the marquis's memory 4

 

Chapter 4

 

Whilst Suggs was starting out, Geoffrey managed to get dressed to eat in the barroom in the ‘Running Buck.’ Here, he was an object of interest to the locals, and nodded, genially to them.  Pip disappeared, preferring to eat with the inn servants; something which must be rectified, but not yet.

Gaffer Keeble was the one who dared speak up.

“They du say as how yew’ve forgotten who yew be, squire,” he said. It was a question more than a statement.

“Well, yes, I took a nasty knock to the bone-box, in avoiding the sow, who I believe rejoices in the name ‘Sarey,’” said Geoffrey. “I haven’t forgotten my table manners, though, so you need not worry that I shall make an exhibit of myself.”

Gaffer Keeble gave a wheezing laugh.

“Well, most of us appreciates that yew let yerself be knocked all hickety hock to avoid a prize sow,” he said. “Though they did say yew bruk both legs, so I be right glad yew be less on the huh than wuz said.  Moi hog services Sarey, so it’s moi income too.”

“Ah, you’ll be Miss Congreve’s neighbour, then,” said Geoffrey.

“Arr, thass roight,” said the Gaffer. “That dratted sow loike to go walkabout; when that’s hot, she trots down the lane to the river for a swim.”

“Is it far down the lane?” asked Geoffrey.  “I never got further than her wallow. Will you join me in dinner?”

“Don’t mind if I do,” said the Gaffer, with alacrity. “Miss Effie, she cooks for me three times a week, but since I lost moi Mattie, I do-ant hev the heart to cook.”

“I am sorry for your loss,” said Geoffrey.

“Ar, well, I’d sell up my little bit cottage – it bein’ freehold, not rented, you see – and go live with moi married daughter but for two things,” said the Gaffer.

“Oh, what’s that?” asked Geoffrey.

“I wouldn’t want to leave Napoleon, thass my boar, unless someone wass appreciates him bought un out; an’ I loike bein’ foive minutes as the sow trots, or ten minutes as the Gaffer totters, from the sea. It ain’t real sea, bein’ tidal estuary, but thass enough loike ut.”

“Old sailor?” asked Geoffrey.

“Ar, and bought my cottage with moi prize money,” said the Gaffer. “Took up by the press when I were leadin’ the ruddy preventatives astray, though I will say, they learned me plenty. I wuz glad to git my discharge in the peace o’ Amiens, bein’ at sea, thass a young man’s craft, and I wuz glad to celebrate moi sixtieth birthday on land.”

“Why, surely that would make you over seventy, now?” asked Geoffrey. “You don’t look it.”

“Ar, well, two pints o’ cider an’ two pipes o’ baccy a day does a man wonders,” said the Gaffer. “I never catch anythin’. My poor Matty went off with the same influenza wass turned to pleurisy in owd vicar, afore we hed that maudlin’ cantin’ bishy-barneybee o’ a fellow, wi’ his ‘You shuud drink less mai man’ and his ‘Will we see yu in church this Sunday, mai brother?’ and I says to him, if you wuz my brother, like as not our da would of put yew on the parish fer not bein’ able tu work a man’s day by the time yew was eight years’ owd, there bein’ nobbut wrong wi’ yew but learziness. I’ve earned moi drink an moi pipe wi’ a loiftoime’s o’ work, not that yew’d know what work was,’ I towd him. “‘An’ moi day o’ rest, bar feedin’ the animals, I earned that tu, an’ spile it listening’ to a totty-hidded shanny ow’ fule loike yew, I will not do.’ And he was not best pleased an’ he cum near tu stroikin’ me.  ‘Go on!’ I says. ‘Dew yew hit a pore ow’ man loike me, the other cheek Our’ll be turnin’  is yourn wi’ a cross-buttock throw. An’ Our’ll be seein’ the Good Lord afore yew, loike as not, so Our’ll be getting’ moi tearle in first about yew, yew cantin’ hypocrite.’ And he minces out.”

“Leaving a well-developed slime-trail like a hodemedod,” added Geoffrey, who had grown up in Suffolk, and knew the idiom well enough to liken the vicar to a snail.

The Gaffer laughed.

“Ar, that’d suit un foine well,” he said.

“So, you’re a sporting man with the noble science of pugilism?” asked Geoffrey.

“Ar, I learned ut in the navy, an’ I was champion o’ the Pegasus, ship o’ the line,” said Gaffer. “Reckon I could show yew a thing or two.”

“I don’t doubt it,” said Geoffrey. “Perhaps you’ll help me get my strength back up when I’ve healed.”

“Well now! Don’t mind if I do,” said Gaffer. “Ah! Here come the vittles’!”

