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“You wish it?” said he, reproachfully. “You desire this?”
“What matters it whether I wish it or not? I know it must be. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye, then, – good-bye,” said he, affecting as much indifference as he could; and then, slightly raising his hat, he turned away on the road homeward.
Joseph Nelligan’s reflections were not of the pleasantest as he sauntered slowly back. He was not exactly satisfied with himself; he felt, he could not just say how, that the young girl had had the mastery over him; she was more calm or self-possessed; she had more tact, or she knew more of life; had more of self-control, or breeding, or some other quality, whatever it might be, than he had. At all events, he was ill at ease and discontented. Then he doubted whether he ought to have taken her at her word when she talked of parting. It might, possibly, have been meant by her to evoke some show of resistance on his part; that same inequality of station she seemed to hint at might, perhaps, demand from him a greater deference. In fact, whichever way he turned the matter over, he saw little cause for self-gratulation; nor did he discover that it mended matters when he tried to accuse her of French frivolity, and such other traits as he fancied of foreign origin.
In this not over-pleasant mood was it that he re-entered the cottage, where his mother was busy in preparing a very formidable cravat for the approaching dinner-party.
“Ah, Joe!” said she, anxiously, “if you were to dress now, and then stay quiet, you ‘d be quite fresh when the time came; for, remember, it’s not like your father you are, that has the world about him, and can converse about everything that comes uppermost; but with all your learning, you know, you always feel somehow – ”
“Stupid, mother?”
“Not stupid, my dear, but depressed, – out of spirits in society; so that my advice to you is, now, dress yourself in good time, take a small glass of ginger-cordial, and throw your eye over the second chapter of ‘Social Hints,’ with an account of conversation before and at dinner, and some excellent advice about’compliments, meet for every season of the year.’”
“Do you think such preparations quite necessary, mother?” asked Joe, slyly; for he rather relished the simplicity of her counsels.
“To be sure, I do; for yours is no common difficulty, Joe. If you talk of country matters, you ‘ll get into Kyle’s Wood and the Chancery suit; if you touch politics or religion, it will be worse again. The Martins, I hear, never play cards, so you can’t allude to them; and they ‘ll be too grand to know anything about poor Miss Cuddy going off with the sergeant of police, or what Con Kelly did with his aunt’s furniture.”
“So that really the topics open to me are marvellously few.”
“Well, there’s shooting; but to be sure you know nothing about that, nor fishing, either; and I suppose farming, if you did understand it, would n’t be genteel. Indeed, I see little that is n’t dangerous, except the dearness of everything. I remark that’s a subject nobody ever tires of, and all can take their share in.”
“And I conclude it to be fact, mother?”
“A very melancholy fact, my dear; and so I said to Betty Gargan, yesterday. ‘It’s well for you,’ said I, ‘and the likes of you, that use nothing but potatoes; but think of us, that have to pay sixpence a pound for mutton, six-and-a-half for the prime pieces, and veal not to be had under eightpence.’ They talk of the poor, indeed! but sure they never suffer from a rise in butcher’s meat, and care nothing at all what tea costs. I assure you I made the tears come into her eyes, with the way I described our hardships.”
“So that this will be a safe subject for me, mother?”
“Perfectly safe, my dear, and no ways mean, either; for I always remarked that the higher people are, the stingier they are, and the more pleasure they take in any little sharp trick that saves them sixpence. And when that ‘s exhausted, just bring in the Rams.”
“The Rams?”
“I mean my aunt Ram, and my relations in Wexford. I ‘m sure, with a little address, you ‘ll be able to show how I came to be married beneath me, and all the misery it cost me.”
“Well, mother, I believe I have now ample material,” said Joe, rising, with a lively dread of an opening which he knew well boded a lengthy exposition; “and to my own want of skill must it be ascribed if I do not employ it profitably.” And with this he hurried to his room to prepare for the great event.
The “Gentlemen of England” do not deem it a very formidable circumstance to repair towards seven, or half-past, to a dinner-party, even of the dullest and most rigid kind. There is a sombre “routine” in these cases, so recognized that each goes tolerably well prepared for the species of entertainment before him. There is nothing very exhilarating in the prospect, and as little to depress. It is a leaf torn out of one of the tamest chapters in life’s diary, where it is just as rare to record a new dish as a new idea, and where the company and the cookery are both foreknown.
