The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer Part 5

"Nor sperits and wather?"

"Worse and worse, ma'am."

"Oh, thin, maybe oaten mail tay would do? it's a beautiful thing for the stomick, any how."

"Rank poison on the present occasion, believe me."

"Oh, then, blessed Mary, what am I to do--what is to become of me?"

"Go down at once to your berth, ma'am; lie still and without speaking till we come in sight of land; or," and here a bright thought seized me, "if you really feel very ill, call for that man there, with the fur collar on his coat; he can give you the only thing I ever knew of any efficacy; he's the steward, ma'am, Stewart Moore; but you must be on your guard too as you are a stranger, for he's a conceited fellow, and has saved a trifle, and sets up for a half gentleman; so don't be surprised at his manner; though, after all, you may find him very different; some people, I've heard, think him extremely civil."

"And he has a cure, ye say?"

"The only one I ever heard of; it is a little cordial of which you take, I don't know how much, every ten or fifteen minutes."

"And the naygur doesn't let the saycret out, bad manners to him?"

"No, ma'am; he has refused every offer on the subject.'

"May I be so bowld as to ax his name again?"

"Stewart Moore, ma'am. Moore is the name, but people always call him Stewart Moore; just say that in a loud clear voice, and you'll soon have him."

With the most profuse protestations of grat.i.tude and promises of pork "a discretion," if I ever sojourned at Ballinasloe, my fair friend proceeded to follow my advice, and descended to the cabin.

Some hours after, I also betook myself to my rest, from which, however, towards midnight I was awoke by the heavy working and pitching of the little vessel, as she laboured in a rough sea. As I looked forth from my narrow crib, a more woe-begone picture can scarcely be imagined than that before me. Here and there through the gloomy cabin lay the victims of the fell malady, in every stage of suffering, and in every att.i.tude of misery. Their cries and lamentings mingled with the creaking of the bulk-heads and the jarring tw.a.n.g of the dirty lamp, whose irregular swing told plainly how oscillatory was our present motion. I turned from the unpleasant sight, and was about again to address myself to slumber with what success I might, when I started at the sound of a voice in the very berth next to me--whose tones, once heard, there was no forgetting. The words ran as nearly as I can recollect thus:-- "Oh, then, bad luck to ye for pigs, that ever brought me into the like of this. Oh, Lord, there it is again." And here a slight interruption to eloquence took place, during which I was enabled to reflect upon the author of the complaint, who, I need not say, was Mrs. Mulrooney.

"I think a little tay would settle my stomach, if I only could get it; but what's the use of talking in this horrid place? They never mind me no more than if I was a pig. Steward, steward--oh, then, it's wis.h.i.+ng you well I am for a steward. Steward, I say;" and this she really did say, with an energy of voice and manner that startled more than one sleeper. "Oh, you're coming at last, steward."

"Ma'am," said a little dapper and dirty personage, in a blue jacket, with a greasy napkin negligently thrown over one arm "ex officio," "Ma'am, did you call?"

"Call, is it call? No; but I'm roaring for you this half hour. Come here. Have you any of the cordial dhrops agin the sickness?--you know what I mean."

"Is it brandy, ma'am?"

"No, it isn't brandy;"

"We have got gin, ma'am, and bottled porter--cider, ma'am, if you like."

"Agh, no! sure I want the dhrops agin the sickness."

"Don't know indeed, ma'am."

"Ah, you stupid creature; maybe you're not the real steward. What's your name?"

"Smith, ma'am."

"Ah, I thought so; go away, man, go away."

This injunction, given in a diminuendo cadence, was quickly obeyed, and all was silence for a moment or two. Once more was I dropping asleep, when the same voice as before burst out with-- "Am I to die here like a haythen, and n.o.body to come near me? Steward, steward, steward Moore, I say,"

"Who calls me?" said a deep sonorous voice from the opposite side of the cabin, while at the same instant a tall green silk nightcap, surmounting a very aristocratic-looking forehead, appeared between the curtains of the opposite berth.

"Steward Moore," said the lady again, with her eyes straining in the direction of the door by which she expected him to enter.

"This is most strange," muttered the baronet, half aloud. "Why, madam, you are calling me!"

"And if I am," said Mrs. Mulrooney, "and if ye heerd me, have ye no manners to answer your name, eh? Are ye steward Moore?"

"Upon my soul ma'am I thought so last night, when I came on board; but you really have contrived to make me doubt my own ident.i.ty."

