Venetia Part 44

'I will call upon you to-morrow, and pray receive me with smiles.'

'I ever will,' said the lady, weeping plenteously. 'It is all my fault; you are ever too good. There is not in the world a kinder and more gentle being than yourself. I shall never forgive myself for this exposure.

'Would you like to take anything?' said Lord Cadurcis: 'I am sure you must feel exhausted. You see I am drinking wine; it is my only dinner to-day, but I dare say there is some salvolatile in the house; I dare say, when my maids go into hysterics, they have it!'

'Ah, mocker!' said Lady Monteagle; 'but I can pardon everything, if you will only let me see you.'

'Au revoir! then,' said his lordship; 'I am sure the carriage must be ready. I hear it. Come, Mr. Gertrude, settle your wig; it is quite awry. By Jove! we might as well go to the Pantheon, as you are ready dressed. I have a domino.' And so saying, Lord Cadurcis handed the lady to his carriage, and pressed her lightly by the hand, as he reiterated his promise of calling at Monteagle House the next day.

CHAPTER XVII.

Lord Cadurcis, unhappy at home, and wearied of the commonplace resources of society, had pa.s.sed the night in every species of dissipation; his princ.i.p.al companion being that same young n.o.bleman in whose company he had been when he first met Venetia at Ranelagh. The morn was breaking when Cadurcis and his friend arrived at his door.

They had settled to welcome the dawn with a beaker of burnt Burgundy.

'Now, my dear Scrope,' said Cadurcis, 'now for quiet and philosophy.

The laughter of those infernal women, the rattle of those cursed dice, and the oaths of those ruffians are still ringing in my ears. Let us compose ourselves, and moralise.'

Accustomed to their master's habits, who generally turned night into day, the household were all on the alert; a blazing fire greeted them, and his lordship ordered instantly a devil and the burnt Burgundy.

'Sit you down here, my Scrope; that is the seat of honour, and you shall have it. What is this, a letter? and marked "Urgent," and in a man's hand. It must be read. Some good fellow nabbed by a bailiff, or planted by his mistress. Signals of distress! We must a.s.sist our friends.'

The flame of the fire fell upon Lord Cadurcis' face as he read the letter; he was still standing, while his friend was stretched out in his easy chair, and inwardly congratulating himself on his comfortable prospects. The countenance of Cadurcis did not change, but he bit his lip, and read the letter twice, and turned it over, but with a careless air; and then he asked what o'clock it was. The servant informed him, and left the room.

'Scrope,' said Lord Cadurcis, quietly, and still standing, 'are you very drunk?'

'My dear fellow, I am as fresh as possible; you will see what justice I shall do to the Burgundy.'

'"Burgundy to-morrow," as the Greek proverb saith,' observed Lord Cadurcis. 'Read that.'

His companion had the pleasure of perusing a challenge from Lord Monteagle, couched in no gentle terms, and requesting an immediate meeting.

'Well, I never heard anything more ridiculous in my life,' said Lord Scrope. 'Does he want satisfaction because you have planted her?'

'D--n her!' said Lord Cadurcis. 'She has occasioned me a thousand annoyances, and now she has spoilt our supper. I don't know, though; he wants to fight quickly, let us fight at once. I will send him a cartel now, and then we can have our Burgundy. You will go out with me, of course? Hyde Park, six o'clock, and short swords.'

Lord Cadurcis accordingly sat down, wrote his letter, and dispatched it by Mr. Spalding to Monteagle House, with peremptory instructions to bring back an answer. The companions then turned to their devil.

'This is a bore, Cadurcis,' said Lord Scrope.

'It is. I cannot say I am very valorous in a bad cause. I do not like to fight "upon compulsion," I confess. If I had time to screw my courage up, I dare say I should do it very well. I dare say, for instance, if ever I am publicly executed, I shall die game.'

'G.o.d forbid!' said Lord Scrope. 'I say, Cadurcis, I would not drink any Burgundy if I were you. I shall take a gla.s.s of cold water.'

'Ah! you are only a second, and so you want to cool your valour,' said Cadurcis. 'You have all the fun.'

'But how came this blow-up?' inquired Lord Scrope. 'Letters discovered, eh? Because I thought you never saw her now?'

'By Jove! my dear fellow, she has been the whole evening here masquerading it like a very vixen, as she is; and now she has committed us both. I have burnt her letters, without reading them, for the last month. Now I call that honourable; because, as I had no longer any claim on her heart, I would not think of trenching on her correspondence. But honour, what is honour in these dishonourable days? This is my reward. She contrived to enter my house this evening, dressed like a farmer's boy, and you may imagine what ensued; rage, hysterics, and repentance. I am sure if Monteagle had seen me, he would not have been jealous. I never opened my mouth, but, like a fool, sent her home in my carriage; and now I am going to be run through the body for my politeness.'

In this light strain, blended, however, with more decorous feeling on the part of Lord Scrope, the young men conversed until the messenger's return with Lord Monteagle's answer. In Hyde Park, in the course of an hour, himself and Lord Cadurcis, attended by their friends, were to meet.

