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- Author: William Makepeace Thackeray
Book online «The Virginians by William Makepeace Thackeray (kiss me liar novel english txt) 📖». Author William Makepeace Thackeray
Mr. Draper went to his chambers in dudgeon then; bullied his clerks all round, sent off a messenger to the Baroness, to say that he had waited on the young gentleman, who had demanded a little time for consideration, which was for form's sake, as he had no doubt; the lawyer then saw clients, transacted business, went out to his dinner in the most leisurely manner; and then finally turned his steps towards the neighbouring Cursitor Street. “He'll be at home when I call, the haughty beast!” says Draper, with a sneer. “The Fortunate Youth in his room?” the lawyer asked of the sheriff's officer's aide-de-camp who came to open the double doors.
“Mr. Warrington is in his apartment,” said the gentleman, “but——” and here the gentleman winked at Mr. Draper, and laid his hand on his nose.
“But what, Mr. Paddy from Cork?” said the lawyer.
“My name is Costigan; me familee is noble, and me neetive place is the Irish methrawpolis, Mr. Six-and-eightpence!” said the janitor, scowling at Draper. A rich odour of spirituous liquors filled the little space between the double doors where he held the attorney in conversation.
“Confound you, sir, let me pass!” bawled out Mr. Draper.
“I can hear you perfectly well, Six-and-eightpence, except your h's, which you dthrop out of your conversation. I'll thank ye not to call neems, me good friend, or me fingers and your nose will have to make an intimate hic-quaintance. Walk in, sir! Be polite for the future to your shupariors in birth and manners, though they may be your infariors in temporary station. Confound the kay! Walk in, sir, I say!—Madam, I have the honour of saluting ye most respectfully!”
A lady with her face covered with a capuchin, and further hidden by her handkerchief, uttered a little exclamation as of alarm as she came down the stairs at this instant and hurried past the lawyer. He was pressing forward to look at her—for Mr. Draper was very cavalier in his manners to women—but the bailiff's follower thrust his leg between Draper and the retreating lady, crying, “Keep your own distance, if you plaise! This way, madam! I at once recognised your ladysh——” Here he closed the door on Draper's nose, and left that attorney to find his own way to his client upstairs.
At six o'clock that evening the old Baroness de Bernstein was pacing up and down her drawing-crutch, and for ever running to the window when the noise of a coach was heard passing in Clarges Street. She had delayed her dinner from hour to hour: she who scolded so fiercely, on ordinary occasions, if her cook was five minutes after his time. She had ordered two covers to be laid, plate to be set out, and some extra dishes to be prepared as if for a little fete. Four—five o'clock passed, and at six she looked from the window, and a coach actually stopped at her door.
“Mr. Draper” was announced, and entered bowing profoundly.
The old lady trembled on her stick. “Where is the boy?” she said quickly. “I told you to bring him, sir! How dare you come without him?”
“It is not my fault, madam, that Mr. Warrington refuses to come.” And Draper gave his version of the interview which had just taken place between himself and the young Virginian.
CHAPTER XLVIII. An Apparition
Going off in his wrath from his morning's conversation with Harry, Mr. Draper thought he heard the young prisoner speak behind him; and, indeed, Harry had risen, and uttered a half-exclamation to call the lawyer back. But he was proud, and the other offended: Harry checked words, and Draper did not choose to stop. It wound Harry's pride to be obliged to humble himself before the lawyer, and to have to yield from mere lack and desire of money. “An hour hence will do as well,” thought Harry, and lapsed sulkily on to the bed again. No, he did not care for Maria Esmond! No: he was ashamed of the way in which he had been entrapped into that engagement. A wily and experienced woman, she had cheated his boyish ardour. She had taken unfair advantage of him, as her brother had at play. They were his own flesh and blood, and they ought to have spared him. Instead, one and the other had made a prey of him, and had used him for their selfish ends. He thought how they had betrayed the rights of hospitality: how they had made a victim of the young kinsman who came confiding within their gates. His heart was sore wounded: his head sank back on his pillow: bitter tears wetted it. “Had they come to Virginia,” he thought, “I had given them a different welcome!”
He was roused from this mood of despondency by Gumbo's grinning face at his door, who said a lady was come to see Master Harry, and behind the lad came the lady in the capuchin, of whom we have just made mention. Harry sat up, pale and haggard, on his bed. The lady, with a sob, and almost ere the servant-man withdrew, ran towards the young prisoner, put her arms round his neck with real emotion and a maternal tenderness, sobbed over his pale cheek and kissed it in the midst of plentiful tears, and cried out—
“Oh, my Harry! Did I ever, ever think to see thee here?”
He started back, scared as it seemed at her presence, but she sank down at the bedside, and seized his feverish hand, and embraced his knees. She had a real regard and tenderness for him. The wretched place in which she found him, his wretched look, filled her heart with a sincere love and pity.
“I—I thought none of you would come!” said poor Harry, with a groan.
More tears, more kisses of the hot young hand, more clasps and pressure with hers, were the lady's reply for a moment or two.
“Oh, my dear! my dear! I cannot bear to think of thee in misery,” she sobbed out.
Hardened though it might be, that heart was not all marble—that dreary life not all desert. Harry's mother could not have been fonder, nor her tones more tender than those of his kinswoman now kneeling at his feet.
“Some of the debts, I fear, were owing to my extravagance!” she said (and this was true). “You bought trinkets and jewels in order to give me pleasure. Oh, how I hate them now! I little thought I ever could! I have brought them all with me, and more trinkets—here! and here! and all the money I have in the world!”
And she poured brooches, rings, a watch, and a score or so of guineas into Harry's lap. The sight of which strangely agitated and immensely touched the young man.
“Dearest, kindest cousin!” he sobbed out.
His lips found no more words to utter, but yet, no doubt they served to express his gratitude, his affection, his emotion.
He became quite gay presently, and smiled as he put away some of the trinkets, his presents to Maria, and told her into what danger he had fallen by selling other goods which he had purchased on credit; and how a lawyer had
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