"And is it there ye're lying on the broad of yer back, and me as sick as a dog fornent ye?"

"I concede ma'am the fact; the position is a most irksome one on every account."

"Then why don't ye come over to me?" and this Mrs. Mulrooney said with a voice of something like tenderness--wis.h.i.+ng at all hazards to conciliate so important a functionary.

"Why, really you are the most incomprehensible person I ever met."

"I'm what?" said Mrs. Mulrooney, her blood rus.h.i.+ng to her face and temples as she spoke--for the same reason as her fair townswoman is reported to have borne with stoical fort.i.tude every harsh epithet of the language, until it occurred to her opponent to tell her that "the divil a bit better she was nor a p.r.o.noun;" so Mrs. Mulrooney, taking "omne ignotum pro horribili," became perfectly beside herself at the unlucky phrase. "I'm what? repate it av ye dare, and I'll tear yer eyes out? Ye dirty bla--guard, to be lying there at yer ease under the blankets, grinning at me. What's your thrade--answer me that--av it isn't to wait on the ladies, eh?"

"Oh, the woman must be mad," said Sir Stewart.

"The devil a taste mad, my dear--I'm only sick. Now just come over to me, like a decent creature, and give me the dhrop of comfort ye have. Come, avick."

"Go over to you?"

"Ay, and why not? or if it's so lazy ye are, why then I'll thry and cross over to your side."

These words being accompanied by a certain indication of change of residence on the part of Mrs. Mulrooney, Sir Stewart perceived there was no time to lose, and springing from his berth, he rushed half-dressed through the cabin, and up the companion-ladder, just as Mrs. Mulrooney had protruded a pair of enormous legs from her couch, and hung for a moment pendulous before she dropped upon the floor, and followed him to the deck. A tremendous shout of laughter from the sailors and deck pa.s.sengers prevented my hearing the dialogue which ensued; nor do I yet know how Mrs. Mulrooney learned her mistake. Certain it is, she no more appeared among the pa.s.sengers in the cabin, and Sir Stewart's manner the following morning at breakfast amply satisfied me that I had had my revenge.

CHAPTER X.

UPSET--MIND--AND BODY.

No sooner in Liverpool, than I hastened to take my place in the earliest conveyance for London. At that time the Umpire Coach was the perfection of fast travelling; and seated behind the box, enveloped in a sufficiency of broad-cloth, I turned my face towards town with as much anxiety and as ardent expectations as most of those about me. All went on in the regular monotonous routine of such matters until we reached Northampton, pa.s.sing down the steep street of which town, the near wheel-horse stumbled and fell; the coach, after a tremendous roll to one side, toppled over on the other, and with a tremendous crash, and sudden shock, sent all the outsides, myself among the number, flying through the air like sea-gulls. As for me, after describing a very respectable parabola, my angle of incidence landed me in a bonnet-maker's shop, having pa.s.sed through a large plate-gla.s.s window, and destroyed more leghorns and dunstables than a year's pay would recompense. I have but light recollection of the details of that occasion, until I found myself lying in a very s.p.a.cious bed at the George Inn, having been bled in both arms, and discovering by the mult.i.tude of bandages in which I was enveloped, that at least some of my bones were broken by the fall. That such fate had befallen my collar-bone and three of my ribs I soon learned; and was horror-struck at hearing from the surgeon who attended me, that four or five weeks would be the very earliest period I could bear removal with safety. Here then at once was a large deduction from my six months' leave, not to think of the misery that awaited me for such a time, confined to my bed in an inn, without books, friends, or acquaintances. However even this could be remedied by patience, and summoning up all I could command, I "bided my time," but not before I had completed a term of two months' imprisonment, and had become, from actual starvation, something very like a living transparency.

No sooner, however, did I feel myself once more on the road, than my spirits rose, and I felt myself as full of high hope and buoyant expectancy as ever. It was late at night when I arrived in London. I drove to a quiet hotel in the west-end; and the following morning proceeded to Portman-square, bursting with impatience to see my friends the Callonbys, and recount all my adventures--for as I was too ill to write from Northampton, and did not wish to entrust to a stranger the office of communicating with them, I judged that they must be exceedingly uneasy on my account, and pictured to myself the thousand emotions my appearance so indicative of illness would give rise to; and could scarcely avoid running in my impatience to be once more among them. How Lady Jane would meet me, I thought of over again and again; whether the same cautious reserve awaited me, or whether her family's approval would have wrought a change in her reception of me, I burned to ascertain. As my thoughts ran on in this way, I found myself at the door; but was much alarmed to perceive that the closed window-shutters and dismantled look of the house proclaimed them from home. I rung the bell, and soon learned from a servant, whose face I had not seen before, that the family had gone to Paris about a month before, with the intention of spending the winter there. I need not say how grievously this piece of intelligence disappointed me, and for a minute or two I could not collect my thoughts. At last the servant said: "If you have any thing very particular, sir, that my Lord's lawyer can do, I can give you his address."

