Chapter IV: Part 4

"Of course not," said Bob. "Being married is strange at first, I suppose. Baker says he knew a woman who was married four times, and by the fourth time she wasn't nervous to speak of. But is it true, Pen, that you won't tell any one who it is?"

"I won't," said Pen.

"Bravo," cried Bob. "Stick to it. Oh, it will make granny so savage! Has Bill spoken about it to you?"

"He laughs," said Pen. "He always does laugh."

"He tells rattling good stories," said Bob. "He told me a splendid one about a man who stole a parrot the other day. I'll tell it you sometime when I remember it. Is anything going to happen to-night, Pen?"

Pen shivered.

"Oh, dear, I don't know. Mind you come, too, Bob."

Bob vowed he wouldn't miss coming for worlds.

"I believe you're thinking of telling 'em you've done it," he said, and Pen said she was thinking of telling them.

"You won't tell me who it is? I'm as close as wax," urged Bob.

"I can't, dear," said Pen.

"Oh, by Jove, I remember Bill's parrot story, Pen. A man stole a parrot, and when he was caught he said he took it for a lark. And the man who owned it said he'd make a bally fine judge at a bird-show."

"Oh," said Pen, rather blankly; "but if he only took it for a lark, I suppose they let him off. Did they?"

"Let him off what?"

"Why--going to prison, of course," said Pen.

"I don't know," replied Bob, staring. "Don't you see it's a joke?"

"Yes, I see, of course," said Pen. "Why, the man said it was a lark, and it was a parrot. I think it's a very good story, Bob."

And Bob went away wondering whether it was or not.

"I'll tell it to Baker," he said, thoughtfully.

He turned up at nine o'clock that night with Titania, who was in a state of mind requiring instant attention from a physician.

"Good heavens, what is it, I wonder," said Titania. "Robert, I wonder what it is? But what do you know? I am in a tremble; I am sure she will do or say something even more scandalous than she has done yet. I put it all on Bradstock; to make him her guardian was a fatal error. My nerves--but I have none. I quiver like a jelly; I shake; I must be pale as a ghost. Why should we take so much trouble over anything? I must think of myself. I will go to bed and stay there for a week, and send for Dr. Lumsden Griff."

But Bradstock was as calm as a philosopher without anything in the objective world to worry him.

"What does it matter?" he inquired. "Does anything matter?"

Brading, whom no one had seen for many months, as he had spent the whole winter in a yacht down the Mediterranean, was perfectly good-humoured.

"You see, she's a dear, but only my half-sister after all," he said to Bradstock, "and women are so wonderful! I can tell you a story by and by of a Greek lady, and one about a Spaniard. And, to tell the truth, I almost agree with Pen. I'm a bit of a socialist, or an anarchist, if you like. Have you read Nietzsche?"

"Who wrote it?" asked Bradstock.

But the horde came in one by one, and Penelope, who was dressed in the most unremarkable costume at her disposal, and looked like a lily, received them at the door.

"A most awful and improper situation," said Titania.

"I say, I'll tell you about that Greek girl," said Brading. "Do you think Pen could stick a knife in a fellow?"

Bradstock didn't think so, and listened to the story of the lady who suggested the notion.

"Right through my coat and waistcoat," said Brading. "Only a very stiff piece of starch saved my life!"

"Good heavens!" cried Bradstock.

The room was full, and Bob buzzed around it like a bluebottle in an orchard.

"Oh, I say," he cried to every one. He told the story of the parrot after he had asked Brading whether he had it right. He tried it on De Vere and failed. Goby roared handsomely. Bramber was absent-minded with his eye on Penelope. Gordon said, "Yes, yes, a ripping good story." The Marquis de Rivaulx balked at it, but was led to understand it.

"And when can I go up in a balloon?" asked Bob. He waited for no answer, but told it to Williams, suggesting that the war correspondent might pay for it by a story with blood and torture in it, please. And all of a sudden it was noticed that the hostess had slipped out of the room.

"Where--where is Penelope?" asked trembling Titania. "Mrs. Cadwallader, where is Lady Penelope?"

Bob ran her to earth in her bedroom, and after many appeals he was let in.

"Oh, dear, oh, dear," said Penelope. "Bob, let me take hold of you. Do I tremble?"

"Rather," said Bob. "I'll bet you couldn't drink a glass of wine without spilling it. What's wrong? Buck up. Ain't you comin' in to tell 'em? I've broken it a bit for you."

Pen screamed.

"You wretched boy, what have you done?"

"Bless you, nothing to speak of," said Bob. "I only said you would make 'em sit up presently. They think I know something, and want to bribe me. I say, Pen, if you say nothing for a few days, I believe old Gordon will make me a director. Can you? I want to make money and restore the family property. I say, do."

But Pen paid no attention to him. She groaned instead.

"Where's the pain?" asked Bob, anxiously. "Shall I get you some brandy?"

"No, no, Bob! I _must_ go in and tell them."

"Come on, then," said Bob, eagerly. "I don't care about the directorship. They're all white and shaking. I _guess_ they _are_ in a stew."

But still Pen did not move, and when Chloe came she sent her away, saying, "In a moment, in a moment!"

Then Bob had a brilliant idea.

"I say, Pen, I'll do it!"

"Do what?"

"I'll go in and tell 'em you've done it. It would be a lark!"

But Pen shook her head.

