The door was not opened immediately, and he repeated his summons still louder. Scarcely had the rope quitted his hand, however, when a heavy bolt was drawn back, the door was thrown wide, and a tall athletic man, in shirt and trousers, stood before him.
“Well, stranger, you arn’t much distressed with patience, that’s a fact,” said a strongly nasal accent, while the speaker gave a look of very fierce defiance at the visitor.
“Am I speaking to Colonel Quackinboss?” asked O’Shea, in some surprise.
“Well, sir, if it ain’t him, it’s some one in his skin, I’m thinkin’.”
“My visit was to Mr. Layton,” said the other, stiffly. “Is he at home?”
“Yes, sir; but he ‘s not a-goin’ to see you.”
“I came here by his appointment.”
“That don’t change matters a red cent, stranger; and as I said a’ready, he ain’t a-goin’ to see you.”
“Oh, then I ‘m to understand that he has placed himself in your hands? You assume to act for him?” said O’Shea, stiffly.
“Well, if you like to take it from that platform, I ‘ll offer no objection,” said Quackinboss, gravely.
“Am I, or am I not, to regard you as a friend on this occasion?” said O’Shea, authoritatively.
“I ‘ll tell you a secret, stranger; you ‘ll not be your own friend if you don’t speak to me in another tone of voice. I ain’t used to be halloaed at, I ain’t.”
“One thing at a time, sir,” said O’Shea. “When I have finished the business which brought me here, I shall be perfectly at your service.”
“Now I call that talkin’ reasonable. Step inside, sir, and take a seat,” said Quackinboss, whose manner was now as calm as possible.
Whatever irritation O’Shea really felt, he contrived to subdue it in appearance, as he followed the other into the room.
O’Shea was not so deficient in tact that he could not see his best mode of dealing with the American was to proceed with every courtesy and deference, and so, as he seated himself opposite him, he mentioned the reason of his coming there without anything like temper, and stated that from a slight altercation such a difference arose as required either an explanation or a meeting.
“He can’t go a-shooting with you, stranger; he ‘s struck down this morning,” said Quackinboss, gravely, as the other finished.
“Do you mean he ‘s ill?”
“I s’pose I do, when I said he was down, sir.”
“This is most unfortunate,” broke in O’Shea. “My duties as a public man require my being in England next week. I hoped to have settled this little matter before my departure. I see nothing for it but to beg you will in writing – a few lines will suffice – corroborate the fact of my having presented myself here, according to appointment, and mention the sad circumstances by which our intentions, for I believe I may speak of Mr. Layton’s as my own, have been frustrated.”
“Well, now, stranger, we are speakin’ in confidence here, and I may just as well observe to you that of all the weapons that fit a man’s hands, the pen is the one I ‘m least ready with. I ‘m indifferent good with firearms or a bowie, but a pen, you see, cuts the fingers that hold it just as often as it hurts the enemy, and I don’t like it.”
“But surely, where the object is merely to testify to a plain matter-of-fact – ”
“There ain’t no such things on the ‘arth as plain matters of fact, sir,” broke in Quackinboss, eagerly. “I’ve come to the middle period of life, and I never met one of ‘em!”
O’Shea made a slight, very slight movement of impatience at these words; but the other remarked it, and said, —
“We ‘ll come to that presently, sir. Let us just post up this account of Mr. Layton’s, first of all.”
“I don’t think there is anything further to detain me here,” said O’Shea, rising with an air of stiff politeness.
“Won’t you take something, sir, – won’t you liquor?” asked Quackinboss, calmly.
“Excuse me; I never do of a morning.”
“I ‘m sorry for it. I was a-thinkin’, maybe you ‘d warm up a bit with a glass of something strong. I was hopin’ it’s the cold of the day chilled you!”
“Do you mean this for insult, sir?” said O’Shea. “I ask you, because, really, your use of the English language is of a kind to warrant the question.”
“That ‘s where I wanted to see you, sir. You ‘re coming up to a good boilin’-point now, stranger,” said Quackinboss, with a pleased look.
“Is he mad, is he deranged?” muttered O’Shea, half aloud.
“No, sir. We Western men are little liable to insanity; our lives are too much abroad and open-air lives for that. It’s your thoughtful, reflective, deep men, as wears a rut in their mind with thinkin’; them ‘s the fellows goes mad.”
