The Knight Of Gwynne Volume II Part 5

"'Oh! I see now,' said my grandfather; 'that was the wager, was it? Oh, bedad! I think you might have given me odds, if that was our bet.'

"'Why, what did you think it was?'

"'Oh, nothing at all, sir. It's no matter now; it was another thing was pa.s.sing in my mind. I was hoping to have the honor of making his acquaintance, nattered as I was by all you told me about him.'

"'Ah! that's difficult, I confess,' said the captain; 'but still one might do something. He wants a little money just now. If you could make interest to be the lender, I would n't say that what you suggest is impossible.'

"Well, ma'am, it was just as it happened before; the old story,--more parchment, more comparing of deeds, a heavy check on the bank for the amount.

"When it was all done, M'Claverty came in one morning and in plain clothes to my grandfather's back office.

"'Dodd and Dempsey,' said he, 'I 've been thinking over your business, and I'll tell you what my plan is. Old Vereker, the chamberlain, is little better than a beast, thinks nothing of anybody that is n't a lord or a viscount, and, in fact, if he had his will, the Lodge in the Phoenix would be more like Pekin in Tartary than anything else? but I 'll tell you, if he won't present you at the levee, which he flatly refuses at present, I 'll do the thing in a way of my own. His Grace is going to spend a week up at Ballyriggan House, in the county of Wicklow, and I 'll contrive it, when he 's taking his morning walk through the shrubbery, to present you. All you 've to do is to be ready at a turn of the walk. I 'll show you the place, you 'll hear his foot on the gravel, and you 'll slip out, just this way. Leave the rest to me.'

"'It's beautiful,' said my grandfather. 'Begad, that's elegant.'

"'There 's one difficulty,' said M'Claverty,--'one infernal difficulty.'

"'What's that?' asked my grandfather.

"'I may be obliged to be out of the way. I lost five fifties at Daly's the other night, and I may have to cross the water for a few weeks.'

"'Don't let that trouble you,' said my grandfather; 'there's the paper.'

And he put the little bit of music into his hand; and sure enough a pleasanter sound than the same crisp squeak of a new note no man ever listened to.

"'It 's agreed upon now?' said my grandfather.

"'All right,' said M'Claverty; and with a jolly slap on the shoulder, he said, 'Good-morning, D. and D. and away he went.

"He was true to his word. That day three weeks my grandfather received a note in pencil; it was signed J. M'C, and ran thus: 'Be up at Ballyriggan at eleven o'clock on Wednesday, and wait at the foot of the hill, near the birch copse, beside the wooden bridge. Keep the left of the path, and lie still.' Begad, ma'am, it's well n.o.body saw it but himself, or they might have thought that Dodd and Dempsey was turned highwayman.

"My grandfather was prouder of the same note, and happier that morning, than if it was an order for fifty b.u.t.ts of sherry. He read it over and over, and he walked up and down the little back office, picturing out the whole scene, settling the chairs till he made a little avenue between them, and practising the way he 'd slip out slyly and surprise his Grace. No doubt, it would have been as good as a play to have looked at him.

"One difficulty preyed upon his mind,--what dress ought he to wear?

Should he be in a court suit, or ought he rather to go in his robes as an alderman? It would never do to appear in a black coat, a light gray spencer, punch-colored shorts and gaiters, white hat with a strip of black c.r.a.pe on it,--mere Dodd and Dempsey! That wasn't to be thought of.

If he could only ask his friend M'Hale, the fishmonger, who was knighted last year, he could tell all about it. M'Hale, however, would blab. He 'd tell it to the whole livery; every alderman of Skinner's Alley would know it in a week. No, no, the whole must be managed discreetly; it was a mutual confidence between the Duke and 'D. and D.' 'At all events,'

said my grandfather, 'a court dress is a safe thing;' and out he went and bespoke one, to be sent home that evening, for he could n't rest till he tried it on, and felt how he could move his head in the straight collar, and bow, without the sword tripping him up and pitching him into the Duke. I 've heard my father say that in the days that elapsed till the time mentioned for the interview, my grandfather lost two stone in weight. He walked half over the county Dublin, lying in ambush in every little wood he could see, and jumping out whenever he could see or hear any one coming,--little surprises which were sometimes taken as practical jokes, very unbecoming a man of his age and appearance.

