We and the World Volume II Part 16

Before Alister could reply, he was interrupted by a message from our late captain. The _Water-Lily_ was still in harbour, and the captain wanted the ex-mate to help him on some matters connected with the ship or her cargo. Alister would not refuse, and he was to be paid for the job, so we hastily arranged that he should go, and that Dennis and I should devote the evening to looking up the Irish cousin, and we appointed to meet on the "stelling" or wharf, alongside of which the _Water-Lily_ lay, at eleven o'clock on the following morning.

"I was a fool not to speak to that engineer fellow the other night,"

said Dennis, as we strolled on the shady side of a wide street, down the middle of which ran a wide water-d.y.k.e fringed with oleanders. "He would be certain to know where my cousin's place is."

"Do you know him?" I asked, with some eagerness, for the young officer was no small hero in my eyes.

"Oh, yes, quite well. He's a lieutenant in the Engineers. He has often stayed at my father's for shooting. But he has been abroad the last two or three years, and I suppose I've grown. He didn't know--"

"There he is!" said I.

He was coming out of a garden-gate on the other side of the street. But he crossed the road, saying, "Hi, my lads!" and putting his hand into his pocket as he came.

"Here's diversion, Jack!" chuckled Dennis; "he's going to tip us for our a.s.sistance in the gunpowder plot. Look at him now! Faith, he's as short of change as myself. How that half-crown's eluding him in the corner of his pocket! It'll be no less, I a.s.sure ye. He's a liberal soul. Now for it!"

And as the young lieutenant drew near, Dennis performed an elaborate salute. But his eyes were br.i.m.m.i.n.g with roguishness, and in another moment he burst out laughing, and after one rapid glance, and a twist of his moustache that I thought must have torn it up by the roots, the young officer exploded in the same fashion.

"DENNIS!--What in the name of the mother of mischief (and I'm sure she was an O'Moore) are you masquerading in that dress for, out here?" But before Dennis could reply, the lieutenant became quite grave, and turning him round by the arm, said, "But this isn't masquerading, I see.

Dennis, my dear fellow, what does it mean?"

"It means that I was a stowaway, and my friend here a castaway--I mean that I was a castaway, and Jack was a stowaway. Willie, do you remember Barton?"

"Old Barney? Of course I do. How did he come to let you out of his sight?"

Dennis did not speak. I saw that he could not, so I took upon me to explain.

"They were out in the hooker, off the Irish coast, and she went to pieces in a gale. Old Barney was lost, and we picked Dennis up."

He nodded to me, and with his hand through Dennis O'Moore's arm, said kindly, "We'll go to my quarters, and talk it over. Where are you putting up?"

"We're only just paid off," said I.

"Then you'll rough it with me, of course, both of you."

I thanked him, and Dennis said, "Willie, the one thing I've been wanting to ask you is, if you know where that cousin of my father's lives, who is in business out here. Do you know him?"

"Certainly. I'm going there to-night, for a dance, and you shall come with me. I can rig you out."

They went ahead, arm-in-arm, and I followed at just sufficient distance behind to catch the backward looks of amazement which the young officer's pa.s.sing friends were too polite to indulge when exactly on a level with him. He capped first one and then another with an air of apparent unconsciousness, but the contrast between his smart appearance and spotless white uniform, and the patched remains of Dennis's homespun suit (to say nothing of the big bundle in which he carried his "duds"), justified a good deal of staring, of which I experienced a humble share myself.

Very good and pleasant are the comforts of civilization, as we felt when we were fairly established in our new friend's quarters. Not that the first object of life is to be comfortable, or that I was moved by a hair's-breadth from my aims and ambitions, but I certainly enjoyed it; and, as Dennis said, "Oh, the luxury of a fresh-water wash!"--for salt water really will not clean one, and the only way to get a fresh-water wash at sea is to save out of one's limited allowance. We had done this, to the extent of two-thirds of a pailful, as we approached Guiana, and had been glad enough all to soap in the same bucket (tossing for turns) and rinse off with clean sea-water, but real "tubs" were a treat indeed!

I had had mine, and, clothed in a white suit, nearly as much too big for me as the old miser's funeral gloves, was reposing in a very easy chair, when Dennis and his friend began to dress for the dance. The lieutenant was in his bedroom, which opened to the left out of the sitting-room where I sat, and Dennis was tubbing in another room similarly placed on the right. Every door and window was open to catch what air was stirring, and they shouted to each other, over my head, so to speak, while the lieutenant's body-servant ran backwards and forwards from one to the other. He was, like so many soldiers, an Irishman, and having been with his master when he visited the O'Moores, he treated Dennis with the utmost respect, and me with civility for Dennis' sake.

He was waiting on his master when the lieutenant shouted,

"Dennis! what's your length, you lanky fellow?"

"Six foot two by the last notch on the front door. I stood in my socks, and the squire measured it with his tape."

"Well, there's half-an-inch between us if he's right; but that tape's been measuring the O'Moores from the days of St. Patrick, and I've a notion it has shrunk with age. I think my clothes will do for you."

"Thank you, thank you, Willie! You're very good."

In a few minutes...o...b..ien came out with his arms full of clothes, and pursued by his master's voice.

"O'Brien's bringing you the things; can he go in? Be quick and finish off that fresh-water business, old fellow, and get into them. I promised not to be late."

I tried to read a newspaper, but the cross-fire of talk forbade anything like attention.

"Was ye wanting me, sorr?"

"No, no. Never mind me, O'Brien. Attend to Mr. O'Moore. Can he manage with those things?"

"He can, sorr. He looks illigant," replied O'Brien from the right-hand chamber. We all laughed, and Dennis began to sing:

"Oh, once we were illigant people, Though we now live in cabins of mud; And the land that ye see from the steeple, Belonged to us all from the flood.

My father was then king of Connaught ----"

"And mislaid his crown, I'll be bound!" shouted the lieutenant. "Look here, Dennis, you'll get no good partners if we're late, and if you don't get a dance with your cousin's daughter, you'll miss a treat, I can tell you. But dancing out here isn't trifled with as it is in temperate climates, and cards are made up early."

By and by he shouted again,

"O'Brien!"

"Coming, your honour."

"I don't want you. But _is_ Mr. O'Moore ready?"

"He is, sorr, barring the waistcoat. _Take a fresh tie, Master Dennis.

The master 'll not be pleased to take ye out with one like that. Sure it's haste that's the ruin of the white ties all along._ Did ye find the young gentleman a pair of shoes, sorr?"

"Won't those I threw in fit you?" asked our host.

"I've got them. The least bit too large. A thousand thanks."

"Can you dance in them?"

"I'll try," replied Dennis, and judging by the sound, he did try then and there, singing as he twirled,

"Bad luck to this marching, Pipe-claying and starching, How neat one must be to be killed by the French!"

But O'Brien's audible delight and the progress of the song were checked by the lieutenant, who had dressed himself, and was now in the sitting-room.

"O'Brien!"

"Sorr!"

"If Mr. O'Moore is not ready, I must go without him."