The Knight Of Gwynne, Vol. 2. Lever Charles James

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ skill in household matters; and Miss Darcy, who seemed immensely amused by the novelty of such a character, sustained her part to admiration, entering deeply into culinary details, and communicating receipts invented for the occasion. At another time, perhaps, the Knight would have checked the spirit of persiflage in which his daughter indulged; but he suffered it now to take its course, well pleased that the mark of her ridicule was not only worthy of the sarcasm, but insensible to its arrow.

      “Quite right, – quite right not to try Mother Fum’s when you can get up a little thing like this, – and such capital sherry; look how Tom takes it in, – slips like oil over his lip!”

      Leonard looked up. An expression of rebuking severity for a moment crossed his features; but his eyes fell the next instant, and a low, faint sigh escaped him.

      “I ought to know what sherry is, – ‘Dodd and Dempsey’s’ was the great house for sherry.”

      “By the way,” said the Knight, “did not you promise me a little narrative of Dodd and Dempsey, when we parted yesterday?”

      “To be sure, I did. Will you have it now?”

      Lady Eleanor and Helen rose to withdraw; but Mr. Dempsey, who took the movement as significant, immediately interposed, by saying, —

      “Don’t stir, ma’am, – sit down, ladies, I beg; there’s nothing broad in the story, – it might be told before the maids of honor.”

      Lady Eleanor and Helen were thunderstruck at the explanation, and the Knight laughed till the tears came.

      “My dear Eleanor,” said he, “you really must accept Mr. Dempsey’s assurance, and listen to his story now.”

      The ladies took their seats once more, and Mr. Dempsey, having filled his glass, drank off a bumper; but whether it was that the narrative itself demanded a greater exertion at his hands, or that the cold quietude of Lady Eleanor’s manner abashed him, but he found a second bumper necessary before he commenced his task.

      “I say,” whispered he to the Knight, “couldn’t you get that decanter out of Leonard’s reach before I begin? He’ll not leave a drop in it while I am talking.”

      As if he felt that, after his explanation, the tale should be more particularly addressed to Lady Eleanor, he turned his chair round so as to face her, and thus began: —

      “There was once upon a time, ma’am, a Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland who was a Duke. Whether he was Duke of Rutland, or Bedford, or Portland, or any other title it was he had, my memory does n’t serve me; it is enough, however, if I say he was immensely rich, and, like many other people in the same way, immensely in debt. The story goes that he never travelled through England, and caught sight of a handsome place, or fine domain, or a beautiful cottage, that he did n’t go straightway to the owner and buy it down out of the face, as a body might say, whether he would or no. And so in time it came to pass that there was scarcely a county in England without some magnificent house belonging to him. In many parts of Scotland he had them too, and in all probability he would have done the same in Ireland, if he could. Well, ma’am, there never was such rejoicings as Dublin saw the night his Grace arrived to be our Viceroy. To know that we had got a man with one hundred and fifty thousand a year, and a spirit to spend double the money, was a downright blessing from Providence, and there was no saying what might not be the prosperity of Ireland under so auspicious a ruler.

      “To do him justice, he did n’t balk public expectation. Open house at the Castle, ditto at the Lodge in the Park, a mansion full of guests in the county Wicklow, a pack of hounds in Kildare, twelve horses training at the Curragh, a yacht like a little man-of-war in Dunleary harbor, large subscriptions to everything like sport, and a pension for life to every man that could sing a jolly song, or write a witty bit of poetry. Well, ma’am, they say, who remember those days, that they saw the best of Ireland; and surely I believe, if his Grace had only lived, and had his own way, the peerage would have been as pleasant, and the bench of bishops as droll, and the ladies of honor as – Well, never mind, I ‘ll pass on.” Here Mr. Dempsey, to console himself for the abruptness of his pause, poured out and drank another bumper of sherry. “Pleasant times they were.” said he, smacking his lips; “and faith, if Tom Leonard himself was alive then, the color of his nose might have made him Commander of the Forces; but, to continue, it was Dodd and Dempsey’s house supplied the sherry, – only the sherry, ma’am; old Stewart, of Belfast, had the port, and Kinnahan the claret and lighter liquors. I may mention, by the way, that my grandfather’s contract included brandy, and that he would n’t have given it up for either of the other two. It was just about this time that Dodd died, and my grandfather was left alone in the firm; but whether it was out of respect for his late partner, or that he might have felt himself lonely, but he always kept up the name of Dodd on the brass plate, and signed the name along with his own; indeed, they say that he once saluted his wife by the name of Mrs. Dodd and Dempsey. But, as I was saying, it was one of those days when my grandfather was seated on a high stool in the back office of his house in Abbey Street, that a fine, tall young fellow, with a blue frock-coat, all braided with gold, and an elegant cocked-hat, with a plume of feathers in it, came tramping into the room, his spurs jingling, and his brass sabre clinking, and his sabretash banging at his legs.

      “‘Mr. Dempsey?’ said he.

      “‘D. and D.,’ said my grandfather, – ‘that is, Dodd and Dempsey, your Grace,’ for he half suspected it was the Duke himself.

      “‘I am Captain M’Claverty, of the Scots Greys,’ said he, ‘first aide-de-camp to his Excellency.’

      “‘I hope you may live to be colonel of the regiment,’ said my grandfather, for he was as polite and well-bred as any man in Ireland.

      “‘That’s too good a sentiment,’ said the captain, ‘not to be pledged in a glass of your own sherry.’

      “‘And we’ll do it too,’ said old Dempsey. And he opened the desk, and took out a bottle he had for his own private drinking, and uncorked it with a little pocket corkscrew he always carried about with him, and he produced two glasses, and he and the captain hobnobbed and drank to each other.

      “‘Begad!’ said the captain, ‘his Grace sent me to thank you for the delicious wine you supplied him with, but it’s nothing to this, – not to be compared to it.’

      “‘I ‘ve better again,’ said my grandfather. ‘I ‘ve wine that would bring the tears into your eyes when you saw the decanter getting low.’

      “The captain stared at him, and maybe it was that the speech was too much for his nerves, but he drank off two glasses one after the other as quick as he could fill them out.

      “‘Dempsey,’ said he, looking round cautiously, ‘are we alone?’

      “‘We are,’ said my grandfather.

      “‘Tell me, then,’ said M’Claverty, ‘how could his Grace get a taste of this real sherry – for himself alone, I mean? Of course, I never thought of his giving it to the Judges, and old Lord Dunboyne, and such like.’

      “‘Does he ever take a little sup in his own room, of an evening?’

      “‘I am afraid not, but I ‘ll tell you how I think it might be managed. You ‘re a snug fellow, Dempsey, you ‘ve plenty of money muddling away in the bank at three-and-a-half per cent; could n’t you contrive, some way or other, to get into his Excellency’s confidence, and lend him ten or fifteen thousand or so?’

      “‘Ay, or twenty,’ said my grandfather, – ‘or twenty, СКАЧАТЬ