Kitabı oku: «One Of Them», sayfa 15

No, no! play must not be thought of, – it must be most sparingly alluded to even in conversation, – and so what remains? O’Shea was not without reminiscences, and he “went into them like a man.” He told scenes of early Trinity College life; gave sketches of his contemporaries, one or two of them now risen to eminence; he gave anecdotes of Gray’s Inn, where he had eaten his terms; of Templar life, its jollities and its gravities; of his theatrical experiences, when he wrote the “Drama” for two weekly periodicals; of his like employ when he reported prize-fights, boat-races, and pigeon-matches for “Bell’s Life.” He then gave a sketch of his entrance into public life, with a picture of an Irish election, dashed off spiritedly and boldly; but all he could obtain from his phlegmatic listener was a faint smile at times, and a low muttering sound, that resolved itself into, “What snobs!”

At last he was in the House, dealing with great names and great events, which he ingeniously blended up with Bellamy’s and the oyster suppers below stairs; but it was no use, – they, too, were snobs! It was all snobbery everywhere. Freshmen, Templars, Pugilists, Scullers, County Electors, and House of Commons celebrities, – all snobs!

O’Shea then tried the Turf, – disparagingly, as a great moralist ought. They were, as he said, a “bad lot;” but he knew them well, and they “could n’t hurt him.” He had a variety of curious stories about racing knaveries, and could clear up several mysterious circumstances, which all the penetration of the “Ring” had never succeeded in solving. Heathcote, however, was unappeasable; and these, too, – trainers, jockeys, judges, and gentlemen, – they were all snobs!

It was only two o’clock, and there were two more mortal hours to get through before dinner. With a bright inspiration he bethought him of bitter beer. Oh, Bass! ambrosia of the barrack-room, thou nectar of the do-nothings in this life, how gracefully dost thou deepen dulness into drowsiness, making stupidity but semi-conscious! What a bond of union art thou between those who have talked themselves out, and would without thy consoling froth, become mutually odious! Instead of the torment of suggestiveness which other drinks inspire, how gloriously lethargic are all thy influences, how mind-quelling, and how muddling!

There is, besides, a vague notion prevalent with your beer-drinker, that there is some secret of health in his indulgence, – that he is undergoing a sort of tonic regimen, something to make him more equal to the ascent of Mont Blanc, or the defeat of the Zouaves, and he grows in self-esteem as he sips. It is not the boastful sentiment begotten of champagne, or the defiant courage of port, but a dogged, resolute, resistant spirit, stout in its nature and bitter to the last!

And thus they sipped, and smoked, and said little to each other, and the hours stole over, and the wintry day darkened apace, and, at last, out of a drowsy nap over the fire, the waiter awoke them, to say dinner was on the table.

“You were asleep!” said O’Shea, to his companion.

“Yes, ‘twas your snoring set me off!” replied Heathcote, stretching himself, as he walked to the window. “Raining just as hard as ever!”

“Come along,” said the other, gayly. “Let us see what old Fan has done for us.”

CHAPTER XXI. MR. O’SHEA UPON POLITICS, AND THINGS IN GENERAL

It was a most appetizing little dinner that was now set before the O’Shea and Charles Heathcote. The trout from Castellano and the mutton from Pistoja were each admirable; and a brace of woodcocks, shot in the first snowstorm on the Carrara mountains, were served in a fashion that showed the cook had benefited by English teachings.

“There are worse places than this, after all!” said O’Shea, as he sat at one side of the fire, Heathcote opposite, and a small table liberally covered with decanters between them.

“Wonderful Burgundy this,” said Heathcote, gazing at his glass in the light. “What does he call it?”

“He calls it Lafitte. These fellows think all red wines come from the Bordeaux country. Here it is, – marked seven francs.”

“Cheap at double the price. My governor will take every bottle of it.”

“Not before I leave, I hope,” said O’Shea, laughing. “I trust he ‘ll respect what they call vested interests.”

“Oh, by the way,” said the other, indolently, “you are going?”

“Yes. Our party are getting uneasy, and I am constantly receiving letters pressing me to return to England.”

“Want you in the House, perhaps?” said Heathcote, as he puffed his cigar in lazy enjoyment.

