Love Climbs In Page 2

  “I had no idea of that,” the Marquis said after a pause. “You don’t mean she killed herself?”

  “No, of course not,” Freddie answered. “But he was her whole life and when he was no longer there she just gave up breathing.”

  “You have never told me this before.”

  “I would not have told you now,” his friend replied, “only I thought that it might make you understand what I am talking about.”

  “I am not certain I do understand,” the Marquis said, “but it is making me think.”

  “That is what I want you to do.”

  The Marquis sighed.

  “Neither you nor I, Freddie, are likely to feel like that about any woman.”

  He paused before he went on.

  “Yes, I do understand what you are trying to say to me. Of course I do. But I am not the romantic sort.”

  He saw the expression on his friend’s face and laughed.

  “All right! All right! There have been a lot of women in my life and I would not pretend otherwise, some of whom have been damned attractive. Do you remember that little doe-eyed girl in Lisbon?”

  The Marquis ceased speaking for a moment and then said,

  “No, let’s not get off the track. You are telling me that I have to feel some strange emotion that I have never felt before and then I shall know that I am in love.”

  “That is part of it,” Freddie said, “but I have a feeling there is something more.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I think that in every marriage there has to be a common ideal in the relationship, something that you are aiming for together.”

  “What I am aiming for,” the Marquis said, “is to have a son.”

  “You are being deliberately obtuse. When we used to debate with each other and our friends at Oxford, you know we talked about a great many things we have not mentioned since.”

  “Of course we did,” the Marquis agreed, “but it was high-flown balderdash analysing our souls and worrying over what happened in the next world. I have often thought that we wasted a hell of a lot of time talking when we might have been chasing pretty girls.”

  “You did that too,” Freddie remarked in a tired voice. “Try to concentrate on what I am saying, Serle, because it’s important.”

  “To me or to you?” the Marquis asked quickly.

  “To both of us I suppose,” Freddie replied. “I will tell you one thing, our friendship will never be the same if you marry Dilys.”

  “Why not?”

  Freddie did not reply and the Marquis said slowly as if the idea had suddenly percolated into his mind,

  “You are not telling me, you are not saying that you and Dilys – ?”

  “That is not the sort of question you should be asking me,” Freddie interrupted.

  “Then you have!” the Marquis exclaimed. “Good God, I had no idea.”

  “I think you will find yourself in the same uncomfortable position with a large number of your friends,” Freddie said, after a moment as if he was goaded into a reply.

  The Marquis walked across to the window and looked out on the green velvet lawns stretching down to the gleaming lake lying below the house, which was spanned by a stone bridge of perfect architectural proportions.

  His eyes were on the swans moving slowly across the silver water, but Freddie was sure that he was looking with a new perception into the future and seeing a very different picture from the one he had conjured up before.

  There was a long silence before the Marquis said irritably,

  “I cannot think, Freddie, why you should come here and upset me and try to alter the plans I have made for myself.”

  “If I have upset them, then I can only say that I am sincerely glad,” Freddie remarked.

  “Damn you!” the Marquis swore. “There are times when I actively dislike you and this is one of them.”

  He had not turned around as he spoke and Freddie, looking at the squareness of his shoulders silhouetted against the light, smiled a little ruefully.

  He knew that his friendship with the Marquis was far too deep and too vital to both of them to be destroyed by anything.

  At the same time he thought it would be more pleasant if the problem of Dilys had not been raised the very moment after his arrival.

  Again there was silence until, as if the Marquis had suddenly made up his mind, he said in a different tone,

  “Anyway the question of my marriage can be shelved for the moment at least until after tonight.”

  Freddie stiffened.

  “What is happening tonight?” he asked.

  “Well, it was intended as a grand gesture of goodbye to my freedom and all that sort of thing.”

  Freddie looked apprehensive.

  “You have not already proposed to Dilys, have you?”

  “No, not in actual words, but I rather think that she is already wondering whether or not she should wear a white veil at our Wedding.”

  Freddie let out a sound of protest.

  “God Almighty, Serle,” he began, “she would be the laughing-stock – ”

  He stopped.

  “You are roasting me! I might have guessed. Well, let me hear the worst. What have you planned for tonight?”

  “A Midnight Steeplechase,” the Marquis replied.

  “Is that all?” Freddie questioned. “I thought it would be something new and original. I hate your steeplechases. You always win!”

  “This one is going to be different,” the Marquis said, “and what is more the prizes are well worthwhile.”

  “What do you call ‘worthwhile’?”

  “A thousand guineas!”

  “That will cost you nothing. You always come in first.”

  “Five hundred guineas to the second and a hundred for third place.”

  “That gives somebody a sporting chance,” Freddie admitted. “But what is so original about a Midnight Steeplechase? You have had them before. Your last one left my best horse lame for a month.”

  “You should be a better rider,” the Marquis retorted, “and tonight you will have to be.”

  “Why?”

  “I intend introducing certain handicaps.”

  Freddie groaned.

