The Virginians Part 13

If Maria hoped a present interview, her fond heart was disappointed. "Where are you going to dine, Harry?" asks Madame de Bernstein. "My niece Maria and I shall have a chicken in the little parlour-I think you should go to the best ordinary. There is one at the White Horse at three, we shall hear his bell in a minute or two. And you will understand, sir, that you ought not to spare expense, but behave like Princess Pocahontas's son. Your trunks have been taken over to the lodging I have engaged for you. It is not good for a lad to be always hanging about the ap.r.o.ns of two old women. Is it, Maria?"

"No," says her ladyship, dropping her meek eyes; whilst the other lady's glared in triumph. I think Andromeda had been a good deal exposed to the Dragon in the course of the last five or six days: and if Perseus had cut the latter's cruel head off he would have committed not unjustifiable monstricide. But he did not bare sword or shield; he only looked mechanically at the lacqueys in tawny and blue as they creaked about the room.

"And there are good mercers and tailors from London always here to wait on the company at the Wells. You had better see them, my dear, for your suit is not of the very last fashion-a little lace--"

"I can't go out of mourning, ma'am," said the young man, looking down at his sables.

"Ho, sir," cried the lady, rustling up from her chair and rising on her cane, "wear black for your brother till you are as old as Methuselah, if you like. I am sure I don't want to prevent you. I only want you to dress, and to do like other people, and make a figure worthy of your name."

"Madam," said Mr. Warrington with great state, "I have not done anything to disgrace it that I know."

Why did the old Woman stop and give a little start as if she had been struck? Let bygones be bygones. She and the boy had a score of little pa.s.sages of this kind in which swords were crossed and thrusts rapidly dealt or parried. She liked Harry none the worse for his courage in facing her. "Sure a little finer linen than that shirt you wear will not be a disgrace to you, sir," she said, with rather a forced laugh.

Harry bowed and blushed. It was one of the homely gifts of his Oakhurst friends. He felt pleased somehow to think he wore it; thought of the new friends, so good, so pure, so simple, so kindly, with immense tenderness, and felt, while invested in this garment, as if evil could not touch him. He said he would go to his lodging, and make a point of returning arrayed in the best linen he had.

"Come back here, sir," said Madame Bernstein, "and if our company has not arrived, Maria and I will find some ruffles for you!" And herewith, under a footman's guidance, the young fellow walked off to his new lodgings.

Harry found not only handsome and s.p.a.cious apartments provided for him, but a groom in attendance waiting to be engaged by his honour, and a second valet, if he was inclined to hire one to wait upon Mr. Gumbo. Ere he had been many minutes in his rooms, emissaries from a London tailor and bootmaker waited him with the cards and compliments of their employers, Messrs. Regnier and Tull; the best articles in his modest wardrobe were laid out by Gumbo, and the finest linen with which his thrifty Virginian mother had provided him. Visions of the snow-surrounded home in his own country, of the crackling logs and the trim quiet ladies working by the fire, rose up before him. For the first time a little thought that the homely clothes were not quite smart enough, the home-worked linen not so fine as it might be, crossed the young man's mind. That he should be ashamed of anything belonging to him or to Castlewood! That was strange. The simple folks there were only too well satisfied with all things that were done, or said, or produced at Castlewood; and Madam Esmond, when she sent her son forth on his travels, thought no young n.o.bleman need be better provided. The clothes might have fitted better and been of a later fashion, to be sure-but still the young fellow presented a comely figure enough when he issued from his apartments, his toilet over; and Gumbo calling a chair, marched beside it, until they reached the ordinary where the young gentleman was to dine.

Here he expected to find the beau whose acquaintance he had made a few hours before at his aunt's lodging, and who had indicated to Harry that the White Horse was the most modish place for dining at the Wells, and he mentioned his friend's name to the host: but the landlord and waiters leading him into the room with many smiles and bows a.s.sured his honour that his honour did not need any other introduction than his own, helped him to hang up his coat and sword on a peg, asked him whether he would drink Burgundy, Pontac, or champagne to his dinner, and led him to a table.

Though the most fashionable ordinary in the village, the White Horse did not happen to be crowded on this day. Monsieur Barbeau, the landlord, informed Harry that there was a great entertainment at Summer Hill, which had taken away most of the company; indeed, when Harry entered the room, there were but four other gentlemen in it. Two of these guests were drinking wine, and had finished their dinner: the other two were young men in the midst of their meal, to whom the landlord, as he pa.s.sed, must have whispered the name of the new-comer, for they looked at him with some appearance of interest, and made him a slight bow across the table as the smiling host bustled away for Harry's dinner.