"No, I must, I will be brave. If a woman has ideas she must live up to them. I have done good so far. Are they not very much improved, Bob?"

"Some, I think," said Bob, carelessly. "But I dare say they'll go regular muckers now. Come on, Pen, I do want to see their jaws drop."

And Pen went with him. She stayed outside the door, and Bob went in first.

"She's coming," said Bob. And Pen entered with her eyes on the floor. Bob took her hand.

"Buck up and spit it out," he said, in an encouraging whisper, which was audible in the farthest corner of the room. Some of the horde turned pale; Titania fell back in her chair; Bradstock leant against the wall. Brading put up his eyeglass, and then told Bradstock Pen reminded him of a girl who had once tried to smother him with a pillow.

"She had Penelope's straightforwardness, and never gave in, just like Pen," said Brading, thoughtfully.

And now Penelope took hold of her courage, so to speak, and opened her mouth.

"S-sh," said Bob, who looked on himself as the master of the ceremonies, "s-sh, I say."

And he took hold of Pen's hand.

"I'm so glad to see you here to-night," said the reformer, "for I am so much interested in you all, you see. And you've all been so brave."

"Hear, hear," said Bob.

"So brave in different ways, about balloons and motor-cars and curing yourselves of your weak points," went on Penelope. "That's what I hoped my influence would do. I said I was only a girl, but even a girl ought to do something, and I knew you all liked me very much, for you all said so, and I said, what can I do for you? And I did my best, and you did yours, I'm sure, for I've heard from every one of you all about the others."

This made many of them look rather queer, as no doubt it might.

"And months ago I said--I said--"

"Go ahead, Pen," whispered Bob. "You mean you said you'd marry one of 'em."

"I said I'd--marry one of you."

Titania groaned in the corner of a vast settee. Bradstock and Brading whistled, or it seemed so. But the other poor wretches stared at Penelope, and saw no one, heard no one, but her.

"And I wanted you to come to-night so that I could ask you all to go on in the path of rectitude and simplicity and courage, balloons and hard work and healthiness and thought for others, even if I was married," said Pen, with a gasp. "Will you, oh, will you?"

"We will," said the crowd, Goby leading with a deep bass voice and tears in his eyes.

"Oh, I'm so glad," said Penelope, "for I shall not have lived in vain even if I died to-night. And now--and now--I have to tell you something."

"Great heavens," said Titania, in an awestricken and penetrating whisper, "what is she going to say now?"

"I have kept my word," said Penelope, with her eyes on the floor. "I have kept my word!"

"What--what word?" asked the collapsed duchess, and Pen tried to say what word she had kept.

"Speak up," said Bob, "speak up, Pen!"

And she did speak up.

"For--for," gasped Penelope, "for, you see, I _have_ married one of you!"

Titania uttered a scream and promptly fainted. The men looked at each other furiously and suspiciously, while Pen was on her knees beside the poor duchess. At that moment a message was brought in for Gordon, and an urgent note from the whip for Bramber. Brading stood in a corner and whistled. Bradstock shrugged his shoulders, and Bob buzzed all over the room like a wasp in a bottle. By dint of water and smelling-salts and the slapping of hands Titania was brought to, and when she had recovered consciousness to the extent of knowing what it was that had bowled her over, she uttered words on the spur of the moment which were almost as much of a bombshell as those Penelope had spoken.

"I don't believe she's married at all," said Titania.

*CHAPTER XII.*

To talk about the grounds of certainty is to talk metaphysically, and metaphysics being the highest form of nonsense, becomes sense in that altitude, as it must be if Hegel is to be believed. But in the conduct of life the grounds of certainty are an estate beyond the rainbow. If Penelope believed any one thing with more fervour than another, it was that her truthfulness must be self-evident. The course of events after the evening on which Titania fainted and recovered so sharply showed her that nothing was certain, not even self-evident truths. For though she said she was married, few, if any, believed her. Titania, who believed in her intuitions, as all right-minded women must, because reason is only an attribute of man, declared that Penelope had lied, to put it plainly. She invented an hypothesis to account for it.

"She found out she didn't want to marry any of them, and her courage to say so failed her. This notion of hers gives her time, and of course, my dear, as you see from what I say, she's not married in the least."

Bradstock, who was a philosopher, disagreed with her, and agreed with Bob.

"Not married in the least, eh?" said Bradstock. "What is the least degree of marriage which would meet with your moral approval, Titania?"

"Don't talk nonsense, Augustin," replied Titania, tartly.

"I cannot help it," said Augustin, "the situation is so absurd."

And so it was for every one but the Duchess and Penelope, who did not understand a joke even with illustrations. And they undoubtedly had the illustrations. There were leading articles in several papers on the subject of marriage, with discreet allusions to Penelope's case. There was a long and rabid correspondence in the _Daily Turncoat_, a new halfpenny paper, to which every lady with a past or a future contributed. The editor of the _Dictator_ wrote a moral essay with his own hand, obvious to every student of his immemorial style, which proved that another such case would knock the bottom out of the British Empire and bring on protection. He showed that marriage, open and unadulterated, in a chapel, at the least, was the minimum on which morality could exist, and he pointed out with sad firmness that the ethical standards of the true Briton were the only decent ones at present unfurled in the universe, and that they were in great danger of being rolled up and put away. As every one knows, all he said was undoubtedly fact. The true Briton is the only moral person in the world. As a result Penelope felt that she wasn't a true Briton, and it made her very mournful, as it should have done. Nothing but her native obstinacy, which was imperial if not British, made her stick to her ideas, when her half-brother came to her and asked her crudely to "chuck" it. For, though he was humourous, it was past a joke now, and his admiration of Pen was tinged with alarm.

