Castle Richmond Part 26

"Not--in--the least. I have no conception whatever, and never have had any. I know no cause for trouble that should disquiet him."

"There is nothing wrong about the property?"

"Not to my knowledge."

"Who has the t.i.tle-deeds?"

"They are at Coutts's."

"You are sure of that?"

"Well; as sure as a man can be of a thing that he does not see. I have never seen them there; indeed, have never seen them at all; but I feel no doubt in my own mind as to their being at the bankers."

"Is there much due on the estate?"

"Very little. No estate in county Cork has less on it. Miss Letty has her income, and when Poulnasherry was bought,--that townland lying just under Berryhill, where the gorse cover is, part of the purchase money was left on mortgage. That is still due; but the interest is less than a hundred a year."

"And that is all?"

"All that I know of."

"Could there be enc.u.mbrances without your knowing it?"

"I think not. I think it is impossible. Of all men your father is the last to enc.u.mber his estates in a manner unknown to his agent, and to pay off the interest in secret."

"What is it then, Mr. Somers?"

"I do not know." And then Mr. Somers paused. "Of course you have heard of a visit he received the other day from a stranger?"

"Yes; I heard of it."

"People about here are talking of it. And he--that man, with a younger man--they are still living in Cork, at a little drinking-house in South Main Street. The younger man has been seen down here twice."

"But what can that mean?"

"I do not know. I tell you everything that I do know."

Herbert exacted a promise from him that he would continue to tell him everything which he might learn, and then rode back to Castle Richmond.

"The whole thing must be a delusion," he said to himself; and resolved that there was no valid reason why he should make Clara unhappy by any reference to the circ.u.mstance.

CHAPTER XIII.

MR. MOLLETT RETURNS TO SOUTH MAIN STREET.

I must now take my readers back to that very unsavoury public-house in South Main Street, Cork, in which, for the present, lived Mr.

Matthew Mollett and his son Abraham.

I need hardly explain to a discerning public that Mr. Matthew Mollett was the gentleman who made that momentous call at Castle Richmond, and flurried all that household.

"Drat it!" said Mrs. Jones to herself on that day, as soon as she had regained the solitude of her own private apartment, after having taken a long look at Mr. Mollett in the hall. On that occasion she sat down on a low chair in the middle of the room, put her two hands down substantially on her two knees, gave a long sigh, and then made the above exclamation,--"Drat it!"

Mrs. Jones was still thoroughly a Saxon, although she had lived for so many years among the Celts. But it was only when she was quite alone that she allowed herself the indulgence of so peculiarly Saxon a mode of expressing either her surprise or indignation.

"It's the same man," she said to herself, "as come that day, as sure as eggs;" and then for five minutes she maintained her position, cogitating. "And he's like the other fellow too," she continued.

"Only, somehow he's not like him." And then another pause. "And yet he is; only it can't be; and he ain't just so tall, and he's older like." And then, still meditating, Mrs. Jones kept her position for full ten minutes longer; at the end of which time she got up and shook herself. She deserved to be bracketed with Lord Brougham and Professor Faraday, for she had kept her mind intent on her subject, and had come to a resolution. "I won't say nothing to n.o.body, noways," was the expression of her mind's purpose. "Only I'll tell missus as how he was the man as come to Wales." And she did tell so much to her mistress--as we have before learned.

Mr. Mollett had gone down from Cork to Castle Richmond in one of those delightful Irish vehicles called a covered car. An inside-covered car is an equipage much given to shaking, seeing that it has a heavy top like a London cab, and that it runs on a pair of wheels. It is entered from behind, and slopes backwards. The sitter sits sideways, between a cracked window on one side and a cracked doorway on the other; and as a draught is always going in at the ear next the window, and out at the ear next the door, it is about as cold and comfortless a vehicle for winter as may be well imagined.

Now the journey from Castle Richmond to Cork has to be made right across the Boggeragh Mountains. It is over twenty miles Irish; and the road is never very good. Mr. Mollett, therefore, was five hours in the covered car on his return journey; and as he had stopped for lunch at Kanturk, and had not hurried himself at that meal, it was very dark and very cold when he reached the house in South Main Street.

I think I have explained that Mr. Mollett senior was not absolutely a drunkard; but nevertheless, he was not averse to spirits in cold weather, and on this journey had warmed himself with whisky once or twice on the road. He had found a shebeen house when he crossed the Nad river, and another on the mountain-top, and a third at the point where the road pa.s.ses near the village of Blarney, and at all these convenient resting-spots Mr. Mollett had endeavoured to warm himself.

There are men who do not become absolutely drunk, but who do become absolutely cross when they drink more than is good for them; and of such men Mr. Mollett was one. What with the cold air, and what with the whisky, and what with the jolting, Mr. Mollett was very cross when he reached the Kanturk Hotel, so that he only cursed the driver instead of giving him the expected gratuity.

"I'll come to yer honour in the morning," said the driver.

"You may go to the devil in the morning," answered Mr. Mollett; and this was the first intimation of his return which reached the ears of his expectant son.

"There's the governor," said Aby, who was then flirting with Miss O'Dwyer in the bar. "Somebody's been stroking him the wrong way of the 'air."

The charms of Miss O'Dwyer in these idle days had been too much for the prudence of Mr. Abraham Mollett; by far too much, considering that in his sterner moments his ambition led him to contemplate a match with a young lady of much higher rank in life. But wine, which "inspires us" and fires us

"With courage, love, and joy,"

had inspired him with courage to forget his prudence, and with love for the lovely f.a.n.n.y.

"Now, nonsense, Mr. Aby," she had said to him a few minutes before the wheels of the covered car were heard in South Main Street. "You know you main nothing of the sort."

"By 'eavens, f.a.n.n.y, I mean every word of it; may this drop be my poison if I don't. This piece of business here keeps me and the governor hon and hoff like, and will do for some weeks perhaps; but when that's done, honly say the word, and I'll make you Mrs. M. Isn't that fair now?"

"But, Mr. Aby--"

"Never mind the mister, Fan, between friends."

"La! I couldn't call you Aby without it; could I?"

"Try, my darling."

"Well--Aby--there now. It does sound so uppish, don't it? But tell me this now; what is the business that you and the old gentleman is about down at Kanturk?"

Abraham Mollett hereupon had put one finger to his nose, and then winked his eye.

"If you care about me, as you say you do, you wouldn't be shy of just telling me as much as that."