Jack Hinton Part 21

This news so stunned me that for a moment or two I couldn't reply.

O'Grady perceived it, and, patting me gaily on the shoulder, said--

'Yes, Jack, I am sorry we are to separate. But as for me, no other course was open; and as to you, with all your independence from fortune, and with all your family influence to push your promotion, the time is not very distant when you will begin to feel the life you are leading vapid and tiresome. You will long for an excitement more vigorous and more healthy in its character; and then, my boy, my dearest hope is that we may be thrown once more together.'

Had my friend been able at the moment to have looked into the secret recesses of my heart and read there my inmost thoughts, he could not more perfectly have depicted my feelings, nor pictured the impressions that, at the very moment he spoke, were agitating my mind. The time he alluded to had indeed arrived. The hour had come when I wished to be a soldier in more than the mere garb; but with that wish came linked another even stronger still; and this was, that, before I went on service, I should once more see Louisa Bellew, explain to her the nature and extent of my attachment to her, and obtain, if possible, some pledge on her part that, with the distinction I hoped to acquire, I should look to the possession of her love as my reward and my recompense. Young as I was, I felt ashamed at avowing to O'Grady the rapid progress of my pa.s.sion. I had not courage to confess upon what slight encouragement I built my hopes, and at the same time was abashed at being compelled to listen tamely to his prophecy, when the very thoughts that flashed across me would have indicated my resolve.

While I thus maintained an awkward silence, he once more resumed--

'Meanwhile, Jack, you can serve me, and I shall make no apologies for enlisting you. You've heard me speak of this great Loughrea steeplechase: now, somehow or other, with my usual prudence, I have gone on adding wager to wager, until at last I find myself with a book of some eight hundred pounds--to lose which at a moment like this, I need not say, would almost ruin all my plans. To be free of the transaction, I this morning offered to pay half forfeit, and they refused me. Yes, Hinton, they knew every man of them the position I stood in. They saw that not only my prospects but my honour was engaged; that before a week I should be far away, without any power to control, without any means to observe them. They knew well that, thus circ.u.mstanced, I must lose; and that if I lost, I must sell my commission, and leave the army beggared in character and in fortune.'

'And now, my dear friend,' said I, interrupting, 'how happens it that you bet with men of this stamp? I understood you it was a friendly match, got up at a dinnerparty.'

'Even so, Jack. The dinner was in my own rooms, the claret mine, the men my _friends_. You may smile, but so the world is pleased to call those with whom from day to day we a.s.sociate, with no other bond of union than the similarity of a pursuit which has nothing more reprehensible in it than the character of the intimacies it engenders. Yes, Hinton, these are my sporting friends, sipping my wine while they plot my ruin.

Conviviality with them is not the happy abandonment to good fellowship and enjoyment, but the season of cold and studied calculation--the hour when, unexcited themselves, they trade upon the unguarded and unwary feelings of others. They know how imperative is the code of honour as regards a bet, and they make a virtue to themselves in the unflinching firmness of their exaction, as a cruel judge would seek applause for the stern justice with which he condemns a felon. It is usual, however, to accept half forfeit in circ.u.mstances like these of mine: the condition did not happen to be inserted, and they rejected my offer.'

'Is this possible,' said I, 'and that these men call themselves your friends?'

'Yes, Jack; a betting-book is like Shylock's bond, and the holder of one pretty much about as merciful as the worthy Israelite. But come, come!

it is but boyish weakness in one like me to complain of these things; nor, indeed, would I speak of them now, but with the hope that my words may prove a warning to you, while they serve to explain the service I look for from you, and give you some insight into the character of those with whom you 'll have to deal.'

'Only tell me,' said I, 'only explain, my dear O'Grady, what I can do, and how; it is needless for me to say I 'm ready.'

'I thought as much. Now listen to me. When I made this unlucky match it was, as I have said, over a dinnerparty, when, excited by wine and carried away by the enthusiasm of the moment, I made a proposition which, with a calmer head, I should never have ventured. For a second or two it was not accepted, and Mr. Burke, of whom you 've heard me speak, called out from the end of the table, "A sporting offer, by Jove! and I'll ride for you myself." This I knew was to give me one of the first hors.e.m.e.n in Ireland; so, while filling my gla.s.s and nodding to him, accepted his offer, I cried out, "Two to one against any horse named at this moment!" The words were not spoken when I was taken up, at both sides of the table; and as I leaned across to borrow a pencil from a friend, I saw that a smile was curling every lip, and that Burke himself endeavoured with his wine-gla.s.s to conceal the expression of his face.