“Just so. You see, a parliamentary session is a sort of campaign in which every arm of warfare is needed. You want your great guns for the grand battles, your dashing cavalry charges for emergencies, and your light skirmishers to annoy the enemy and disconcert his advance.”

“And which are you?” asked the other, in a tone of bantering indifference.

“Well, I ‘m what you might call a mounted rifleman, – a dash of the dragoon with a spice of the sharpshooter.”

“Sharp enough, I take it,” muttered Heathcote, who bethought him of the billiard-table, and the wonderful “hazards” O’Shea used to accomplish.

“You understand,” resumed the Member, confidentially, “I don’t come out on the Budget, or Reform, or things of that kind; but I lie by till I hear some one make a blunder or a mistake, no matter how insignificant, and then I ‘m down on him, generally with an anecdote – something he reminds me of – and for which I ‘m sure to have the laugh against him. It’s so easy, besides, to make them laugh; the worst jokes are always successful in the House of Commons.”

“Dull fellows, I suppose?” chimed in Heathcote.

“No, indeed; not that. Go down with six or eight of them to supper, and you’ll say you never met pleasanter company. ‘T is being caged up there all together, saying the same things over and over, that’s what destroys them.”

“It must be a bore, I take it?” sighed out Heathcote.

“I’ll tell you what it is,” said O’Shea, as, in a voice of deepest confidence, he leaned over the table and spoke, – “I ‘ll tell you what it is. Did you ever play the game called Brag, with very little money in your pocket?”

Heathcote nodded what might mean assent or the opposite.

“That’s what Parliament is,” resumed O’Shea. “You sit there, night after night, year after year, wondering within yourself, ‘Would it be safe for me to play this hand? Shall I venture now?’ You know well that if you do back your luck and lose, that it’s all up with you forever, so that it’s really a mighty serious thing to risk it. At last, maybe, you take courage. You think you ‘ve got the cards; it’s half-past two o’clock; the House is thin, and every one is tired and sleepy. Up you get on your legs to speak. You’re not well down again, till a fellow from the back benches, you thought sound asleep, gets up and tears all you said to tatters, – destroys your facts, scatters your inferences, and maybe laughs at your figures of speech.”

“Not so pleasant, that,” said Heathcote, languidly.

“Pleasant! it’s the devil!” said O’Shea, violently; “for you hear the pen scratching away up in the reporters’ gallery, and you know it will be all over Europe next morning.”

“Then why submit to all this?” asked Heathcote, more eagerly.

“Just as I said awhile ago; because you might chance upon a good card, and ‘brag’ on it for something worth while. It’s all luck.”

“Your picture of political life is not fascinating,” said Heathcote, coldly.

“After all, do you know, I like it,” resumed O’Shea. “As long as you ‘ve a seat in the House, there’s no saying when you might n’t be wanted; and then, when the session’s over, and you go down to the country, you are the terror of all the fellows that never sat in Parliament. If they say a word about public matters, you put them down at once with a cool ‘I assure you, sir, that’s not the view we take of it in the House.’”

“I ‘d say, ‘What’s that to me?’”

“No, you would n’t, – not a bit of it; or, if you did, nobody would mind you, and for this reason, – it’s the real place, after all. Why do you pay Storr and Mortimer more than another jeweller? Just because you’re sure of the article. There now, that’s how it is!”

“There’s some one knocking at the door, I think,” said Heathcote; but at the same instant Joe’s head appeared inside, with a request to be admitted. “‘T is the telegraph,” said he, presenting a packet.

“I have asked for a small thing in Jamaica, some ten or twelve hundred a year,” whispered O’Shea to his friend. “I suppose this is the reply.” And at the same time he threw the portentous envelope carelessly on the table.

Either Heathcote felt no interest in the subject, or deemed it proper to seem as indifferent as his host, for he never took any further notice of the matter, but smoked away as before.

“You need n’t wait,” said O’Shea to Joe, who still lingered at the door. “That fellow is bursting with curiosity now,” said he, as the man retired; “he ‘d give a year’s wages to know what was inside that envelope.”

“Indeed!” sighed out Heathcote, in a tone that showed how little he sympathized with such eagerness.

If O’Shea was piqued at this cool show of indifference, he resolved to surpass it by appearing to forget the theme altogether; and, pushing the bottle across the table, he said, “Did I ever tell you how it was I first took to politics?”

