_ CHAPTER IV. PERCY'S FIRST ADVENTURE AS A FREE AGENT
It was a fine, picturesque outline of road on which the young outcast found himself journeying, whither he neither knew nor cared. His heart was full of enterprise and the unfledged valour of inexperience. He had proceeded several miles, and the dusk of the evening was setting in, when he observed a stage-coach crawling heavily up a hill, a little ahead of him, and a tall, well-shaped man, walking alongside of it, and gesticulating somewhat violently. Godolphin remarked him with some curiosity; and the man, turning abruptly round, perceived, and in his turn noticed very inquisitively, the person and aspect of the young traveller.
"And how now?" said he, presently, and in an agreeable, though familiar and unceremonious tone of voice; "whither are you bound this time of day?"
"It is no business of yours, friend," said the boy with the proud petulance of his age; "mind what belongs to yourself."
"You are sharp on me, young sir," returned the other; "but it is our business to be loquacious. Know, sir,"--and the stranger frowned--"that we have ordered many a taller fellow than yourself to execution for a much smaller insolence than you seem capable of."
A laugh from the coach caused Godolphin to lift up his eyes, and he saw the door of the vehicle half-open, as if for coolness, and an arch female face looking down on him.
"You are merry on me, I see," said Percy; "come out, and I'll be even with you, pretty one."
The lady laughed yet more loudly at the premature gallantry of the traveller; but the man, without heeding her, and laying his hand on Percy's shoulder, said--
"Pray, sir, do you live at B----?" naming the town they were now approaching.
"Not I," said Godolphin, freeing himself from the intrusion.
"You will, perhaps, sleep there?"
"Perhaps I shall."
"You are too young to travel alone."
"And you are too old to make such impertinent remarks," retorted Godolphin, reddening with anger.
"Faith, I like this spirit, my Hotspur," said the stranger, coolly. "If you are really going to put up for the night at B----, suppose we sup together?"
"And who and what are you?" asked Percy, bluntly.
"Anything and everything! in other words, an actor!"
"And the young lady----?'
"Is our prima donna. In fact, except the driver, the coach holds none but the ladies and gentlemen of our company. We have made an excellent harvest at A----, and we are now on our way to the theatre at B----; pretty theatre it is, too, and has been known to hold seventy-one pounds eight shillings." Here the actor fell into a reverie; and Percy, moving nearer to the coach-door, glanced at the damsel, who returned the look with a laugh which, though coquettish, was too low and musical to be called cold.
"So that gentleman, so free and easy in his manners, is not your husband?"
"Heaven forbid! Do you think I should be so gay if he were? But, pooh! what can you know of married life? No!" she continued, with a pretty air of mock dignity; "I am the Belvidera, the Calista, of the company; above all control, all husbanding, and reaping thirty-three shillings a week."
"But are you above lovers as well as husbands?" asked Percy with a rakish air, borrowed from Saville.
"Bless the boy! No: but then my lovers must be at least as tall, and at least as rich, and, I am afraid, at least as old, as myself."
"Don't frighten yourself, my dear," returned Percy; "I was not about to make love to you."
"Were you not? Yes, you were, and you know it. But why will you not sup with us?"
"Why not, indeed?" thought Percy, as the idea, thus more enticingly put than it was at first, pressed upon him. "If _you_ ask me," he said, "I will."
"I _do_ ask you, then," said the actress; and here the hero of the company turned abruptly round with a theatrical start, and exclaimed, "To sup or not to sup? that is the question."
"To sup, sir," said Godolphin.
"Very well! I am glad to hear it. Had you not better mount and rest yourself in the coach? You can take my place--I am studying a new part. We have two miles farther to B---- yet."
Percy accepted the invitation, and was soon by the side of the pretty actress. The horses broke into a slow trot, and thus delighted with his adventure, the son of the ascetic Godolphin, the pupil of the courtly Saville, entered the town of B----, and commenced his first independent campaign in the great world. _