I needed no stronger proof that the whole match had been a preconcerted scheme between the parties, and that I had fallen into a snare laid purposely to entrap me. It was too late, however, to retract; I booked my bets, drank my wine, congeed my friends, went to bed, and woke the next morning to feel myself a dupe.

'But come, Jack; at this rate I shall never have done. The match was booked, the ground chosen, Mr. Burke to be my jockey, and, in fact, everything arranged, when, what was my surprise, my indignation, to find that the horse I destined for the race (at the time in possession of a friend) was bought up for five hundred and sent off to England! This disclosed to me how completely I was entrapped. Nothing remained for me then but to purchase one which offered at the moment! and this one, I 've told you already, has the pleasant reputation of being the most wicked devil and the hardest to ride in the whole west; in fact, except Burke himself, n.o.body would mount him on a road, and as to crossing a country with him, even _he_, they say, has no fancy for it. In any case, he made it the ground of a demand which I could not refuse--that, in the event of my winning, he was to claim a third of the stakes. At length the horse is put in training, improves every hour, and matters seem to be taking a favourable turn. In the midst of this, however, the report reaches me, as you heard yourself yesterday morning, that Burke will not ride. However I affected to discredit it at the moment, I had great difficulty to preserve the appearance of calm. This morning settles the question by this letter:--

'"Red House, Wednesday Morning."

'"Dear Sir,--A friendly hint has just reached me that I am to be arrested on the morning of the Loughrea race for a trifle of a hundred and eighteen pounds and some odd shillings. If it suits your convenience to pay the money, or enter into bail for the amount, I'll be very happy to ride your horse; for, although I don't care for a double ditch, I've no fancy to take the wall of the county jail, even on the back of as good a horse as Moddiridderoo.--Yours truly, Ulick Burke."'

'Well,' said I, as, after some difficulty, I spelled through this ill-written and dirty epistle, 'and what do you mean to do here?'

'If you ask me,' said Phil, 'what I 'd like to do, I tell you fairly it would be to horsewhip my friend Mr. Burke as a preliminary, pay the stakes, withdraw my horse, and cut the whole concern; but my present position is, unhappily, opposed to each of these steps. In the first place, a rencontre with Burke would do me infinite disservice at the Horse Guards, and as to the payment of eight hundred pounds, I don't think I could raise the money, unless some one would advance five hundred of it for a mortgage on Corny Delany. But to be serious, Jack--and, as time pa.s.ses, I must be serious--I believe the best way on this occasion is to give Burke the money (for as to the bill, that's an invention); yet as I must start to-night for England, and the affair will require some management, I must put the whole matter into your hands, with full instructions how to act.'

'I am quite ready and willing,' said I; 'only give me the _carte du pay_.'

'Well, then, my boy, you'll go down to Loughrea for me the day before the race, establish yourself as quietly as you can in the hotel, and, as the riders must be named on the day before the running, contrive to see Mr. Burke, and inform him that his demand will be complied with. Have no delicacy with him---it is a mere money question; and although by the courtesy of the turf he is a gentleman, yet there is no occasion to treat him with more of ceremony than is due to yourself in your negotiation. This letter contains the sum he mentions. In addition to that, I have inclosed a bank cheque for whatever you like to give him; only remember one thing, Hinton--_he_ must ride, and _I_ must win.'

All the calmness with which O'Grady had hitherto spoken deserted him at this moment; his face became scarlet, his brow was bent, and his lip quivered with pa.s.sion, while, as he walked the room with hurried steps he muttered between his teeth--

'Yes, though it cost my last shilling, I'll win the race! They thought to ruin me; the scheme was deeply laid and well planned too, but they shall fail. No, Hinton,' resumed he in a louder tone--'no, Hinton; believe me, poor man that I am, this is not with me a question of so many pounds: it is the wounded _amour propre_ of a man who, all through his life, held out the right hand of fellowship to those very men who now conspire to be his ruin. And such, my dear boy, such, for the most part, are the dealings of the turf. I do not mean to say that men of high honour and unblemished integrity are not foremost in the encouragement of a sport which, from its bold and manly character, is essentially an English one; but this I would a.s.sert, that probity, truth, and honour are the gifts of but a very small number of those who make a traffic of the turf, and are, what the world calls, "racing men."

