The Absentee (11 page)

'Ah! that's the devil, that Mordicai,' said Lord Clonbrony; 'that's the
only man an earth I dread.'

'Why, he is only a coachmaker, is not he!' said Lady Clonbrony: 'I can't
think how you can talk, my lord, of dreading such a low man. Tell him,
if he's troublesome, we won't bespeak any more carriages; and, I'm sure,
I wish you would not be so silly, my lord, to employ him any more, when
you know he disappointed me the last birthday about the landau, which I
have not got yet.'

'Nonsense, my dear,'said Lord Clonbrony; 'you don't know what you are
talking of. Terry, I say, even a friendly execution is an ugly thing.'

'Phoo! phoo!—an ugly thing! So is a fit of the gout—but one's all the
better for it after. 'Tis just a renewal of life, my lord, for which
one must pay a bit of a fine, you know. Take patience, and leave me
to manage all properly—you know I'm used to these things, Only you
recollect, if you please, how I managed my friend Lord —; it's bad to
be mentioning names—but Lord EVERYBODY-KNOWS-WHO—didn't I bring him
through cleverly, when there was that rascally attempt to seize
the family plate? I had notice, and what did I do, but broke open a
partition between that lord's house and my lodgings, which I had taken
next door; and so, when the sheriff's officers were searching below on
the ground floor, I just shoved the plate easy through to my bedchamber
at a moment's warning, and then bid the gentlemen walk in, for they
couldn't set a foot in my paradise, the devils! So they stood looking
at it through the wall, and cursing me and I holding both my sides with
laughter at their fallen faces.'

Sir Terence and Lord Clonbrony laughed in concert.

'This is a good story,' said Miss Nugent, smiling; 'but surely, Sir
Terence, such things are never done in real life?'

'Done! ay, are they; and I could tell you a hundred better strokes, my
dear Miss Nugent.'

'Grace!' cried Lady Clonbrony, 'do pray have the goodness to seal and
send these notes; for really,' whispered she, as her niece came to the
table,'I CAWNT STEA, I cawnt bear that man's VICE, his accent grows
horrider and horrider!'

Her ladyship rose, and left the room.

'Why, then,' continued Sir Terence, following up Miss Nugent to the
table, where she was sealing letters, 'I must tell you how I sarved that
same man on another occasion, and got the victory too.'

No general officer could talk of his victories, or fight his battles
o'er again, with more complacency than Sir Terence O'Fay recounted his
CIVIL exploits.

'Now I'll tell Miss Nugent. There was a footman in the family, not an
Irishman, but one of your powdered English scoundrels that ladies are so
fond of having hanging to the backs of their carriages; one Fleming he
was, that turned spy, and traitor, and informer, went privately and gave
notice to the creditors where the plate was hid in the thickness of the
chimney; but if he did, what happened! Why, I had my counter-spy, an
honest little Irish boy, in the creditor's shop, that I had secured with
a little douceur of usquebaugh; and he outwitted, as was natural, the
English lying valet, and gave us notice just in the nick, and I got
ready for their reception; and, Miss Nugent, I only wish you'd seen the
excellent sport we had, letting them follow the scent they got; and when
they were sure of their game, what did they find?—Ha! ha! ha!—dragged
out, after a world of labour, a heavy box of—a load of brickbats; not
an item of my friend's plate—that was all snug in the coal-hole, where
them dunces never thought of looking for it. Ha! ha! ha!'

'But come, Terry,' cried Lord Clonbrony, 'I'll pull down your pride.
How finely, another time, your job of the false ceiling answered in the
hall. I've heard that story, and have been told how the sheriffs fellow
thrust his bayonet up through your false plaster, and down came
tumbling the family plate hey, Terry? That hit cost your friend, Lord
everybody-knows-who, more than your head's worth, Terry.'

'I ask your pardon, my lord, it never cost him a farthing.'

'When he paid £7000 for the plate, to redeem it?'

'Well! and did not I make up for that at the races of —? The creditors
learned that my lord's horse, Naboclish, was to run at—races; and, as
the sheriff's officer knew he dare not touch him on the race-ground,
what does he do, but he comes down early in the morning on the
mail-coach, and walks straight down to the livery stables. He had
an exact description of the stables, and the stall, and the horse's
body-clothes.

'I was there, seeing the horse taken care of; and, knowing the cut
of the fellow's jib, what does I do, but whips the body-clothes off
Naboclish, and claps them upon a garrone that the priest would not ride.

