Charles Lever - Barrington. Volume 2

If Withering had been with them as they strolled, this, perhaps, might have been avoided; he had all a lawyer’s technical skill to change a topic; but Withering had gone to take his accustomed midday nap, the greatest of all the luxuries his time of idleness bestowed upon him.

Now, although Stapylton’s alludings – and they were no more – to Barrington’s gifts of fortune were such as perfectly consisted with good taste and good breeding, Barring-ton felt them all painfully, and probably nothing restrained him from an open disclaimer of their fitness save the thought that from a host such an avowal would sound ungracefully. “It is my duty now,” reasoned he, “to make my guest feel that all the attentions he receives exact no sacrifice, and that the pleasure his presence affords is unalloyed by a single embarrassment. If he must hear of my difficulties, let it be when he is not beneath my roof.” And so he let Stapylton talk away about the blessings of tranquil affluence, and the happiness of him whose only care was to find time for the enjoyments that were secured to him. He let him quote Pope and Wharton and Edmund Burke, and smiled the blandest concurrence with what was irritating him almost to fever.

“This is Withering’s favorite spot,” said Peter, as they gained the shade of a huge ilex-tree, from which two distinct reaches of the river were visible.

“And it shall be mine, too,” said Stapylton, throwing himself down in the deep grass; “and as I know you have scores of things which claim your attention, let me release you, while I add a cigar – the only possible enhancement – to the delight of this glorious nook.”

“Well, it shall be as you wish. We dine at six. I ‘ll go and look after a fish for our entertainment;” and Barrington turned away into the copse, not sorry to release his heart by a heavy sigh, and to feel he was alone with his cares.

Let us turn for a moment to M’Cormick, who continued to saunter slowly about the garden, in the expectation of Barrington’s return. Wearied at length with waiting, and resolved that his patience should not go entirely unrequited, he turned into a little shady walk on which the windows of the kitchen opened. Stationing himself there, in a position to see without being seen, he took what he called an observation of all within. The sight was interesting, even if he did not bring to it the appreciation of a painter. There, upon a spacious kitchen table, lay a lordly sirloin, richly and variously colored, flanked by a pair of plump guinea-hens and a fresh salmon of fully twenty pounds’ weight. Luscious fruit and vegetables were heaped and mingled in a wild profusion, and the speckled plumage of game was half hidden under the massive bunches of great hot-house grapes. It is doubtful if Sneyders himself could have looked upon the display with a higher sense of enjoyment It is, indeed, a question between the relative merits of two senses, and the issue lies between the eye and the palate.

Wisely reasoning that such preparations were not made for common guests, M’Cormick ran over in his mind all the possible and impossible names he could think of, ending at last with the conviction it was some “Nob” he must have met abroad, and whom in a moment of his expansive hospitality he had invited to visit him. “Isn’t it like them!” muttered he. “It would be long before they’d think of such an entertainment to an old neighbor like myself; but here they are spending – who knows how much? – for somebody that to-morrow or next day won’t remember their names, or maybe, perhaps, laugh when they think of the funny old woman they saw, – the ‘Fright’ with the yellow shawl and the orange bonnet. Oh, the world, the world!”

It is not for me to speculate on what sort of thing the world had been, if the Major himself had been intrusted with the control and fashion of it; but I have my doubts that we are just as well off as we are. “Well, though they haven’t the manners to say ‘M’Cormick; will you stop and dine?’ they haven’t done with me yet; not a bit!” And with this resolve he entered the cottage, and found his way to the drawing-room. It was unoccupied; so he sat himself down in a comfortable armchair, to await events and their issue. There were books and journals and newspapers about; but the Major was not a reader, and so he sat musing and meditating, while the time went by. Just as the clock struck five, Miss Dinah, whose various cares of housewifery had given her a very busy day, was about to have a look at the drawing-room before she went to dress, and being fully aware that one of her guests was asleep, and the other full stretched beside the river, she felt she could go her “rounds” without fear of being observed. Now, whatever had been the peculiar functions she was lately engaged in, they had exacted from her certain changes in costume more picturesque than flattering. In the first place, the sleeves of her dress were rolled up above the elbows, displaying arms more remarkable for bone than beauty. A similar curtailment of her petticoats exhibited feet and ankles which – not to be ungallant – might be called massive rather than elegant; and lastly, her two long curls of auburn hair – curls which, in the splendor of her full toilette, were supposed to be no mean aids to her captivating powers – were now tastefully festooned and fastened to the back of her head, pretty much as a pair of hawsers are occasionally disposed on the bow of a merchantman! Thus costumed, she had advanced into the middle of the room before she saw the Major.

“A pleasure quite unexpected, sir, is this,” said she, with a vigorous effort to shake out what sailors would call her “lower courses.” “I was not aware that you were here.”

“Indeed, then, I came in myself, just like old times. I said this morning, if it ‘s fine to-day, I ‘ll just go over to the ‘Fisherman’s Home.’”

“‘The Home,’ sir, if you please. We retain so much of the former name.” But just as she uttered the correction, a chance look at the glass conveyed the condition of her head-gear, – a startling fact which made her cheeks perfectly crimson. “I lay stress upon the change of name, sir,” continued she, “as intimating that we are no longer innkeepers, and expect something, at least, of the deference rendered to those who call their house their own.”

“To be sure, and why not?” croaked out the Major, with a malicious grin. “And I forgot all about it, little thinking, indeed, to surprise you in ‘dishabille,’ as they call it.”

“ You surprise me, sir, every time we meet,” said she, with flashing eyes. “And you make me feel surprised with myself for my endurance!” And so saying, she retired towards the door, covering her retreat as she went by every object of furniture that presented itself, and, like a skilful general, defending her rear by every artifice of the ground. Thus did she exit, and with a bang of the door – as eloquent as any speech – close the colloquy.

“Faix! and the Swiss costume doesn’t become you at all!” said the Major, as he sat back in his chair, and cackled over the scene.

As Miss Barrington, boiling with passion, passed her brother’s door, she stopped to knock.

“Peter!” cried she. “Peter Barrington, I say!” The words were, however, not well out, when she heard a step ascending the stair. She could not risk another discovery like the last; so, opening the door, she said, “That hateful M’Cormick is below. Peter, take care that on no account – ”

There was no time to finish, and she had barely an instant to gain her own room, when Stapylton reached the corridor.

Peter Barrington had, however, heard enough to inform him of his sister’s high behest. Indeed, he was as quick at interpreting brief messages as people have grown in these latter days of telegraphic communication. Oracular utterings had been more than once in his life his only instructors, and he now knew that he had been peremptorily ordered not to ask the Major to dinner.