Tony Butler Part 58

"Of course I do, aunt; it reminds me of long ago," said he, with an air of emotion.

"By the way, it was George, and not you, I used to call Pickle,--poor George, that went to Bombay."

"Ah, yes; he was India Pickle, aunt, and you used to call me Piccalilli!"

"Perhaps I did, but I forget. Here, take the head of the table; Mr.

Tony, sit by me. Oh dear! what a small party! This day last week we were twenty-seven! Oh, he 'll not find Alice, for I left her in my flower-garden; I 'll go for her myself."

"Make yourself at home, Tony," said Skeffy, as soon as the old Lady left the room. "Believe me, it is with no common pleasure that I see you under my roof."

"I was going to play parrot, and say, 'Don't you wish you may?'"

muttered Tony, dryly.

"Unbeliever, that will not credit the mutton on his plate, nor the sherry in his gla.s.s! Hush! here they are."

Alice sailed proudly into the room, gave her hand to Tony with a pretended air of condescension, but a real cordiality, and said, "You 're a good boy, after all; and Bella sends you all manner of kind forgivenesses."

"My nephew Darner, Alice," said Mrs. Maxwell, never very formal in her presentations of those she regarded as little more than children. "I suppose he 'll not mind being called Pickle before you?"

Even Tony--not the shrewdest, certainly, of observers--was struck by the well-bred ease with which his friend conducted himself in a situation of some difficulty, managing at the same time neither to offend the old lady's susceptibilities nor sacrifice the respect he owed himself. In fact, the presence of Alice recalled Skeffy, as if by magic, to every observance of his daily life. She belonged to the world he knew best,--perhaps the only one he knew at all; and his conversation at once became as easy and as natural as though he were once more back in the society of the great city.

Mrs. Maxwell, however, would not part with him so easily, and proceeded to put him through a catechism of all their connections--Skeffingtons, Darners, Maxwells, and Nevils--in every variety of combination. As Skeffy avowed afterwards, "The 'Little Go' was nothing to it." With the intention of shocking the old lady, and what he called "shunting her"

off all her inquiries, he reported nothing of the family but disasters and disgraces. The men and women of the house inherited, according to him, little of the proud boast of the Bayards; no one ever before heard such a catalogue of rogues, swindlers, defaulters, nor so many narratives of separations and divorces. What he meant for a shock turned out a seduction; and she grew madly eager to hear more,--more even than he was prepared to invent.

"Ugh!" said he at last to himself, as he tossed off a gla.s.s of sherry, "I'm coming fast to capital offences, and if she presses me more I'll give her a murder."

These family histories, apparently so confidentially imparted, gave Alice a pretext to take Tony off with her, and show him the gardens.

Poor Tony, too, was eager to have an opportunity to speak of his friend to Alice. "Skeffy was such a good fellow; so hearty, so generous, so ready to do a kind thing; and then, such a thorough gentleman! If you had but seen him, Alice, in our little cabin, so very different in every way from all he is accustomed to, and saw how delighted he was with everything; how pleasantly he fell into all our habits, and how nice his manner to my mother. She reads people pretty quickly; and I 'll tell you what she said,--'He has a brave big heart under all his motley.'"

"I rather like him already," said Alice, with a faint smile at Tony's eagerness; "he is going to stop here, is he not?"

"I cannot tell. I only know that Mrs. Maxwell wrote to put him off."

"Yes, that she did a couple of days ago; but now that Bella is so much better,--so nearly well, I may say,--I think she means to keep him, and you too, Tony, if you will so far favor us."

"I cannot,--it is impossible."

"I had hoped, Tony," said she, with a malicious sparkle in her eyes, "that it was only against Lyle Abbey you bore a grudge, and not against every house where I should happen to be a visitor."

"Alice, Alice!" said he, with trembling lips, "surely this is not fair."

"If it be true, is the question; and until you have told me why you ceased to come to us,--why you gave up those who always liked you,--I must, I cannot help believing it to be true."

Tony was silent: his heart swelled up as if it would burst his chest; but he struggled manfully, and hid his emotion.

"I conclude," said she, sharply, "it was not a mere caprice which made you throw us off. You had a reason, or something that you fancied was a reason."

"It is only fair to suppose so," said he, gravely.

"Well, I 'll give you the benefit of that supposition; and I ask you, as a matter of right, to give me your reason."

"I cannot, Alice,--I cannot," stammered he out, while a deadly paleness spread over his face.

"Tony," said she, gravely, "if you were a man of the world like your friend Mr. Darner, for instance, I would probably say that in a matter of this kind you ought to be left to your own judgment; but you are not. You are a kind-hearted simple-minded boy. Nay, don't blush and look offended; I never meant to offend you. Don't you know that?" and she held out to him her fair white hand, the taper fingers trembling with a slight emotion. Tony stooped and kissed it with a rapturous devotion.

"There, I did not mean that, Master Tony," said she, blushing; "I never intended your offence was to be condoned; I only thought of a free pardon."

"Then give it to me, Alice," said he, gulping down his emotion; "for I am going away, and who knows when I shall see you again?"

"Indeed," said she, with a look of agitation; "have you reconsidered it, then? have you resolved to join Maitland?"

"And were you told of this, Alice?"

"Yes, Tony: as one who feels a very deep interest in you, I came to hear it; but, indeed, partly by an accident."

"Will you tell me what it was you heard?" said he, gravely; "for I am curious to hear whether you know more than myself."

"You were to go abroad with Maitland,--you were to travel on the Continent together."

"And I was to be his secretary, eh?" broke in Tony, with a bitter laugh; "was n't that the notable project?"

"You know well, Tony, it was to be only in name."

"Of course I do; my incapacity would insure that much."

"I must say, Tony," said she, reproachfully, "that so far as I know of Mr. Maitland's intentions towards you, they were both kind and generous.

In all that he said to me, there was the delicacy of a gentleman towards a gentleman."

"He told you, however, that I had refused his offer?"

"Yes; he said it with much regret, and I asked his leave to employ any influence I might possess over you to make you retract the refusal,--at least to think again over his offer."

"And of course he refused you nothing?" said Tony, with a sneering smile.

"Pardon me,--he did not grant my request."

"Then I think better of him than I did before."

"I suspect, Tony, that, once you understood each other, you are men to be friends."

"You mean by that to flatter me, Alice,--and of course it is great flattery; but whether it is that I am too conscious of my own inferiority, or that I have, as I feel I have, such a hearty hatred of your accomplished friend, I would detest the tie that should bind me to him. Is he coming back here?"

"I do not know."

"You do not know!" said he, slowly, as he fixed his eyes on her.

"Take care, sir, take care; you never trod on more dangerous ground than when you forgot what was due to _me_, I told you I did not know; it was not necessary I should repeat it."

"There was a time when you rebuked my bad breeding less painfully, Alice," said he, in deep sorrow; "but these are days not to come back again. I do not know if it is not misery to remember them."