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Richmond got Molyneux up to time again. He rallied gamely, but his distance was ill-judged. Cribb did much as he liked with him, got his head into chancery, and fibbed till he fell.
‘Lombard Street to a China orange!’ exclaimed Mr Fitzjohn. ‘Ay, you can see how Richmond and Bill Gibbons are working on him, but it’s my belief he’s done . . . No, by God, he’s coming up to the mark again! Damme, the fellow’s got excellent bottom, say what you will! But he’s dead-beat, Taverner. Wonder Richmond don’t throw the towel in. . . . Hey, that’s finished him! What a left! Enough to break his jaw!’
The Black had gone down like a log. He was dragged to his corner, apparently insensible, and it seemed impossible that he could recover in the half-minute. But Cribb, who, in spite of his disfigured countenance, seemed as full of gaiety as ever, gave away his chance, and hugely delighted the crowd by dancing a hornpipe round the stage.
Molyneux got off his second’s knee, but it was obvious that he could do no more. He made a game attempt to rally, but fell almost at once.
‘I believe Cribb did break his jaw,’ said Mr Fitzjohn, who was watching the Black closely. ‘Damn it, the man’s done! Richmond ought to throw in the towel. No sport in this! Lord, he’s up again, full of pluck! No, he’s done for! There’ll be no getting him on his feet again. Ah, you see – Richmond knows it! He’s going to throw in his towel.’ Here Mr Fitzjohn broke off to join in the cheering.
On the stage the Champion, and Gully, his second, were engaged in dancing a Scotch reel to announce the victory. Peregrine joined Mr Fitzjohn in waving his hat in the air, and cheering, and sat down again feeling that he had seen a great fight. The knowledge that he had lost quite a large sum of money on it did not weigh with him in the least. He exchanged cards with Mr Fitzjohn, accepted some advice from that knowledgeable young gentleman on the best hotel to put up at in London, promised to call on him in Cork Street to pay his debts at the first opportunity, and parted from him with the agreeable conviction that he now had at least one acquaintance in London.
Three
MISS TAVERNER SPENT A PLEASANT MORNING EXPLORING the town. There was scarcely anyone about, and that circumstance, coupled with the fine ness of the weather, tempted her to take another stroll after her luncheon of cakes and wine. There was nothing to do at the George beyond sit at her bedroom window and wait for Peregrine’s return, and this prospect did not commend itself to her. Walking about the town had not tired her, and she understood from the chambermaid that Great Ponton church, only three miles from Grantham, was generally held to be worth a visit. Miss Taverner decided to walk there, and set out a little before midday, declining the escort of her maid.
The walk was a pretty one, and a steep climb up the highroad into the tiny village of Great Ponton quite rewarded Miss Taverner for her energy. A fine burst of country met her eyes, and a few steps down a by-road brought her to the church, a very handsome example of later perpendicular work, with a battlemented tower, and a curious weathervane in the form of a fiddle upon one of its pinnacles. There was no one of whom she could inquire the history of this odd vane, so after exploring the church, and resting a little while on a bench outside, she set out to walk back to Grantham.
At the bottom of the hill leading out of the village a pebble became lodged in her right sandal and after a very little way began to make walking an uncomfortable business. Miss Taverner wriggled her toes in an effort to shift the stone, but it would not answer. Unless she wished to limp all the way to Grantham she must take off her shoe and shake the pebble out. She hesitated, for she was upon the highroad and had no wish to be discovered in her stockings by any chance wayfarer. One or two carriages had passed her already: she supposed them to be returning from Thistleton Gap: but at the moment there was nothing in sight. She sat down on the bank at the side of the road, and pulled up her frilled skirt an inch or two to come at the strings of her sandal. As ill-luck would have it these had worked themselves into a knot which took her some minutes to untie. She had just succeeded in doing this, and was shak
ing out the pebble, when a curricle-and-four came into sight, travelling at a brisk pace towards Grantham.
Miss Taverner thrust the sandal behind her and hurriedly let down her skirts, but not, she felt uneasily, before the owner of the curricle must have caught a glimpse of her shapely ankle. She picked up her parasol, which she had allowed to fall at the foot of the bank, and pretended to be interested in the contemplation of the opposite side of the road.
The curricle drew alongside, and checked. Miss Taverner cast a fleeting glance upwards at it, and stiffened. The curricle stopped. ‘Beauty in distress again?’ inquired a familiar voice.
Miss Taverner would have given all she possessed in the world to have been able to rise up and walk away in the opposite direction. It was not in her power, however. She could only tuck her foot out of sight and affect to be quite deaf.
The curricle drew right in to the side of the road, and at a sign from its driver the tiger perched up behind jumped down and ran to the wheel-horses’ heads. Miss Taverner raged inwardly, and turned her head away.
The curricle’s owner descended in a leisurely fashion, and came up to her. ‘Why so diffident?’ he asked. ‘You had plenty to say when I met you yesterday.’
Miss Taverner turned to look at him. Her cheeks had reddened, but she replied without the least sign of shyness: ‘Be pleased to drive on, sir. I have nothing to say to you, and my affairs are not your concern.’
‘That – or something very like it – is what you said to me before,’ he remarked. ‘Tell me, are you even prettier when you smile? I’ve no complaint to make, none at all: the whole effect is charming – and found at Grantham too, of all unlikely places! – but I should like to see you without the scowl.’
Miss Taverner’s eyes flashed.
‘Magnificent!’ said the gentleman. ‘Of course, blondes are not precisely the fashion, but you are something quite out of the way, you know.’
‘You are insolent, sir!’ said Miss Taverner.
He laughed. ‘On the contrary, I am being excessively polite.’
She looked him full in the eyes. ‘If my brother had been with me you would not have accosted me in this fashion,’ she said.
‘Certainly not,’ he agreed, quite imperturbably. ‘He would have been very much in the way. What is your name?’
‘Again, sir, that is no concern of yours.’
‘A mystery,’ he said. ‘I shall have to call you Clorinda. May I put on your shoe for you?’
She gave a start; her cheeks flamed. ‘No!’ she said chokingly. ‘You may do nothing for me except drive on!’
‘Why, that is easily done!’ he replied, and bent, and before she had time to realise his purpose, lifted her up in his arms, and walked off with her to his curricle.
Miss Taverner ought to have screamed, or fainted. She was too much surprised to do either; but as soon as she had recovered from her astonishment at being picked up in that easy way (as though she had been a featherweight, which she knew she was not) she dealt her captor one resounding slap, with the full force of her arm behind it.
He winced a little, but his arms did not slacken their hold; rather they tightened slightly. ‘Never hit with an open palm, Clorinda,’ he told her. ‘I will show you how in a minute. Up with you!’