O’Shea’s stare of astonishment at this speech scarcely seemed to convey a concurrence in the assertion, and he made a step towards the door.
“If you’re a-goin’, I’ve nothing more to say, sir,” said Quackinboss.
“I cannot see what there is to detain me here!” said the other, sternly.
“There ain’t much, that’s a fact,” was the cool reply. “There’s nothing remarkable in them bottles; it’s new brandy and British gin; and as for myself, sir, I can only say I must give you a bill payable at sight, – whenever we may meet again, I mean; for just now this young man here can’t spare me. I ‘m his nurse, you see. I hope you understand me?”
“I believe I do.”
“Well, that’s all right, stranger, and here’s my hand on ‘t.” And even before O’Shea was well aware, the other had taken his hand in his strong grasp and was shaking it heartily. O’Shea found it very hard not to laugh outright, but there was a meaning-like determination in the American’s manner that showed it was no moment for mirth.
It was, however, necessary to say something to relieve a very awkward pause, and so he observed, —
“I hope Mr. Layton’s illness is not a serious one. I saw him, as I thought, perfectly well two days back.”
“He’s main bad, sir; very sick, – very sick, indeed.”
“You have a doctor, I suppose?”
“No, sir. I have some experience myself, and I ‘m just a-treatin’ him by what I picked up among people that have very few apothecaries, – the Mandan Indians.”
“Without being particular, I must own I ‘d prefer a more civilized course of physic,” said O’Shea, with a faint smile.
“Very likely, stranger; and if you had a dispute, you ‘d rather, mayhap, throw it into a law court, and leave it to three noisy fellows to quarrel over; while I’d look out for two plain fellows, with horny hands and honest hearts, and say, ‘What’s the rights o’ this, gentlemen?’”
“I wish you every success, I’m sure,” said O’Shea, bowing.
“The same to you, sir,” said the other, in a sing-song tone. “Good-bye.”
When O’Shea had reached the first landing, he stopped, and, leaning against the wall, laughed heartily. “I hope I ‘ll be able to remember all he said,” muttered he, as he fancied himself amusing some choice company by a personation of the Yankee. “The whole thing was as good as a play! But,” added he, after a pause, “I ‘m not sorry it’s over, and that I have done with him!” Very true and heartfelt was this last reflection of the Member for Inch, – a far more honest recognition than even the hearty laugh he had just enjoyed, – and then there came an uneasy afterthought, that asked, “What could he mean by talking of a long bill, payable at some future opportunity? Surely he can’t imagine that we ‘re to renew all this if we ever meet again. No, no, Colonel, your manners and your medicine may be learned amongst the Mandans, but they won’t do here with us!” And so he issued into the street, not quite reassured, but somewhat more comforted.
So occupied was his mind with the late scene, that he had walked fully half-way back to his inn ere he bestowed a thought upon Joe. Wise men were they who suggested that the sentence of a prisoner should not immediately follow the conclusion of his trial, but ensue after the interval of some two or three days. In the impulse of a mind fully charged with a long narrative of guilt there is a force that seeks its expansion in severity; whereas, in the brief respite of even some hours, there come doubts and hesitations and regrets and palliations. In a word, a variety of considerations unadmitted before find entrance now to the mind, and are suffered to influence it.
Now, though Mr. O’ Shea’s first and not very unnatural impulse was to give Joe a sound thrashing and then discharge him, the interval we have just described moderated considerably the severity of this resolve. In the first place, although the reader may be astonished at the assertion, Joe was one very difficult to replace, since, independently of his aptitude to serve as groom, valet, or cook, he was deeply versed in all the personal belongings of his master. He had been with him through long years of difficulty, and aided him in various ways, from corrupting the virtuous freeholders of Inchabogue to raising an occasional supply on the rose-amethyst ring. Joe had fought for him and lied for him, with a zealous devotion not to be forgotten. Not, indeed, that he loved his master more, but that he liked the world less, and Joe found a sincere amount of pleasure in seeing how triumphantly their miserable pretensions swayed and dominated over mankind. And, lastly, he had another attribute, not to be undervalued in an age like ours, – he had no wages! It is not to be understood that he served O’Shea out of some sense of heroic devotion or attachment: no; Joe lived, as they say in India, on “loot”. When times were prosperous, – that is, when billiards and blind-hookey smiled, and to his master’s pockets came home small Californias of half-crowns and even sovereigns, – Joe prospered also. He drank boldly and freely from the cup when brimful, but the half-empty goblet he only sipped at. When seasons of pressure set in, Joe’s existence was maintained by some inscrutable secret of his own; for, be it known that on O’Shea’s arrival at an hotel, his almost first care was to announce, “You will observe my servant is on board wages; he pays for himself;” and Joe would corroborate the myth with a bow. Bethink yourself, good reader, had you been the Member for Inch, it might have been a question whether to separate from such a follower.
