Jack Hinton Part 34

'No, no, I pray you not!' said Louisa, in reply to I know not what.

'Don't you hear my uncle?'

In her anxiety to press forward she had slightly disengaged her arm from mine as she spoke. At this instant a man rushed forward, and catching her hand, drew it rudely within his arm, calling out as he did so--

'Never fear, Louisa! you shall not be insulted while your cousin is here to protect you.'

She sprang round to reply: 'You are mistaken, Ulick! It is Mr. Hinton!'

She could say no more, for he lifted her into the carriage, and, closing the door with a loud bang, desired the coachman to drive on.

Stupefied with amazement, I stood quite motionless. My first impulse was to strike him to the ground; for although a younger and a weaker man, I felt within me at the moment the strength to do it. My next thought was of Louisa's warning not to quarrel with her cousin. The struggle was indeed a severe one, but I gained the victory over my pa.s.sion. Unable, however, to quit the spot, I stood with my arms folded, and my eyes riveted upon him. He returned my stare, and with a sneer of insufferable insolence pa.s.sed me by and walked upstairs. Not a word was spoken on either side; but there are moments in one's life in which a look or pa.s.sing glance rivets an undying hate. Such a one did we exchange and nothing that the tongue could speak could compa.s.s that secret instinct by which we ratified our enmity.

With slow, uncertain steps I mounted the stairs. Some strange fascination led me, as it were, to dog his steps; and although in my heart I prayed that no collision should ever come between us, yet I could not resist the headlong impulse to follow and to watch him.

Like that unexplained temptation that leads the gazer over some lofty precipice to move on, step by step, yet nearer to the brink, conscious of his danger, yet unable to recede; so did I track this man from place to place, following him as he pa.s.sed from one group to the other of his friends, till at length he seated himself at a table, around which a number of persons were engaged in noisy and boisterous conversation.

He filled a tumbler to the brim with wine, and drinking it off at a draught, refilled again.

'You are thirsty, Ulick,' said some one.

'Thirsty! On fire, by G----! You'll not believe me when I tell you--I can't do it; no, by Heaven! there is nothing in the way of provocation----'

As he said thus much, some lady pa.s.sing near induced him to drop his voice, and the remainder of the sentence was inaudible to me. Hitherto I had been standing beside his chair; I now moved round to the opposite side of the table, and, with my arms folded and my eyes firmly fixed, stood straight before him. For an instant or two he did not remark me, as he continued to speak with his head bent downwards. Suddenly lifting up his eyes, he started--pushed his chair slightly back from the table--

'And look! see!' cried he, as with outstretched finger he pointed toward me--'see! if he isn't there again!'

Then suddenly changing the tone of his voice to one of affected softness, he continued, addressing me--

'I have been explaining, sir, as well as my poor powers will permit, the excessive pains I have taken to persuade you to prove yourself a gentleman. One half the trouble you have put me to would have told an Irish gentleman what was looked for at his hands; you appear, however, to be the best-tempered fellows in the world at your side of the Channel. Come now, boys! if any man likes a bet, I'll wager ten guineas that even this won't ruffle his amiable nature. Pa.s.s the sherry here, G.o.dfrey! Is that a clean gla.s.s beside you?'

So saying, he took the decanter, and, leisurely filling the gla.s.s, stood up as if to present it, but when he attained the erect position, he looked at me fixedly for a second, and then dashed the wine in my face.

A roar of laughter burst around me, but I saw and heard no more. The moment before, and my head was cool, my senses clear, my faculties unclouded; but now, as if derangement had fallen upon me, I could see nothing but looks of mockery and scorn, and hear nothing save the discordant laugh and the jarring accent of derision.

CHAPTER XXVIII. THE INN FIRE

How I escaped from that room, and by what means I found myself in the street, I know not. My first impulse was to tear off my cravat, that I might breathe more freely; still a sense of suffocation oppressed me, and I felt stunned and stupefied.

'Come along, Hinton--rouse yourself, my boy! See, your coat is drenched with rain,' said a friendly voice behind me; while, grasping me forcibly by the arm, the Major led me forward.

'What have I done?' cried I, struggling to get free. 'Tell me--oh, tell me, have I done wrong? Have I committed any dreadful thing? There is an aching pain here--here in my forehead, as though----- I dare not speak my shame.'

'Nothing of the kind, my boy,' said Mahon: 'you've conducted yourself admirably. Matt Keane saw it all, and he says he never witnessed anything finer; and he's no bad judge, let me tell you. So, there now, be satisfied, and take off your wet clothes.'

There was something imperative in the tone in which he spoke; besides, the Major was one of those people who somehow or other always contrive to have their own way in the world; so that I yielded at once, feeling, too, that any opposition would only defer my chance of an explanation.

While I was thus occupied in my inner room, I could overhear my friend without engaged in the preparation of a little supper, mingling an occasional soliloquy with the simmering of the grilled bone that browned upon the fire--the clink of gla.s.ses and plates, and all the evidences of punch-making, breaking every now and then amid such reflections as these:--

'A mighty ugly business! nothing for it but meeting him. Poor lad, they'll say we murdered him among us! Och, he's far too young for Galway. Holloa, Hinton, are you ready? Now you look something reasonable; and when we've eaten a bit, well talk this matter over coolly and sensibly. And to make your mind easy, I may tell you at once, I have arranged a meeting for you with Burke at five to-morrow morning.'