“No, I think not,” said Heathoote, listlessly.

“Well, it was a chance, and a mere chance; this is the way it happened. Though I was bred to the Bar, I never did much at the law; some say that an agreeable man, with a lively turn in conversation, plenty of anecdote, and a rich fancy, is never a favorite with the attorneys; the rascals always think that such a man will never make a lawyer, and though they ‘ll listen to his good stories by the hour in the Hall, devil a brief they ‘ll give him, nor so much as a ‘declaration.’ Well, for about five years I walked about in wig and gown, joking and quizzing and humbugging all the fellows that were getting business, and taking a circuit now and again, but all to no good; and at last I thought I ‘d give it up, and so my friends advised me, saying, ‘Get something under the Government, Gorman; a snug place with a few hundreds a year, and be sure take anything that ‘s offered you to begin with.’

“Now there was a room in Dublin Castle – it’s the second down the corridor off the private stairs – that used to be called the Poker-room. It may be so still, for anything I know, and for this reason: it was there all the people expecting places or appointments were accustomed to wait. It was a fine, airy, comfortable room, with a good carpet, easy-chairs, and always an excellent fire; and here used to meet every day of their lives the same twenty or five-and-twenty people, one occasionally dropping off, and another coming in, but so imperceptibly and gradually that the gathering at last grew to be a sort of club, where they sat from about eleven till dark every day, chatting pleasantly over public and private events. It was thus found necessary to give it a kind of organization, and so we named for President the oldest, – that is, the longest expectant of place, – who, by virtue of his station, occupied the seat next the fire, and alone, of all the members, possessed the privilege of poking it. The poker was his badge of office; and the last act of his official life, whenever promotion separated him from us, was to hand the poker to his successor, with a solemn dignity of manner and a few parting words.

I verily believe that most of us got to be so fond of the club that it was the very reverse of a pleasure when we had to leave it to become, maybe, a Police Inspector at Skibbereen, Postmaster at Tory Island, or a Gauger at Innismagee; and so we jogged on, from one Viceroy to another, very happy and contented. Well, it was the time of a great Marquis, – I won’t say who, but he was the fast friend of O’Connell, – and we all of us thought that there would be plenty of fine things given away, and the poker-room was crammed, and I was the President, having ascended the throne two years and a half before. It was somewhere early in March; a cold raw day it was. I had scarcely entered the club, than a messenger bawled out, ‘Gorman O’Shea, – Mr. Gorman O’Shea.’ ‘Here he is,’ said I. ‘Wanted in the Chief Secretary’s office,’ said he, ‘immediately.’ I gave a knowing wink to the company around the fire, and left the room. Three mortal hours did I stand in the ante-room below, seeing crowds pass in and out before I was called in; and then, as I entered, saw a little wizened, sharp-faced man standing with his back to the fire paring his nails. He never so much as looked at me, but said in a careless, muttering sort of way, —

“‘You’re the gentleman who wishes to go as resident magistrate to Oackatoro, ain’t you?’

“‘Well, indeed, sir, I’m not quite sure,’ I began.

“‘Oh yes, you are,’ broke he in. ‘I know all about you. Your name has been favorably mentioned to the office. You are Mr. O’Gorman – ’

“‘Mr. Gorman O’Shea,’ said I, proudly.

“‘The same thing, Gorman O’Shea. I remember it now. Your appointment will be made out: five hundred a year, and a retiring pension after six years; house, and an allowance for monkeys.’

“‘A what?’ asked I.

“‘The place is much infested with a large species of oorang-outang, and the governor gives so much per head for destroying them. Mr. Simpson, in the office, will give you full information. You are to be at your post by the 1st of August.’

“‘Might I make bold to ask where Whackatory is?’

“‘Oackatoro, sir,’ said he, proudly, ‘is the capital of Fighi. I trust I need not say where that is.’

“‘By no means,’ said I, modestly; and, muttering my thanks for the advancement, I backed out, almost deranged to think that I did n’t know where I was going.

“‘Where is it? What is it? How much is it, O’Shea?’ cried thirty ardent voices, as I entered the club.

“‘It’s five hundred a year,’ said I, ‘without counting the monkeys. It’s a magistrate’s place; but may a gooseberry skin make a nightcap for me if I know where the devil it is!’

“‘But you have accepted!’ cried they out, all together.