'Well, there is nothing like having these affairs over,' said Cadurcis; 'and to confess the truth, my dear Scrope, I should not much care if Monteagle were to despatch me to my fathers; for, in the whole course of my miserable life, and miserable, whatever the world may think, it has been, I never felt much more wretched than I have during the last four-and-twenty hours. By Jove! do you know I was going to leave England this morning, and I have ordered my horses, too.'

'Leave England!'

'Yes, leave England; and where I never intended to return.'

'Well, you are the oddest person I ever knew, Cadurcis. I should have thought you the happiest person that ever existed. Everybody admires, everybody envies you. You seem to have everything that man can desire.

Your life is a perpetual triumph.'

'Ah! my dear Scrope, there is a skeleton in every house. If you knew all, you would not envy me.'

'Well, we have not much time,' said Lord Scrope; 'have you any arrangements to make?'

'None. My property goes to George, who is my only relative, without the necessity of a will, otherwise I should leave everything to him, for he is a good fellow, and my blood is in his veins. Just you remember, Scrope, that I will be buried with my mother. That is all; and now let us get ready.'

The sun had just risen when the young men went forth, and the day promised to be as brilliant as the preceding one. Not a soul was stirring in the courtly quarter in which Cadurcis resided; even the last watchman had stolen to repose. They called a hackney coach at the first stand they reached, and were soon at the destined spot. They were indeed before their time, and strolling by the side of the Serpentine, Cadurcis said, 'Yesterday morning was one of the happiest of my life, Scrope, and I was in hopes that an event would have occurred in the course of the day that might have been my salvation.

If it had, by-the-bye, I should not have returned to town, and got into this cursed sc.r.a.pe. However, the G.o.ds were against me, and now I am reckless.'

Now Lord Monteagle and his friend, who was Mr. Horace Pole, appeared.

Cadurcis advanced, and bowed; Lord Monteagle returned his bow, stiffly, but did not speak. The seconds chose their ground, the champions disembarra.s.sed themselves of their coats, and their swords crossed. It was a brief affair. After a few pa.s.ses, Cadurcis received a slight wound in his arm, while his weapon pierced his antagonist in the breast. Lord Monteagle dropped his sword and fell.

'You had better fly, Lord Cadurcis,' said Mr. Horace Pole. 'This is a bad business, I fear; we have a surgeon at hand, and he can help us to the coach that is waiting close by.'

'I thank you, sir, I never fly,' said Lord Cadurcis; 'and I shall wait here until I see your princ.i.p.al safely deposited in his carriage; he will have no objection to my friend, Lord Scrope, a.s.sisting him, who, by his presence to-day, has only fulfilled one of the painful duties that society imposes upon us.'

The surgeon gave an unfavourable report of the wound, which he dressed on the field. Lord Monteagle was then borne to his carriage, which was at hand, and Lord Scrope, the moment he had seen the equipage move slowly off, returned to his friend.

'Well Cadurcis,' he exclaimed in an anxious voice, 'I hope you have not killed him. What will you do now?'

'I shall go home, and await the result, my dear Scrope. I am sorry for you, for this may get you into trouble. For myself, I care nothing.'

'You bleed!' said Lord Scrope.

'A scratch. I almost wish our lots had been the reverse. Come, Scrope, help me on with my coat. Yesterday I lost my heart, last night I lost my money, and perhaps to-morrow I shall lose my arm. It seems we are not in luck.

CHAPTER XVIII.

It has been well observed, that no spectacle is so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodical fits of morality. In general, elopements, divorces, and family quarrels pa.s.s with little notice. We read the scandal, talk about it for a day, and forget it. But, once in six or seven years, our virtue becomes outrageous. We cannot suffer the laws of religion and decency to be violated. We must make a stand against vice. We must teach libertines that the English people appreciate the importance of domestic ties. Accordingly, some unfortunate man, in no respect more depraved than hundreds whose offences have been treated with lenity, is singled out as an expiatory sacrifice. If he has children, they are to be taken from him. If he has a profession, he is to be driven from it. He is cut by the higher orders, and hissed by the lower. He is, in truth, a sort of whipping boy, by whose vicarious agonies all the other transgressors of the same cla.s.s are, it is supposed, sufficiently chastised. We reflect very complacently on our own severity, and compare, with great pride, the high standard of morals established in England, with the Parisian laxity. At length, our anger is satiated, our victim is ruined and heart-broken, and our virtue goes quietly to sleep for seven years more.

These observations of a celebrated writer apply to the instance of Lord Cadurcis; he was the periodical victim, the scapegoat of English morality, sent into the wilderness with all the crimes and curses of the mult.i.tude on his head. Lord Cadurcis had certainly committed a great crime: not his intrigue with Lady Monteagle, for that surely was not an unprecedented offence; not his duel with her husband, for after all it was a duel in self-defence; and, at all events, divorces and duels, under any circ.u.mstances, would scarcely have excited or authorised the storm which was now about to burst over the late spoiled child of society. But Lord Cadurcis had been guilty of the offence which, of all offences, is punished most severely: Lord Cadurcis had been overpraised. He had excited too warm an interest; and the public, with its usual justice, was resolved to chastise him for its own folly.