Mr. Warrington returned the salute of the two gentlemen, who bade him welcome to Tunbridge, and hoped he would like the place upon better acquaintance. Then they smiled and exchanged waggish looks with each other, of which Harry did not understand the meaning, nor why they cast knowing glances at the two other guests over their wine.

One of these persons was in a somewhat tarnished velvet coat with a huge queue and bag, and voluminous ruffles and embroidery. The other was a little beetle-browed, hook-nosed, high-shouldered gentleman, whom his opposite companion addressed as milor, or my lord, in a very high voice. My lord, who was sipping the wine before him, barely glanced at the new-comer, and then addressed himself to his own companion.

"And so you know the nephew of the old woman-the Croesus who comes to arrive?"

"You're thrown out there, Jack!" says one young gentleman to the other.

"Never could manage the lingo," said Jack. The two elders had begun to speak in the French language.

"But a.s.suredly, my dear lord!" says the gentleman with the long queue.

"You have shown energy, my dear Baron! He has been here but two hours. My people told me of him only as I came to dinner."

"I knew him before!-I have met him often in London with the Baroness and my lord, his cousin," said the Baron.

A smoking soup for Harry here came in, borne by the smiling host. "Behold, sir! Behold a potage of my fashion!" says my landlord, laying down the dish and whispering to Harry the celebrated name of the n.o.bleman opposite. Harry thanked Monsieur Barbeau in his own language, upon which the foreign gentleman, turning round, grinned most graciously at Harry, and said, "Fous bossedez notre langue barfaidement, monsieur." Mr. Warrington had never heard the French language p.r.o.nounced in that manner in Canada. He bowed in return to the foreign gentleman.

"Tell me more about the Croesus, my good Baron," continued his lordship, speaking rather superciliously to his companion, and taking no notice of Harry, which perhaps somewhat nettled the young man.

"What will you, that I tell you, my dear lord? Croesus is a youth like other youths; he is tall, like other youths; he is awkward, like other youths; he has black hair, as they all have who come from the Indies. Lodgings have been taken for him at Mrs. Rose's toy-shop."

"I have lodgings there too," thought Mr. Warrington. "Who is Croesus they are talking of? How good the soup is!"

"He travels with a large retinue," the Baron continued, "four servants, two postchaises, and a pair of outriders. His chief attendant is a black man who saved his life from the savages in America, and who will not hear, on any account, of being made free. He persists in wearing mourning for his elder brother from whom he inherits his princ.i.p.ality."

"Could anything console you for the death of yours, Chevalier?" cried out the elder gentleman.

"Milor! his property might," said the Chevalier, "which you know is not small."

"Your brother lives on his patrimony-which you have told me is immense-you by your industry, my dear Chevalier."

"Milor!" cries the individual addressed as Chevalier.

"By your industry or your esprit,-how much more n.o.ble! Shall you be at the Baroness's to-night? She ought to be a little of your parents, Chevalier?"

"Again I fail to comprehend your lordship," said the other gentleman, rather sulkily.

"Why, she is a woman of great wit-she is of n.o.ble birth-she has undergone strange adventures-she has but little principle (there you happily have the advantage of her). But what care we men of the world? You intend to go and play with the young Creole, no doubt, and get as much money from him as you can. By the way, Baron, suppose he should be a guet-apens, that young Creole? Suppose our excellent friend has invented him up in London, and brings him down with his character for wealth to prey upon the innocent folks here?"

"J'y ai souvent pense, milor," says the little Baron, placing his finger to his nose very knowingly, "that Baroness is capable of anything."

"A Baron-a Baroness, que voulez-vous, my friend? I mean the late lamented husband. Do you know who he was?"

"Intimately. A more notorious villain never dealt a card. At Venice, at Brussels, at Spa, at Vienna-the gaols of every one of which places he knew. I knew the man, my lord."

"I thought you would. I saw him at the Hague, where I first had the honour of meeting you, and a more disreputable rogue never entered my doors. A minister must open them to all sorts of people, Baron,-spies, sharpers, ruffians of every sort."

"Parbleu, milor, how you treat them!" says my lord's companion.

"A man of my rank, my friend-of the rank I held then-of course, must see all sorts of people-entre autres your acquaintance. What his wife could want with such a name as his I can't conceive."

"Apparently, it was better than the lady's own."

"Effectively! So I have heard of my friend Paddy changing clothes with the scarecrow. I don't know which name is the most distinguished, that of the English bishop or the German baron."

"My lord," cried the other gentleman, rising and laying his hand on a large star on his coat, "you forget that I, too, am a Baron and a Chevalier of the Holy Roman--"

"-Order of the Spur!-not in the least, my dear knight and baron! You will have no more wine? We shall meet at Madame de Bernstein's to-night." The knight and baron quitted the table, felt in his embroidered pockets, as if for money to give the waiter, who brought him his great laced hat, and waving that menial off with a hand surrounded by large ruffles and blazing rings, he stalked away from the room.