“‘I have,’ said I. ‘I’m to be at Fighi, wherever that is, by the 1st of August. And now,’ said I, turning to the fire, and taking up the poker, ‘there is nothing for me to do but resign this sacred symbol of my office into the hands of my successor.’

“Where’s O’Dowd?’ shouted out the crowd. And they awoke out of a pleasant sleep a little old fellow that never missed his day for two years at the club.

“‘Gentlemen,’ said I, in a voice trembling with feeling, ‘the hour is come when my destiny is to separate me from you forever; an hour that is equally full of the past and the future, and has even no small share of present emotions. If ever there were a human institution devised to cement together the hearts and affections of men, to bind them into one indissoluble mass, and blend their instincts into identity, it is the club we have here. Here we stand, like the departed spirits at the Styx, waiting for the bark of Charon to ferry us over. To what, however? Is it to some blessed elysium of a Poor Law Commissioner’s place, or is it to some unknown fate in a distant land, with five hundred a year and an allowance for monkeys? That’s the question, there’s the rub! as Hamlet says.’ After dilating at large on this, I turned to O’Dowd. ‘To your hands,’ said I, ‘I commit this venerable relic: keep it, guard it, honor it, and preserve it. Remember,’ said I, ‘that when you stir those coals it is the symbol of keeping alive in the heart the sparks of an undying hope; that though they may wet the slack and water the cinders of our nature, the fire within us will still survive, red, glowing, and generous. Is n’t that as fine, as great, glorious, and free, I ask you?’

“‘Who is that fellow that’s talking there, with a voice like Lablache?’ asked a big man at the door; and then, as the answer was whispered in his ear, he said, ‘Send him out here to me.’

“Out I went, and found myself face to face with O’Connell.

“‘I want a man to stand for Drogheda to-morrow; the gentleman I expected cannot arrive there possibly before three. Will you address the electors, and speak till he comes? If he isn’t there by half-past three, you shall be returned!’

“‘Done!’ said I. And by five o’clock on the following evening Gorman O’Shea was at the top of the poll and declared Member for Drogheda! That was, I may say, the first lift I ever got from Fortune. May I never!” exclaimed O’Shea, half angrily, – “may I never, if he’s not asleep – and snoring! These Saxons beat the world for stupidity.”

The Member now suddenly bethought him that it would be a favorable moment to read his telegram, and so he tore open the envelope, and held it to the light. It was headed as usual, and addressed in full, showing that no parsimony defrauded him of his full title. The body of the despatch was, however, brief enough, and contained only one word, “Bosh!” It was clear, bold, and unmistakably “Bosh!” Could insolence go further than that? To send such a message a thousand miles, at the cost of one pound fourteen and sixpence!

“What the deuce? you’ve nearly upset the table!” cried Heathcote, waking suddenly up, as O’Shea with a passionate gesture had thrown one of the decanters into the other’s lap.

“I was asleep, like yourself, I suppose,” said the Member, roughly. “I must say, we are neither of us the very liveliest company.”

“It was that yarn of yours about attacking monkeys with a poker, or some stuff of that kind, set me off,” yawned Heathcote, drearily. “I had not felt the least sleepy till then.”

“Here, let us fill our glasses, and drink to the jolly time that is coming for us,” said O’Shea, with all his native recklessness.

“With all my heart; but I wish I could guess from what quarter it’s coming,” said Heathcote, despondingly.

If neither felt much disposed to converse, they each drank deeply; and although scarcely more than a word or two would pass between them, they sat thus, hour after hour, till it was long past midnight.

It was after a long silence between them that Heathcote said: “I never tried so hard in my life to get drunk, without success. I find it won’t do, though; I’m just as clearheaded and as low-spirited as when I started.”

“Bosh!” muttered O’Shea, half dreamily.

“It’s no such thing!” retorted Heathcote. “At any ordinary time one bottle of that strong Burgundy would have gone to my head; and see, now I don’t feel it.”

“Maybe you ‘re fretting about something. It’s perhaps a weight on your heart – ”

“That’s it!” sighed out the other, as though the very avowal were an inexpressible relief to him.

“Is it for a woman?” asked O’Shea.

The other nodded, and then leaned his head on his hand.

“Upon my conscience, I sometimes think they ‘re worse than the Jews,” said the Member, violently; “and there’s no being ‘up to them.’”