'In comes the bailiff—"Good morrow to you, sir," says I, leading out of
the stable my lord's horse, with an OULD saddle and bridle on.

'"Tim Neal," says I to the groom, who was rubbing down the garrone's
heels, "mind your hits to-day, and WEE'L wet the plate to-night."

'"Not so fast, neither," says the bailiff—"here's my writ for seizing
the horse."

'"Och," says I, "you wouldn't be so cruel."'

"That's all my eye," says he, seizing the garrone, while I mounted
Naboclish, and rode him off deliberately to —'

'Ha! ha! ha!—That was neat, I grant you, Terry,' said Lord Clonbrony.
'But what a dolt of a born ignoramus must that sheriffs fellow have
been, not to know Naboclish when he saw him!'

'But stay, my lord—stay, Miss Nugent—I have more for you,' following
her wherever she moved. 'I did not let him off so, even. At the cant, I
bid and bid against them for the pretended Naboclish, till I, left him
on their hands for 500 guineas. Ha! ha! ha!—was not that famous?'

'But,' said Miss Nugent, 'I cannot believe you are in earnest, Sir
Terence. Surely this would be—'

'What?—out with it, my dear Miss Nugent.'

'I am afraid of offending you.'

'You can't, my dear, I defy you—say the word that came to the tongue's
end; it's always the best.'

'I was going to say, swindling,' said the young lady, colouring deeply.

'Oh! you was going to say wrong, then! It's not called swindling amongst
gentlemen who know the world—it's only jockeying—fine sport—and very
honourable to help a friend at a dead lift. Anything to get a friend out
of a present pressing difficulty.'

'And when the present difficulty is over, do your friends never think of
the future?'

The future! leave the future to posterity,' said Sir Terence; 'I'm
counsel only for the present; and when the evil comes, it's time enough
to think of it. I can't bring the guns of my wits to bear till the
enemy's alongside of me, or within sight of me at the least. And
besides, there never was a good commander yet, by sea or land, that
would tell his little expedients beforehand, or before the very day of
battle.'

'It must be a sad thing,' said Miss Nugent, sighing deeply, 'to be
reduced to live by little expedients—daily expedients.'

Lord Colambre struck his forehead, but said nothing.

'But if you are beating your brains about your own affairs, my Lord
Colambre, my dear,' said Sir Terence, 'there's an easy way of settling
your family affairs at once; and, since you don't like little daily
expedients, Miss Nugent, there's one great expedient, and an expedient
for life, that will settle it all to your satisfaction—and ours. I
hinted it delicately to you before, but, between friends, delicacy is
impertinent; so I tell you, in plain English, you've nothing to do but
go and propose yourself, just as you stand, to the heiress Miss B—,
that desires no better—'

'Sir!' cried Lord Colambre, stepping forward, red with sudden anger.
Miss Nugent laid her hand upon his arm—

'Oh, my lord!'

'Sir Terence O'Fay,' continued Lord Colambre, in a moderated tone, 'you
are wrong to mention that young lady's name in such a manner.'

'Why, then, I said only Miss B—, and there are a whole hive of BEES.
But I'll engage she'd thank me for what I suggested, and think herself
the queen bee if my expedient was adopted by you.'

'Sir Terence,' said his lordship, smiling, 'if my father thinks proper
that you should manage his affairs, and devise expedients for him, I
have nothing to say on that point; but I must beg you will not trouble
yourself to suggest expedients for me, and that you will have the
goodness to leave me to settle my own affairs.'

Sir Terence made a low bow, and was silent for five seconds; then
turning to Lord Clonbrony, who looked much more abashed than he did—

'By the wise one, my good lord, I believe there are some men—noblemen,
too—that don't know their friends from their enemies. It's my firm
persuasion, now, that if I had served you as I served my friend I was
talking of, your son there would, ten to one, think I had done him an
injury by saving the family plate.'

'I certainly should, sir. The family plate, sir, is not the first object
in my mind,' replied Lord Colambre; 'family honour—Nay, Miss Nugent,
I must speak,' continued his lordship, perceiving; by her countenance,
that she was alarmed.

