Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon Volume Ii Part 59

"I know it--I feel it--my heart never bade me hope--and now--'tis over."

He stood up as he spoke, and while he threw the light folds of his mantle round him, a gleam of light fell upon his features. They were pale as death; two dark circles surrounded his sunken eyes, and his bloodless lip looked still more ghastly, from the dark mustache that drooped above it.

"Farewell!" said he, slowly, as he crossed his arms sadly upon his breast; "I will not pain you more."

"Oh, go not thus from me!" said she, as her voice became tremulous with emotion; "do not add to the sorrow that weighs upon my heart! I cannot, indeed I cannot, be other than I am; and I do but hate myself to think that I cannot give my love where I have given all my esteem. If time--" But before she could continue further, the noise of approaching footsteps was heard, and the voice of Sir George, as he came near. Hammersley disappeared at once, and Lucy, with rapid steps, advanced to meet her father, while I remained riveted upon the spot. What a torrent of emotions then rushed upon my heart! What hopes, long dead or dying, sprang up to life again! What visions of long-abandoned happiness flitted before me! Could it be then--dare I trust myself to think it--that Lucy cared for me? The thought was maddening! With a bounding sense of ecstasy, I dashed across the park, resolving, at all hazards, to risk everything upon the chance, and wait the next morning upon Sir George Dashwood. As I thought thus, I reached my hotel, where I found Mike in waiting with a letter. As I walked towards the lamp in the _porte cochere_, my eyes fell upon the address. It was General Dashwood's hand; I tore it open, and read as follows:--

Dear Sir,--Circ.u.mstances into which you will excuse me entering, having placed an insurmountable barrier to our former terms of intimacy, you will, I trust, excuse me declining the honor of any nearer acquaintance, and also forgive the liberty I take in informing you of it, which step, however unpleasant to my feelings, will save us both the great pain of meeting.

I have only this moment heard of your arrival in Brussels, and take thus the earliest opportunity of communicating with you.

With every a.s.surance of my respect for you personally, and an earnest desire to serve you in your military career, I beg to remain,

Very faithfully yours,

GEORGE DASHWOOD

"Another note, sir," said Mike, as he thrust into my unconscious hands a letter he had just received from an orderly.

Stunned, half stupefied, I broke the seal. The contents were but three lines:--

Sir,--I have the honor to inform you that Sir Thomas Picton has appointed you an extra aide-de-camp on his personal staff. You will, therefore, present yourself to-morrow morning at the Adjutant-General's office, to receive your appointment and instructions.

I have the honor to be, etc.,

G. FITZROY.

Crushing the two letters in my fevered hand, I retired to my room, and threw myself, dressed as I was, upon my bed. Sleep, that seems to visit us in the saddest as in the happiest times of our existence, came over me, and I did not wake until the bugles of the Ninety-fifth were sounding the reveille through the park, and the brightest beams of the morning sun were peering through the window.

CHAPTER L.

AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE.

"Mr. O'Malley," said a voice, as my door opened, and an officer in undress entered,--"Mr. O'Malley, I believe you received your appointment last night on General Picton's staff?"

I bowed in reply, as he resumed:--

"Sir Thomas desires you will proceed to Courtrai with these despatches in all haste. I don't know if you are well mounted, but I recommend you, in any case, not to spare your cattle."

So saying, he wished me a good-morning, and left me, in a state of no small doubt and difficulty, to my own reflections. What the deuce was I to do?

I had no horse; I knew not where to find one. What uniform should I wear?

For, although appointed on the staff, I was not gazetted to any regiment that I knew of, and hitherto had been wearing an undress frock and a foraging cap; for I could not bring myself to appear as a civilian among so many military acquaintances. No time was, however, to be lost; so I proceeded to put on my old Fourteenth uniform, wondering whether my costume might not cost me a reprimand in the very outset of my career. Meanwhile I despatched Mike to see after a horse, caring little for the time, the merits, or the price of the animal provided he served my present purpose.

In less than twenty minutes my worthy follower appeared beneath my window, surrounded by a considerable mob, who seemed to take no small interest in the proceedings.

"What the deuce is the matter?" cried I, as I opened the sash and looked out.

"Mighty little's the matter, your honor; it's the savages, here, that's admiring my horsemanship," said Mike, as he belabored a tall, scraggy-looking mule with a stick which bore an uncommon resemblance to a broom-handle.

"What do you mean to do with that beast?" said I. "You surely don't expect me to ride a mule to Courtrai?"

"Faith, and if you don't, you are likely to walk the journey; for there isn't a horse to be had for love or money in the town; but I am told that Mr. Marsden is coming up to-morrow with plenty, so that you may as well take the journey out of the soft horns as spoil a better; and if he only makes as good use of his fore-legs as he does of his hind ones, he'll think little of the road."

[Ill.u.s.tration: MICKEY ASTONISHES THE NATIVES.]

A vicious lash out behind served in a moment to corroborate Mike's a.s.sertion, and to scatter the crowd on every side.

However indisposed to exhibit myself with such a turn-out, my time did not admit of any delay; and so, arming myself with my despatches, and having procured the necessary information as to the road, I set out from the Belle Vue, amidst an ill-suppressed t.i.tter of merriment from the mob, which nothing but fear of Mike and his broomstick prevented becoming a regular shout of laughter.