“It’s our own fault, then,” cried Heathcote; “because we never play fairly with them.”

“Bosh!” muttered O’Shea, again.

“I defy you to deny it,” cried he, angrily.

“I ‘d like a five-pound note to argue it either way,” said O’Shea.

As if offended by the levity of the speech, Heathcote turned away and said nothing.

“When you get down to Rome, and have some fun over those ox-fences, you ‘ll forget all about her, whoever she is,” said O’Shea.

“I’m for England to-morrow, and for India next week, if they ‘ll have me.”

“Well, if that’s not madness – ”

“No, sir, it is not,” broke in Heathoote, angrily; “nor will I permit you or any other man to call it so.”

“What I meant was, that when a fellow had your prospects before him, India ought n’t to tempt him, even with the offer of the Governor-Generalship.”

“Forgive me my bad temper, like a good fellow,” cried Heathoote, grasping the other’s hand; “but, in honest truth, I have no prospects, no future, and there is not a more hopeless wretch to be found than the man before you.”

O’Shea was very near saying “Bosh!” once more, but he coughed it under.

Like all bashful men who have momentarily given way to impatience, Charles Heathoote was over eager to obtain his companion’s good will, and so he dashed at once into a full confession of all the difficulties that beset, and all the cares that surrounded him. O’Shea had never known accurately, till now, the amount of May Leslie’s fortune, nor how completely she was the mistress of her own fate. Neither had he ever heard of that strange provision in the will which imposed a forfeit upon her if unwilling to accept Charles Heathcote as her husband, – a condition which he shrewdly judged to be the very surest of all ways to prevent their marriage.

“And so you released her?” cried he, as Heathoote finished his narrative.

“Released her! No. I never considered that she was bound. How could I?”

“Upon my conscience,” muttered the O’Shea, “it is a hard case – a mighty hard case – to see one’s way in; for if, as you say, it’s not a worthy part for a man to compel a girl to be his wife just because her father put it in his will, it’s very cruel to lose her only because she has a fine property.”

“It is for no such reason,” broke in Heathoote, half angrily. “I was unwilling – I am unwilling – that May Leslie should be bound by a contract she never shared in.

“That’s all balderdash!” cried O’Shea, with energy.

“What do you mean, sir?” retorted the other, passionately.

“What I mean is this,” resumed he: “that it’s all balderdash to talk of the hardship of doing things that we never planned out for ourselves. Sure, ain’t we doing them every moment of our lives? Ain’t I doing something because you contrived it? and ain’t you doing something else because I left it in your way?”

“It comes to this, then, that you ‘d marry a girl who did n’t care for you, if the circumstances were such as to oblige her to accept you?”

“Not absolutely, – not unreservedly,” replied O’Shea.

“Well, what is the reservation? Let us hear it.”

“Her fortune ought to be suitable.”

“Oh, this is monstrous!”

“Hear me out before you condemn me. In marriage, as in everything else, you must take it out in malt or in meal: don’t fancy that you ‘re going to get love and money too. It’s only in novels such luck exists.”

“I’m very glad I do not share your sentiments,” said Charles, sternly.

“They ‘re practical, anyway. But now to another point. Here we are, sitting by the fire in all frankness and candor. Answer me fairly two questions: Have you given up the race?”

“Yes.”

“Well, then, have you any objection if I enter for the stakes myself?”

“You! Do you mean that you would propose for May Leslie?”

“I do; and, what’s more, I don’t despair of success, either.”

An angry flush rose to Heathcote’s face, and for a moment it seemed as if his passion was about to break forth; but he mastered it, and, rising slowly, said: “If I thought such a thing possible, it would very soon cure me of one sorrow.” After a pause, he added: “As for me, I have no permission to give or to withhold. Go, by all means, and make your offer. I only ask one thing: it is, that you will honestly tell me afterwards how it has been received.”

“That I pledge my word to. Where do you stop in Paris?”

“At the Windsor.”

“Well, you shall have a despatch from me, or see myself there, by Saturday evening; one or the other I swear to.”

“Agreed. I’ll not wish you success, for that would be hypocritical, but I ‘ll wish you well over it!” And with this speech, uttered in a tone of jeering sarcasm, Heathcote said good-bye, and departed.