CHAPTER LIV. IN CONCLAVE.
When O"Rorke left Kate, it was not the direction of the post-office that he took; he went straight to the head inn of the town, on the doorsteps of which he stationed himself, anxiously watching for the arrival of another traveller. Nor had he long to wait, for as the town clock struck the half-hour, a chaise and pair galloped up to the door, and young Ladarelle cried out from the window, "The last seven miles in forty-six minutes! What do you say to that! Is dinner ready?" asked he, as he descended.
"Everything"s ready, Sir," said O"Rorke, obsequiously, as, pushing the landlord aside, he a.s.sumed the office of showing the way up-stairs himself.
"Tell Morse to unpack some of that sherry," said Ladarelle; and then laughingly added, "Order your own tap, Master O"Rorke, for I"m not going to throw away Dalradern wine upon _you_."
O"Rorke laughed too--perhaps not as genially, but he could afford to relish such a small joke even against himself--not to say that it conveyed an a.s.surance he was well pleased with, that Ladarelle meant him to dine along with himself.
As the dinner was served, Ladarelle talked away about everything. It was his first visit to Ireland, and, though it amused him, he said he hoped his last also. Everything was absurd, laughable, and poverty-stricken to his eyes; that is to say, Pauperism was so apparent on all sides, the whole business of life seemed to be carried on by make-shifts.
The patriot O"Rorke had need of much forbearance as he listened to the unfeeling comments and ignorant inferences of the "Saxon." He heard him, however, without one word of disclaimer, and with a little grin on his face, that if Ladarelle had been an Irishman, and had one drop of Irish blood in his body, he would not have accepted as any evidence of pleasure or satisfaction.
"Order whatever you mean to have," said Ladarelle, as the meal was concluded, "and don"t let us have that fellow coming into the room every moment."
O"Rorke made his provision accordingly, and having secured a kettle, in case it should be his caprice to make punch, he bolted the door and resumed his place.
"There"s your letter!" said Ladarelle, throwing a coa.r.s.e-looking scrawl, sealed with green wax, on the table; "and I"ll be shot if I understand one line of it!"
"And why not?" asked the other, angrily. "Is it the writing"s so bad?"
"No; the writing can be made out. I don"t complain of that. It"s your blessed style that floors me! Now, for instance, what does this mean?
"Impelled by the exuberant indignation that in the Celtic heart rises to the height of the grandest sacrifices, whether on the altars------""
O"Rorke s.n.a.t.c.hed the letter from his hand, crushed it into a ball, and threw it into the fire. "You"ll not have it to laugh at another time,"
cried he, sternly, and with a stare so full of defiance that Ladarelle looked at him for some seconds in amazement, without speaking.
"My good friend," said he, at last, with a calm, measured voice, "it is something new to me to meet conduct like this."
"Not a bit newer or stranger than for me to be laughed at. Bigger and stronger fellows than you never tried that game with me."
"I certainly never suspected you would take it so ill. I thought if any one knew what a joke meant, it was an Irishman."
"And so he does; none better. The mistake was, you thought an Englishman knew how to make one."
"Let there be an end of this," said Ladarelle, haughtily. "If I had kept you in your proper place, you would never have forgotten yourself!" And as he spoke, he flung his cigar into the fire, and arose and walked up and down the room.
O"Rorke hung his head for a moment, and then, in a tone of almost abject contrition, said, "I ask your pardon, Sir. It was just as you say; my head was turned by good treatment."
If Ladarelle had been a physiognomist, he would not have liked the expression of the other"s face, the hue of utter sickness in the cheek, while the eyes flashed with a fiery energy; but he noted none of these, and merely said, as he resumed his place:
"Don"t let it happen again, that"s all. Tell me now what occurred when you got back to Westport, for the only thing I know is that you met her there the morning you arrived."
"I"ll tell it in three words: She was on the quay, just come after a severe night at sea, when I was trying to make a bargain with a fisherman to take me over to the island. I didn"t see her till her hand was on my arm and her lips close to my ear, as she whispered:
""What news have you for me?"
""Bad news," says I; "the sorrow worse."
"She staggered back, and sat down on the stock of an anchor that was there, and drew the tail of her cloak oyer her face, and that"s the way she remained for about a quarter of an hour.
""Tell it to me now, Mr. O"Rorke," said she; "and as you hope to see Glory, tell me the truth, and nothing more."