By the fluctuations of O’Shea’s fortunes, Joe’s whole conduct seemed moulded. When the world went well with his master, his manner grew somewhat almost respectful; let the times grow worse, Joe became indifferent; a shade lower, and he was familiar and insolent; and, by long habit, O’Shea had come to recognize these changes as part of the condition of a varying fortune.
Little wonder was it that Joe grew to speak of his master and himself as one, complaining, as he would, “We never got sixpence out of our property. ‘T is the ruin of us paying that annuity to our mother;” and so on.
Now, these considerations, and many others like them, weighed deeply on O’Shea’s mind, as he entered the room of the hotel, angry and irritated, doubtless, but far from decided as to how he should manifest it. Indeed, the deliberation was cut short, for there stood Joe before him.
“I thought I was never to see your face again,” said O’Shea, scowling at him. “How dare you have the insolence to appear before me?”
“Is n’t it well for you that I ‘m alive? Ain’t you lucky that you ‘re not answering for my death this minute?” said the other, boldly. “And if I did n’t drive like blazes, would I be here now? Appear before you, indeed! I’d like to know who you ‘d be appearin’ before, if I was murthered with them bitthers you gave me?”
“Lying scoundrel! you think to turn it all off in this manner. You commit a theft first, and if the offence had killed you, it’s no more than you deserved. Who told you to steal the contents of that bag, sir?”
“The devil, I suppose, for I never felt pain like it, – twistin’ and tearin’ and torturin’ me as if you had a pinchers in my inside, and were nippin’ me to pieces!”
“I ‘m glad of it, – heartily glad of it.”
“I know you are, – I know you well. ‘T is a corpse you ‘d like to see me this minute.”
“So that I never set eyes on you, I don’t care what becomes of you.”
“That ‘s enough, – enough said. I ‘m goin’.”
“Go, and be – !”
“No, I won’t. I ‘ll go and earn my livin’; and I ‘ll have my carakter, too, – eleven years last Lady-day; and I ‘ll be paid back to my own counthry; and I’ll have my wages up to Saturday next; and the docther’s bill, here, for all the stuff I tuk since I came in; and when you are ready with all this, you can ring for me.” And with his hands clasped over his stomach, and in a half-bent position, Joe shuffled out and left his master to his own reflections.
The world is full of its strange vicissitudes, and in nothing more remarkably than the way people are reconciled, ignore the past, and start afresh in life to incur more disagreements, and set to bickering again. Great kings and kaisers indulge in this pastime; profound statesmen and politicians do very little else. What wonder, then, if the declining sun saw the smart tandem slipping along towards the Bagni, with the O’Shea and his man sitting side by side in pleasant converse! They were both smoking, and seemed like men who enjoyed their picturesque drive, and the inspiriting pace they travelled at.
“When I ‘ll singe these ‘cat hairs’ off, and trim him a little about the head, he ‘ll look twice as well,” said Joe, with his eye on the leader. “It’s a pity to see a collar on him.”
“We ‘ll take him down to Rome, and show him off over the hurdles,” said his master, joyfully.
“I was just thinkin’ of that this minute; wasn’t that strange now?”
“We ‘ll have to go, for they ‘re going to break up house here, and go off to Rome for the winter.”
“How will we settle with Pan?” said Joe, thoughtfully.
“A bill, I suppose.”
Joe shook his head doubtingly. “I ‘m afraid not.”
“Go I will, and go I must,” said O’Shea, resolutely. “I ‘m not going to lose the best chance I ever had in life for the sake of a beggarly innkeeper.”