No one goes with any exaggerated expectations of enjoyment; but as little does he anticipate anything to discompose or displease him. The whole thing is very quiet and well-bred; rather dull, but not unpleasant. Now, Joseph Nelligan had not graduated as a “diner-out;” he was about as ignorant of these solemn festivals as any man well could be. He was not, therefore, without a certain sense of anxiety as to the conversational requisites for such occasions. Would the company rise to themes and places and people of which he had never as much as heard? or would they treat of ordinary events, and if so, on what terms? If politics came to be discussed, would Mr. Martin expect him to hear in silence opinions from which he dissented? Dare he speak his sentiments, at the cost of directing attention to himself? – a course he would fain have avoided. These, and innumerable other doubts, occupied him as he was dressing, and made him more than once regret that he had determined to accept this invitation; and when the hour at last came for him to set out, he felt a sense of shrinking terror of what was before him greater than he had ever known as he mounted the dreaded steps of the College Examination Hall.
He might, it is true, have bethought him of the fact that where Simmy Crow and Maurice Scanlan were guests, he too might pass muster without reproach; but he did not remember this, or, at least, it failed to impress him sufficiently. Nor was his dread without a certain dash of vanity, as he thought of the contrast between the humble place he was perhaps about to occupy at a great man’s table, and the proud one he had achieved in the ranks of scholarship and science. Thus musing, he sauntered slowly along till he found himself in front of the little garden of the Osprey’s Nest. He looked at his watch, – it was exactly seven; so he pulled the bell, and entered.
CHAPTER IX. THE MARTIN ARMS
In the small and not over-neat parlor of the Martin Arms at Oughterard, a young man sat at his breakfast, at times casting his eyes over the columns of the “Vindicator,” and anon strolling to the window to watch the gathering of the country people at the weekly market. The scene was one of that mingled bustle and languor so characteristically Irish. Cart-loads of turf, vegetables, fruit, or turkeys blocked up the narrow passage between booths of fancy wares, gilt jewelry, crockery, and cutlery; the vendors all eagerly vociferating commendations of their stores, in chorus with still more clamorous beggars, or the discordant notes of vagrant minstrelsy. Some animal monstrosity, announced by a cracked-voiced herald and two clarionets, added to a din to which loud laughter contributed its share of uproar.
The assemblage was entirely formed of the country people, many of whom made the pretext of having a pig or a lamb to sell the reason of their coming; but, in reality, led thither by the native love of a gathering, – that fondness to be where their neighbors were, – without any definite aim or object. There was, then, in strong contrast to the anxious solicitation of all who had aught to sell, the dreary, languid, almost apathetic look of the mere lounger, come to while away his weary hour and kill time just like any very bored fine gentleman who airs his listlessness along St James’s Street, or lazily canters his ennui down Rotten Row.
Jack Massingbred – for he was the traveller whose straw hat and knapsack stood upon a table near – was amused at a scene so full of its native characteristics. The physiognomy, the dress, the bearing of the people, their greetings as they met, their conduct of a bargain, all bespoke a nation widely differing from the sister country, and set him a-dreaming as to how it was that equality of laws might very possibly establish anything but equality of condition amongst people so dissimilar.
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While thus musing, his eye chanced to rest upon the half-effaced inscription over a shop door in front, and where the name of Daniel Nelligan figured as “licensed for all kinds of groceries and spirits.” “Nelligan,” repeated he to himself, “I shall certainly quiz my friend Joe, when we meet, about his namesake in Oughterard. How good it would be to pick up some details of our friend opposite to torment him with! What rare fun to affect to have discovered a near relative in this man of hides, glue, sugar, and Jamaica rum! Eh, gad, I’ll try it.” And with this resolve he crossed the street at once, and soon found himself in the compact crowd which thronged the doorway of this popular shop.