""It"s little I have to tell," says I, sitting down beside her. "The ould man was out on a terrace when I gave him your letter. He took it this way, turning it all round, and then looking up at me, he says: "I know this handwriting," says he, "and I think I know what"s inside of it, but you may tell her it"s too late." He then muttered something about a sea-bathing place abroad that I couldn"t catch, and he went on: "She didn"t know when she was well-------""
""No, no, that he never said!" says she, bursting in--"that he never said!"
""Not in them words," says I, "certainly not, but it came to the same, for he said she used to be as happy here as the days was long!"
""True; it was all true," said she to herself. "Go on."
""" Go back," says he, "and say, that sorry as I was at first, I"m getting over it now, and it wouldn"t be better for either of us to hold any more correspondence." And with that he gave me the letter back, sealed as it was.""
"What made you say that?" cried Ladarelle.
"Because I knew she"d never ask for it; or if she did, I"d say, "I had it in my trunk at home." The first thing was to get her to believe me, at any cost."
"Is _that_ her way?" asked the other, thoughtfully.
"That"s her way. She"s not given to have suspicions, you can see that.
If you talk to her straight ahead, and never break down in what you say, she"ll look at you openly, and believe it all; but if ever she sees you stop, or look confused, or if she catches you taking a sly look at her under the eyes, you"re done--done entirely! The devil a lawyer from this to Dublin would put you through such a cross-examination; and I defy the cleverest fellow that ever sat in the witness-box to baffle her. And she begins quite regular--quiet, soft, and smooth as a cat."
"What do I care for all this? She may be as shrewd as she pleases this day fortnight, Master O"Rorke. Let us only have the b.a.l.l.s our own, and we"ll win the game before she gets a hazard."
This ill.u.s.tration from the billiard-table was not fully intelligible to O"Rorke, but he saw its drift, and he a.s.sented.
"Where was I? Oh, I remember. "He gave me the letter back," says I, "and told the servants to see I had my supper, and everything I wanted.
""He did this with his hand, as much as to say, "You may go away;" but I made as if I didn"t understand him, and I waited till the servant left the place, and then I drew near him, and said:
""I think," says I, "it would be better your honour read the letter, anyhow. Maybe there"s something in it that you don"t suspect."
"""Who are you," says he, "that"s teaching _me_ manners?""
"I didn"t say them was his words, but something that meant the same.
"""I know every line that"s in it. I know far better than you--ay, or than she suspects--the game she would play.""
"She gave a little cry, as if something stung her. Andeed, I asked her, What was it hurt her? But she never answered me, but stood up straight, and, with a hand up this way, she said something to herself, as if she was making a vow or taking an oath. After that, it wasn"t much she minded one word I said, and lucky for me it was, for I was coming to the hard part of my story--about your honour; how you heard from the servants that I was in the house, and sent for me to your own room, and asked me hundreds of questions about her. Where she was, and who with, and what she wrote about, and then how angry you grew with your uncle--I called him your uncle, I don"t know why--and how you said he was an unfeeling old savage, that it was the same way he treated yourself, pampering you one day, turning you out of doors the next. "And at last,"
says I--"I couldn"t keep it in any longer--I up and told him what I came about, and that your letter was asking a trifle of money to defend your grandfather for his life."
"Sorrow matter what I said, she never listened to me. I told her you swore that her grandfather should have the first lawyer in the land, and that you"d come over yourself to the a.s.sizes. I told her how you put twenty pounds into my hand, and said, "Tim"--no, not Tim--"Mr. O"Rorke, there"s a few pounds to begin. Go back and tell Miss Kate she has a better and truer friend than the one she lost; one that never forgot the first evening he seen her, and would give his heart"s blood to save her."
"She gave a little smile--it was almost a laugh once--and I thought she was pleased at what I was telling her. Not a bit of it. It was something about the ould man was in her mind, and something that didn"t mean any good to him either, for she said, "He shall rue it yet." And after that, though I talked for an hour, she never minded me no more than them fireirons! At last she clutched my arm in her fingers, and said, ""Do you know that my uncle declares I am never to go back again? I came away against his will, and he swore that if I crossed the threshold to come here, I should never re-cross it again. Do you know," says she, "I have no home nor friend now in the whole world, and I don"t know what"s to become of me."