Charles Lever - Jack Hinton - The Guardsman

But, at length, to come back, the Rooneys now were installed as the great people of the capital. Many of the ancien régime , who held out sturdily before, and who looked upon the worthy attorney in the light of a usurper, now gave in their allegiance, and regarded him as the true monarch. What his great prototype effected by terror, he brought about by turtle; and, if Napoleon consolidated his empire and propped his throne by the bayonets of the grand army, so did Mr. Rooney establish his claims to power by the more satisfactory arguments which, appealing not only to the head, but to the stomach, convince while they conciliate. You might criticise his courtesy, but you could not condemn his claret. You might dislike his manners, but you could not deny yourself his mutton. Besides, after all, matters took pretty much the same turn in Paris as in Dublin; public opinion ran strong in both cases. The mass of the world consists of those who receive benefits, and he who confers them deserves to be respected. We certainly thought so; and among those of darker hue who frequented Mr. Rooney’s table, three red-coats might daily be seen, whose unchanged places, added to their indescribable air of at-homeishness, bespoke them as the friends of the family.

O’Grady, at Mrs. Rooney’s right hand, did the honours of the soup; Lord Dudley, at the other end of the table, supported Mr. Rooney, while to my lot Miss Bellew fell. But, as our places at table never changed, there was nothing marked in my thus every day finding myself beside her, and resuming my place on our return to the drawing-room. To me, I confess, she formed the great attraction of the house. Less imbued than my friend O’Grady with the spirit of fun, I could not have gone on from day to day to amuse myself with the eccentricities of the Rooneys, while I could not, on the other hand, have followed Lord Dudley’s lead, and continued to receive the hospitalities of a house while I sneered at the pretensions of its owner.

Under any circumstances Louisa Bellew might be considered a very charming person; but, contrasted with those by whom she was surrounded, her attractions were very great. Indeed, her youth, her light-heartedness, and the buoyancy of her spirit, concealed to a great degree the sorrow it cost her to be associated with her present hosts; for, although they were kind to her, and she felt and acknowledged their kindness, yet the humiliating sense of a position which exposed her to the insolent familiarity of the idle, the dissipated, or the underbred visitors of the house, gradually impressed itself upon her manner, and tempered her mild and graceful nature with a certain air of hauteur and distance. A circumstance, slight in itself, but sufficiently indicative of this, took place some weeks after what I have mentioned.

Lord Dudley de Vere, who, from his rank and condition, was looked upon as a kind of privileged person in the Rooney family, sitting rather later than usual after dinner, and having drunk a great deal of wine, offered a wager that, on his appearance in the drawing-room, not only would he propose for, but be accepted by, any unmarried lady in the room. The puppyism and coxcombry of such a wager might have been pardoned, were it not that the character of the individual, when sober, was in perfect accordance with this drunken boast. The bet, which was for three hundred guineas, was at once taken up; and one of the party running hastily up to the drawing-room, obtained the names of the ladies there, which, being written on slips of paper, were thrown into a hat, thus leaving chance to decide upon whom the happy lot was to fall.

‘Mark ye, Upton,’ cried Lord Dudley, as he prepared to draw forth his prize – ‘mark ye, I didn’t say I ‘d marry her.’

‘No, no,’ resounded from different parts of the room; ‘we understand you perfectly.’

‘My bet,’ continued he, ‘is this: I have booked it.’ With these words he opened a small memorandum-book and read forth the following paragraph: – ‘Three hundred with Upton that I don’t ask and be accepted by any girl in Paul’s drawing-room this evening, after tea; the choice to be decided by lottery. Isn’t that it?’

‘Yes, yes, quite right, perfectly correct,’ said several persons round the table. ‘Come, my lord, here is the hat.’

‘Shake them up well, Upton.’

‘So here goes,’ said Herbert, as affectedly tucking up the sleeve of his coat, he inserted two fingers and drew forth a small piece of paper carefully folded in two. ‘I say, gentlemen, this is your affair; it doesn’t concern me.’ With these words he threw it carelessly on the table, and resuming his seat, leisurely filled his glass, and sipped his wine.

‘Come, read it, Blake; read it up! Who is she?’

‘Gently, lads, gently; patience for one moment. How are we to know if the wager be lost or won? Is the lady herself to declare it?’

‘Why, if you like it; it is perfectly the same to me.’

‘Well, then,’ rejoined Blake, ‘it is – Miss Bellew!’

No sooner was the name read aloud, than, instead of the roar of laughter which it was expected would follow the announcement, a kind of awkward and constrained silence settled on the party. Mr. Rooney himself, who felt shocked beyond measure at this result, had been so long habituated to regard himself as nothing at the head of his own table, accepting, not dictating, its laws, that, much as he may have wished to do so, did not dare to interfere to stay any further proceedings. But many of those around the table who knew Sir Simon Bellew, and felt how unsuitable and inadmissible such a jest as this would be, if practised upon his daughter, whispered among themselves a hope thai the wager would be abandoned, and never thought of more by either party.

‘Yes, yes,’ said Upton, who was an officer in a dragoon regiment, and although of a high family and well connected, was yet very limited in his means. ‘Yes, yes, I quite agree. This foolery might be very good fun with some young ladies we know, but with Miss Bellew the circumstances are quite different; and, for my part, I withdraw from the bet.’

‘Eh – aw! Pass down the claret, if you please. You withdraw from the bet, then? That means you may pay me three hundred guineas; for d – n me, if I do! No, no; I am not so young as that. I haven’t lost fifteen thousand on the Derby without gaining some little insight into these matters. Every bet is a p. p., if not stated to be the reverse. I leave it to any gentleman in the room.’

‘Come, come, De Vere,’ said one, ‘listen to reason, my boy!’

‘Yes, Dudley,’ cried another, ‘only think over the thing. You must see – ’

‘I only wish to see a cheque for three hundred. And I ‘ll not be done,’

‘Sir!’ said Upton, springing from his chair, as the blood mounted to his face and temples, ‘did you mean that expression to apply to me?’

‘Sit down, Mr. Upton, for the love of Heaven! Sit down; do, sir; his lordship never meant it at all. See, now, I’ll pay the money myself. Give me a pen and ink. I’ll give you a cheque on the bank this minute. What the devil signifies a trifle like that!’ stammered out poor Paul, as he wiped his forehead with his napkin, and looked the very picture of terror. ‘Yes, my lord and gentlemen of the jury, we agree to pay the whole costs of this suit.’

A perfect roar of laughter interrupted the worthy attorney, and as it ran from one end of the table to the other, seemed to promise a happier issue to this unpleasant discussion.

‘There, now,’ said honest Paul, ‘the Lord be praised, it is all settled! So let us have another cooper up, and then we ‘ll join the ladies.’

‘Then I understand it thus,’ said Lord Dudley: ‘you pay the money for Mr. Upton, and I may erase the bet from my book?’