"Well, ma'am, Wednesday morning came, and at six o'clock my grandfather was on the way to Ballyriggan, and at nine he was in the wood, posted at the very spot M'Claverty told him, as happy as any man could be whose expectations were so overwhelming. A long hour pa.s.sed over, and another; n.o.body pa.s.sed but a baker's boy with a bull-dog after him, and an old woman that was stealing brushwood in the shrubbery. My grandfather remarked her well, and determined to tell his Grace of it; but his own business soon drove that out of his head, for eleven o'clock came, and now there was no knowing the moment the Duke might appear. With his watch in his hand, he counted the minutes, ay, even the seconds; if he was a thief going to be hanged, and looking out over the heads of the crowd for a fellow to gallop in with a reprieve, he could n't have suffered more: his heart was in his mouth. At last, it might be about half-past eleven, he heard a footstep on the gravel, and then a loud, deep cough,--'a fine kind of cough,' my grandfather afterwards called it. He peeped out; and there, sure enough, at about sixty paces, coming down the walk, was a large, grand-looking man,--not that he was dressed as became him, for, strange as you may think it, the Lord-Lieutenant had on a shooting-jacket, and a pair of plaid trousers, and cloth boots, and a big lump of a stick in his hand,--and lucky it was that my grandfather knew him, for he bought a picture of him. On he came nearer and nearer; every step on the gravel-walk drove out of my grandfather's head half a dozen of the fine things he had got off by heart to say during the interview, until at last he was so overcome by joy, anxiety, and a kind of terror, that he could n't tell where he was, or what was going to happen to him, but he had a kind of instinct that reminded him he was to jump out when the Duke was near him; and 'pon my conscience so he did, clean and clever, into the middle of the walk, right in front of his Grace. My grandfather used to say, in telling the story, that he verily believed his feelings at that moment would have made him burst a blood-vessel if it wasn't that the Duke put his hands to his sides and laughed till the woods rang again; but, between shame and fright, my grandfather did n't join in the laugh.

"'In Heaven's name!' said his Grace, 'who or what are you?--this isn't May-day.'

"My grandfather took this speech as a rebuke for standing so bold in his Grace's presence; and being a shrewd man, and never deficient in tact, what does he do but drops down on his two knees before him? 'My Lord,'

said he, 'I am only Dodd and Dempsey.'

"Whatever there was droll about the same house of Dodd and Dempsey I never heard, but his Grace laughed now till he had to lean against a tree. 'Well, Dodd and Dempsey, if that's your name, get up. I don't mean you any harm. Take courage, man; I am not going to knight you. By the way, are you not the worthy gentleman who lent me a trifle of twenty thousand more than once?'

"My grandfather could n't speak, but he moved his lips, and he moved his bands, this way, as though to say the honor was too great for him, but it was all true.

"'Well, Dodd and Dempsey, I 've a very high respect for you,' said his Grace; 'I intend, some of these fine days, when business permits, to go over and eat an oyster at your villa on the coast.'

"My grandfather remembers no more; indeed, ma'am, I believe that at that instant his Grace's condescension had so much overwhelmed him that he had a kind of vision before his eyes of a whole wood full of Lord-Lieutenants, with about thirty thousand people opening oysters for them as fast as they could eat, and he himself running about with a pepper-caster, pressing them to eat another 'black fin.' It was something of that kind; for when he got on his legs a considerable time must have elapsed, as he found all silent around him, and a smart rheumatic pain in his knee-joints from the cold of the ground.

"The first thing my grandfather did when he got back to town was to remember that he had no villa on the sea-coast, nor any more suitable place to eat an oyster than his house in Abbey Street, for he could n't ask his Grace to go to 'Killeen's.' Accordingly he set out the next day in search of a villa, and before a week was over he had as beautiful a place about a mile below Howth as ever was looked at; and that he mightn't be taken short, he took a lease of two oyster-beds, and made every preparation in life for the Duke's visit. He might have spared himself the trouble. Whether it was that somebody had said something of him behind his back, or that politics were weighing on the Duke's mind,--the Catholics were mighty troublesome then,--or, indeed, that he forgot it altogether, clean, but so it was, my grandfather never heard more of the visit, and if the oysters waited for his Grace to come and eat them, they might have filled up Howth harbor.

"A year pa.s.sed over, and my grandfather was taking his solitary walk in the Park, very nearly in the same place as before,--for you see, ma'am, he could n't bear the sight of the seacoast, and the very smell of sh.e.l.l-fish made him ill,--when somebody called out his name. He looked up, and there was M'Claverty in a gig.