"No, thank you--nothing;" at the same time I muttered to myself, "I'll have some occupation for him though ere long. The family were all quite well, didn't you say?"

"Yes sir, perfectly well. My Lord had only a slight cold,"

"Ah--yes--and there address is 'Meurice;' very well."

So saying I turned from the door, and with slower steps than I had come, returned to my hotel.

My immediate resolve was to set out for Paris; my second was to visit my uncle, Sir Guy Lorrequer, first, and having explained to him the nature of my position, and the advantageous prospects before me, endeavour to induce him to make some settlement on Lady Jane, in the event of my obtaining her family's consent to our marriage. This, from his liking great people much, and laying great stress upon the advantages of connexion, I looked upon as a matter of no great difficulty; so that, although my hopes of happiness were delayed in their fulfilment, I believed they were only about to be the more securely realized. The same day I set out for Elton, and by ten o'clock at night reached my uncle's house. I found the old gentleman looking just as I had left him three years before, complaining a little of gout in the left foot--praising his old specific, port-wine--abusing his servants for robbing him--and drinking the Duke of Wellington's health every night after supper; which meal I had much pleasure in surprising him at on my arrival--not having eaten since my departure from London.

"Well, Harry," said my uncle, when the servants had left the room, and we drew over the spider table to the fire to discuss our wine with comfort, "what good wind has blown you down to me, my boy? for it's odd enough, five minutes before I heard the wheels on the gravel I was just wis.h.i.+ng some good fellow would join me at the grouse--and you see I have had my wis.h.!.+ The old story, I suppose, 'out of cash.' Would not come down here for nothing--eh? Come, lad, tell truth; is it not so?"

"Why, not exactly, sir; but I really had rather at present talk about you, than about my own matters, which we can chat over tomorrow. How do you get on, sir, with the Scotch steward?"

"He's a rogue, sir--a cheat--a scoundrel; but it is the same with them all; and your cousin, Harry--your cousin, that I have reared from his infancy to be my heir, (pleasant topic for me!) he cares no more for me than the rest of them, and would never come near me, if it were not that, like yourself, he was hard run for money, and wanted to wheedle me out of a hundred or two."

"But you forget, sir--I told you I have not come with such an object."

"We'll see that--we'll see that in the morning," replied he, with an incredulous shake of the head.

"But Guy, sir--what has Guy done?"

"What has he not done? No sooner did he join that popinjay set of fellows, the _th hussars, than he turned out, what he calls a four-in-hand drag, which dragged nine hundred pounds out of my pocket --then he has got a yacht at Cowes--a grouse mountain in Scotland--and has actually given Tattersall an unlimited order to purchase the Wreckinton pack of harriers, which he intends to keep for the use of the corps. In a word, there is not an amus.e.m.e.nt of that villanous regiment, not a flask of champagne drank at their mess, I don't bear my share in the cost of; all through the kind offices of your worthy cousin, Guy Lorrequer."

This was an exceedingly pleasant expose for me, to hear of my cousin indulged in every excess of foolish extravagance by his rich uncle, while I, the son of an elder brother who unfortunately called me by his own name, Harry, remained the sub. in a marching regiment, with not three hundred pounds a year above my pay, and whom any extravagance, if such had been proved against me would have deprived of even that small allowance. My uncle however did not notice the chagrin with which I heard his narrative, but continued to detail various instances of wild and reckless expense the future possessor of his ample property had already launched into.

Anxious to say something without well-knowing what, I hinted that probably my good cousin would reform some of these days, and marry.

"Marry," said my uncle; "yes, that, I believe, is the best thing we can do with him; and I hope now the matter is in good train--so the latest accounts say, at least."

"Ah, indeed," said I, endeavouring to take an interest where I really felt none--for my cousin and I had never been very intimate friends, and the differences in our fortunes had not, at least to my thinking, been compensated by any advances which he, under the circ.u.mstances, might have made to me.

"Why, Harry, did you not hear of it?" said my uncle.

"No--not a word, sir."

"Very strange, indeed--a great match, Harry--a very great match, indeed."