"I say, old girl, chuck it," said Bill.

"I can't! I won't!" said Penelope.

"Nobody believes you."

Penelope couldn't help that.

"I've spoken the truth."

"Why, even the other men don't believe it," said her brother. "Why, I met three of 'em to-day, and they all said, 'Oh, yes, we understand.' I say, Pen, this is too much. Chuck it!"

"Once for all, dear, I won't," said Penelope. "Much as I dislike this publicity, I see it is doing good. I get letters every day from scores of people saying that I am doing good. Three to-day declared that they were following my example in a registrar's office, and three more are thinking of it. One lady writes, saying she hopes I would go in for abolishing marriage altogether when public opinion was prepared for the extinction of the race. I don't agree with her, but she was enthusiastic, and enthusiasm is a great thing."

"I shall go yachting for a year," said Bill.

"I wish you would, dear Bill," replied Penelope. "It will do you good. You look quite pale, and I don't like you to do that. Have you any cough?"

"Damn it, no," said Brading, crossly.

And he went yachting again without publicity but with a lady. He was no true Briton, and never read the _Dictator_.

His departure took one thing off Pen's hands, but none of her lovers departed. Titania's words had sunk deep in their minds.

"She's not married," they said. "And if she says she is, it is only to try us."

They all interviewed Bob, and made things very pleasant for that rising statesman. If he believed Pen was married there was no reason to say so openly.

"Am I old enough to be a director, do you think?" he asked Gordon. "What I want is to make pots of money and rebuild Goring, which is a bally ruin."

"You don't answer my questions," said Gordon.

"Oh, about Pen," said Bob. "She's queer. I don't know, Mr. Gordon, I can't tell. She may be, for all I know. She's so clever, I don't know that she hasn't married you, and put you up to coming and asking me questions."

Gordon couldn't help grinning.

"I think you'll be a director of something some day," said he. "I can't make you one now, but if you have a hundred pounds I'll invest it in something for you, my son, that will make your hair curl."

"Like yours?" asked Bob, curiously, and Gordon flinched.

"Well," went on Bob, without waiting for an answer, "I haven't a hundred pounds, but I've an idea how to get it."

"Yes?" said the financier. "What's your idea, Bob?"

"It's a safe and a certain investment, is it?"

"Why, of course," replied Gordon.

"Then I'll tell you what, you lend it me," said Bob, brightly, "and invest it for me."

"Damned if I don't," cried Gordon. "Bob, when you are twenty-one I'll make you a director and ask your advice! And you'll come and tell me if you find out anything about Lady Penelope?"

Bob looked at him and shook his head.

"I say, you're so clever, I don't know how to take you. I dare say it's you!"

The flattered financier smiled.

"Oh, by the way," said Bob, rather in a hurry, "I suppose I should get nearly as much if I invested ninety pounds as if I put in a hundred?"

"Nearly," said Gordon, who hoped to be let off a little, "only ten per cent. less."

"That'll do me," said Bob. "Then you can give me the tenner now, Mr. Gordon, and put in the rest for me."

"I wish I had a boy like that," said Gordon. He went away ten pounds poorer, but with a great admiration for Bob, who was determined to restore the faded splendour of Goring.

"Hanged if I know who it is," said Bob. "It may be Gordon after all. And every one but De Vere and Bramber have been at me. Is it one of these?"

He had a remarkable list of all those who had pretended to Penelope's hand, for he was very curious, like all the rest of the world. He was also a little sore with Pen for not confiding in him.

"I told her I'd find out," he said, "and I will."

This was his list, and a curious document it was, written in a big, round hand that "old Guth" could never get him to modify. His spelling was almost ducal in its splendour.

"_Plant_. It isn't Mr. Plant, because he said would I like to go out in a motor, a new one, ninety-horse power, and I said rather, if he'd let her rip. And he looked anshious I thought. He tiped me.

"_Goby_. It isn't Goby, Goby says he'll always be my friend. He said had I another pony not sound, to experiment with. He stamped up and down, some. He tiped me.

"_Williams_. It isn't Williams, he took me to lunch and told me lots of things about the Chinese that his paper wouldn't print. They were orful. He said if I'd keep in with him he knew worse. He didn't tip me this time because the lunch was so much. I had turtell three times.

"_Rivaulx_. It isn't the Frenchy because he tore his hair, and said I could go up in a baloon any day. At least, he didn't tear his hair; it's too short. He keeps it up with Gordon too but looks horrid. He tiped me.

"_Carew_. It isn't him. He's very anxshus and says he can't paint: says the crittics are right. He was a sad sight to see, walking around in his studio. He said would I sit to him for an angel. He stops walking and tries to do Pen quick. I think it's muck. I wouldn't like a tip from him, for if an artist can't paint through grief what becomes of him? Do the others buy him for the Chantrey Bequest?"

"That's the lot so far," said Bob. And he added to his notes:

"_Gordon_. It isn't Gordon. He lent me a hundred pounds to invest in something to make hair curl. I said make it ninety and give me ten now, and he did. He didn't tip me, but I don't think him mean on that account."

