Charity Girl Read online

  He smiled, but said: 'Miss Silverdale didn't mean that you would be glad to meet me again, Cherry. Look, do you recognize that gentleman?'

  She turned her head, and for the first time caught sight of Mr Steane. She stared at him blankly for an instant, and then gave a tiny gasp, and said: 'Papa?'

  'My child!' uttered Mr Steane. 'At last I may clasp you to my bosom again!' This, however, he was unable to do, since she had been set down on the sofa, and the corset he wore made it impossible for him to stoop so low. He compromised by putting an arm round her shoulders, and kissing her brow. 'My little Charity!' he said fondly.

  'I thought you were dead, Papa!' she said wonderingly. 'I'm so happy to know you aren't! But why did you never write to me, or to poor Miss Fletching?'

  'Do not speak to me of that woman!' he commanded, sidestepping this home-question. 'Never would I have left you in her charge had I known how shamefully she would betray my trust, my poor child!'

  'Oh, no, Papa!' she cried distressfully. 'How can you say so, when she was so kind to me, and kept me at the school for nothing?'

  'She delivered you up to Amelia Bugle, and that I can never forgive!' declared Mr Steane.

  'But, Papa, you make it sound as if I wasn't willing to go with my aunt, but I promise you I was! I wanted to have a home so much. You don't know how much!' She found that Mr Nethercott, standing behind the head of the sofa, had dropped a hand on her shoulder, and she nursed it gratefully to her cheek, tears on the ends of her eyelashes. She winked them away, and continued to address her father, with a good deal of urgency: 'So, pray, Papa, don't go away again without paying her what she is owed!'

  'Had I found you as I left you, happy in her care, I would have paid and overpaid her, but I did not so find you! I found you, after an unceasing search which was attended by such pangs of anxiety as only a father can know, being buffeted about the world, and not one penny will I pay her!' said Mr Steane resolutely.

  'In other words,' said Desford, 'you mean to tip her the double!'

  'Papa, you cannot behave so shabbily! You must not!' Cherry cried, in considerable agitation.

  'I think, my love,' said Mr Nethercott, 'that you had best leave me to deal with this matter.'

  'But it isn't right that you should deal with it!' she said indignantly. 'It isn't your debt! It's Papa's!'

  'I do not acknowledge it,' stated Mr Steane majestically. 'She may consider herself fortunate that I have decided not to bring an action against her for gross neglect of her duty. That is my last word!'

  'In that case,' said Mr Nethercott matter-of-factly, 'I will carry Cherry upstairs. You must realize, I am persuaded, sir, that she has had a very exhausting day, and has been quite knocked-up by it. Miss Hetta, will you conduct me to her bedchamber, if you please?'

  'Indeed, I will!' Henrietta replied. 'No, no, don't argue, Cherry! Mr Nethercott is perfectly right, and I am going to put you to bed directly. You shall have your dinner sent up to you, – and your Papa may visit you tomorrow!'

  'How kind you are! How very kind you are, Miss Silverdale!' Cherry sighed. 'I own I am feeling rather fagged, so – so if you won't think it very uncivil of me, Papa, I believe I will go to bed! Oh, Lord Desford, in case I don't see you again, goodbye, and thank you a thousand, thousand times for all you've done for me!'

  He took the hand she stretched out to him, and kissed it, saying in a rallying voice: 'But you will be constantly seeing me, you little pea-goose! We are to be neighbours!'

  'As to that,' said Mr Steane haughtily, 'I have by no means decided to give my consent to this marriage. I shall require Mr Nethercott to satisfy me as to his ability to support my daughter in a manner befitting her breeding.'

  Mr Nethercott, already in the doorway with his fair burden, paused to say with unruffled composure that he would do himself the honour of laying before his prospective fatherin-law all the relevant facts concerning his birth, fortune, and situation in life as soon as he had carried Cherry up to her room. He then con tinued on his purposeful way, preceded by Henrietta, and telling his betrothed, very kindly, to hush, when she attempted to argue that her marriage had nothing whatsoever to do with her father.

  The Viscount shut the door, and strolled back to his chair, regarding Mr Steane with a pronounced twinkle in his eyes. 'You are to be congratulated, Mr Steane,' he said. 'Your daughter is making a very creditable marriage, and you need never suffer pangs of anxiety about her again.'

  'There is that, of course,' acknowledged Mr Steane heavily. 'But when I think of the plans I have been making for years – I should have known better! All my life, Desford, I have been quite the dregs of my family as to luck. It disheartens a man! There's no denying that!' He turned his jaundiced gaze upon the Viscount, and added: 'Not that you know anything about it! You seem to me to have the devil's own luck! Well, consider what has happened this day! You wouldn't have braced it through if this fellow, Nethercott, hadn't dropped out of the sky like a honey-fall for you!'

  'Oh, yes, I should!' said the Viscount. 'Not to use words with the bark on them, your intention was to bludgeon me into marrying Cherry, but you chose the wrong man, Steane: there was never the least hope of buttoning that scheme up!'

  'I abandoned all thought of your marrying Cherry when I learned of your betrothal,' Mr Steane replied. 'Never shall it be said of me that I wrecked the happiness of an innocent female – however deluded she may be! But I fancy, my lord, you'd have come down handsomely to keep this scandalous business quiet! Or, at any hand, that stiff-necked father of yours would!'

  'From what I know of my stiff-necked father, Mr Steane, I think he would have been far more likely to have driven you out of the country.'

  'Well, it's a waste of time to discuss the matter!' said Mr Steane irritably.

  'Of course it is! Consider instead how much cause you have to be thankful that your only daughter has had the good fortune to become attached to a man who will certainly make her an admirable husband!'

  'My only daughter! She's another disappointment! There's no end to them. I had hopes of her when she was a child: seemed to be a bright, coming little thing. She could have been very useful to me.'

  'In what way?' asked Desford curiously.

  'Oh, many ways!' said Mr Steane. 'I hoped she might act as hostess in the establishment I have set up in Paris, but I saw at a glance that she's too like her mother. Pretty enough, but not up to snuff. Wouldn't know how to go on at all. A pity! Sheer waste of my time and blunt to have come to England.'

  Since he seemed to be slipping rapidly into a maudlin frame of mind, the Viscount was relieved to see Mr Nethercott come back into the room. He was accompanied by Henrietta, and it was immediately plain to the Viscount that it was she who had prompted him to suggest to Mr Steane that it would be more con venient to discuss such matters as Settlements at Marley House.

  'I think that an excellent notion!' she said warmly. 'You will wish to inspect Cherry's future home, I expect, Mr Steane. And if you care to visit her tomorrow, Mr Nethercott has been kind enough to say that he will be happy to put you up for the night!'

  'I am obliged to you, sir,' said Mr Steane, reverting to his grand manner. 'I shall be happy to avail myself of your hospitality – but without prejudice, understand!' He then took a punctilious leave of Henrietta, bowed stiffly to the Viscount, and allowed himself to be ushered out of the room by the impassive Mr Nethercott.

  'You unprincipled woman!' said the Viscount, when the door was fairly shut behind the departing visitors. 'You should be ashamed of yourself ! Saddling the unfortunate man with that old rumstick!'

  'Oh, did you guess it was my doing?' she said, breaking into pent-up laughter.

  'Guess!' he said scornfully. 'I knew it the instant you came in looking as demure as a nun's hen!'

  'Oh, no, did I? But I had to get rid of him, Des, or Mama would have taken to her bed! What with thinking Charlie had eloped with Cherry, and then hearing that Wilfred Steane was on his way to visit us, she's been havi