It was, indeed, a busy scene, since many who were there came as much sellers as buyers, giving all the complexity of barter to their several transactions. Here was a staid country-woman exchanging her spunyarn, or her “cloth,” as it is called, for various commodities in tea, candles, and such like; here a farmer, with a sample of seed-oats in his pocket-handkerchief, of which he wanted the value in certain farm utensils; here was another, with a stout roll of home-made frieze to dispose of; some were even fain to offer a goose or a hen as the medium for a little tobacco, or some equally tempting luxury of cottier life. But there was another class of customers, who, brushing their way through the throng, made for a small, dingy-looking chamber behind the shop, in which Mr. Nelligan performed the functions of banker and money-lender, discounting small bills, advancing loans, and transacting all the various duties of a petty capitalist, – means by which, it was alleged, he had already amassed a very ample fortune.
An announcement in writing on the glass door of this sanctum informed Massingbred that “bank-notes” were exchanged, and “small loans advanced on good security,” suggesting to him at once the means of opening an acquaintance with the interior. Without any very definite purpose, however, he now found himself one of a very closely packed crowd within the chamber. At a small desk, around which ran a railing of about a foot in height, serving, as it were, to “filter the stream” of solicitation that poured in upon him, sat a dark-eyed, bilious-looking man of about fifty; a black wig, cut in two deep arches over the temples, showed a strongly formed, massive head, very favorably in contrast to the features beneath it, which were only indicative of intense shrewdness and cunning. The eyes, in particular, were restless and furtive-looking, distrust and suspicion giving their entire expression, – qualities, it was to be owned, in very active employment in the intercourse of his daily life.
The anxious looks around him – careworn, eager, tremulous with anxiety as they were – seemed the very opposite to his own, full of the security that a strong purse bestows, and stern in the conscious strength of his affluence.
“It won’t do, Hagan,” said he, with a half-smile, as he pushed back through the grating a very dirty, discolored piece of paper. “You ‘ll be off to America before it comes due. I would n’t take the Lord-Lieutenant’s note at six months, as times go.”
“See, now, Mr. Nelligan,” replied the other, pressing his face close to the cage, and talking with intense eagerness. “May I never see Christmas, but I ‘ll pay it ‘T was marryin’ the daughter left me low in cash; but with the blessing of God and your help – ”
“I hope you ‘re more certain of the blessing than the help. What’s this with the string round it?” continued Nelligan, addressing another applicant.
“‘T is a roll of notes I wanted to ax your honor about. Molly never ‘let on’ she had them till Friday last; and now that James is going away, and wants a trifle to fit him out – ”
“Why, they’re French’s Bank, man, that broke years ago, – they ‘re not worth a farthing!”
“Arrah, don’t say so, and God reward you,” cried the poor fellow, while his eyes filled up and his lip trembled convulsively; “don’t take the hope out of my heart all at onst. Look at them again, your honor, and maybe you ‘ll think different.”
“If I did, I ‘d be as great a fool as yourself, Patsy. The bank is closed, and the banker dead this many a day; and I would n’t give you sixpence for sixty thousand of them. Take him out in the fresh air, – give him a mouthful of water,” added he, hastily, as the wretched countryman staggered back, sick, and almost fainting with the sad tidings.
“Mrs. Mooney,” said he, addressing a pale, mild-featured woman in a widow’s cap and black gown, “you can’t expect to hear from Dublin for a week or ten days to come. It takes some time to administer; but if you are in want of a few pounds – ”
“No, sir, thank you,” said she, in a low voice; “but as I can’t go back to the place again, – as I ‘ll never be able to live there now – ”
“Don’t be in a hurry, Mrs. Mooney, do nothing rash. None of us know what we can do till we ‘re tried. There’s Miles Dogherty never thought he ‘d be paying me that eight pound fifteen he owes me, and see now if he is n’t come with it to-day.”
“Faix, and I am not,” sturdily responded a very powerfully built man in the comfortable dress of a substantial farmer. “I don’t owe it, and I ‘ll never pay it; and what’s more, if you get a decree against me to-morrow, I’d sell every stick and stone in the place and go to ‘Quay bec’.”
“Indeed you would n’t, Miles, not a bit more than I’d go and take the law of an old friend and neighbor.”
“Faix, I never thought you would,” said the stout man, wiping his forehead, and appearing as if he had forgotten his wrath.