"That leaves only De Vere and Bramber," said Bob, "and she never seemed much stuck on either to my mind. But if they don't say anything to me I shall begin to suspect."

He said so to Bradstock, who called him a young devil.

But about three days later Bob added to his notes:

"_Bramber_. It isn't Bramber. I met him in the park. He took me to the House and gave me a beastly lunch. But he didn't notice it as he couldn't eat and looked very pale and savidge. He tiped me.

"_De Vere_. It's not the poetry rotter. He wants me to stay with him and look after the dogs. He said if I had a sick one he'd rather have it than not. He said he was desprit. I don't know why, but suppose it's Pen. He tiped me."

"Now where am I at?" he said, blankly. "I've written down it isn't any of 'em. And that's what granny says. But I don't believe her."

He chewed his pencil till it was in rags, and then a sudden idea struck him.

"I'll buy all Sherlock Holmes and read him right through," said Bob. "That's the way to find out anything. I wish I knew the man that wrote him. I wonder if De Vere knows him? I'll ask Baker to get a sick dog from the vet's, and I'll go down and stay with De Vere if I can make granny say 'yes.' I wonder why old De Vere wants a sick dog, though. I can't understand poets."

It was no wonder Gordon wished he had a boy like Bob.

*CHAPTER XIII.*

It was all very well for Bob to declare that his grandmother was altogether "off it" when she said that Penelope wasn't married at all. For, little by little, after furious discussions in ten thousand houses, in the court, the camp, and the grove, that came to be the general opinion.

Titania expressed the general opinion:

"She is mad, of course. What can one expect when her mother was an American? All Americans are mad. Bradstock assures me there is a something in the air of the United States (oh, even in Canada) which makes one take entirely new views of everything. And that, of course, is madness, my dear, madness undoubted and dangerous. He assured me, poor fellow, that six months in that absurd country made him tremble for his belief in a constitutional monarchy! He adds that he has only partially recovered, by firmly fixing his eyes on what a limited monarch might be, if he tried. Yes, she was an American, and adored our aristocracy, not knowing what we are, poor thing. And yet where Penelope's ideas come from I do not know. I firmly believe Bradstock is the cause of them. When she was a little girl he would take her on his knee and pour anarchism into her innocent ears. You know his way; he runs counter to everything, though now comparatively silent. And Penelope was always ready to go against me, though she loves me. This was an early idea of hers; Augustin owns that he suggested it humourously to her years ago. There is nothing so dangerous as humour; it is always liable to be taken seriously. Mr. Browning, the poet, said so to me at a garden-party; he said he was a humourist, and he said Mr. Tennyson (oh, yes, Lord Tennyson) lacked humour, while he himself had too much of it. He explained Sordello to me, and made me laugh heartily. But as I was saying, Penelope took up the idea and gave it out, and now is sorry, and, not having the courage to say so, she has taken refuge in what I am reluctantly compelled to characterize as a lie, and it is a great relief to me. The scandal will blow over; already the halfpenny papers are tired of her. I expect she will marry by and by. Oh, no, of course she isn't married!"

And as Penelope's ideas were in every way absolutely contrary to what one has a right to expect, it is only natural that, proof of the contrary being lacking, the whole world began gradually to come around to Titania's opinion. A duchess has a great deal of influence if she only likes to use it, and the public is no more proof against her than the public offices are.

And Pen set her teeth together and ignored every one, and had very little to say to society. Her apparent passion was for motor-cars, and she went out in the sixty-horse Panhard almost every day. And every end of the week she disappeared, coming back on Monday or Tuesday.

"I could tell 'em something," said Geordie Smith, "couldn't I, old girl?"

The "old girl" he referred to was the machine he loved next best, at least, to Lady Penelope.

"Me and Bunting could wake 'em up some," he said. "I'd like Bunting if he'd only get rid of the notion that horses are everything. I hope to see the time when there won't be any except in parks, running wild like deer."

It was an awful notion, and it was a wonder that he and Bunting got on without fighting.

"My lady _uses_ your bloomin' tracking engine," said Tim, contemptuously, "but she _loves_ 'orses. You can't give carrots to your old thing, and it ain't got no smooth and silky muzzle to pat. Faugh! the smell of it makes me sick; give me the 'ealthy hodour of the stable, Smith!"

"Find me a horse that'd carry her and me a hundred and twenty miles in three hours and damn the expense in fines," replied Smith, "and I'm with you. My lady loves this car a'most as much as I do. Who can catch her and me, flying along? Let 'em come, let 'em try, and I'll put her out to the top notch and let her sizzle. You come out and try, Tim; one drive and you'll be another man, looking on horses as what they are, mere animals and not up to date. My lady's up to date and beyond it."

"When I go in your bally machine hit'll be by my lady's horders," said Timothy, "and it'll be tryin' my hallegiance very 'ard. Come and 'ave a drink, if you hain't too advanced for that! 'Ave you been chased lately as you brought my lady 'ome?"

"I thought I was," replied Smith, "but I shook 'em off. I'm egging her on to get a ninety-horse in case. That young cousin of hers let on to me that she'll be followed up some day, and I told her. She'll do it!"

"I wonder what's her game?" said Tim. "Blowed if I hunderstand."

"So far's I see," replied Smith, "it's a general notion that a party's private biz is their private biz. And the others says it isn't, and there's where the trouble begins. I agree with her in a measure, don't you?"

