"A niece of Sir Gilbert Biggs," repeated Hawbury.
"A niece--of--Sir Gilbert Biggs?" said Dacres, slowly. "Good Lord!"
"Yes; and what of that?"
"Very much. Don"t you know that Minnie Fay is a niece of Sir Gilbert Biggs?"
"By Jove! So she is. I remember being startled when you told me that, and for a moment an odd fancy came to me. I wondered whether your child-angel might not be the identical being about whom my poor dear mother went into such raptures. Good Lord! what a joke! By Jove!"
"A joke!" growled Dacres. "I don"t see any joke in it. I remember when you said that Biggs"s nieces were at the bottom of your troubles, I asked whether it might be this one."
"So you did, old chap; and I replied that I hoped not. So you need not shake your gory locks at me, my boy."
"But I don"t like the looks of it."
"Neither do I."
"Yes, but you see it looks as though she had been already set apart for you especially."
"And pray, old man, what difference can that make, when I don"t set myself apart for any thing of the kind?"
Dacres sat in silence with a gloomy frown over his brow.
"Besides, are you aware, my boy, of the solemn fact that Biggs"s nieces are legion?" said Hawbury. "The man himself is an infernal old bloke; and as to his nieces--heavens and earth!--old! old as Methuselah; and as to this one, she must be a grandniece--a second generation. She"s not a true, full-blooded niece. Now the lady I refer to was one of the original Biggs"s nieces. There"s no mistake whatever about that, for I have it in black and white, under my mother"s own hand."
"Oh, she would select the best of them for you."
"No, she wouldn"t. How do you know that?"
"There"s no doubt about that."
"It depends upon what you mean by the best. The one _you_ call the best might not seem so to _her_, and so on. Now I dare say she"s picked out for me a great, raw-boned, redheaded niece, with a nose like a horse. And she expects me to marry a woman like that! with a pace like a horse! Good Lord!"
And Hawbury leaned back, lost in the immensity of that one overwhelming idea.
"Besides," said he, standing up, "I don"t care if she was the angel Gabriel. I don"t want any of Biggs"s nieces. I won"t have them. By Jove! And am I to be entrapped into a plan like that? I want Ethel.
And what"s more, I will have her, or go without. The child-angel may be the very identical one that my mother selected, and if you a.s.sert that she is, I"ll be hanged if I"ll argue the point. I only say this, that it doesn"t alter my position in the slightest degree. I don"t want her. I won"t have her. I don"t want to see her. I don"t care if the whole of Biggs"s nieces, in solemn conclave, with old Biggs at their head, had formally discussed the whole matter, and finally resolved unanimously that she should be mine. Good Lord, man! don"t you understand how it is? What the mischief do I care about any body?
Do you think I went through that fiery furnace for nothing? And what do you suppose that life on the island meant? Is all that nothing? Did you ever live on an island with the child-angel? Did you ever make a raft for her and fly? Did you ever float down a river current between banks burned black by raging fires, feeding her, soothing her, comforting her, and all the while feeling in a general fever about her? You hauled her out of a crater, did you? By Jove! And what of that? Why, that furnace that I pulled Ethel out of was worse than a hundred of your craters. And yet, after all that, you think that I could be swayed by the miserable schemes of a lot of Biggs"s nieces!
And you scowl at a fellow, and get huffy and jealous. By Jove!"
After this speech, which was delivered with unusual animation, Hawbury lighted a cigar, which he puffed at most energetically.
"All right, old boy," said Dacres. "A fellow"s apt to judge others by himself, you know. Don"t make any more set speeches, though. I begin to understand your position. Besides, after all--"
Dacres paused, and the dark frown that was on his brow grew still darker.
"After all what?" asked Hawbury, who now began to perceive that another feeling besides jealousy was the cause of his friend"s gloomy melancholy.
"Well, after all, you know, old fellow, I fear I"ll have to give her up."
"Give her up?"
"Yes."
"That"s what you said before, and you mentioned Australia, and that rot."
"The more I think of it," said Dacres, dismally, and regarding the opposite wall with a steady yet mournful stare--"the more I think of it, the more I see that there"s no such happiness in store for me."
"Pooh, man! what is it all about? This is the secret that you spoke about, I suppose?"
"Yes; and it"s enough to put a barrier between me and her. Was I jealous? Did I seem huffy? What an idiot I must have been! Why, old man, I can"t do any thing or say any thing."
"The man"s mad," said Hawbury, addressing himself to a carved tobacco-box on the table.
"Mad? Yes, I was mad enough in ever letting myself be overpowered by this bright dream. Here have I been giving myself up to a phantom--an empty illusion--and now it"s all over. My eyes are open."
"You may as well open my eyes too; for I"ll be hanged if I can see my way through this!"
"Strange! strange! strange!" continued Dacres, in a kind of soliloquy, not noticing Hawbury"s words. "How a man will sometimes forget realities, and give himself up to dreams! It was my dream of the child-angel that so turned my brain. I must see her no more."
"Very well, old boy," said Hawbury. "Now speak Chinese a little for variety. I"ll understand you quite as well. I will, by Jove!"
"And then, for a fellow that"s had an experience like mine--before and since," continued Dacres, still speaking in the tone of one who was meditating aloud--"to allow such an idea even for a moment to take shape in his brain! What an utter, unmitigated, unmanageable, and unimprovable idiot, a.s.s, dolt, and blockhead! Confound such a man! I say; confound him!"
[Ill.u.s.tration: "CONFOUND SUCH A MAN! I SAY."]
And as Dacres said this he brought his fist down upon the table near him with such an energetic crash that a wine-flask was sent spinning on the floor, where its ruby contents splashed out in a pool, intermingled with fragments of gla.s.s.
Dacres was startled by the crash, and looked at it for a while in silence. Then he raised his head and looked at his friend. Hawbury encountered his glance without any expression. He merely sat and smoked and pa.s.sed his fingers through his pendent whiskers.
"Excuse me," said Dacres, abruptly.
"Certainly, my dear boy, a thousand times; only I hope you will allow me to remark that your style is altogether a new one, and during the whole course of our acquaintance I do not remember seeing it before.
You have a melodramatic way that is overpowering. Still I don"t see why you should swear at yourself in a place like Naples, where there are so many other things to swear at. It"s a waste of human energy, and I don"t understand it. We usedn"t to indulge in soliloquies in South America, used we?"
[Ill.u.s.tration: "HAWBURY SANK BACK IN HIS SEAT, OVERWHELMED."]
"No, by Jove! And look here, old chap, you"ll overlook this little outburst, won"t you? In South America I was always cool, and you did the hard swearing, my boy. I"ll be cool again; and what"s more, I"ll get back to South America again as soon as I can. Once on the pampas, and I"ll be a man again. I tell you what it is, I"ll start to-morrow.
What do you say? Come."
"Oh no," said Hawbury, coolly; "I can"t do that. I have business, you know."
"Business?"
"Oh yes, you know--Ethel, you know."
"By Jove! so you have. That alters the matter."
"But in any case I wouldn"t go, nor would you. I still am quite unable to understand you. Why you should grow desperate, and swear at yourself, and then propose South America, is quite beyond me. Above all, I don"t yet see any reason why you should give up your child-angel. You were all raptures but a short time since. Why are you so cold now?"