And oh how very hard the struggle, how nice the difficulty, of him who makes these men his daily companions, to avoid the many artifices which the etiquette of the racecourse permits, but which the feelings of a gentleman would reject as unfair and unworthy! How contaminating that laxity of principle that admits of every stratagem, every trick, as legitimate, with the sole proviso that it be successful! And what a position is it that admits of no alternative save being the dupe or the blackleg! How hard for the young fellow entering upon life with all the ardour, all the unsuspecting freshness of youth about him, to stop short at one without pa.s.sing on to the other stage! How difficult, with offended pride and wounded self-love, to find himself the mere tool of sharpers! How very difficult to check the indignant spirit, that whispers retaliation by the very arts by which he has been cheated! Is not such a trial as this too much for any boy of twenty? and is it not to be feared that, in the estimation he sees those held in whose blackguardism is their pre-eminence, a perverted ambition to be what is called a sharp fellow may sap and undermine every honourable feeling of the heart, break down the barriers of rigid truth and scrupulous fidelity, teaching him to exult at what formerly he had blushed, and to recognise no folly so contemptible as that of him who believes the word of another? Such a career as this has many a one pursued, abandoning bit by bit every grace, every virtue, and every charm of his character, that, at the end, he should come forth a "sporting gentleman."'

He paused for a few seconds, and then, turning towards me, added, in a voice tremulous from emotion, 'And yet, my boy, to men like this I would now expose you! No, no, Jack; I' ll not do it. I care not what turn the thing may take; I 'll not embitter my life with this reflection.' He seized the letter, and crushing it in his hand, walked towards the window.

'Come, come, O'Grady,' said I, 'this is not fair; you first draw a strong picture of these men, and then you deem me weak enough to fall into their snares. That would hardly say much for my judgment and good sense; besides, you have stimulated my curiosity, and I shall be sadly disappointed if I'm not to see them.'

'Be it so, Jack!' said he with a sigh. 'I shall give you a couple of letters to some friends of mine down there; and I know but one recompense you'll have for all the trouble and annoyance of this business--your pretty friend, Miss Bellew, is on a visit in the neighbourhood, and is certain to be at the race.'

Had O'Grady looked at me while he spoke he would have seen how deeply this intelligence affected me, while I myself could with difficulty restrain the increased interest I now felt in all about the matter, questioning him on every particular, inquiring into a hundred minute points, and, in fact, displaying an ardour on the subject that nothing short of my friend's preoccupation could have failed in detecting the source of. My mind now fixed on one object, I could scarcely follow him in his directions as to travelling down, secrecy, etc.

I heard something about the ca.n.a.l-boat, and some confused impression was on my mind about a cross-road and a jaunting-car; but the prospect of meeting Louisa, the hope of again being in her society, rendered me indifferent to all else; and as I thrust the letters he gave me into my coat-pocket, and promised an implicit observance of all his directions, I should have been sorely puzzled had he asked me to repeat them.

'Now,' continued O'Grady, at the end of about half-an-hour's rapid speaking, 'I believe I've put you in possession of all the bearings of this case. You understand, I hope, the kind of men you have to deal with, and I trust Mr. Ulick Burke is thoroughly known to you by this time?'

'Oh, perfectly,' said I, half mechanically.

'Well, then, my boy, I believe I had better say good-bye. Something tells me we shall meet ere long; meanwhile, Jack, you have my best wishes.' He paused for a moment and turned away his head, evidently affected, then added, 'You'll write to me soon, of course; and as that old fool Corny follows me in a week----'

'And is Corny going abroad?'

'Ay, confound him! like the old man in Sindbad, there 's no getting him off one's shoulders. Besides, he has a kind of superst.i.tion that he ought to close the eyes of the last of the family; and as he has frankly confessed to me this morning he knows I am in that predicament, he esteems it a point of duty to accompany me. Poor fellow, with all his faults, I can't help feeling attached to him; and were I to leave him behind me, what would become of him? No, Jack, I am fully sensible of all the inconvenience, all the ridicule of this step, but, 'faith, I prefer both to the embittering reflection I should have did I desert him.'

'Why does he remain after you, Phil? He 'll never find his way to London.'

'Oh, trust him! What with scolding, cursing, and abusing every one he meets, he'll attract notice enough on the road never to be forgotten, or left behind. But the fact is, it is his own proposition; and Corny has asked for a few days' leave of absence, for the first time for seven-and-twenty years!'

'And what the deuce can that be for?'

'You 'd never guess if you tried until to-morrow--to see his mother.'

'Corny's mother! Corny Delany's mother!'

'Just so--his mother. Ah, Hinton! you still have much to learn about us all here. And now, before we part, let me instruct you on this point; not that I pretend to have a reason for it, nor do I know that there is any, but somehow I'll venture to say that whenever you meet with a little cross-grained, ill-conditioned, ill-thriven old fellow, with a face as if carved in the knot of a crab-tree, the odds are about fifteen to one that the little wretch has a mother alive. Whether it is that the tenacity of life among such people is greater, or whether Nature has any peculiar objects of her own in view in the matter, I can't say, but trust me for the fact. And now, I believe, I have run myself close to time; so once more, Jack, good-bye, and G.o.d bless you!'