"I agrees with my lady hevery time," said Tim. "She's a sweet lady, and, my word, if I didn't I'd get the sack, which I don't want. What she says she sticks to, bein' in that different to hany woman I never met. That's what the trouble is, that and reformin' lovers and husbands and law and so hon!"

But the real trouble was that what she said she stuck to. She began to care much less for reform, and now never read Herbert Spencer and the greater philosopher, who has discovered that man doesn't think so much of yesterday as he does of to-morrow. She forgot the Deceased Wife's Sister, and ignored the London County Council, and didn't read the _Times_ except on great occasions. She spent the days in dreaming, and, except when she was devouring the space between London and Lincolnshire, she lay about on sofas and read poetry or listened to Bob, and looked ten thousand times more beautiful than ever, like the Eastern beauties, of whom one reads in the Arabian Nights, returning from the bath. She was wonderfully affectionate to Bob, who was a most considerate boy, and didn't worry her when he had once discovered that asking questions was no use. He told her of his vain efforts to find out whom she had married, and was very amusing. He began to have great ambitions.

"Mr. Gordon says I've a great future before me, Pen. He thinks no end of me. He says being a duke by and by is all very well, but I agree with him there are greater things than merely being one. He says the men with power are the rulers of the world. He told me how he and Rothschild stopped a war in a hurry. He didn't say which war. I asked him why he didn't stop the South African War, and he said that was different. I asked him did he bring it on then, and he said 'No.' But I think he did, somehow. Will you ask old Sir Henry if he did? I don't like Sir Henry, though, do you?"

He went on to tell her about Sherlock Holmes.

"I'm reading him through again, Pen. And when I go down to De Vere's I shall ask De Vere to invite the man that wrote him. I'm going to De Vere's to take him a sick dog. He said he wanted one, and I've got one from Baker. Baker says he must want to vivisect him, and he doesn't like the idea. Baker's a very kind man to animals, but I've given my word that the dog sha'n't be vivisected. You don't think a poet would, do you? Did you tell him to learn to be a vet or anything? If you did, that would explain it. I've been through the whole list, Pen, and, though I won't worry you, I've come to the conclusion so far that I don't know which you've married. If I find out I won't tell."

"You're a dear," said Pen, languidly.

"I've got a notion how to find out, though," said Bob. "At least, I shall have when I've finished Sherlock Holmes. I'd rather be Sherlock Holmes than a duke. It seems to me that unless you are the Duke of Norfolk or the Duke of Devonshire you are out of it. Being a common duke is dull, but being Holmes must be very exciting."

One thing that he told her made her think furiously.

"Not one of 'em really believes you, Pen, and they're much more jealous of each other than they were. I believe they'll be fighting presently."

"Don't talk nonsense," said Pen, anxiously.

Bob shrugged his shoulders, a trick he had caught from the marquis.

"It's not nonsense. I can see bloodshed in their eyes. The marquis looks awfully ferocious, and Williams, too. Of course, I don't say that Gordon would fight much. And I should snigger to see old De Vere in a duel, shouldn't you? But if Bramber and the marquis and Williams and Goby get together, I shouldn't be surprised if they fought with swords or guns. I think Rivaulx would like that. He would stick them all and make 'em squeal, I can tell you. He's a whale at fencing. He took me to see him once, and when he stamped and said 'Ha-ha,' like a war-horse, I wondered the other man didn't run."

"If they had a duel, any of them, I shouldn't speak to them again," said Penelope. "I abhor duels and warfare and weapons, and think they should be abolished in universal peace. And as I am married now, Bob, I hope you will do what you can to make them believe it."

"You can make 'em believe it at once," said Bob. "I do think this is absurd. And don't you see it's funny, too, Pen?"

"No," said Pen, "it's not. It's right, and what is right can't be funny."

Bob reflected.

"Well, there's something in that. It ain't much fun generally."

And he returned to Sherlock Holmes.

"I wonder what he would do," said Bob to himself, pensively. "There ain't any footsteps or blood in this. I suppose he'd take a look at Pen and then have a smoke and go out in a hansom and come back very tired. I've looked at Pen a lot, but smoking still makes me sick, and I don't know where to go in a hansom. And I think Holmes would think it mean to follow her when she goes off with Smith in her car. Besides, a hansom can't catch a sixty-horse Panhard unless it breaks down. I think he would get at it by looking at the men."

That put him on the track of a dreadful scheme, a most wicked and immoral scheme, that his hero would have disapproved of.

"I believe I have it," said Bob, starting up in wild excitement. "If I go around to them all and say that I'm sure she's not married, but that she loves the one they hate most, they will jump and be in a rage, won't they? I should be, I know. And the one that doesn't jump will be him. I dare say De Vere won't jump, but he's not a jumping sort, but he'll cry, likely. Rivaulx _will_ snort if it isn't him."

He sat and pondered over this lovely scheme.

"But if she loves one of 'em, why don't she own it to him, and why this mystery? They'll ask that, of course. Oh, but that doesn't matter; they'll do the snorting first. And, besides, I could let on that not all of them are in earnest. Ain't it possible that the one she loves won't ask her now, and she's covering up her disappointment? That would make Rivaulx fairly howl, I know. He's a real good chap, and between howling and weeping he says he wants her to be happy. I'll do it."

He went off to do it at once.