“Don’t you let him go chisellin’ off of you too often, Mr. Jefferson,” said Jinny Pigeon, as she set down a thick stew with dumplings, mashed potato, green peas, and a loaf of bread and a pat of butter to go with it.

“Oh, I am paying for hearing his life’s tale,” said Geoffrey.

“He’ll tell that for free,” said Jinny. “What are you drinking, sir?”

“Cider,” said Gaffer.

“I’ll join him,” said Geoffrey. “I’ve heard tell your cider is something special.”

“Well, now, I hope you like it,” said Jinny, flattered. “We don’t run to much fancy, but I’m told my beetroot wine is equal to a good port.”

“Well, then, the Gaffer and I will finish the meal with a glass,” said Geoffrey, recklessly.

 

The meal was delicious, the beef in the stew succulent and tender, and nothing overcooked. The dumplings were lightly seasoned, and Geoffrey decided to emulate Gaffer Keeble in using a slice of bread and butter to mop up the last of his gravy. 

The stew was followed by cheesecakes with bottled cherries and cream, and then the beetroot wine, which was a rich tawny colour and slid down so smoothly that it was not until he endeavoured to stand up that Geoffrey realised how potent it was.

Pigeon came to help him up to his room.

“That beetroot wine is good stuff,” declared Geoffrey. “I hope you have plenty of it.”

“Enough for your needs, I hope, milord,” said Pigeon.

“And you forget that, I’m plain Mr. Jefferson,” said Geoffrey.

“O’ course, sir,” said Pigeon.

 

oOoOo

 

Simon Endicott had utilised the time whilst Lady Calver was at Bow Street to pack a bag for his employer, and go to the bank in his name. Preferring not to stay to answer any questions from either a Bow Street Officer, or Lady Calver, he packed a bag for himself, as well, and took off with his own curricle. His curricle was not as shiny as Geoffrey’s, and his team were reliable and steady rather than likely to race, and unlike Geoffrey, Simon drove two abreast rather than tandem, not being either inclined to care about showing his skill in driving tandem, nor having the urge to overtake other vehicles where the narrower profile of the equipage more than made up for a longer team to have to overtake on narrow roads. Having been informed where his employer would be, Simon felt able to push on at whatever pace his horses found comfortable, without having to stop to ask the way.  If Suggs had been a little more astute, or lucky, he might have overheard the gossip of the stablehands, that Mr. Endicott was going out with his lordship’s bags, and plainly knew where he was; at which point, Suggs might have followed. However, Suggs missed that bit of byplay, proving that law enforcement must always rely on luck; and that partisan servants were not about to share information to the man hired by the unpopular dowager to find the popular peer just because she wanted it.  For all his hot temper, Geoffrey was popular, as he went to the effort of knowing everything about his employees, and seeing to their needs and wants. He also made up for any lapses of temper with material apologies as bonuses to anyone he had called down unjustly; and it made his people ready to go the extra mile for him.

And if Mr. Endicott knew where milord was, and was going to join him, it was nobody else’s business, and milady like as not would not even miss Mr. Endicott, a school chum of milord’s, since she thought anyone who had to work for a living to be beneath her notice.

Simon Endicott was wondering how Geoffrey had made his way to the Shotley Peninsula in one day; and came to the inevitable conclusion that he had not.  He pushed on into the evening to achieve the objective of Chelmsford, where he stayed at The Black Boy, with its unashamedly Royalist inn name, to check that Milord Jeffy had been through, had joined a mill and knocked out the local champion, had drunk a bottle of brandy, but had still been up for breakfast at six-thirty and pushed on, still, in the words of mine host, in the devil’s own temper. Simon knew his friend’s tempers, and doubted that Geoffrey had consciously stopped for the night, even with the amelioration to his anger of being able to knock a man down.  Geoffrey had learned to control his tempers since his father’s death, but when the dowager went out of her way to cause him grief, he could completely lose himself in rage.  Simon cordially detested Lady Calver, who saw her son as a possession to be flaunted, and whose marriage was to provide a setting for herself, the mother of the bridegroom, the generous dowager welcoming a new bride into her place under her tutelage – or, more to the point, under her thumb. Simon cursed himself for having missed that breakfast fiasco, and therefore his failure to bring Geoffrey out of the red rage in which he had set off.  He had not had any qualms that Geoffrey would have an accident, and had been surprised to learn that such had, indeed, befallen his friend. Geoffrey, however angry, seemed to have a veritable instinct for driving, and behaved, on the whole, with courtesy on the road.  When Simon read that the mishap had occurred avoiding a hog, he was much happier; it was just like Geoffrey to do so.

