Sir Brook Fossbrooke Volume I Part 8

"He is here, sir; he has been waiting these twenty minutes. I told him you were with his Excellency."

"So I was,--so I always am," said he, throwing a half-smoked cigar into the fire. "Admit him."

A pale, care-worn, anxious-looking man, whose face was not without traces of annoyance at the length of time he had been kept waiting, now entered and sat down.

"Just where we were yesterday, Pemberton," said Balfour, as he rose and stood with his back to the fire, the tails of his gorgeous dressing-gown hanging over his arms. "Intractable as he ever was; he won't die, and he won't resign."

"His friends say he is perfectly willing to resign if you agree to his terms."

"That may be possible; the question is, What are his terms? Have you a precedent of a Chief Baron being raised to the peerage?"

"It's not, as I understand, the peerage he insists on; he inclines to a moneyed arrangement."

"We are too poor, Pemberton,--we are too poor. There's a deep gap in our customs this quarter. It's reduction we must think of, not outlay."

"If the changes _are_ to be made," said the other, with a tone of impatience, "I certainly ought to be told at once, or I shall have no time left for my canva.s.s."

"An Irish borough, Pemberton,--an Irish borough requires so little,"

said Balfour, with a compa.s.sionate smile.

"Such is not the opinion over here, sir," said Pemberton, stiffly; "and I might even suggest some caution in saying it."

"Caution is the badge of all our tribe," said Balfour, with a burlesque gravity. "By the way, Pemberton, his Excellency is greatly disappointed at the issue of these Cork trials; why did n't you hang these fellows?"

"Juries can no more be coerced here than in England; they brought them in not guilty."

"We know all that, and we ask you why? There certainly was little room for doubt in the evidence."

"When you have lived longer in Ireland, Mr. Balfour, you will learn that there are other considerations in a trial than the testimony of the witnesses."

"That's exactly what I said to his Excellency; and I remarked, 'If Pemberton comes into the House, he must prepare for a sharp attack about these trials.'"

"And it is exactly to ascertain if I am to enter Parliament that I have come here to-day," said the other, angrily.

"Bring me the grateful tidings that the Lord Chief Baron has joined his ill.u.s.trious predecessors in that distinguished court, I 'll answer you in five minutes."

"Beattie declares he is better this morning. He says that he has in all probability years of life before him."

"There 's nothing so hard to kill as a judge, except it be an archbishop. I believe a sedentary life does it; they say if a fellow will sit still and never move he may live to any age."

Pemberton took an impatient turn up and down the room, and then wheeling about directly in front of Balfour, said, "If his Excellency knew, perhaps, that I do not want the House of Commons--"

"Not want the House,--not wish to be in Parliament?"

"Certainly not. If I enter the House, it is as a law-officer of the Crown; personally it is no object to me."

"I'll not tell him that, Pem. I'll keep your secret safe, for I tell you frankly it would ruin you to reveal it."

"It's no secret, sir; you may proclaim it,--you may publish it in the 'Gazette,' But really we are wasting much valuable time here. It is now two o'clock, and I must go down to Court. I have only to say that if no arrangement be come to before this time to-morrow--" He stopped short.

Another word might have committed him, but he pulled up in time.

"Well, what then?" asked Balfour, with a half smile.

"I have heard you pride yourself, Mr. Balfour," said the other, recovering, "on your skill in nice negotiation; why not try what you could do with the Chief Baron?"

"Are there women in the family?" said Balfour, caressing his moustache.

"No; only his wife."

"I 've seen her," said he, contemptuously.

"He quarrelled with his only son, and has not spoken to him, I believe, for nigh thirty years, and the poor fellow is struggling on as a country doctor somewhere in the west."

"What if we were to propose to do something for him? Men are often not averse to see those a.s.sisted whom their own pride refuses to help."

"I scarcely suspect you 'll acquire his grat.i.tude that way."

"We don't want his grat.i.tude, we want his place. I declare I think the idea a good one. There's a thing now at the Cape, an inspectors.h.i.+p of something,--Hottentots or hospitals, I forget which. His Excellency asked to have the gift of it; what if we were to appoint this man?"

"Make the crier of his Court a Commissioner in Chancery, and Baron Lendrick will be more obliged to you," said Pem-berton, with a sneer.

"He is about the least forgiving man I ever knew or heard of."

"Where is this son of his to be found?"

"I saw him yesterday walking with Dr. Beattie. I have no doubt Beattie knows his address. But let me warn you once more against the inutility of the step you would take. I doubt if the old Judge would as much as thank you."

Balfour turned round to the gla.s.s and smiled sweetly at himself, as though to say that he had heard of some one who knew how to make these negotiations successful,--a fellow of infinite readiness, a clever fellow, but withal one whose good looks and distinguished air left even his talents in the background.

"I think I 'll call and see the Chief Baron myself," said he. "His Excellency sends twice a day to inquire, and I 'll take the opportunity to make him a visit,--that is, if he will receive me."

"It is doubtful. At all events, let me give you one hint for your guidance. Neither let drop Mr. Attorney's name nor mine in your conversation; avoid the mention of any one whose career might be influenced by the Baron's retirement; and talk of him less as a human being than as an inst.i.tution that is destined to endure as long as the British const.i.tution."

"I wish it was a woman--if it was only a woman I had to deal with, the whole affair might be deemed settled."

"If you should be able to do anything before the mail goes out to-night, perhaps you will inform me," said Pem-berton, as he bowed and left the room. "And these are the men they send over here to administer the country!" muttered he, as he descended the stairs,--"such are the intelligences that are to rule Ireland! Was it Voltaire who said there was nothing so inscrutable in all the ways of Providence as the miserable smallness of those creatures to whom the destiny of nations was committed?"

Ruminating over this, he hastened on to a _nisi prius_ case.

CHAPTER VIII. A PUZZLING COMMISSION

As Colonel Cave re-entered his quarters after morning parade in the Royal Barracks of Dublin, he found the following letter, which the post had just delivered. It was headed "Strictly Private," with three dashes under the words.

"Holt-Trafford.

"My dear Colonel Cave,--Sir Hugh is confined to bed with a severe attack of gout,--the doctors call it flying gout. He suffers greatly, and his nerves are in a state of irritation that makes all attempt at writing impossible. This will be my apology for obtruding upon you, though, perhaps, the cause in which I write might serve for excuse. We are in the deepest anxiety about Lionel. You are already aware how heavily his extravagance has cost us. His play-debts amounted to above ten thousand pounds, and all the cleverness of Mr. Joel has not been able to compromise with the tradespeople for less than as much more; nor are we yet done with demands from various quarters. It is not, however, of these that I desire to speak. Your kind offer to take him into your own regiment, and exercise the watchful supervision of a parent, has relieved us of much anxiety, and his own sincere affection for you is the strongest a.s.surance we can have that the step has been a wise one.

Our present uneasiness has however a deeper source than mere pecuniary embarra.s.sment. The boy--he is very little more than a boy in years--has fallen in love, and gravely writes to his father for consent that he may marry. I a.s.sure you the shock brought back all Sir Hugh's most severe symptoms; and his left eye was attacked with an inflammation such as Dr.