'Never fear, Miss Nugent dear,' said Sir Terence; 'I'm as cool as a
cucumber. Faith! then, my Lord Colambre, I agree with you, that family
honour's a mighty fine thing, only troublesome to one's self and one's
friends, and expensive to keep up with all the other expenses and debts
a gentleman has nowadays. So I, that am under no natural obligations
to it by birth or otherwise, have just stood by through life, and asked
myself, before I would volunteer being bound to it, what could this same
family honour do for a man in this world? And, first and foremost, I
never remember to see family honour stand a man in much stead in a
court of law—never saw family honour stand against an execution, or a
custodiam, or an injunction even. 'Tis a rare thing, this same family
honour, and a very fine thing; but I never knew it yet, at a pinch, pay
for a pair of boots even,' added Sir Terence, drawing up his own with
much complacency.

At this moment Sir Terence was called out of the room by one who wanted
to speak to him on particular business.

'My dear father,' cried Lord Colambre, 'do not follow him; stay for one
moment, and hear your son—your true friend.'

Miss Nugent went out of the room, that she might leave the father and
son at liberty.

'Hear your natural friend for one moment,' cried Lord Colambre. 'Let
me beseech you, father, not to have recourse to any of these paltry
expedients, but trust your son with the state of your affairs, and we
shall find some honourable means—'

'Yes, yes, yes, very true; when you're of age, Colambre, we'll talk of
it; but nothing can be done till then. We shall get on, we shall get
through, very well, till then, with Terry's assistance. And I must beg
you will not say a word more against Terry—I can't bear it—I can't
hear it—I can't do without him. Pray don't detain me—I can say no
more—except,' added he, returning to his usual concluding sentence,
'that there need, at all events, be none of this, if people would but
live upon their own estates, and kill their own mutton.' He stole out of
the room, glad to escape, however shabbily, from present explanation
and present pain. There are persons without resource who in difficulties
return always to the same point, and usually to the same words.

While Lord Colambre was walking up and down the room, much vexed and
disappointed at finding that he could make no impression on his
father's mind, nor obtain his confidence as to his family affairs, Lady
Clonbrony's woman, Mrs. Petito, knocked at the door, with a message from
her lady, to beg, if Lord Colambre was BY HIMSELF; he would go to her
dressing-room, as she wished to have a conference with him. He obeyed
her summons.

'Sit down, my dear Colambre—' And she began precisely with her old
sentence—

'With the fortune I brought your father, and with my lord's estate, I
CAWNT understand the meaning of all these pecuniary difficulties; and
all that strange creature Sir Terence says is algebra to me, who speak
English. And I am particularly sorry he was let in this morning—but
he's such a brute that he does not think anything of forcing one's door,
and he tells my footman he does not mind NOT AT HOME a pinch of snuff.
Now what can you do with a man who could say that sort of thing, you
know—the world's at an end.'

'I wish my father had nothing to do with him, ma'am, as much as you can
wish it,' said Lord Colambre; 'but I have said all that a son can with
propriety say, and without effect.'

'What particularly provokes me against him,' continued Lady Clonbrony,
'is what I have just heard from Grace, who was really hurt by it, too,
for she is the warmest friend in the world: I allude to the creature's
indelicate way of touching upon a tender PINT, and mentioning an amiable
young heiress's name. My dear Colambre, I trust you have given me credit
for my inviolable silence all this time upon the PINT nearest my
heart. I am rejoiced to hear you was so warm when she was mentioned
inadvertently by that brute, and I trust you now see the advantages of
the projected union in as strong and agreeable a PINT of view as I do,
my own Colambre; and I should leave things to themselves, and let you
prolong the DEES of courtship as you please, only for what I now hear
incidentally from my lord and the brute, about pecuniary embarrassments,
and the necessity of something being done before next winter. And indeed
I think now, in propriety, the proposal cannot be delayed much longer;
for the world begins to talk of the thing as done; and even Mrs.
Broadhurst, I know, had no doubt that, if this CONTRETEMPS about the
poor Berryls had not occurred, your proposal would have been made before
the end of last week.'

Our hero was not a man to make a proposal because Mrs. Broadhurst
expected it, or to marry because the world said he was going to be
married. He steadily said that, from the first moment the subject had
been mentioned, he had explained himself distinctly; that the young
lady's friends could not, therefore, be under any doubt as to his
intentions; that, if they had voluntarily deceived themselves, or
exposed the lady in situations from which the world was led to make
false conclusions, he was not answerable: he felt his conscience at
ease—entirely so, as he was convinced that the young lady herself,
for whose merit, talents, independence, and generosity of character he
professed high respect, esteem, and admiration, had no doubts either of
the extent or the nature of his regard.