“And now, Miles, what about that water-course?” said Nelligan, good-humoredly; “are you content to leave it to any two fair men – ”
As he got thus far, his eye for the first time fell upon Massingbred, who, with folded arms, was leaning against a wall, an attentive spectator of the whole scene.
“That is a stranger yonder! what can he want here?” said Nelligan, who watched the attentive look of Massingbred’s face with considerable distrust. He whispered a few words into the ear of a man beside him, who, making his way through the crowd, addressed the young man with —
“It’s the master, sir, wants to know if he could do anything for your honor?”
“For me? oh, you spoke to me?” said Massingbred, suddenly recalled to himself. “Yes, to be sure; I wanted to know – that is, I was thinking – ” And he stopped to try and remember by what device he had purposed making Mr. Nelligan’s acquaintance.
While he thus stood doubting and confused, his eyes suddenly met the black, searching, deep-set orbs that peered at him behind the grating; and without knowing how or why, he slowly approached him.
“In what way can I be of any use to you, sir?” said Nelligan, in a tone which very palpably demanded the reason of his presence there.
Jack Massingbred was eminently “cool,” – that is, he was possessed of that peculiar assurance which rarely suffers itself to be ruffled by a difficulty. In the intercourse of society, and with men of the world, he could have submitted to any test unabashed; and yet now, in presence of this shrewd-looking and very commonplace personage, he, somehow, felt marvellously ill at ease, and from the simple reason that the man before whom he stood was not of his “world,” but one of a set of whose habits and thoughts and ways he was in utter ignorance.
Nelligan’s question was a second time addressed to him, and in the same words, before he thought of framing a reply to it. For a second or two it occurred to him to say that he had strolled in, half inadvertently, and apologizing for the intrusion, to withdraw; but his pride was offended at the notion of defeat this conduct implied, and with an assumption of that conventional impudence far more natural to him, he said, —
“It was your name, sir, attracted me – the name ‘Nelligan’ which I read over your door – being that of a very dear and valued friend of mine, suggested to me to inquire whether you might not be relatives.”
The cool indifference which accompanied these words, uttered as they were in a certain languid drawl, were very far from predisposing Nelligan in favor of the speaker; while the pretence of attaching any singularity to a name so common as his own, struck him at once as indicative of covert impertinence.
“Nelligan is not a very remarkable name down here, sir,” dryly responded he.
“Very possibly,” replied Jack, with all his accustomed ease. “I know little or nothing of Ireland. Your namesake, or your relative, perhaps, was a college friend of mine, but to what part of the country he belonged, I never knew.”
The words, “a college friend,” roused the other’s anxiety, and leaning forward eagerly, and dropping his voice to a whisper, he said, —
“Where? In what college, may I ask, sir?”
“In Trinity, Dublin.”
“The Medallist of this year, you mean?” said the other, almost breathless in his anxiety.
“Just so. The same fellow who has been sweeping away all the honors of his day. You have heard of him, it would seem?”
“He is my son, sir. I ‘m Joe Nelligan’s father!”
Massingbred’s astonishment did not betray itself by any change of feature; not a word escaped him; but his eye ranged over the scene around him, and came back to rest upon old Nelligan’s face with an expression of the calmest meaning.
“What a fortunate accident – for me, I mean,” continued he. “Joe and I are very dear friends, and it is a great happiness for me to make his father’s acquaintance. Is he with you now?” “No, sir; he’s at the sea, – a place called Kilkieran, about twenty miles away; but we ‘ll have him back by tomorrow if you ‘ll stay with us, and I ‘m sure you ‘ll not refuse me that pleasure. The young gentleman who is my son’s friend, is mine also, if he ‘ll permit me to call him so; and now just tell me what name shall I say? – who is it that I ‘m to tell Joe has arrived here?”
“Say that Jack Massingbred is come, and I ‘ll lay my life on’t you’ll see him here as fast as may be.”
“And now, Mr. Massingbred, just take up your quarters with us. Where are you stopping? I ‘ll send over the boy for your trunks, for I need n’t say that this must be your home while you stay at Oughterard.” The genial tone of warm hospitality in which he now spoke made him seem a very different man from the hard-featured old money-lender he had appeared when Jack first beheld him, and Massingbred returned his cordial shake hands with a pressure equal to his own, while he said, —
“Be assured that I accept your offer most heartily. My whole baggage is a knapsack and a fishing-rod, so that if you admit me as your guest you must dispense with all beyond the very humblest requirements. I have no coat, except this on me; and, when I brush my hair, I have dressed for dinner.”