Simon had collected the rest of the ruby parure from the bank, in case Geoffrey wanted to sell more, and had answered the manager’s coy queries about an announcement in the offing with a fishy stare. The tale of a betrothal had been quashed in the newspaper, and as the ruby parure was a Calver family set of jewellery, there was nothing to stop Geoffrey from doing what he liked with it, up to and including throwing it in the River Orwell.  Which he was quite as likely to do as anything else if Lady Calver mentioned that she found it handsome and imposing.

Miss Ann Sherley had attracted the former marquis with her beauty, and being well below her husband socially had attempted to make up for her lack of birth in throwing her weight around. Her husband had been able to keep her in order; but her demands that her son marry someone ‘suitable’ had left Geoffrey’s temper fraying more and more as any girls he showed a partiality for were frightened off, their parents bought off, or downright threatened, whilst the dowager pushed girls of impeccable lineage but retiring disposition on him.

 

 

 Simon duly entered the Running Buck in time for dinner on Tuesday, to find his friend seated with a red haired youth – presumably the boy he meant to take as a ward – and an elderly bucolic.

“Hello, Sluggy! You took your time,” said Geoffrey.

“It’s impossible to do the trip in less than two days, Hedgehog,” said Simon, relieved that Geoffrey was using boyish nicknames. His own, less than flattering, had come about via his refusal to answer to ‘Sim’ at school, and an older boy calling him ‘Slimyone’ which, Geoffrey had said, was far more dignified to take a stage further and accept rather than get upset by it. As Simon had retorted that Geoffrey was a fine one to talk, being more full of prickles than an urchin, the names had stuck.

“I did it… no, wait, I stopped over somewhere,” said Geoffrey. “Had a lovely mill, there, too.”

“Traumatised the local champion in Chelmsford for life into believing that he was milled down by a combination of Mendoza, Jackson, and a runaway coach,” said Simon, cheerfully. “So, you’ve lost your memory?”

“Tactically speaking, yes,” said Geoffrey. “Oh, my manners; this is Pip, who is some get of Cabbage Seward’s, and this is Gaffer Keeble, who’s an old sailor, pugilist, and proud owner of Napoleon, a boar.”

“The one that upset you?”

“No, that one belongs to Miss Congreve, sister of the late reverend. Sarey the sow is Napoleon’s inamorata of choice, and has a fondness for sunbathing in the road and bathing bathing in the Orwell.”

“Clear as mud,” said Simon. “What’s for dinner?”

“Mutton curried with rice, removed with duck stuffed with apricots served with green peas, shallots, new potatoes and celery,” said Geoffrey. “Jinny Pigeon is a fine cook.”

“And, I confess, a nice change from the excess of removes your French cook insists on,” said Simon.

“My mother’s French cook,” said Geoffrey. “So, is she throwing things and threatening retribution?”

“She was; but yesterday, she headed to Bow Street to report you missing, and hire a runner to find you.”

“How remarkably gauche of her,” said Geoffrey, his eyes glittering. “What crime has she laid at my door to be arrested for?”

“Oh, none; just that you are a missing person.”

“I am tempted to get a yacht, and sail to Gibraltar,” said Geoffrey.

“You’d be seasick in the Bay of Biscay,” said Simon.

“Damn you, yes,” said Geoffrey. “Mind, I like the concept of slipping my moorings and heading for Ipswich, Harwich, Felixtowe or somewhere on the double estuary.”

“What a good job I brought you plenty of blunt,” said Simon. “Are you serious?”

“Well, I wouldn’t mind settling here for a while,” said Geoffrey. “I want to rescue the lady who picked me up and patched me up from the attentions of the vicar, only though I like her well enough, nothing has screamed to me that I want to be with her for the rest of my life. And I don’t know how she’d feel about me adopting Pip.”

“If you adopted all of Cabbage’s get, you’d be knee deep in brats,” said Simon. “As I recall, he made a habit of debauching village girls from about the age of fourteen.”

“That would make the oldest about eighteen, now,” said Geoffrey. “I don’t know how old Pip is.”

“I hadn’t been counting,” said Pip. “Why ‘Cabbage?’ and why ‘Sluggy’ and ‘Hedgehog?’”

“It started out as ‘Cribbage’ because he used to cheat at cribbage at school,” said Geoffrey. “I think it morphed because nobody likes cabbage. Not the way it’s cooked at school, anyway.”

“And you don’t get to use our nicknames, young shaver,” said Simon. “I brought you some more suitable clothes for your estate; you look like the wraggle-taggle gypsy-o.”

“Poor brat, he more or less has been,” said Geoffrey.