It was only when the person addressed as my lord had begun to speak of the bishop's widow and the German baron's wife that Harry Warrington was aware how his aunt and himself had been the subject of the two gentlemen's conversation. Ere the conviction had settled itself on his mind, one of the speakers had quitted the room, and the other, turning to a table at which two gentlemen sate, said, "What a little sharper it is! Everything I said about Bernstein relates mutato nomine to him. I knew the fellow to be a spy and a rogue. He has changed his religion I don't know how many times. I had him turned out of the Hague myself when I was amba.s.sador, and I know he was caned in Vienna."

"I wonder my Lord Chesterfield a.s.sociates with such a villain!" called out Harry from his table. The other couple of diners looked at him. To his surprise the n.o.bleman so addressed went on talking.

"There cannot be a more fieffe coquin than this Poellnitz. Why, Heaven be thanked, he has actually left me my snuff-box! You laugh?-the fellow is capable of taking it." And my lord thought it was his own satire at which the young men were laughing.

"You are quite right, sir," said one of the two diners, turning to Mr. Warrington, "though, saving your presence, I don't know what business it is of yours. My lord will play with anybody who will set him. Don't be alarmed, he is as deaf as a post, and did not hear a word that you said; and that's why my lord will play with anybody who will put a pack of cards before him, and that is the reason why he consorts with this rogue."

"Faith, I know other n.o.blemen who are not particular as to their company," says Mr. Jack.

"Do you mean because I a.s.sociate with you? I know my company, my good friend, and I defy most men to have the better of me."

Not having paid the least attention to Mr. Warrington's angry interruption, my lord opposite was talking in his favourite French with Monsieur Barbeau, the landlord, and graciously complimenting him on his dinner. The host bowed again and again; was enchanted that his Excellency was satisfied: had not forgotten the art which he had learned when he was a young man in his Excellency's kingdom of Ireland. The salmi was to my lord's liking? He had just served a dish to the young American seigneur who sate opposite, the gentleman from Virginia.

"To whom?" My lord's pale face became red for a moment, as he asked this question, and looked towards Harry Warrington, opposite to him.

"To the young gentleman from Virginia who has just arrived, and who perfectly possesses our beautiful language!" says Mr. Barbeau, thinking to kill two birds, as it were, with this one stone of a compliment.

"And to whom your lordship will be answerable for language reflecting upon my family, and uttered in the presence of these gentlemen," cried out Mr. Warrington, at the top of his voice, determined that his opponent should hear.

"You must go and call into his ear, and then he may perchance hear you," said one of the younger guests.

"I will take care that his lordship shall understand my meaning, one way or other," Mr. Warrington said, with much dignity; "and will not suffer calumnies regarding my relatives to be uttered by him or any other man!"

Whilst Harry was speaking, the little n.o.bleman opposite to him did not hear him, but had time sufficient to arrange his own reply. He had risen, pa.s.sing his handkerchief once or twice across his mouth, and laying his slim fingers on the table. "Sir," said he, "you will believe, on the word of a gentleman, that I had no idea before whom I was speaking, and it seems that my acquaintance, Monsieur de Poellnitz, knew you no better than myself. Had I known you, believe me that I should have been the last man in the world to utter a syllable that should give you annoyance; and I tender you my regrets and apologies, before my Lord March and Mr. Morris here present."

To these words, Mr. Warrington could only make a bow, and mumble out a few words of acknowledgment: which speech having made believe to hear, my lord made Harry another very profound bow, and saying he should have the honour of waiting upon Mr. Warrington at his lodgings, saluted the company, and went away.

CHAPTER XXVI. In which we are at a very Great Distance from Oakhurst

Within the precinct of the White Horse Tavern, and coming up to the windows of the eating-room, was a bowling-green, with a table or two, where guests might sit and partake of punch or tea. The three gentlemen having come to an end of their dinner about the same time, Mr. Morris proposed that they should adjourn to the Green, and there drink a cool bottle. "Jack Morris would adjourn to the Dust Hole, as a pretext for a fresh drink," said my lord. On which Jack said he supposed each gentleman had his own favourite way of going to the deuce. His weakness, he owned, was a bottle.

"My Lord Chesterfield's deuce is deuce-ace," says my Lord March. "His lordship can't keep away from the cards or dice."

"My Lord March has not one devil, but several devils. He loves gambling, he loves horse-racing, he loves betting, he loves drinking, he loves eating, he loves money, he loves women; and you have fallen into bad company, Mr. Warrington, when you lighted upon his lordship. He will play you for every acre you have in Virginia."

"With the greatest pleasure in life, Mr. Warrington!" interposes my lord.