He hurried from the room as he spoke, but, as the door was closing, I saw that his lip trembled and his cheek was pale; while I leaned against the window-shutter and looked after him with a heavy and oppressed heart, for he was my first friend in the world.

CHAPTER XIX. THE Ca.n.a.l-BOAT

In obedience to O'Grady's directions, of which, fortunately for me, he left a memorandum in writing, I started from Portobello in the ca.n.a.l-boat on the afternoon of the day after his departure. The day was dark and lowering, with occasional showers of cold and sleety rain.

However, the casual glance I took of the gloomy cell, denominated cabin, deterred me from seeking shelter there, and b.u.t.toned up in my greatcoat and with my travelling-cap drawn firmly over my eyes, I walked the deck for several hours, my own thoughts affording me sufficient occupation; and even had the opportunity presented itself, I should not have desired any other. On this score, however, there was no temptation; and as I looked at my fellow-pa.s.sengers, there was nothing either in their voice, air, or appearance to induce me to care for any closer intimacy.

The majority of them were stout, plain-looking countryfolk, with coats of brown or grey frieze, leather gaiters, and thick shoes, returning, as I could guess from some chance expressions they dropped, from the Dublin market, whither they had proceeded with certain droves of bullocks, wethers, and hoggets, the qualities of which formed the staple of conversation. There were also some lady pa.s.sengers--one a rather good-looking woman, with a certain air of half gentility about her, which enabled her at times to display to her companion her profound contempt for the rest of the company. This companion was a poor subdued-looking girl of about eighteen or twenty years, who scarcely ventured to raise her haggard eyes, and spoke with an accent painful from agitation; her depressed look and her humble manner did not conceal, however, a certain air of composed and quiet dignity, which spoke of happier days. A host of ill-bred, noisy, and unmannerly children accompanied them; and I soon discovered that the mother was the wife of the great shopkeeper in Loughrea, and her pale companion a governess she had just procured in Dublin, to initiate the promising offspring in the accomplished acquirements of French, Italian, music, and painting. Their only acquaintance on board seemed to be a jolly-looking man who, although intimate with every one, seemed somehow not to suffer in the grand lady's esteem from the familiarities he dispensed on all sides. He was a short, florid-looking little fellow, with a round bullet head, the features of which seemed at first sight so incongruous that it was difficult to decide on their prevailing expression; his large grey eyes, which rolled and twinkled with fun, caught a character of severity from his heavy overhanging eyebrows, and there was a stern determination in his compressed lips that every moment gave way to some burst of jocular good-humour, as he accosted one or other of his friends. His voice, however, was the most remarkable thing about him; for while at one moment he would declaim in the full round tone of a person accustomed to speak in public, in the next he would drop down into an easy and familiar accent, to which the mellowness of his brogue imparted a raciness quite peculiar. His dress was a suit of rusty black, with leather breeches of the same colour, and high boots.

This costume, which p.r.o.nounced him a priest, might also, had I known more of the country, have explained the secrets of that universal understanding he maintained with all on board. He knew every one's business, whither they were going, where they had been, what success had attended them in the market, how much the black heifer brought, what the pigs were sold for; he asked why Tim didn't come to his duties, and if Molly's child was well of the measles; he had a word too for the shopkeeper's wife, but that was said in a whisper; and then producing a copper snuff-box, about the size of a saucer, he presented it to me with a graceful bow, saying--

'This is not the first time I have had the honour of being your fellow-traveller, Captain. We came over from Liverpool together.'

I now remembered that this was the same priest whose controversial powers had kept me awake for nearly half the night, and whose convivial ones filled up the remainder. I was delighted, however, to renew my acquaintance, and we soon cemented an intimacy, which ended in his proposing that we should sit together at dinner, to which I at once a.s.sented.

'Dacent people, dacent people, Captain; but _bastes_, after all, in the ways of the world--none of the _usage de societe_, as we used to say at St. Omer's. No, no; _ferae naturae_, devil a more. But here comes the dinner; the ould story--leg of mutton and turnips, boiled chickens and ham, a cod and potatoes! By the Ma.s.s, they would boil one's father if they had him on board,' while he added in a whisper--'by rason they can't roast! So now, will you move down, if you please?'

'After your reverence, if you'll permit. _Arma cedant togae_.'

'Thrue for you, my son, _sacerdotes priores_; and though I am only a priest----'