"Ha, ha, my beautiful boy," said the Marquis of Rivaulx, whom he found in his rooms in Piccadilly, "have you come with news for me, the devoted and despairing?"

"Well, I don't know, marquis," returned Bob, soberly. "I've been thinking about it, and I'm in a state of puzzle."

"And I am in a state of the devil himself," replied Rivaulx. "I suspect every one. I am enraged. I suspect you, Bob, my boy."

Bob shook his head.

"I suspect you, too. I've never got over thinking that it may be you," he said, "for you are all just like each other, and it's obvious some one is telling me lies."

Rivaulx smiled, a deep and dark French smile, which was agonizing to behold. It puzzled Bob dreadfully.

"There," he said, "you smile, and so does Pen, and you all smile. But I believe I've discovered something."

"About who or which?" asked Rivaulx. "Is it about that Goby?"

He might loathe Gordon, but he was jealous of Goby. He promenaded the room, and was already in a rage.

"Yes," said Bob, boldly. "I believe she's not married, and I believe she likes him best."

"The hound, the vile one, the unmeasured beast," roared Rivaulx, "it cannot be. If she loves him (no, I can't believe it), why does she not wed him? I shall slay him. Is she unhappy? Does she weep? I adore her, but if she loves him he shall marry her or I will stab him to the heart."

"I dare say he's not in earnest," said Bob. And the marquis ground his teeth and foamed at the mouth, and again tried to tear his close-cropped hair without the least success.

"Not--oh, sacred dog of a man,--ha--let me kill him!"

He tore around the room and knocked two ornaments off the mantelpiece and upset a table, which Bob laboriously restored to its place. After he had put it back three times, he gave it up and cowered under the storm.

"I shouldn't be surprised if this was put on," said Bob, rather gloomily. "I know he can act like blazes; Pen says he can. She said he was finer than Irving or Toole in a tragedy. I don't think it has the true ring of sincerity."

And making his escape from the cyclone, he went off to see Goby, who was hideously jealous of Carteret Williams.

"I hope he won't be as mad as the marquis," said Bob. "That table barked my shins horribly the last time it fell. I wish Frenchmen wouldn't shout so when they're angry; I'm nearly deaf."

There was the devil to pay with Goby. He announced his intention of assaulting Williams at once.

"Oh, I say, you mustn't," cried Bob, in great alarm. "She'll never forgive you."

"That Williams!" said Goby. "I always did hate war correspondents. I don't believe it."

But it looked as if he did.

"I dare say you are putting it on," cried Bob. "I don't know where I am."

Goby said he didn't, either, but that if this turned out to be true he would wring Williams's neck in the park the first fine Sunday in June.

"He would have acted just the same if he was married to her, and thought she loved Williams best after all," said Bob to himself. "I'll try Bramber and Williams, and then give it up."

Bramber was in a furious temper, and when Bob assured him that Penelope loved Gordon best of any one, he swore horribly. As he rarely swore, this was very impressive, and Bob almost shivered.

"I say, you mustn't kick Gordon," he urged. "After all, I may be mistaken."

"I wish you were dead," said Bramber, "and you will be if you don't get out."

Bob got out, and when he was in the open air he sighed.

"I don't think I'll try Williams," he said, thoughtfully. "He's much bigger and stronger even than Goby, and they say he's a terror when he's very angry. My scheme doesn't seem to work; there's something wrong with it."

But there was nothing wrong with it, and it worked marvellously. The report that Bob said positively that Pen wasn't married carried much weight. Goby and Rivaulx both gave it away. And all the men now loathed each other openly. Rivaulx cut Goby and Goby cut Williams and Bramber sneered at Gordon, and there was great likelihood of there being the devil to pay. Pen tried to patch up peace among them, and failed, and wept about it, seeing so much of the good she had done melt like sugar in warm rain. At last she announced her intention of leaving them and the world alone.

"I almost think I'll give up reform," she sighed.

And the season went by and the autumn came, and Titania found herself at Goring in October with a large house-party which didn't include Penelope.

"She is, of course, somewhat ashamed of herself," said Titania, happily. "This comes of having ideas and foolishly attempting to carry them into practice. Now that I am certain she is not married and that she only says so, I feel quite different. I no longer abhor the poor, foolish men who are so much in love with her. I see plainly (for I, too, am naturally a democrat of the proper kind) that they have fine qualities. I have marked my sense of this in a way which appears to amuse Lord Bradstock for some reason that I do not follow,--but then, I never could follow Augustin, poor fellow,--by asking them all down here. I dare say they think Penelope will come, for they have all accepted. I am delighted, for I really admire them. Mr. Carew is the handsomest young man in London, and will paint my portrait between meals. I wonder whether I shall try to get thinner by eating less, or will it be better to tell Mr. Carew to make me thinner in his picture. That seems the easiest course; for if Penelope's conduct has not made me thin, what would? Neither hot weather nor despair has the least effect upon me. I shall trust to Mr. Carew's idea of what is right and proper. I wish I could rely with equal confidence upon poor, dear, misguided Penelope."

There was much discontent in the camp when the lovers learnt that their beloved was not one of Titania's house-party. They were not civil to each other, and with difficulty were civil to Titania.

"Confound the old harridan," said Goby. This was wicked, for Titania was very sweet, and retained much more than a trace of her youthful beauty. She belonged to the modern band of those who sternly refuse to grow old.