It was near night-fall as, tired and weary of the road, I entered the little village of Halle. All was silent and noiseless in the deserted streets; nor a lamp threw its glare upon the pavement, nor even a solitary candle flickered through the cas.e.m.e.nt. Unlike a town, garrisoned by troops, neither sentry nor outpost was to be met with; nothing gave evidence that the place was held by a large body of men; and I could not help feeling struck, as the footsteps of my mule were echoed along the causeway, with the silence almost of desolation around me. By the creaking of a sign, as it swung mournfully to and fro, I was directed to the door of the village inn, where, dismounting, I knocked for some moments, but without success.

At length, when I had made an uproar sufficient to alarm the entire village, the cas.e.m.e.nt above the door slowly opened, and a head enveloped in a huge cotton nightcap--so, at least, it appeared to me from the size--protruded itself. After muttering a curse in about the most barbarous French I ever heard, he asked me what I wanted there; to which I replied, most nationally, by asking in return, where the British dragoons were quartered.

"They have left for Nivelle this morning, to join some regiments of your own country."

"Ah! ah!" thought I, "he mistakes me for a Brunswicker;" to which, by the uncertain light, my uniform gave me some resemblance. As it was now impossible for me to proceed farther, I begged to ask where I could procure accommodation for the night.

"At the burgomaster's. Turn to your left at the end of this street, and you will soon find it. They have got some English officers there, who, I believe in my soul, never sleep."

This was, at least, pleasant intelligence, and promised a better termination to my journey than I had begun to hope for; so wishing my friend a good-night, to which he willingly responded, I resumed my way down the street. As he closed the window, once more leaving me to my own reflections, I began to wonder within myself to what arm of the service belonged these officers to whose convivial gifts he bore testimony. As I turned the corner of the street, I soon discovered the correctness of his information. A broad glare of light stretched across the entire pavement from a large house with a clumsy stone portico before it. On coming nearer, the sound of voices, the roar of laughter, the shouts of merriment that issued forth, plainly bespoke that a jovial party were seated within.

The half-shutter which closed the lower part of the windows prevented my obtaining a view of the proceedings; but having cautiously approached the cas.e.m.e.nt, I managed to creep on the window-sill and look into the room.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE GENTLEMEN WHO NEVER SLEEP.]

There the scene was certainly a curious one. Around a large table sat a party of some twenty persons, the singularity of whose appearance may be conjectured when I mention that all those who appeared to be British officers were dressed in the robes of the _echevins_ (or aldermen) of the village; while some others, whose looks bespoke them as st.u.r.dy Flemings, sported the c.o.c.ked hats and cavalry helmets of their a.s.sociates. He who appeared the ruler of the feast sat with his back towards me, and wore, in addition to the dress of burgomaster, a herald's tabard, which gave him something the air of a grotesque screen at its potations. A huge fire blazed upon the ample hearth, before which were spread several staff uniforms, whose drabbled and soaked appearance denoted the reason of the party's change of habiliments. Every imaginable species of drinking-vessel figured upon the board, from the rich flagon of chased silver to the humble _cruche_ we see in a Teniers picture. As well as I could hear, the language of the company seemed to be French, or, at least, such an imitation of that language as served as a species of neutral territory for both parties to meet in.

He of the tabard spoke louder than the others, and although, from the execrable endeavors he made to express himself in French, his natural voice was much altered, there was yet something in his accents which seemed perfectly familiar to me.

"Mosheer l'Abbey," said he, placing his arm familiarly on the shoulder of a portly personage, whose shaven crown strangely contrasted with a pair of corked moustachios,--"Mosheer l'Abbey, nous sommes freres, et moi, savez-vous, suis eveque,--'pon my life it's true; I might have been Bishop of Saragossa, if I only consented to leave the Twenty-third. Je suis bong Catholique. Lord bless you, if you saw how I loved the nunneries in Spain!

J'ai tres jolly souvenirs of those nunneries; a goodly company of little silver saints; and this waistcoat you see--mong gilet--was a satin petticoat of our Lady of Loretto."

Need I say, that before this speech was concluded, I had recognized in the speaker n.o.body but that inveterate old villain, Monsoon himself.

"Permettez, votre Excellence," said a hale, jolly-looking personage on his left, as he filled the major's goblet with obsequious politeness.

"Bong engfong," replied Monsoon, tapping him familiarly on the head.

"Burgomaster, you are a trump; and when I get my promotion, I'll make you prefect in a wine district. Pa.s.s the lush, and don't look sleepy!

'Drowsiness,' says Solomon, 'clothes a man in rags;' and no man knew the world better than Solomon. Don't you be laughing, you raw boys. Never mind them, Abbey; ils sont pet.i.ts garcongs--f.a.gs from Eton and Harrow; better judges of mutton broth than sherry negus."

"I say, Major, you are forgetting this song you promised us."

"Yes, yes," said several voices together; "the song, Major! the song!"

"Time enough for that; we're doing very well as it is. Upon my life, though, they hold a deal of wine. I thought we'd have had them fit to bargain with before ten, and see, it's near midnight; and I must have my forage accounts ready for the commissary-general by to-morrow morning."

This speech having informed me the reason of the Major's presence there, I resolved to wait no longer a mere spectator of their proceedings; so dismounting from my position, I commenced a vigorous attack upon the door.

It was some time before I was heard; but at length the door was opened, and I was accosted by an Englishman, who, in a strange compound of French and English, asked, "What the devil I meant by all that uproar?" Determining to startle my old friend the major, I replied, that "I was aide-de-camp to General Picton, and had come down on very unpleasant business." By this time the noise of the party within had completely subsided, and from a few whispered sentences, and their thickened breathing, I perceived that they were listening.