"And for all your tobacco, and for all your spices, and for all your slaves, and for all your oxen and a.s.ses, and for everything that is yours."

"Shall we begin now? Jack, you are never without a dice-box or a bottle-screw. I will set Mr. Warrington for what he likes."

"Unfortunately, my lord, the tobacco, and the slaves, and the a.s.ses, and the oxen, are not mine, as yet. I am just of age, and my mother, scarce twenty years older, has quite as good chance of long life as I have."

"I will bet you that you survive her. I will pay you a sum now against four times the sum to be paid at her death. I will set you a fair sum over this table against the reversion of your estate in Virginia at the old lady's departure. What do you call your place?"

"Castlewood."

"A princ.i.p.ality, I hear it is. I will bet that its value has been exaggerated ten times at least amongst the quidnuncs here. How came you by the name of Castlewood?-you are related to my lord? Oh, stay: I know,-my lady, your mother, descends from the real head of the house. He took the losing side in '15. I have had the story a dozen times from my old d.u.c.h.ess. She knew your grandfather. He was friend of Addison and Steele, and Pope and Milton, I dare say, and the bigwigs. It is a pity he did not stay at home, and transport the other branch of the family to the plantations."

"I have just been staying at Castlewood with my cousin there," remarked Mr. Warrington.

"Hm! Did you play with him? He's fond of pasteboard and bones."

"Never, but for sixpences and a pool of commerce with the ladies."

"So much the better for both of you. But you played with Will Esmond if he was at home? I will lay ten to one you played with Will Esmond."

Harry blushed, and owned that of an evening his cousin and he had had a few games at cards.

"And Tom Sampson, the chaplain," cried Jack Morris, "was he of the party? I wager that Tom made a third, and the Lord deliver you from Tom and Will Esmond together!"

"Nay; the truth is, I won of both of them," said Mr. Warrington.

"And they paid you? Well, miracles will never cease!"

"I did not say anything about miracles," remarked Mr. Harry, smiling over his wine.

"And you don't tell tales out of school-the volto sciolto-hey, Mr. Warrington?" says my lord.

"I beg your pardon," said downright Harry, "French is the only language besides my own of which I know a little."

"My Lord March has learned Italian at the Opera, and a pretty penny his lessons have cost him," remarked Jack Morris. "We must show him the Opera-mustn't we, March?"

"Must we, Morris?" said my lord, as if he only half liked the other's familiarity.

Both of the two gentlemen were dressed alike, in small scratch-wigs without powder, in blue frocks with plate b.u.t.tons, in buckskins and riding-boots, in little hats with a narrow cord of lace, and no outward mark of fashion.

"I don't care about the Opera much, my lord," says Harry, warming with his wine; "but I should like to go to Newmarket, and long to see a good English hunting-field."

"We will show you Newmarket and the hunting-field, sir. Can you ride pretty well?"

"I think I can," Harry said; "and I can shoot pretty well, and jump some."

"What's your weight? I bet you we weigh even, or I weigh most. I bet you Jack Morris beats you at birds or a mark, at five-and-twenty paces. I bet you I jump farther than you on flat ground, here on this green."

"I don't know Mr. Morris's shooting-I never saw either gentleman before-but I take your bets, my lord, at what you please," cries Harry, who by this time was more than warm with Burgundy.

"Ponies on each!" cried my lord.

"Done and done!" cried my lord and Harry together. The young man thought it was for the honour of his country not to be ashamed of any bet made to him.

"We can try the last bet now, if your feet are pretty steady," said my lord, springing up, stretching his arms and limbs, and looking at the crisp, dry gra.s.s. He drew his boots off, then his coat and waistcoat, buckling his belt round his waist, and flinging his clothes down to the ground.

Harry had more respect for his garments. It was his best suit. He took off the velvet coat and waistcoat, folded them up daintily, and, as the two or three tables round were slopped with drink, went to place the clothes on a table in the eating-room, of which the windows were open.

Here a new guest had entered; and this was no other than Mr. Wolfe, who was soberly eating a chicken and salad, with a modest pint of wine. Harry was in high spirits. He told the Colonel he had a bet with my Lord March-would Colonel Wolfe stand him halves? The Colonel said he was too poor to bet. Would he come out and see fair play? That he would with all his heart. Colonel Wolfe set down his gla.s.s, and stalked through the open window after his young friend.

"Who is that tallow-faced Put with the carroty hair?" says Jack Morris, on whom the Burgundy had had its due effect.

Mr. Warrington explained that this was Lieutenant-Colonel Wolfe, of the 20th Regiment.

"Your humble servant, gentlemen!" says the Colonel, making the company a rigid military bow.

"Never saw such a figure in my life!" cries Jack Morris. "Did you-March?"