“You are amongst very humble people, Mr. Massingbred, – a country shopkeeper, and his wife, and son, – and they ‘ll be only too happy to feel that you don’t despise their company. Come, and I ‘ll show you your room.” And so saying, Nelligan led him up a narrow stair, and at the end of a corridor opened a door into a neatly furnished chamber, which looked out into a spacious garden. The whole interior was scrupulously clean and comfortable; and as Jack surveyed his new dominions, he inwardly blessed his good fortune that had piloted him into such a haven.
“I ‘ll just step down and write to Joe. Meanwhile you ‘ll have your things brought over to you. Make yourself at home here – at least, as much as you can in such a place – and when you want anything, just ask for it.” And with these words old Nelligan left him to his own thoughts.
Whatever savored of an adventure was the delight of Jack Massingbred. He was one of those men whose egotism takes the shape of playing hero to themselves, – a tolerably large category amongst the spoiled children of this world. To be thrown into any strange or novel position, with associates he was unused to, and amidst circumstances totally unlike all he had ever met before, was his great happiness; and although here there was nothing like actual peril to heighten the zest of the enjoyment, there was a certain dash of embarrassment in the situation that increased its piquancy. This embarrassment lay in his approaching meeting with young Nelligan.
All the reserve his young college friend had maintained with regard to his family was at once explained; and Jack began to think over how often it must have occurred to him to say the most galling and offensive things in his ignorance of Nelligan’s real station. “If he had been frank and open with me,” said he to himself, “this would never have happened.” But therein Jack made two errors, since Nelligan was in no wise bound to make such revelations, nor was Massingbred the man to distinguish himself amongst his associates by a close friendship with the son of a country shopkeeper. He had been trained in a very different school, and taught to estimate his own station by the standard of his companionship. Indeed, he had witnessed the lenity which met his transgressions when they occurred in high company, and saw his father pay the debts he had contracted amongst titled associates with a far more generous forgiveness than had they taken their origin with more plebeian friends. “What could have induced the man to become a Fellow-Commoner,” said he, over and over; “it is such a palpable piece of presumption?” The truth was, Jack felt excessively irritated at never having even suspected his friend’s pretensions, and was eager to throw the blame of a deception where none had ever been practised.
“They told me I should find everything very different here from in England, but they never hinted at anything like this.” There came then another phase over his reflections, as he asked himself, “But what affair is it of mine? Nelligan never thrust himself on me, it was I that sought him. He never proposed introducing me to his family, it was I that made them out, – I, in fact, who have imposed myself upon them. If I deemed the old grocer infra dig., I need never have known him; but I have not felt this to be the case. He may be – indeed, Joe Nelligan’s father ought to be – a very superior fellow, and at all events the whole situation is new, and must be amusing.”
Such was the course of his thoughts as he arranged his clothes in the little chest of drawers, put out his few books and papers on the table, and proceeded to make himself perfectly at home and comfortable in his new quarters.
The embarrassments of selfish men are always lighter than those of other people, their egotism filling, as it does, such a very large space in the sea of their troubles. Thus was it that Massingbred suffered little discomfort at the thought of his friend Nelligan’s probable shame and awkwardness, his thoughts being occupied by how he, clever fellow that he was, had traced out his home and origin, – won, by a few words, the old father’s esteem, and established himself, by his own sharp wits, a guest of his house.
“It is a downright adventure,” said he; he even thought how the thing would tell afterwards at some convivial meeting, and set about dramatizing to himself his own part in the incident, to heighten the piquancy of the narrative. He resolved to conform in everything to the habits of the household, – to accommodate himself in all respects to old Nelligan’s tastes, so that Joe should actually be amazed at the versatile resources of his nature, and struck with astonishment at this new evidence of his powers.
Nor was Mr. Nelligan idle during all this time; the thought of a fellow collegian of his son Joe being a guest under his roof was a very proud and inspiring reflection. It was such a recognition of Joe’s social claims, – so flat a contradiction to all the surmises of those who deprecated his college life, and said “that old Dan was wrong to put his boy into Trinity” – that he already regarded the incident as the full earnest of success.