  “I just knew that there was going to be something dangerous about it, in which case I am not going to take part.”

  “Can you really be so chicken-livered?” the Marquis jeered at him.

  “Certainly,” his friend replied. “I consider my life too valuable to throw it away on some schoolboy’s taunt of ‘I ride better than you’. You should grow up, Serle.”

  “I will call you out if you talk to me like that,” the Marquis fumed. “This will be a race for grown-ups, I can assure you.”

  “If you think I am going to ride in my nightshirt with my eyes bandaged or sitting backwards in the saddle you can count me out.” Freddie retorted. “My father always said theat steeplechases were for fools who want to risk their necks and the more foolish of them end up in the churchyard. That is where I have no wish to be at the moment.”

  “Stop being a spoilsport, Freddie,” the Marquis ordered. “Whether you take part or not, there will be at least twenty competitors present because they have already accepted.”

  “So you have been planning this nonsense for a long time?”

  “For the last three days since I decided to get married,” the Marquis replied. “I told myself if I survived the steeplechase, then I could survive marriage. It seemed that there was nothing much to choose between them except that the steeplechase would undoubtedly be more enjoyable.”

  “The truth is that you are seeking danger,” Freddie pointed out. “Now tell me what the conditions are that make this particular Chase unique.”

  “I thought it would be amusing,” the Marquis said slowly, as if he was choosing his words carefully, “if every contestant rode as if he only had one arm and one eye. It’s damned difficult, as it happens, to see with one eye when you are used to using two.”

  “And that means,” Freddie said, “you will find it hard to take your fences and undoubtedly break your neck! It’s too big a gamble. I will be the referee and use two eyes.”

  “Forsett has already agreed to do that,” the Marquis replied. “He disapproves, but at the same time he is completely just and everyone will accept his decision should there be any controversy.”

  Freddie knew this was true where Lord Forsett was concerned.

  He was older than the Marquis and himself and he had been too badly wounded in battle to be able to race his horses or to walk without a stick.

  They all respected him as a brave man and it was true that, whatever decision he made, they would accept.

  “Forsett or no Forsett,” Freddie said, “I can only hope that you have ordered plenty of stretcher-bearers to pick up the casualties and Surgeons to set broken arms and legs, besides grave-diggers to bury those who fall on their heads.”

  “Stop being so gloomy,” the Marquis commanded, “we are going to have the best dinner we have ever had. The wines will be superlative, the finest I have in the cellar. After that the majority of those present will be only too glad to compete for the prizes I am offering.”

  “That I can well believe,” Freddie remarked, “but the more sensible of your friends will undoubtedly have an excuse which will prevent them from accepting your invitation. Who is actually coming?”

  The Marquis gave him a rapid list of names, most of whom he knew well. Then, as he added ‘Sir Charles Lingfield’, Freddie commented,

  “Lingfield? But he is too old.”

  “Not really. I don’t suppose he has reached his fortieth birthday.”

  “Then he is too old,” Freddie protested. “You know as well as I do, Serle, that if the course is the same as we have ridden over on previous occasions the jumps are very steep for men of our age let alone an older man.”

  “I like Lingfield and his house is on my estate. I can hardly leave him out.”

  “If he had any sense he would refuse.”

  “Well, he has accepted, so what do you expect me to do? Say ‘Freddie thinks you are too old, so run home, my dear man, and come another day when things are easier’?”

  “I suppose it’s all right,” Freddie admitted reluctantly. “I have seen Lingfield out hunting, he is a good rider.”

  “Then stop clucking over my guests like a mother hen,” the Marquis ordered him. “Nobody is going to get hurt. If the course is too rough for them, they can always pull off their eyeshade and unstrap their arm. It’s as easy as that.”

  “I hope you are right,” Freddie said disparagingly. “Personally I think it all sounds like an unnecessary risk of life and limb to make a Roman holiday.”

  “Is that what you consider I am doing?”

  “Of course you are. You are bringing in the sacrificial animals and a few Christians to amuse yourself and personally I think it is all quite unnecessary.”

  The Marquis poured himself out another glass of champagne.

  “What I would really like at the moment,” he said, “is to have a call from the Duke of Wellington to say that he needs us both. I would like to shake the creases out of my uniform and ride off with you to the nearest Barracks, knowing that there was an adventure ahead and that we would both be far too excited to suffer even one moment of boredom.”

  “I know what you mean,” Freddie replied after a moment. “Equally I think we have to face the fact that we have to come to terms with a world without war. Personally I am quite content as I am, I can find many amusements in London. I am looking forward both to the shooting and hunting in the autumn.”

  “One small fox,” the Marquis murmured disparagingly.

  “Did you really enjoy killing Frenchmen?” Freddie enquired.

  There was a moment’s pause before the Marquis replied,

  “No, it was the chase that I liked. It was exhilarating, but I never wanted to think of the result of the objective.”

