then I know the very thing!’ she said. ‘Particularly since it is you who are to take charge of him, Mr Beaumaris!’

  Mr Beaumaris waited in deep foreboding for the blow to fall.

  ‘He must learn to look after horses, and then, as soon as he is a little older, you may employ him as your Tiger!’ said Arabella radiantly.

  Mr Beaumaris, whose views on the folly of entrusting blood-cattle to the guardianship of small boys were as unequivocal as they were well-known, replied without a tremor: ‘To be sure I may. The future now being provided for –’

  ‘But you never drive with a Tiger up behind you!’ exclaimed Lord Bridlington. ‘You have said I know not how many times –’

  ‘I do wish, Bridlington, that you would refrain from interrupting with these senseless comments,’ said Mr Beaumaris.

  ‘But that child is far too young to be a Tiger!’ pointed out Lady Bridlington.

  Arabella’s face fell. ‘Yes, he is,’ she said regretfully. ‘Yet it would be the very thing for him, if only we knew what to do with him in the meantime!’

  ‘I think,’ said Mr Beaumaris, ‘that in the meantime I had better convey him to my own house, and place him in the charge of my housekeeper, pending further discussion between us, Miss Tallant.’