“Why would you? Sure, no one would ask you! For, after all, ‘t is only drivin’ away, if we ‘re put to it I don’t think he ‘d overtake us.”
“Not if we went the same pace you did this morning, Joe,” said O’Shea, laughing; and Joe joined pleasantly in the laugh, and the event ceased to be a grievance from that instant.
CHAPTER XVIII. MRS. MORRIS AS COUNSELLOR
The breakfast at the Villa Caprini always seemed to recall more of English daily life and habit than any other event of the day. It was not only in the luxuriously spread table, and the sideboard arrayed with that picturesque profusion so redolent of home, but there was that gay and hearty familiarity so eminently the temper of the hour, and that pleasant interchange of news and gossip, as each tore the envelope of his letter, or caught some amusing paragraph in his paper.
Mrs. Penthony Morris had a very wide correspondence, and usually contributed little scraps of intelligence from various parts of the Continent. They were generally the doings and sayings of that cognate world whose names require no introduction, and even those to whom they are unfamiliar would rather hear in silence than own to the ignorance. The derelicts of fashion are the staple of small-talk; they are suggestive of all the little social smartness one hears, and of that very Brummagem morality which assumes to judge them. In these Mrs. Morris revelled. No paragraph of the “Morning Post” was too mysteriously worded for her powers of interpretation; no asterisks could veil a name from her piercing gaze. Besides, she had fashioned a sort of algebraic code of life which wonderfully assisted her divination, and being given an unhappy marriage, she could foretell the separation, or, with the data of a certain old gentleman’s visits to St. John’s Wood, could predict his will with an accuracy that seemed marvellous. As she sat, surrounded with letters and notes of all sizes, she varied the tone of her intelligence so artfully as to canvass the suffrage of every listener. Now it was some piece of court gossip, some “scandal of Queen Elizabeth,” now a curious political intrigue, and now, again, some dashing exploit of a young soldier in India. But whether it told of good or evil fortune, of some deeply interesting event or some passing triviality, her power of narrating it was considerable, as, with a tact all her own, she selected some one especial individual as chief listener. After a number of short notices of London, Rome, and Paris, she tossed over several letters carelessly, saying, —
“I believe I have given you the cream of my correspondence. Stay, here is something about your old sloop the ‘Mosquito,’ Lord Agincourt; would you like to hear of how she attacked the forts at the mouth of the – oh, how shall I attack it? – the Bhageebhahoo? This is a midshipman’s letter, written the same evening of the action.”
Though the question was addressed very pointedly, the boy never heard it, but sat deeply engaged in deciphering a very jagged handwriting in a letter before him. It was one of those scratchy, unfinished specimens of penmanship which are amongst the luxuries persons of condition occasionally indulge in. Seeing his preoccupation, Mrs. Morris did not repeat her question, but suffered him to pursue his researches undisturbed. He had just begun his breakfast when the letter arrived, and now he ceased to eat anything, but seemed entirely engrossed by his news. At last he arose abruptly, and left the room.
“I hope Agincourt has not got any bad tidings,” said Sir William; “he seems agitated and uneasy.”
“I saw his guardian’s name – Sommerville – on the envelope,” said Mrs. Morris. “It is, probably, one of those pleasant epistles which wards receive quarterly to remind them that even minors have miseries.”
The meal did not recover its pleasant tone after this little incident, and soon after they all scattered through the house and the grounds, Mrs. Morris setting out for her usual woodland walk, which she took each morning. A half-glance the boy had given her as he quitted the room at breakfast-time, induced her to believe that he wanted to consult her about his letter, and so, as she entered the shrubbery, she was not surprised to find Lord Agincourt there before her.
“I was just wishing it might be your footstep I heard on the gravel,” said he, joining her. “May I keep you company?”
“To be sure, provided you don’t make love to me, which I never permit in the forenoon.”
“Oh, I have other thoughts in my head,” said he, sighing drearily; “and you are the very one to advise me what to do. Not, indeed, that I have any choice about that, only how to do it, that’s the question.”
“When one has the road marked out, it’s never very hard to decide on the mode of the journey,” said she. “Tell me what your troubles are.”
“Troubles you may well call them,” said he, with a deeper sigh. “There, read that – if you can read it – for the old Earl does not grow more legible by being older.”
