Charles Lever - Sir Jasper Carew - His Life and Experience

The appeal was sudden enough to be disconcerting, and so Fagan felt it, for he looked embarrassed and confused in no ordinary degree.

“Come, I see I shall not be refused,” said my father, who at once saw that the only course was the bold one. “It is this: we are expecting some friends to spend a few days with us at Castle Carew, a kind of house-warming to that new wing; we have done our best to gather around us whatever our good city boasts of agreeability and beauty, and with tolerable success. There is, I may say, but one wanting to make our triumph complete. With her presence I ‘d wager a thousand guineas that no country mansion in Great Britain could contest the palm with us.”

Fagan grew deadly pale as he listened, then flushed deeply, and a second time a sickly hue crept over his features as, in a voice barely above a whisper, he said, —

“You mean my daughter, sir?”

“Of course I do, Tony. A man need n’t read riddles to know who is the handsomest girl in Dublin. I hope you ‘ll not deny us the favor of her company. My wife will meet her at Bray; she’ll come into town, if you prefer it, and take her up here.”

“Oh, no, sir; not here,” said Fagan, hurriedly, who, whatever plans he might be forming in his mind, quickly saw the inconvenience of such a step.

“It shall be as you please in every respect, Fagan. Now, on Tuesday morning – ”

“Not so fast, sir, – not so fast,” said Fagan, calmly. “You have n’t given me time for much reflection now; and the very little thought I have bestowed on the matter suggests grave doubts to me. Nobody knows better than Mr. Carew that a wide gulf separates our walk in life from his; that however contented with our lot in this world, it is a very humble one – ”

“Egad! I like such humility. The man who can draw a check for ten thousand at sight, and yet never detect any remarkable alteration in his banker’s book, ought to be proud of the philosophy that teaches him contentment. Tony, my worthy friend, don’t try to mystify me. You know, and you ‘d be a fool if you did n’t know, that with your wealth and your daughter’s beauty you have only to choose the station she will occupy. There is but one way you can possibly defeat her success, and that is by estranging her from the world, and withdrawing her from all intercourse with society. I can’t believe that this is your intention; I can scarcely credit that it could be her wish. Let us, then, have the honor of introducing her to that rank, the very highest position in which she would grace and dignify. I ask it as a favor, – the very greatest you can bestow on us.”

“No, sir; it cannot be. It’s impossible, utterly impossible.”

“I am really curious to know upon what grounds, for I confess they are a secret to me!”

“So they must remain, then, sir, if you cannot persuade me to open more of my heart than I am in the habit of doing with comparative strangers. I can be very grateful for the honor you intend me, Mr. Carew; but the best way to be so is, probably, not to accompany that feeling with any sense of personal humiliation!”

“You are certainly not bent on giving me any clew to your motives, Fagan.”

“I’m sorry for it, sir; but frankness to you might be great unfairness to myself.”

“More riddles, Tony, and I ‘m far too dull to read them.”

“Well, then, sir, perhaps you’d understand me when I say that Anthony Fagan, low and humble as he is, has no mind to expose his daughter to the sneers and scoffs of a rank she has no pretension to mix with; that, miser as he is, he would n’t bring a blush of shame to her cheek for all the wealth of India! and that, rather than sit at home here and brood over every insult that would be offered to the usurer’s daughter by those beggarly spendthrifts that are at liberty by his bounty, he ‘d earn his name of the Grinder by crushing them to the dust!”

The vehemence of his utterance had gone on increasing as he spoke, till at the end the last words were given with almost a scream of passion.

“I must say, Fagan,” replied my father, calmly, “that you form a very humble, I trust a very unfair, estimate of the habits of my house, not to say of my own feelings. However, we’ll not dispute the matter. Good evening to you.”

“Good evening, sir; I ‘m sorry I was so warm; I hope I have said nothing that could offend you.”

“Not when you did n’t mean offence, believe me, Fagan. I repeat my hope that the friends and acquaintances with whom I live are not the underbred and ill-mannered class you think them; beyond that I have nothing to say. Good evening.”

Probably no amount of discussion and argument on the subject could so palpably have convinced Fagan of the vast superiority of a man of good manners over one of inferior breeding as did the calm and gentleman-like quietude of my father’s bearing, in contradistinction to his own passionate outbreak.

“One moment, sir, – one moment,” cried he, laying his hand on my father’s arm; “you really believe that one humbly born as Polly, the daughter of a man in my condition, would be received amongst the high and titled of Dublin without a scornful allusion to whence she came, – without a sneer at her rank in life?”

“If I thought anything else, Fagan, Ï should be dishonored in making this request of you.”

“She shall go, sir, – she shall go,” cried Fagan.

“Thanks for the confidence, Fagan; I know you ‘d rather trust me with half your fortune without a scratch of my pen in return.”

Fagan turned away his head; but a motion of his hand across his eyes showed how he felt the speech.

To obviate the awkwardness of the moment, my father entered upon the details of the journey, for which it was arranged that Fagan was to send his daughter to Bray, where a carriage from Castle Carew would be in waiting to convey her the remainder of the way. These points being settled, my father once again thanked him for his compliance, and departed.

I should be only mystifying my reader most unjustifiably should I affect any secrecy as to my father’s reasons for this singular invitation; for although the gossipry of the day could adduce innumerable plots and plans which were to spring out of it, I sincerely believe his sole motive was the pleasure that he and my mother were sure to feel in doing a piece of graceful and generous politeness. MacNaghten’s account of Polly had strongly excited their curiosity, not to speak of a more worthy feeling, in her behalf; and knowing that Fagan’s immense wealth would one day or other be hers, they felt it was but fair that she should see, and be seen, by that world of which she was yet to be a distinguished ornament. Beyond this, I implicitly believe they had no motive nor plan. Of course, I do not pretend to say that even amongst his own very guests, the men who travelled down to enjoy his hospitality, his conduct did not come in for its share of criticism. Many an artful device was attributed to this seeming stroke of policy, not one of which, however, did not more redound to my father’s craft than to his character for honorable dealing. But what would become of “bad tongues” in this world if there were not generous natures to calumniate and vilify? Of a verity, scandal prefers a high mark and an unblemished reputation for its assaults, far better than a damaged fame and a tattered character; it seems more heroic to shy a pebble through a pane of plate-glass than to pitch a stone through a cracked casement!

Among the members of the Viceregal suite who were to accompany his Grace on a visit was a certain Barry Rutledge, a gentleman usher, whose character and doings were well known in the times I speak of. When a very young man, Rutledge had been stripped of his entire patrimony on the turf, and was thrown for support upon the kindness of those who had known him in better days. Whether it was that time had developed or adversity had sharpened his wits, it is certain that he showed himself to be a far shrewder and more intelligent being than the world had heretofore deemed him. If he was not gifted with any very great insight into politics, for which he was free to own he had no taste, he was well versed in human nature, at least in all its least favorable aspects, and thoroughly understood how to detect and profit by the weaknesses of those with whom he came in contact.