"'Well, D. and D., how goes the world with you?'

"'Very badly indeed,' says my grandfather; his heart was full, and he just told him the whole story.

"'I'll settle it all,' said the captain; 'leave it to me. There 's to be a review to-morrow in the Park; get on the back of the best horse you can find,--the Duke is a capital judge of a nag,--ride him briskly about the field; he 'll notice you, never fear; the whole thing will come up before his memory, and you 'll have him to breakfast before the week's over.'

"'Do you think so?--do you really think so?'

"'I 'll take my oath of it. I say, D. and D., could you do a little thing at a short date just now?'

"'If it was n't too heavy,' said my grandfather, with a faint sigh.

"'Only a hundred.'

"'Well,' said he, 'you may send it down to the office. Good-bye.' And with that he turned back towards town again; not to go home, however, for he knew well there was no time to lose, but straight he goes to Dycer's,--it was old Tom was alive in those days, and a shrewder man than Tom Dycer there never lived. They tell you, ma'am, there 's chaps in London that if you send them your height, and your width, and your girth round the waist, they 'll make you a suit of clothes that will fit you like your own skin; but, 'pon my conscience, I believe if you 'd give your age and the color of your hair to old Tom Dycer, he could provide you a horse the very thing to carry you. Whenever a stranger used to come into the yard, Tom would throw a look at him, out of the corner of his eye,--for he had only one, there was a feather on the other,--Tom would throw a look at him, and he'd shout out, 'Bring out 42; take out that brown mare with the white fetlocks.' That's the way he had of doing business, and the odds were five to one but the gentleman rode out half an hour after on the beast Tom intended for him. This suited my grandfather's knuckle well; for when he told him that it was a horse to ride before the Lord-Lieutenant he wanted, 'Bedad,' says Tom, 'I'll give you one you might ride before the Emperor of Chaney.--Here, Dennis, trot out 176.' To all appearance, ma'am, 176 was no common beast, for every man in the yard, big and little, set off, when they heard the order, down to the stall where he stood, and at last two doors were flung wide open, and out he came with a man leading him. He was seventeen hands two if he was an inch, bright gray, with flea-bitten marks all over him; he held his head up so high at one end, and his tail at the other, that my grandfather said he 'd have frightened the stoutest fox-hunter to look at him; besides, my dear, he went with his knees in his mouth when he trotted, and gave a skelp of his hind legs at every stride, that it was n't safe to be within four yards of him.

"'There's action!' says Tom,--'there 's bone and figure! Quiet as a lamb, without stain or blemish, warranted in every harness, and to carry a lady.'

"'I wish he 'd carry a wine-merchant safe for about one hour and a half,' said my grandfather to himself. 'What's his price?'

"But Tom would n't mind him, for he was going on reciting the animal's perfections, and telling him how he was bred out of Kick the Moon, by Moll Flanders, and that Lord Dunraile himself only parted with him because he did n't think him showy enough for a charger. 'Though, to be sure,' said Tom, 'he's greatly improved since that. Will you try him in the school, Mr. Dempsey?' said he; 'not but I tell you that you 'll find him a little mettlesome or so there; take him on the gra.s.s, and he's gentleness itself,--he's a kid, that's what he is.'

"'And his price?' said my grandfather.

"Dycer whispered something in his ear.

"'Blood alive!' said my grandfather.

"'Devil a farthing less. Do you think you 're to get beauty and action, ay, and gentle temper, for nothing?'

"My dear, the last words, 'gentle temper,' wasn't well out of his mouth when 'the kid' put his two hind-legs into the little pulpit where the auctioneer was sitting, and sent him flying through the window behind him into the stall.

"'That comes of tickling him,' said Tom; 'them blackguards never will let a horse alone.'

"'I hope you don't let any of them go out to the reviews in the Park, for I declare to Heaven, if I was on his back then, Dodd and Dempsey would be D. D. sure enough.'

"'With a large snaffle, and the saddle well back,' says Tom, 'he's a lamb.'

"'G.o.d grant it,' says my grandfather; 'send him over to me to-morrow, about eleven.' He gave a check for the money,--we never heard how much it was,--and away he went.

"That must have been a melancholy evening for him, for he sent for old Rogers, the attorney, and after he was measured for breeches and boots, he made his will and disposed of his effects, 'For there's no knowing,'

said he, 'what 176 may do for me.' Rogers did his best to persuade him off the excursion,--