Lord Kilgobbin Part 104

Lockwood bowed stiffly, but did not speak.

'Be attentive to the old woman,' whispered Walpole. 'A word from her will make your affair all right.'

'I have been very desirous to have had the honour of this introduction, madam,' said Lockwood, as he seated himself at her side.

'Was not that a clever diversion I accomplished with "the Heavy "?' said Walpole, as he drew away Kearney and his son into a window.

'I never heard her much worse than to-day,' said d.i.c.k.

'I don't know,' hesitated Kilgobbin. 'I suspect she is breaking. There is none of the sustained virulence I used to remember of old. She lapses into half-mildness at moments.'

'I own I did not catch them, nor, I'm afraid, did Nina,' said d.i.c.k. 'Look there! I'll be shot if she's not giving your friend the major a lesson!

When she performs in that way with her hands, you may swear she is didactic.'

'I think I'll go to his relief,' said Walpole; 'but I own it's a case for the V.C.'

As Walpole drew nigh, he heard her saying: 'Marry one of your own race, and you will jog on well enough. Marry a Frenchwoman or a Spaniard, and she'll lead her own life, and be very well satisfied; but a poor Irish girl, with a fresh heart and a joyous temper--what is to become of her, with your dull habits and your dreary intercourse, your county society and your Chinese manners!'

'Miss O'Shea is telling me that I must not look for a wife among her countrywomen,' said Lockwood, with a touching attempt to smile.

'What I overheard was not encouraging,' said Walpole; 'but I think Miss O'Shea takes a low estimate of our social temperament.'

'Nothing of the kind! All I say is, you'll do mighty well for each other, or, for aught I know, you might intermarry with the Dutch or the Germans; but it's a downright shame to unite your slow sluggish spirits with the sparkling brilliancy and impetuous joy of an Irish girl. That's a union I'd never consent to.'

'I hope this is no settled resolution,' said Walpole, speaking in a low whisper; 'for I want to bespeak your especial influence in my friend's behalf. Major Lockwood is a most impa.s.sioned admirer of Miss Kearney, and has already declared as much to her father.'

'Come over here, Mat Kearney! come over here this moment!' cried she, half wild with excitement. 'What new piece of roguery, what fresh intrigue is this? Will you dare to tell me you had a proposal for Kate, for my own G.o.d-daughter, without even so much as telling me?'

'My dear Miss Betty, be calm, be cool for one minute, and I'll tell you everything.'

'Ay, when I've found it out, Mat!'

'I profess I don't think my friend's pretensions are discussed with much delicacy, time and place considered,' said Walpole.

'We have something to think of as well as delicacy, young man: there's a woman's happiness to be remembered.'

'Here it is, now, the whole business,' said Kearney. 'The major there asked me yesterday to get my daughter's consent to his addresses.'

'And you never told me,' cried Miss Betty.

'No, indeed, nor herself neither; for after I turned it over in my mind, I began to see it wouldn't do--'

'How do you mean not do?' asked Lockwood.

'Just let me finish. What I mean is this--if a man wants to marry an Irish girl, he mustn't begin by asking leave to make love to her--'

'Mat's right!' cried the old lady stoutly.

'And above all, he oughtn't to think that the short cut to her heart is through his broad acres.'

'Mat's right--quite right!'

'And besides this, that the more a man dwells on his belongings, and the settlements, and such like, the more he seems to say, "I may not catch your fancy in everything, I may not ride as boldly or dance as well as somebody else, but never mind--you're making a very prudent match, and there is a deal of pure affection in the Three per Cents."'

'And I'll give you another reason,' said Miss Betty resolutely. 'Kate Kearney cannot have two husbands, and I've made her promise to marry my nephew this morning.'

'What, without any leave of mine?' exclaimed Kearney.

'Just so, Mat. She'll marry him if you give your consent; but whether you will or not, she'll never marry another.'

'Is there, then, a real engagement?' whispered Walpole to Kearney. 'Has my friend here got his answer?'

'He'll not wait for another,' said Lockwood haughtily, as he arose. 'I'm for town, Cecil,' whispered he.

'So shall I be this evening,' replied Walpole, in the same tone. 'I must hurry over to London and see Lord Danesbury. I've my troubles too.' And so saying, he drew his arm within the major's, and led him away; while Miss Betty, with Kearney on one side of her and d.i.c.k on the other, proceeded to recount the arrangement she had made to make over the Barn and the estate to Gorman, it being her own intention to retire altogether from the world and finish her days in the 'Retreat.'

'And a very good thing to do, too,' said Kearney, who was too much impressed with the advantages of the project to remember his politeness.

'I have had enough of it, Mat,' added she, in a lugubrious tone; 'and it's all backbiting, and lying, and mischief-making, and what's worse, by the people who might live quietly and let others do the same!'

'What you say is true as the Bible.'

'It may be hard to do it, Mat Kearney, but I'll pray for them in my hours of solitude, and in that blessed Retreat I'll ask for a blessing on yourself, and that your heart, hard and cruel and worldly as it is now, may be changed; and that in your last days--maybe on the bed of sickness--when you are writhing and twisting with pain, with a bad heart and a worse conscience--when you'll have n.o.body but hirelings near you--hirelings that will be robbing you before your eyes, and not waiting till the breath leaves you--when even the drop of drink to cool your lips--'

'Don't--don't go on that way, Miss Betty. I've a cold shivering down the spine of my back this minute, and a sickness creeping all over me.'

'I'm glad of it. I'm glad that my words have power over your wicked old nature--if it's not too late.'

'If it's miserable and wretched you wanted to make me, don't fret about your want of success; though whether it all comes too late, I cannot tell you.'

'We'll leave that to St. Joseph.'

'Do so! do so!' cried he eagerly, for he had a shrewd suspicion he would have better chances of mercy at any hands than her own.

'As for Gorman, if I find that he has any notions about claiming an acre of the property, I'll put it all into Chancery, and the suit will outlive _him_; but if he owns he is entirely dependent on my bounty, I'll settle the Barn and the land on him, and the deed shall be signed the day he marries your daughter. People tell you that you can't take your money with you into the next world, Mat Kearney, and a greater lie was never uttered.

Thanks to the laws of England, and the Court of Equity in particular, it's the very thing you can do! Ay, and you can provide, besides, that everybody but the people that had a right to it shall have a share. So I say to Gorman O'Shea, beware what you are at, and don't go on repeating that stupid falsehood about not carrying your debentures into the next world.'

'You are a wise woman, and you know life well,' said he solemnly.

'And if I am, it's nothing to sigh over, Mr. Kearney. One is grateful for mercies, but does not groan over them like rheumatism or the lumbago.'

'Maybe I 'in a little out of spirits to-day.'

'I shouldn't wonder if you were. They tell me you sat over your wine, with that tall man, last night, till nigh one o'clock, and it's not at your time of life that you can do these sort of excesses with impunity; you had a good const.i.tution once, and there's not much left of it.'

'My patience, I'm grateful to see, has not quite deserted me.'

'I hope there's other of your virtues you can be more sure of,' said she, rising, 'for if I was asked your worst failing, I'd say it was your irritability.' And with a stern frown, as though to confirm the judicial severity of her words, she nodded her head to him and walked away.