“‘Crews Court,’” read she, aloud. “Handsome old abbey it must be,” added she, remarking on a little tinted sketch at the top of the letter.
“Yes, that’s a place of mine. I was born there,” said the boy, half proudly.
“It’s quite princely.”
“It’s a fine old thing, and I ‘d give it all this minute not to have had that disagreeable letter.”
“‘My dear Henry,’” began she, in a low, muttering voice, “‘I have heard with – with’ – not abomination – oh no, ‘astonishment – with astonishment, not unmixed with’ – it can’t be straw – is it straw? – no, it is ‘shame, – not unmixed with shame, that you have so far forgiven – forgotten’ – oh, that’s it – ‘what was done to yourself.’”
“No, ‘what was due to yourself,’” interrupted he; “that’s a favorite word of his, and so I know it.”
“‘To become the – the’ – dear me, what can this be with the vigorous G at the beginning? – ‘to become’ – is it really the Giant? – ‘to become the Giant’ – ”
The boy here burst into a fit of laughing, and, taking the letter from her, proceeded to read it out.
“I have spelt it all over five times,” said he, “and I know it by heart. ‘I have heard with astonishment, not unmixed with shame, that you have so far forgotten what was due to yourself as to become the Guest of one who for so many years was the political opponent and even personal enemy of our house. Your ignorance of family history cannot possibly be such as that you are unaware of the claims once put forward by this same Sir William Heathcote to your father’s peerage, or of the disgraceful law proceedings instituted to establish his pretensions.’ As if I ever heard a word of all this before! as if I knew or cared a brass button about the matter!” burst he in. “‘Had your tutor’ – here comes in my poor coach for his turn,” said Agincourt – “‘had your tutor but bestowed proper attention to the instructions written by my own hand for his guidance. – We never could read them; we have been at them for hours together, and all we could make out was, ‘Let him study hazard, roulette, and all other such games;’ which rather surprised us, till we found out it was ‘shun,’ and not ‘study,’ and ‘only frequent the fast society of each city he visits,’ which was a mistake for ‘first.’”
“Certainly the noble Lord has a most ambiguous calligraphy,” said she, smiling; “and Mr. Layton is not so culpable as might be imagined.”
“Ah!” cried the boy, laughing, “I wish you had seen Alfred’s face on the day he received our first quarter’s remittance, and read out: ‘You may drag on me like a mouse, if you please,’ which was intended to be, ‘draw upon me to a like amount, if you please;’ and it was three weeks before we could make that out! But let me go on – where was I? Oh, at ‘guidance.’ ‘Recent information has, however, shown me that nothing could have been more unfortunate than our choice of this young man, his father being one of the most dangerous individuals known to the police, a man familiar with the lowest haunts of crime, a notorious swindler, and a libeller by profession. In the letter which I send off by this day’s post to your tutor I have enclosed one from his father to myself. It is not very likely that he will show it to you, as it contains the most insolent demands for an increase of salary – “as some slight, though inadequate, compensation for an office unbecoming my son’s rank, insulting to his abilities, and even damaging to his acquirements.” I give you this in his own choice language, but there is much more in the same strain. The man, it would appear, has just come out of a lunatic asylum, to which place his intemperate habits had brought him; and I may mention that his first act of gratitude to the benevolent individual who had undertaken the whole cost of his maintenance there was to assault him in the open street, and give him a most savage beating. Captain Hone or Holmes – a distinguished officer, as I am told – is still confined to his room from the consequences.’”
“How very dreadful!” said Mrs. Morris calmly. “Shocking treatment! for a distinguished officer too!”
“Dreadful fellow he must be,” said the boy. “What a rare fright he must have given my old guardian! But the end of it all is, I ‘m to leave Alfred, and go back to England at once. I wish I was going to sea again; I wish I was off thousands of miles away, and not to come home for years. To part with the kind, good fellow, that was like a brother to me, this way, – how can I do it? And do you perceive, he has n’t one word to say against Alfred? It’s only that he has the misfortune of this terrible father. And, after all, might not that be any one’s lot? You might have a father you couldn’t help being ashamed of.”
“Of course,” said she; “I can fancy such a case easily enough.”
“I know it will nearly kill poor Alfred; he ‘ll not be able to bear it. He’s as proud as he is clever, and he’ll not endure the tone of the Earl’s letter. Who knows what he ‘ll do? Can you guess?”
