Tony Butler. Lever Charles James

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СКАЧАТЬ Arthur pondered as he went over what he should say, and how he would meet the remarks he deemed it likely she would make to him. Without being in the least what is called a person of superior abilities, Mrs. Butler was a somewhat hard-headed woman, whose North of Ireland caution and shrewdness stood her in stead for higher qualities; and if they would not have guided her in great difficulties, she had the good fortune or the prudence to escape from such. He knew this; and he knew besides that there pertains to a position of diminished means and station a peculiar species of touchy pride, always suggesting to its possessor the suspicion that this or that liberty would never have been taken in happier days, and thus to regard the most well-meant counsels and delicately conveyed advice as uncalled-for interference, or worse.

      It was after much consideration he saw himself at the little wicket of the garden, where he dismounted, and, fastening his bridle to the gate, knocked at the door. Though he could distinctly hear the sound of voices within, and the quick movement of feet, his summons was unanswered, and he was about to repeat it for the third time when the door was opened.

      “Is your mistress at home, Jeanie?” said he, recognizing with a smile the girl’s courtesy to him.

      “Yes, sir, she’s at home,” was the dry answer.

      “Will you just tell her, then, that Sir Arthur Lyle would take it as a great favor if she’d permit him to speak to her?”

      The girl disappeared with the message, but did not return again for several minutes; and when she did, she looked slightly agitated. “My mistress is very sorry, sir, but she canna see ye the day; it’s a sort of a headache she has.”

      “Mr. Anthony, is he at home?” asked he, curious to remark the effect of his question.

      “He’s no just at name the noo,” was the cautious reply.

      “He has not been up at the Abbey to-day,” said he, carelessly; “but, to be sure, I came through the ‘bracken,’ and might have missed him.”

      A little dry nod of the head, to acknowledge that this or anything else was possible, was all that his speech elicited.

      “Say that I was very sorry, Jeanie, that Mrs. Butler could not see me, and sorrier for the reason; but that I hope tomorrow or next day to be more fortunate. Not,” added he, after a second thought, “that what I wanted to speak of is important, except to myself; don’t forget this, Jeanie.”

      “I winna forget,” said she; and courtesying again, closed the door. Sir Arthur rode slowly back to report that his embassy had failed.

      CHAPTER IV. SOME NEW ARRIVALS

      Day after day went over, and no tidings of Maitland. When the post came in of a morning, and no letter in his hand appeared, Mark’s impatience was too perceptible to make any comment for his sisters either safe or prudent. Nor was it till nigh a week passed over that he himself said, “I wonder what has become of Maitland? I hope he’s not ill.” None followed up the theme, and it dropped. The expected guests began to drop in soon after, and, except by Mark himself, Mr. Norman Maitland was totally forgotten. The visitors were for the most part squires, and their wives and families; solid, well-to-do gentlemen, whose chief objects in life were green crops and the poor-law. Their talk was either of mangold or guano, swedes or the union, just as their sons’ conversation ranged over dogs, horses, meets, and covers; and the ladies disported in toilette, and such details of the Castle drawing-rooms as the Dublin papers afforded. There were Mr. and Mrs. Warren, with two daughters and a son; and the Hunters, with two sons and a daughter. There were Colonel Hoyle and Mrs. Hoyle, from regimental head-quarters, Belfast; and Groves Bulkney, the member for the county, who had come over, in the fear of an approaching dissolution of Parliament, to have a look at his constituents. He was a Tory, who always voted with the Whigs; a sort of politician in great favor with the North of Ireland, and usually supposed to have much influence with both parties. There were Masseys from Tipperary, and M’Clintocks from Louth; and, lastly, herald of their approach, three large coffin-shaped trunks, undeniably of sea-origin, with the words “Cap. Gambier Graham, R.N.,” marked on them, which arrived by a carrier, with three gun-cases and an immense array of fishing-tackle, gaffs, and nets.

      “So I see those odious Grahams are coming,” said Mark, ill-humoredly, as he met his elder sister in the hall. “I declare, if it were not that Maitland might chance to arrive in my absence, I ‘d set off this very morning.”

      “I assure you, Mark, you are all wrong; the girls are no favorites of mine; but looking to the staple of our other guests, the Grahams are perfect boons from Heaven. The Warrens, with their infant school, and Mrs. Maxwell, with her quarrel with the bishop, and the Masseys, with their pretension about that daughter who married Lord Claude Somebody, are so terribly tiresome that I long for the racket and noise of those bustling young women, who will at least dispel our dulness.”

      “At the cost of our good breeding.”

      “At all events, they are Jolly and good-tempered girls. We have known them for – ”

      “Oh, don’t say how long. The younger one is two years older than myself.”

      “No, Mark, Beck is exactly your own age.”

      “Then I ‘m determined to call myself five-and-thirty the first opportunity I have. She shall have three years tacked to her for the coming into the world along with me.”

      “Sally is only thirty-four.”

      “Only! the idea of saying only to thirty-four.”

      “They don’t look within eight or nine years of it, I declare. I suppose you will scarcely detect the slightest change in them.”

      “So much the worse. Any change would improve them, in my eyes.”

      “And the Captain, too. He, I believe, is now Commodore.”

      “I perceive there is no change in the mode of travel,” said Mark, pointing to the trunks. “The heavy luggage used always to arrive the day before they drove up in their vile Irish jaunting-car. Do they still come in that fashion?”

      “Yes; and I really believe with the same horse they had long, long ago.”

      “A flea-bitten mare with a twisted tail?”

      “The very same,” cried she, laughing. “I’ll certainly tell Beck how well you remember their horse. She ‘ll take it as a flattery.”

      “Tell her what you like; she’ll soon find out how much flattery she has to expect from me!” After a short pause, in which he made two ineffectual attempts to light a cigar, and slightly burned his fingers, he said, “I ‘d not for a hundred pounds that Maitland had met them here. With simply stupid country gentry, he ‘d not care to notice their ways nor pay attention to their humdrum habits; but these Grahams, with all their flagrant vulgarity, will be a temptation too irresistible, and he will leave this to associate us forever in his mind with the two most ill-bred women in creation.”

      “You are quite unfair, Mark; they are greatly liked, – at least, people are glad to have them; and if we only had poor Tony Butler here, who used to manage them to perfection, they ‘d help us wonderfully with all the dulness around us.”

      “Thank Heaven we have not. I ‘d certainly not face such a constellation as the three of them. I tell you, frankly, that I ‘d pack my portmanteau and go over to Scotland if that fellow were to come here again.”

      “You ‘re not likely to be СКАЧАТЬ