After dinner more time was lost. First of all, in discussing what they should do; next, in whether it should be done that night. You see, it was not Mrs. Pell they wanted, but her husband. As it was then dark, it was thought best to leave it until morning.
We went up in state about half-past ten; taking a coach, and pa.s.sing _en route_ the busy market scene. The coach seemed to have no springs: Mr. Brandon complained that it shook him to pieces. This was Sat.u.r.day, you know. The Squire meant to be distantly polite to Mrs. and the Miss Pells, but to insist upon having the address given him of Mr. Pell.
"We"ll not take the coach quite up to the door," said he, "or we may not get in." Indeed, the getting in seemed to be a matter of doubt: old Brandon"s opinion was that they"d keep every window and door barred, rather than admit us.
So the coach set us down outside the furthermost barrier of the Upper Town, and we walked on to the gate, went up the path, and knocked at the door.
As soon as the servant opened it--she had the same brown bedgown on, the same grey stockings, and wooden sabots--the Squire dexterously slipped past her into the pa.s.sage to make sure of a footing. She offered no opposition: drew back, in fact, to make room.
"I must come in; I have business here," said he, almost as if in apology.
"The Messieurs are free to enter," was her answer; "but they come to a house empty."
"I want to speak to Madame Brown," returned the Squire, in a determined tone.
"Madame Brown and the Mees Browns are depart," she said. "They depart at daylight this morning, by the first convoi."
We were in the front parlour then: a small room, barely furnished. The Squire flew into one of his tempers: he thought the servant was playing with him. Old Brandon sat down against the wall, and nodded his head. He saw how it was--they had really gone.
But the Squire stormed a little, and would not believe it. The girl, catching one word in ten, for he talked very fast, wondered at his anger.
The young gentlemans was at the place yesterday, she said, glancing at me: it was a malheur but they had come up before the morning, if they wanted so much to see Madame.
"She has not gone: I know better," roared the Squire. "Look here, young woman--what"s your name, though?"
"Mathilde," said she, standing quite at ease, her hands turned on her hips and her elbows out.
"Well, then, I warn you that it"s of no use your trying to deceive _me_.
I shall go into every room of this house till I find Madame Brown--and if you attempt to stop me, I"ll bring the police up here. Tell her that in French, Johnny."
"I hear," said Mathilde, who had a very deliberate way of speaking. "I comprehend. The Messieurs go into the rooms if they like, but I go with, to see they not carry off any of the articles. This is the salon."
Waiting for no further permission, he was out of the salon like a shot.
Mr. Brandon stayed nodding against the wall; he had not the slightest reverence for the Squire"s diplomacy at any time. The girl slipped off her sabots and put her feet into some green worsted slippers that stood in the narrow pa.s.sage. My belief was she thought we wanted to look over the house with a view to taking it.
"It was small, but great enough for a salle a manger," she said, showing the room behind--a little place that had literally nothing in it but an oval dining-table, some matting, and six common chairs against the walls. Upstairs were four bedrooms, bare also. As to the fear of our carrying off any of the articles, we might have found a difficulty in doing so. Except beds, chairs, drawers, and wash-hand-stands, there was nothing to carry. Mrs. Brown and the Miss Browns were not there: and the rooms were in as much order as if they had not been occupied for a month. Mathilde had been at them all the morning. The Squire"s face was a picture when he went down: he began to realize the fact that he was once more left in the lurch.
"It is much health up here, and the house fine," said the girl, leaving her shoes in the pa.s.sage side by side with the sabots, and walking into the salon in her stockings, without ceremony; "and if the Messieurs thought to let it, and would desire to have a good servant with it, I would be happy to serve them, me. I sleep in the house, or at home, as my patrons please; and I very good to make the kitchen; and I----"
"So you have not found them," interrupted old Brandon, sarcastically.
The Squire gave a groan. He was put out, and no mistake. Mathilde, in answer to questions, readily told all she knew.
About six weeks ago, she thought it was--but no, it must be seven, now she remembered--Madame Brown and the four Mees Browns took this house of the proprietaire, one Monsieur Bourgeois, marchand d"epicerie, and engaged her as servant, recommended to Madame by M. Bourgeois. Madame and the young ladies had lived very quietly, giving but little trouble; entrusted her to do all the commissions at the butcher"s and elsewhere, and never questioned her fidelity in the matter of the sous received in change at market. The previous day when she got home with some pork and sausages, which she was going after when the young gentlemans spoke to her--nodding to me--Madame was all bouleversee; first because Mees Constance had been down to the town, which Madame did not like her to do; next because of a letter----
At this point the Squire interrupted. Did she mean to imply that the ladies never went out?
No, never, continued Mathilde. Madame found herself not strong to walk out, and it was not proper for the young demoiselles to go walk without her--as the Messieurs would doubtless understand. But Mees Constance had ennui with that, and three or four times she had walked out without Madame"s knowing. Yesterday, par exemple, Madame was storming at her when she (Mathilde) came home with the meat, and the young ladies her sisters stormed at her----
"There; enough of that," snapped the Squire. "What took them away?"