I grasped his hand convulsively within mine, as a gleam of savage satisfaction shot through me.

'Yes, yes,' said he, as if replying to my look, 'it's all as it ought to be. Even his own friends are indignant at his conduct; and indeed I may say it's the first time a stranger has met with such in our country.'

'I can well believe it,' Major,' said I; 'for, unless from the individual in question, I have met with nothing but kindness and good feeling amongst you. He indeed would seem an exception to his countrymen.'

'Therefore the sooner you shoot him the better. But I wish I could Father Tom.'

'_Adest, domine_,' cried the priest, at the same moment, as he entered the room, throwing his wet greatcoat into a corner and giving himself a shake a Newfoundland dog might have envied. 'Isn't this pretty work, Bob?' said he, turning to his cousin with a look of indignant reproach: 'he is not twenty-four hours in the town, and you've got him into a fight already! And sure it's my own fault that ever brought you together. _Nec fortunam nec gratiam habes_--no indeed, you have neither luck nor grace. _Mauvaise tete_, as the French say---always in trouble.

Arrah, don't be talking to me at all, at all! reach me over the spirits.

Sorra better I ever saw you!--disturbing me out of my virtuous dreams at two in the morning. True enough, _dic mihi societatem tuam_; but little I thought he'd be getting you shot before you left the place.'

I endeavoured to pacify the good priest as well as I was able; the Major too made every explanation; but what between his being called out of bed, his anger at getting wet, and his cousin's well-known character for affairs of this nature, it was not before he had swallowed his second tumbler of punch that he would 'listen to rayson.'

'Well, well, if it is so, G.o.d's will be done,' said he with a sigh. '_Un bon coup d'epee_, as we used to say formerly, is beautiful treatment for bad blood; but maybe you're going to fight with pistols? Oh, murther, them's dreadful things!'

'I begin to suspect,' said the Major slyly, 'that Father Tom's afraid if you shoot Ulick he'll never get that fifty pounds he won. _Hinc illo lacrymo_--eh, Tom?'

'Ah, the spalpeen,' said the priest, with a deep groan, 'didn't he do me out of that money already?'

'How so, father?' said I, scarce able to repress my laughter at the expression of his face.

'I was coming down the main street yesterday evening with Doctor Plunkett, the bishop, beside me, discoursing a little theology, and looking as pious and respectable as may be, when that villain Burke came running out of a shop, and pulling out his pocket-book, cried--

'"Wait a bit, Father Tom, you know I'm a little in your debt about that race; and as you're a sporting character, it's only fair to book up at once."

'"What is this I hear, Father Loftus?" says the bishop.

'"Oh, my lord," say I, "he's a _jocosus puer_--a humbugging bla-guard; a _farceur_, your reverence, and that's the way he is always cutting his jokes upon the people."

"'And so he does not owe you this money?" said the bishop, looking mighty hard at us both.

'"Not a farthing of it, my lord."

'"That's comfortable, anyhow," says Burke, putting up his pocket-book; "and 'faith, my lord," said he with a wink, "I wish I had a loan of you for an hour or two every settling day, for troth you 're a trump!" And with that he went off laughing, till ye'd have thought he'd split his sides--and I am sure I wish he had.'

I don't think Mr. Burke himself could have laughed louder or longer at his scheme than did we in hearing it, The priest at length joined in the mirth, and I could perceive, as the punch made more inroads upon him and the evening wore on, that his holy horror of duelling was gradually melting away before the warmth of his Hibernian propensities, like a wet sponge pa.s.sed across the surface of a dark picture, bringing forth from the gloom many a figure and feature indistinct before, and displaying touches of light not hitherto appreciable, so whisky seems to exercise some strange power of displaying its votaries in all their breadth of character, divesting them of the advent.i.tious clothes in which position or profession has invested them. Thus a tipsy Irishman stands forth in the exuberance of his nationality, _Hibernicis Hibernior_. Forgetting all his moral declamation on duelling, oblivious of his late indignation against his cousin, he rubbed his hands pleasantly, and related story after story of his own early experiences, some of them not a little amusing.

The Major, however, seemed not fully to enjoy the priest's anecdotical powers, but sipped his gla.s.s with a grave and sententious air. 'Very true, Tom,' said he at length, breaking silence; 'you have seen a fair share of these things for a man of your cloth. But where's the man living--show him to me, I say--that has had my experience, either as princ.i.p.al or second? Haven't I had my four men out in the same morning?'

'Why, I confess,' said I meekly, 'that does seem an extravagant allowance.'

'Clear waste, downright profusion, _du luxe, mon cher_, nothing else,'

observed Father Tom.

Meanwhile, the Major rolled his eyes fearfully at me, and fidgeted in his chair with impatience to be asked for his story; and as I myself had some curiosity on the subject, I begged him to relate it.

'Tom, here, doesn't like a story at supper,' said the Major pompously; for, perceiving our att.i.tude of attention, he resolved on being a little tyrannical before telling it.

The priest made immediate submission; and, slyly hinting that his objection only lay against stories he had been hearing for the last thirty years, said he could listen to the narration in question with much pleasure.