"Great Scott!" said Carteret Williams. The others made equally appropriate exclamations. They damned Goring in heaps, and looked at each other like a crowd of strange dogs. Owing to Penelope's influence they all came in motor-cars. Even De Vere turned up in one which was guaranteed by age and its maker not to go more than ten miles an hour. There wasn't room to get them into the temporary garage out of the wet. But the marquis did not come in a balloon or a flying-machine. That was something, at any rate, though Bob growled about it bitterly. Pen's request that he should do his best to make the world believe she was married was entirely forgotten. Without quite meaning to say so, he practically asserted in every word that she was not.

"After all," said Bob, "I believe she is capable of deceiving even me, for she is a woman. Horace, in his Odes, seems to think that. It seems to me that classical authors had a very poor opinion of women."

He went to Rivaulx crossly.

"I say, I think you ought to have come in a flying-machine. Why didn't you? Pen will be mad."

He introduced De Vere to Baker (who had been a sergeant in the Dublin Fusiliers), and left him with him, discussing hydrophobia and bulldogs.

"Baker says he has a great admiration for you, sir," said Bob. "He has lots of pups for you to look at. There's a very queer spotted one that Pen said she was sure you would like. It's very cheap for a spotted dog of the kind, Baker says."

But they were an unhappy crowd, and even the shooting, which was fairly good for a poor duke's place, hardly consoled them.

At night the women, who all gambled, naturally were very cross. It appeared that not one of the men would play bridge, because Penelope had made them swear off. There were only three men in the house not in love with Penelope. Titania had a dreadful time, and much regretted her hospitality. Carew was furious, of course, and his notions of colour were very morbid. And he appeared to see the duchess as she was, in spite of the hints the poor woman threw out to the desperate painter, who looked at her sorrowfully and sighed as he shook his head.

"Being painted is an ordeal," she said. Not one of the others consoled her. De Vere wept with her in the drawing-room; Williams wrecked her orchids in the hothouse; Plant and Gordon quarrelled in the smoking-room. And Bramber, who was only there for four days, looked horridly sorry for himself, and sneered at every one. The marquis went around the park in a ninety-horse-power racer seventeen times between breakfast and lunch. The chauffeurs quarrelled furiously; they even fought in the stable yard with Baker as umpire and Bob as timekeeper.

At the dinner-table was the only time of peace, and then it was too peaceful. Nobody but Bob and Ethel Mytton and Titania did any talking. Bob spoke of very little but Penelope, which was natural but awkward. He told them what Baker said, till they all desired to go out and strangle Baker. Bradstock encouraged him, for Bradstock was the only man there who had any apparent desire to be amused. The rest of them played with the soup, toyed with the _entrees_, fooled with the roasts, choked over the birds, and went out and oversmoked themselves. Then they met in the big hall and the drawing-room, and Titania had to assure them all one after the other, that she was certain Penelope was not married.

"Then why does she say she is?" they asked, bitterly.

"It must be to try you," said Titania. "Augustin, don't you think it is to try them?"

Bradstock made that sound which the English write as "Humph" and the Scotch put down as "Imphm." It means a great deal, but is intelligible to the intelligent.

"Yes, it is to try you," said Titania. "She is a dear, sweet thing, but has ideas which do not commend themselves to me. I understand them, of course, but regret them. It may be, of course, that she does not love any of you, and is trying to get out of it. By and by you will find out if that is so. She is enthusiastic and impulsive. Oh, these impulses of youth! How well I remember the delightful impulses of youth, when one feels as if one could fly with wings! Even now I get impulses. Poor Penelope! Ah, dear, I wish she would come. I have written again and again to ask her, but I'm afraid she will not."

And, indeed, no one at that moment knew where she was, unless, indeed, it was Timothy and Geordie Smith and Miss Mackarness and the pirate in goggles of the motor-car who carried her off.

Titania and Bob between them, at any rate, accomplished one thing. No one pretended to assign a satisfactory reason for Pen's conduct, but every one, except one, perhaps, believed she was still single. They were sure of it, and grew surer every day. As a result, they recovered some little peace of mind; they quarrelled less and ate more and shot straighter. Rivaulx only went fifteen times around the park before lunch; De Vere bought more dogs; Plant agreed to go into some scheme of trust robbery with Gordon, who assured the rest of them that he had Rothschild up his sleeve. Williams stamped less on flower-beds and swore half as much as usual. Goby and Bramber went out walks together with Bob and Ethel Mytton. Titania's barometer went up and her size went down in Carew's picture. He saw her less yellow, and did not insist on her wrinkles. Augustin sat in the library and read books which were of so humourous a character that they compelled him to put them down and laugh continually. It was certainly a most amusing house-party.

"I thought there would have been duels in the park," said Augustin. "I wonder what the deuce Pen would think of them if she saw them now."

And then one day something serious happened. It was on a Sunday, and on Sundays the post came in at half-past ten, just at the time they were all having breakfast before going to church. They were just about as happy as they could ever hope to be till Penelope married one or all of them. Bob, who was especially greedy that morning, was eating against time and winning. Only Ethel was sad, for Goby seemed quite cheerful. When he was mournful she was happier always. Titania flowed wonderfully. Augustin was saying the kind of thing he could say when sitting down. Goring himself was eating as if he was in rivalry with Bob. He never said anything, but looked like a duke, which is a very fine thing when a man is a duke, and can afford it with care. Gordon was eating bacon as if he had no great appetite for it.

