Castle Orchard by E A Dineley Read Free Book Online

door ajar, sat down at the desk and waited.
    ‘The note must go to Major Longbourne at the Officers’ Mess. Dan can take it. I promised I would dine there.’
    ‘Don’t fret, for Gawd’s sake. What shall I say?’
    ‘It is with the . . . deepest regret Captain Allington . . . is no longer in a position to accept . . . the invitation from the officers of the regiment . . . on this day, whatever the day is . . . yes, but we know the day, Nat . . . owing to indisposition . . . Can you write all that? I had better sign it.’
    The familiar searing pain on the left side of his head prevented him from considering what Pride might have made of the task, and he concluded by vomiting into the bowl.
    Pride threw down the pen, jumped up, took a damp cloth from the washstand and wiped his master’s face. He said, ‘You ain’t signing nothing.’ He returned to the desk and picked up his note. On it he had written:
     
    My master, Captain Allington that is, aren’t well.
    It’s his head, which is something when it is bad and comes on sudden. Pride wrote this.
    He folded it carefully.
    Allington said, ‘Have you written it all down?’
    ‘Yes, I’ve done it perfect. When Dan comes round with the mare I’ll give it to him. Meantime I’ll get the ice, somehow or other. Don’t you move or you’ll bring your stomach up all over again.’
    Pride rapidly disappeared down the stairs. When Allington was ill the servant was aware of his responsibilities: he became brisk and authoritative and not in the least tempted by the gin shops.
    He saw a groom, a man even smaller than himself, leading a long-tailed grey mare up the street and called out, ‘Oh Dan, Captain’s bad as could be.’
    Pride took little account of Dan’s deafness and addressed him as though he had no impediment, but at the same time he held his head and covered his eyes, next pointing up to Allington’s window.
    ‘Take this note. It has to go to Major Longbourne. You know where it has to go. You know the barracks.’
    Dan was watching Pride all the time and wishing he did not gabble. He could, to a certain extent, lip-read and he knew where Allington had meant to go. He took the stub of a pencil from his pocket and drew on the outside of the letter, three soldiers. He leaned on the saddle to do it and the three soldiers marched, their guns on their shoulders and their tall shakos on their heads.
    ‘Yes, yes, the Officers’ Mess, the barracks. They are all a-celebrating, though God knows what, except they ain’t dead and thousands were. I must get some ice and make a cold flannel.’
    Dan put the letter in his pocket, got on the grey mare and rode away.
     
    Sir John Parkes had a house in Albemarle Street where he adorned himself in his ridiculous clothes, his wide-striped pantaloons, his drawn-in waists, his puffed-up sleeves and his elaborate gold-topped canes. Now he sat at his bureau wearing a silk chintz dressing gown in green and blue, and Turkish slippers.
    It was several days since he and Arthur had dined together but now Arthur was sitting behind him waiting patiently for something to occur. Finding nothing did, he said, ‘To go or not to go, that is the question.’
    ‘To Almack’s?’
    ‘Of course. It is Wednesday. Where else should we go? We must be seen at Almack’s.’
    ‘To eat a little dry cake and a stale sandwich?’
    ‘To admire the lights and the music.’
    ‘To imbibe some barely intoxicating liquor?’
    ‘Oh well, what could it matter? I always go.’
    ‘And to dance a quadrille with some bashful child, her governess not yet expelled from her mind? Indeed, the said governess is such a ghostly presence you almost think you see her ready to dictate “In a cowslip’s bell I lie” and peering mistrustfully over your shoulder. No, I am not in the mood for Almack’s. Look here, Arthur, I wrote a letter to Allington and have received no reply. It makes me devilish anxious.’
    ‘If it’s Allington on your mind, let us go to