That was the letter, resumed the girl in her deliberate manner. It was the other thing, that letter was, that had contributed to Madame"s boulevers.e.m.e.nt. The letter had been delivered by hand, she supposed, while she was gone to the pork-shop; it told Madame the triste news of the illness of a dear relative; and Madame had to leave at once, in consequence. There was confusion. Madame and the young ladies packing, and she (Mathilde), when her dinner had been cooked and eaten, running quick for the proprietaire, who came back with her. Madame paid him up to the end of the next week, when the month would be finished and--that was all.
Old Brandon took up the word. "Mr. Brown?--He was not here at all, was he?"
"Not at all," replied Mathilde. "Madame"s fancy figured to her he might be coming one of these soon days: if so, I refer him to M. Bourgeois."
"Refer him for what?"
"Nay, I not ask, monsieur. For the information, I conclude, of where Madame go and why she go. Madame talk to the proprietaire with the salon door shut."
So that was all we got. Mathilde readily gave M. Bourgeois"s address, and we went away. She had been civil through it all, and the Squire slipped a franc into her hand. From the profusion of thanks he received in return, it might have been a louis d"or.
Monsieur Bourgeois"s shop was in the Upper Town, not far from the convent of the Dames Ursulines. He said--speaking from behind his counter while weighing out some coffee--that Madame Brown had entrusted him with a sealed letter to Monsieur Brown in case he arrived. It contained, Madame had remarked to him, only a line or two to explain where they had gone, as he would naturally be disappointed at not finding them; and she had confided the trust to him that he would only deliver it into M. Brown"s own hand. _He_ did not know where Madame had gone. As M. Bourgeois did not speak a word of English, or the Squire a word of French, it"s hard to say when they would have arrived at an explanation, left to themselves.
"Now look here," said Mr. Brandon, in his dry, but uncommonly clear-sighted way, as we went home, "_Clement-Pell"s expected here_.
We must keep a sharp watch on the boats."
The Squire did not see it. "As if he"d remain in England all this time, Brandon!"
"We don"t know where he has stayed. I have thought all along he was as likely to be in England as elsewhere: there"s no place a man"s safer in, well concealed. The very fact of his wife and daughters remaining in this frontier town would be nearly enough to prove that he was still in England."
"Then why on earth _did_ he stay there?" retorted the Squire. "Why has he not got away before?"
"I don"t know. Might fear there was danger perhaps in making the attempt. He has lain perdu in some quiet corner; and now that he thinks the matter has partly blown over and the scent is less keen, he means to come over. That"s what his wife has waited for."
The Squire seemed to grasp the whole at once. "I wonder when he will be here?"
"Within a day or two, you may be sure, or not at all," said Mr. Brandon, with a nod. "She"ll write to stop his coming, if she knows where to write to. The sight of Johnny Ludlow has startled her. You were a great m.u.f.f to let yourself be seen, young Johnny."
"Yes, sir, I know I was."
"Live and learn, live and learn," said he, bringing out his tin box.
"One cannot put old heads upon young shoulders."
Sunday morning. After breakfast I and Mr. Brandon were standing under the porte-cochere, looking about us. At the banking house opposite; at a man going into the chemist"s shop with his hand tied up; at the marchand-de-coco with his gay attire and jingling bells and noisy tra-la-la-la: at anything, in short, there might be to see, and so while away the half-hour before church-time. The Squire had gone strolling out, saying he should be back in time for service. People were pa.s.sing down towards the port, little groups of them in twos and threes; apart from the maid-servants in their white caps, who were coming back from ma.s.s. One of the hotel waiters stood near us, his white napkin in his hand. He suddenly remarked, with the easy affability of the French of his cla.s.s (which, so far as I know, and I have seen more of France since then, never degenerates into disrespect), that some of these people might be expecting friends by the excursion boat, and were going down to see it come in.
"What excursion boat?" asked Mr. Brandon of the waiter, quicker than he generally spoke.
"One from Ramsgate," the man replied. "It was to leave the other side very early, so as to get to Boulogne by ten o"clock; and to depart again at six in the afternoon." Mr. Brandon looked at the speaker; and then at me. Putting his hand on my shoulder, he drew me towards the port; charging the waiter to be sure and tell Mr. Todhetley when he returned, that we had gone to see the Ramsgate boat come in. It was past ten then.
"_If Clement-Pell comes at all it will be by this excursion boat_, Johnny," said he impressively, as we hurried on.
"Why do you think so, Mr. Brandon?"
"Well, I do think so. The people who make excursion trips are not those likely to know him, or of whom he would be afraid. He will conceal himself on it amongst the crowd. It is Sunday also--another reason. What flag is that up on the signal-post by the pier house, Johnny? Your eyes are younger than mine."