"Oh, here's the post," said Titania. Augustin took Saturday's _Times_ and opened it.

"I wonder whether dear Penelope has written to me," said Titania. The "horde" looked up; they hoped even yet that Penelope would give in and come at last.

"Any news?" grunted Goring.

"I don't see any," replied Augustin.

"What are Jack Sheppard's United?" asked Gordon, slipping a piece of bacon into his pocket.

And Augustin made his celebrated speech over again, his single speech in the House of Lords.

"Good God!" said Augustin, and he turned almost as white as the _Times_ paper before it went through the machines. Every one stared at him.

"What is it?" screamed Titania. Bob jumped up and deserted a pig's cheek just as it was showing signs of utter defeat.

"It's--it's--" said Augustin, and he stammered vainly.

"I say, let's look," cried Bob. "Granny, it's something in the Births, Marriages, and Deaths!"

"Good heavens, speak, Augustin!" implored Titania.

The band of lovers went as white as Augustin; they stood up simultaneously.

"I see it, I see it," said Bob, and he actually snatched the paper from Lord Bradstock's hand.

"Is she married? Is she dead?" asked Titania.

"No, no," said Bob, sputtering and aflame with wild excitement; "it's 'Brading--Lady Penelope Brading on the 18th of a son!'"

*CHAPTER XIV.*

There are blows which stun; this was, of course, one of them. Titania did not shriek or faint at the awful intelligence conveyed by the Thunderer of Printing House Square. She nodded her head as if she was partially paralyzed, and at last murmured in a dry whisper:

"Of a son! Of a son!"

Bradstock's eyebrows were as high as they would go, and he stared at Titania, and then look around on the circle of men and women. Ethel squeaked a little squeak, like a mouse behind the wainscot and was silent.

"Oh--of a son," said Goby, sighing and looking at the floor.

"Of a son!" said Plant, eyeing the ceiling.

"_Un fils!_" shrieked Rivaulx.

Gordon said "Damnation;" De Vere shook like a stranded jelly-fish; Bramber went as scarlet as a lobster, and then as white as cotton; Carteret Williams looked blue, and Carew looked green, and Bob said: "My eye!"

There is something organic in any given number of people acting under the same shock or the same impulse. What one thinks another thinks; and now all the room fixed their eyes on Titania, whose lips moved in silence.

"This is dreadful!" said Titania to herself. "I don't believe she's married at all. One of these men is a scoundrel, a ruffian, a seducer!"

No one heard what she said, but as she thought it the men looked at each other with awful suspicions. And then Titania, whose mind was whirling, said feebly:

"We--we must hush it up!"

And there lay the _Times_! Hush it up indeed! And Bradstock recovered some of his equanimity.

"Nonsense! She's married, as she says," he remarked, with comparative coolness.

But no one believed it. The men drew apart from each other. De Vere moved his chair, because Goby was looking at him like a demon. Carew shrank from Carteret Williams. Gordon went livid under Plant's eyes. Bramber looked at them all as if he would die on the spot. Rivaulx rose up and waltzed around the room. It was a happy chance that he did so; it is possible that he saved immediate bloodshed. Bradstock and Bob caught the Frenchman in their arms, and led him outside to the lawn, where there was ample room for a frantic _pas seul_.

"Steady, old chap!" said Bradstock, "steady! Her husband _must_ acknowledge now who he is!"

"Oh, no," said Bob, in immense delight, "not much! If she's married at all, she's sworn him not to. She told me she'd swear him not to! And she said if he broke his oath she'd never see him again!"

"Great heavens!" said Bradstock, "so she did. I remember now, she _did_ speak of oaths, dreadful oaths!"

Rivaulx danced over a flower-bed, came in contact with a fence, fell over it, and uttered a howl which brought every one into the garden. He tumbled into a ditch, fortunately a comparatively dry one, and lay there, using the very worst French language.

The gloomy crowd lined the ditch and listened, and wished they understood. As a matter of fact, only Bradstock and Bramber knew sufficient decent French to guess what Rivaulx said, and they shivered. In the background Titania and Ethel hung to each other and wept; old Goring remained inside sucking at an unlighted cigar.

"The terrible, terrible disgrace!" said Titania. She believed the very worst at once. "Is it the marquis? Is he smitten with remorse?"

Rivaulx got out of the ditch on the wrong side, and walked out into the park, where he addressed a commination service to a nice little herd of Jersey cows. After five minutes of this exercise, he returned toward the house and climbed the fence. Then he shook his fist at the others.

"One of you is a _scelerat_," he howled, "a scoundrrrel! I challenge you all to fight! Ha, ha!"

Bradstock took him by the arm and led him away.

"One of us is a hound!" said Goby.

"Yes," said the others, "yes!"

They glared at each other horribly, and clenched their fists. Bob ran around them in the wildest excitement.

"Look here, I say, Captain Goby. Oh, Mr. de Vere! I say, Mr. Plant, if you want to fight, come into the stables. Granny says you mustn't fight here."

He grabbed several of them, and was hurled into space at once. He finally laid hold of De Vere, who wasn't capable of hurling a ladybird off his finger.

"You shall fight Goby if you want to," he roared.

"But I don't want to," shrieked the poet. "What shall I do? My heart is broken!"