“What would have brought him here, if it wasn’t for Joe? How would he ever have been under my roof, if he wasn’t Joe’s friend?” There was a palpable triumph here that nothing could gainsay, and with a proud heart he locked up his desk, resolving to do no more business that day, but make it one of enjoyment.
“Who will I get to dine with us,” thought he, “since Joe can’t have the letter before this evening, and do his best he won’t be here before morning?” The question of those who should fill the places around his board was a difficulty he had never experienced before, for Mr. Nelligan was the first man in Oughterard, and never had any trouble about his dinner company. His politics – very decided as they were – drew the line amongst his acquaintances, and the Liberal party well knew that they alone were the partakers of his hospitalities. There now, however, came the thought that the most respectable residents of the town – Dr. Dasy, of the Infirmary; Mr. Scanlan, the Attorney; and Morris Croft, the Adjutant of the Galway – were Conservatives. These were the fit company to meet young Massingbred, at least for the first day; afterwards, he might be introduced to their own set. And yet, Father Neal Rafferty would be outraged at all this. Peter Hayes, of the Priory, would never enter his doors again; and Peter Hayes had made a will in favor of Joe Nelligan, and left him every sixpence he had in the world. “What if we mixed them all together?” said Dan, fairly puzzled by all the conflicting interests. “A good dinner, some excellent port wine, and ‘lashings’ of whiskey-punch, might mould the ingredients together – at least, when under the restraint of a stranger’s presence – sufficiently to pass muster!”
From his doubts as to how the experiment would succeed, came others as to whether the guests would condescend to meet; and thus his embarrassments went on increasing around him without his finding a way through them.
“That’s an elegant salmon I saw Catty bringing home to you, Nelligan?” said a red-faced man, with large white whiskers, and a most watery look in his eyes.
“Yes, Brierley, there’s a young gentleman just come down here – a friend of Joe’s in college, to stop a day or two with us.”
“A nob?” said the other, with a wink.
Nelligan nodded assent and went on, —
“And I ‘m just bothered how to get two or three to make company for him.”
“If it’s grandeur you want, why don’t you go over to the barracks there, and ask Captain Downie and the two others? Faix! it’s a hearty welcome you ‘d get, for they ‘ve never seen the inside of Cro’ Martin since the detachment came here.”
“It ‘s my own acquaintances I ‘d like to ask to my house, Mat Brierley,” said Nelligan, proudly; “and the time was when they were n’t shy of coming there.”
“What do you say to Peter Hayes, then?” said the other. “If you mean to do the civil thing, you’ll ask him before he buys that old highwayman of a goose he’s cheapening yonder; and there’s Father Rafferty in the snuff-shop, and Tom Magennis, and myself-, and that makes six, just the right number for the little round table.”
Nelligan paused, and seemed to reflect over the proposition.
“You ‘ll be quizzing the Englishman, – ‘taking a rise’ out of the Saxon, Brierley?” said Nelligan, distrustfully.
“Devil a bit; I know better manners than that!”
“Tom Magennis would have at him about politics; I know he could n’t refrain. And I need n’t tell you that English notions are not ours upon these topics.”
“Give Tom a hint, and he ‘ll never touch the subject.”
“And Father Neal, will you vouch for him that he won’t attack the Established Church, and abuse the Protestants?”
“That I will, if he’s not provoked to it.”
“Can you answer for yourself, Mat Brierley, that you won’t try to borrow a five-pound note of him before the evening’s over?” said Nelligan, laughingly.
“I’ ve a friend here,” said Brierley, tapping the other on the breast, “that would never see me in want of such a trifle as that.”
Nelligan made no other reply to this speech than a somewhat awkward grimace, and walked hurriedly on to overtake a tall and very fat man that was just turning the corner of the street. This was Father Neal Rafferty. A very flourishing wave of his reverence’s hand, and an urbane bend of his body, betokened the gracious acceptance he gave to the other’s invitation; and Brierley walked away, muttering to himself: “They may thank me for this dinner, then; for old Dan was going to feed the ‘swells,’ if I had n’t stopped him.”