"Some rich banker's daughter," thought I. "What will he say when he hears of my fortune?"

"A very fine young woman, too, I understand--quite the belle of London --and a splendid property left by an aunt."

I was bursting to tell him of my affair, and that he had another nephew, to whom if common justice were rendered, his fortune was as certainly made for life.

"Guy's business happened this way," continued my uncle, who was quite engrossed by the thought of his favourite's success. "The father of the young lady met him in Ireland, or Scotland, or some such place, where he was with his regiment--was greatly struck with his manner and address --found him out to be my nephew--asked him to his house--and, in fact, almost threw this lovely girl at his head before they were two months acquainted."

"As nearly as possible my own adventure," thought I, laughing to myself.

"But you have not told me who they are, sir," said I, dying to have his story finished, and to begin mine.

"I'm coming to that--I'm coming to that. Guy came down here, but did not tell me one word of his having ever met the family, but begged me to give him an introduction to them, as they were in Paris, where he was going on a short leave; and the first thing I heard of the matter was a letter from the papa, demanding from me if Guy was to be my heir, and asking 'how far his attentions in his family, met with my approval.'"

"Then how did you know sir that they were previously known to each other?"

"The family lawyer told me, who heard it all talked over."

"And why, then, did Guy get the letter of introduction from you, when he was already acquainted with them?"

"I am sure I cannot tell, except that you know he always does every thing unlike every one else, and to be sure the letter seems to have excited some amus.e.m.e.nt. I must show you his answer to my first note to know how all was going on; for I felt very anxious about matters, when I heard from some person who had met them, that Guy was everlastingly in the house, and that Lord Callonby could not live without him."

"Lord who, sir?" said I in a voice that made the old man upset his gla.s.s, and spring from his chair in horror.

"What the devil is the matter with the boy. What makes you so pale?"

"Whose name did you say at that moment, sir," said I with a slowness of speech that cost me agony.

"Lord Callonby, my old schoolfellow and f.a.g at Eton."

"And the lady's name, sir?" said I, in scarcely an audible whisper.

"I'm sure I forget her name; but here's the letter from Guy, and I think he mentions her name in the postscript."

I s.n.a.t.c.hed rudely the half-opened letter from the old man, as he was vainly endeavouring to detect the place he wanted, and read as follows: "My adored Jane is all your fondest wishes for my happiness could picture, and longs to see her dear uncle, as she already calls you on every occasion." I read no more--my eyes swam--the paper, the candles, every thing before me, was misty and confused; and although I heard my uncle's voice still going on, I knew nothing of what he said.

For some time my mind could not take in the full extent of the base treachery I had met with, and I sat speechless and stupified. By degrees my faculties became clearer, and with one glance I read the whole business, from my first meeting with them at Kilrush to the present moment. I saw that in their attentions to me, they thought they were winning the heir of Elton, the future proprietor of fifteen thousand per annum. From this tangled web of heartless intrigue I turned my thoughts to Lady Jane herself. How had she betrayed me! for certainly she had not only received, but encouraged my addresses--and so soon, too.--To think that at the very moment when my own precipitate haste to see her had involved me in a nearly fatal accident, she was actually receiving the attentions of another! Oh, it was too, too bad.

But enough--even now I can scarcely dwell upon the memory of that moment, when the hopes and dreams of many a long day and night were destined to be thus rudely blighted. I seized the first opportunity of bidding my uncle good night; and having promised him to reveal all my plans on the morrow, hurried to my room.

My plans! alas, I had none--that one fatal paragraph had scattered them to the winds; and I threw myself upon my bed, wretched and almost heart-broken.

I have once before in these "Confessions" claimed to myself the privilege, not inconsistent with a full disclosure of the memorabilia of my life, to pa.s.s slightly over those pa.s.sages, the burden of which was unhappy, and whose memory is painful. I must now, therefore, claim the "benefit of this act," and beg of the reader to let me pa.s.s from this sad portion of my history, and for the full expression of my mingled rage, contempt, disappointment, and sorrow, let me beg of him to receive instead, what a learned pope once gave as his apology for not reading a rather polysyllabic word in a Latin letter--"As for this," said he, looking at the phrase in question, "soit qui'l dit," so say I. And now --en route.

THE CONFESSIONS OF HARRY LORREQUER, Volume 2.

CHAPTER XI.

CHELTENHAM--MATRIMONIAL ADVENTURE--SHOWING HOW TO MAKE LOVE FOR A FRIEND.