  “That is what I felt too,” Freddie nodded. “I could not help remembering a great deal of the time that the French were men like us, ordinary men with a life to live and perhaps, and this I could not bear to think about, a wife and children waiting for them somewhere far away in France.”

  “Are you insinuating that there is something wrong with me,” the Marquis asked, “because I want to go on fighting?”

  “No, I don’t think it is that you want to go on fighting,” Freddie replied. “It’s the excitement and the danger you enjoy and that is a very different thing.”

  The Marquis smiled triumphantly.

  “That is exactly what I am giving you tonight.”

  “Oh, to hell with you!” Freddie complained irritably. “You always beat me in an argument. All right, you win. I will ride in your blasted steeplechase and I only hope that tomorrow my head is still on my body and you are not weeping beside my coffin.”

  “I think it very unlikely that I shall be doing so,” the Marquis said, “and, although it has been a hard battle to get you to participate in my race, all I can say is that I should have been very disappointed if you had really been adamant about not taking part.”

  *

  The butler had glanced twice at the dock on the mantelpiece before the door opened and Freddie came slowly and a trifle unsteadily into the breakfast room.

  As he reached the table, a footman hurried to pull out a chair for him and another placed a white linen napkin on his knees, while a third went to the sideboard where a large array of crested silver dishes reposed on tripods, beneath which burned oil soaked wicks to keep them warm.

  However, before the dishes could be carried to Freddie’s side for his inspection, he merely grunted in a hoarse voice which seemed somehow to be constricted in his throat,

  “Brandy! What I need is brandy.”

  “Of course, sir.”

  The butler made a gesture with his hand and the silver dishes were put back over the burning wicks as a footman hurried forward with a cut glass decanter and poured brandy into a glass at Freddie’s side.

  Before he could raise the glass to his lips the door opened and the Marquis walked in.

  “Good morning, Freddie,” he began and, as his friend did not answer, he added, “you look somewhat the worse for wear.”

  Freddie merely groaned as the Marquis went to the sideboard where the footman raised the lids of the silver dishes so that he could inspect what was inside.

  “I will have a lamb chop,” he decided finally and sat down at the table.

  There was a smile on his lips as he looked at Freddie’s pale face and the way that his elbow was now on the table and his forehead was resting on his hand.

  He waited until a lamb chop had been placed in front of him and the butler had poured him a cup of coffee before he said,

  “The trouble with you, Freddie, is that you mix your drinks. I noticed last night that you drank a considerable amount of port, while I followed the champagne with a very little brandy. It’s always wisest to keep off red wines when one is riding.”

  Whatever he had drunk it certainly did not seem to have affected the Marquis’s good looks and the exercise of the night did not seem to have in any way diminished his usual vitality.

  “It’s not only what I drank,” Freddie said after a moment. “It is that I am damned stiff and my arm feels almost paralysed through having been strapped down for so long.”

  “You must have let them tie it too tightly,” the Marquis remarked without much feeling. “As a matter of fact, Freddie I thought you rode exceedingly well. It was just bad luck that Lingfield pipped you for second place. But at least you have come away with a hundred guineas to your credit.”

  “I would gladly pay more – not to feel as I do now,” Freddie responded.

  The Marquis laughed.

  “You will soon be better. Have something to eat. There is nothing worse than alcohol on an empty stomach.”

  “Leave me alone,” Freddie countered. “I know what is best for me.”

  “Very well,” the Marquis answered. “Be it on your own head, but quite frankly I thought last night was a tremendous success. The dinner was excellent, you must admit that.”

  Freddie murmured something which was inaudible and the Marquis continued,

  “You cannot deny that it was a triumph that only three riders failed to complete the course and not because they hurt themselves either. Bingham’s horse went lame and so did Henderson’s. Ironside fell at the water jump which was not surprising. I have never thought much of his horses, although he boasts a great deal about them.”

  Freddie took another sip of brandy and then he said,

  “You are right, Serle, it’s my own fault. I feel as if my head is going to crack open. I should not have drunk the port and certainly not the claret when we came back here.”

  “You will live and learn,” the Marquis said. “I suppose it has never struck you that the reason why I win my own steeplechases is that I am a damned sight more abstemious than the rest of the riders.”

  There was a somewhat wry smile on Freddie’s face as he said,

  “So to make sure of your success you tempt your guests like a Siren with all the delicacies which you feel they will not be able to refuse.”

  “That is in fact the first fence,” the Marquis replied.

  Freddie laughed as if he could not help himself.

  “Really, Serle, you are incorrigible! I suppose I should accuse you of cheating.”

  “It’s not cheating,” the Marquis replied. “It’s just using my brains and taking advantage of another fellow’s stupidity. You know I never drink much when I am going hunting nor did I before a battle.”

  “That is true now I come to think of it,” Freddie admitted. “You were always in the prime of condition while a great number of fellows poured that filthy wine which was the best we could get down their throats. I think really they were giving themselves ‘Dutch courage’.”

  “Exactly,” the Marquis agreed.

  He finished his coffee and the butler hurried to his side with the silver coffee pot.