Aunt Anne, Vol. 2 (of 2)

Portsea Place, Connaught Square, is composed of very small houses, most of which are let out in apartments. It was to one of these that Mrs. Baines drove on her arrival in town. Her two canvas-covered boxes, carefully corded, were on the top of the cab, her many small packages piled up inside. Mr. Wimple was not with her. He had left her at Waterloo, but it had been arranged that he was to see her later on in Portsea Place, and that if she failed to take rooms there, she was to leave a message where she was to be found.

“Well, Mrs. Hooper,” she said to the landlady, smilingly, but with the condescending air of a patroness, “you see I have not forgotten you, and if your rooms are still at liberty I should like to inspect them again.”

“Yes, ma’am, certainly they are at liberty,” said Mrs. Hooper, who felt convinced that, in spite of the shabby cloak with the clasp, the spare old lady must be some grand personage in disguise. “I shall be only too glad if they please you.”

Mrs. Baines inspected them carefully, two little rooms on the drawing-room floor, a bedroom and a sitting-room. She looked at the pictures, she winked at herself in the looking-glass, she gently shook the side-table to see if it was rickety. She tried the springs of the easy-chair, and the softness of the sofa cushions. She asked if the chimney had been properly swept, and whether there was a draught from the windows.

“I think a guinea a week is an ample rent, Mrs. Hooper, considering that it is not the season,” she said. “However, I will take the rooms for a week.”

“I don’t usually let them for so short a time,” the landlady began meekly.

“I might not require them for longer,” answered Mrs. Baines distantly, “but I can make them suit my purpose for a week.”

“Very well, ma’am,” and Mrs. Hooper gave way, overawed by Aunt Anne’s unflinching manner. “Would you like a fire lighted?”

“Certainly, and at once; but first will you be good enough to have the luggage carried in? And tell the cabman to wait; he can drive me to Portman Square. There will be a gentleman here to dinner to-night.”

“I didn’t think you would want late dinner, ma’am; ladies so often have tea and something with it—and company the first night——” but the landlady stopped with a little dismay in her voice, for Mrs. Baines looked displeased.

“I am accustomed to dining late,” she said haughtily, feeling acutely the superiority of her own class, “and I have frequent visitors. Cabman, will you put those boxes into the bedroom?—and be careful not to knock the walls. They are so often careless,” she said, with a smile to the landlady that completely subjugated her, “and it is so very annoying to have one’s place injured.”

“Yes, ma’am, it is,” Mrs. Hooper replied gratefully. “If you will give your orders we will get in what you want for this evening while you are gone to Portman Square.” The address had evidently impressed her.

“I must consider for a moment,” and Aunt Anne sat down and was silent. Then she ordered a little dinner that she thought would be after the heart of Mr. Wimple, and gave many domestic directions; and with “I trust to you to make everything exceedingly comfortable, Mrs. Hooper,” departed in a four-wheeled cab.

Sir William Rammage lived in a big house in Portman Square. The windows looked dull, the blinds dingy, the door-step deserted. Half the square seemed to hear the knock which Mrs. Baines gave at the double door. A servant in an old-fashioned black suit appeared with an air of surprise.

“Is Sir William Rammage at home?” Mrs. Baines asked. The man looked her swiftly up and down.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I wish to see him,” she said, and walked into the wide stone hall, before the servant could prevent her.

“It’s quite impossible, ma’am,” he said firmly; “Sir William keeps his room, and is too ill to see any one.”

“You will be good enough to take him my card,” Mrs. Baines said. “If he is able to do so, you will find that he will see me.”

“I’ll take it to Mr. Boughton, ma’am,” said the man hesitatingly, for he was overcome by the visitor’s imperious manner; “he has been with Sir William just now, and will know if it is possible for any one to see him.”

“Who is Mr. Boughton?” she asked, almost contemptuously.

“He is Sir William’s solicitor.”

“Very well, that will do,” said Mrs. Baines, and she was shown into a large empty dining-room, that looked as grim and gloomy as the outside of the house had promised that all should be within. In a few minutes he returned.

“Mr. Boughton will be with you directly, ma’am,” he said respectfully.

In five minutes’ time there appeared a little dried-up man, bald and shrewd-looking, but with a kindly expression in his pinky face.

“Mr. Boughton,” Mrs. Baines said, “I am most glad to make your acquaintance;” and she shook hands. “Is it possible to see Sir William Rammage? He is my cousin, and we have known each other since we were children together.”

“Quite impossible, my dear madam, quite impossible,” the lawyer answered briskly.

“Is he very ill?”

“Very seriously ill.”

“Dear William,” the old lady said tearfully, “I feared it was so. I knew him too well to suppose that he would leave my letters unanswered had it been otherwise.”

“If it is any business matter, madam, I am his confidential lawyer, and have been for thirty years.”

“Mr. Boughton, I am Sir William’s own first cousin; our mothers were sisters,” Mrs. Baines said with deep emotion.

“Dear me, dear me,” answered the lawyer thoughtfully.

“When we were children we were rocked in the same cradle.”

“Most touching, I am sure;” and still he appeared to be turning something over in his mind.

“I know that he has a sincere affection for me, but of late years he has been so frequently indisposed that he has not been able to show it as he wished.”

“Frequently the case, my dear lady, frequently the case,” Mr. Boughton said soothingly. “May I ask you to tell me what other members of his family survive? I am a little uncertain in the matter.”

“Mr. Boughton, I am his mother’s sister’s child, and the nearest relation he has in the world. The others have been dead and gone these many years. There may be some distant cousins left, but we have never recognized them.”

“I understand,” he said; “most interesting. And you wish to see him on family business, I presume?”

“I did.”