“‘Not in the least. I imagine that he ‘ll submit as patiently as he can, and look out for another situation.”
“Ah, there you don’t know him!” broke in the boy: “he can’t endure this kind of thing. He only consented to take me because his health was breaking up from hard reading; he wanted rest and a change of climate. At first he refused altogether, and only gave way when some of his college dons over-persuaded him.”
She smiled a half-assent, but said nothing.
“Then there’s another point,” said he, suddenly: “I’m sure his Lordship has not been very measured in the terms of his letter to him. I can just fancy the tone of it; and I don’t know how poor Alfred is to bear that.”
“My dear boy, you’ll learn one of these days – and the knowledge will come not the less soon from your being a Peer – that all the world is either forbearing or overbearing. You must be wolf or lamb: there’s no help for it.”
“Alfred never told me so,” said he, sternly.
“It’s more than likely that he did not know! There are no men know less of life than these college creatures; and there lies the great mistake in selecting such men for tutors for our present-day life and its accidents. Alexandre Dumas would be a safer guide than Herodotus; and Thackeray teach you much more than Socrates.”
“If I only had in my head one-half of what Alfred knew, I ‘d be well satisfied,” said the boy. “Ay, and what’s better still, without his thinking a bit about it.”
“And so,” said she, musingly, “you are to go back to England?”
“That does not seem quite settled, for he says, in a postscript, that Sir George Rivers, one of the Cabinet, I believe, has mentioned some gentleman, a ‘member of their party,’ now in Italy, and who would probably consent to take charge of me till some further arrangements could be come to.”
“Hold your chain till a new bear-leader turned up!” said she, laughing. “Oh dear! I wonder when that wise generations of guardians will come to know that the real guide for the creatures like you is a woman. Yes, you ought to be travelling with your governess, – some one whose ladylike tone and good manners would insensibly instil quietness, reserve, and reverence in your breeding, correct your bad French, and teach you to enter or leave a room without seeming to be a housebreaker!”
“I should like to know who does that?” asked he, indignantly.
“Every one of you young Englishmen, whether you come fresh from Brasenose or the Mess of the Forty-something, you have all of you the same air of bashful bull-dogs!”
“Oh, come, this is too bad; is this the style of Charles Heathcote, for instance?”
“Most essentially it is; the only thing is that, the bulldog element predominating in his nature, he appears the less awkward in consequence.”
“I should like to bear what you ‘d say of the O’Shea.”
“Oh, Mr. O’Shea is an Irishman, and their ways bear the same relation to general good breeding that rope-dancing does to waltzing.”
“I ‘ll take good care not to ask you for any description of myself,” said he, laughingly.
“You are very wrong then, for you should have heard something excessively flattering,” was her reply. “Shall I tell you who your new protector is to be?” cried she, after a moment’s pause; “I have just guessed it: the O’Shea himself!”
“O’Shea! impossible; how could you imagine such a thing?”
“I’m certain I’m right. He is always talking of his friend Sir George Rivers – he calls him Rivers, – who is Colonial Secretary, and who is to make him either Bishop of Barbadoes or a Gold Stick at the Gambia; and you ‘ll see if I ‘m not correct, and that the wardship of a young scapegrace lordling is to be the retaining fee of this faithful follower of his party. Of course, there will be no question of tutorship; in fact, it would have such an unpleasant resemblance to the farce and Mr. O’Toole, as to be impossible. You will simply be travelling together. It will be double harness, but only one horse doing the work!”
“I never can make out whether you ‘re in jest or in earnest,” said he, pettishly.
“I’m always in earnest when I’m jesting; that’s the only clue I can give you.”
“But all this time we have been wandering away from the only thing I wanted to think of, – how to part with dear Alfred. You have told me nothing about that.”
“These are things which, as the French say, always do themselves, and, consequently, it is better never to plan or provide for; and, remember, as a maxim, whenever the current is carrying you the way you want to go, put in your oar as little as possible. And as to old associations, they are like old boots: they are very pleasant wear, but they won’t last forever. There now, I have given you quite enough matter to think over: and so, good-bye.”
As Agincourt turned his steps slowly towards the house, he marvelled with himself what amount of guidance she had given him.