Roland Cashel, Volume I (of II)

“Lord Charles Frobisher was a large winner t’other night?” said Linton, after a pause.

“Yes, sir, so I heard them say at supper, and Mr. Cashel first gave a check and then changed his mind, and I saw him hand over a heavy sum in notes.”

“Indeed!” muttered Linton to himself; “and my worthy friend Charley did not confess this to me. Have you taken care that the people don’t send in their bills and accounts, as I mentioned?”

“Yes, sir; with few exceptions, nothing of the kind comes.”

“What brought that Mr. Clare Jones so frequently of late?”

“He came twice in Mr. Downie Meek’s carriage, sir, but sat all the while outside, while Mr. Meek was with my master; the third day, however, he was sent for to come in, and spent nearly an hour in the study.”

“Well, what took place?”

“I could only hear part of the conversation, sir, as I feared I might be sent for. The subject was a seat in Parliament, which Mr. Cashel owns, and that Mr. Meek is desirous of procuring for Jones.”

“Ha! ha! my little Judas! is that your game? Go on, George, this interests me.”

“I have little more to tell, sir, for Mr. Meek always speaks so low, and my master scarcely said anything.”

“And Jones?”

“He merely remarked on the identity of his political principles with those of the present Government.”

“Of course; the fellow began as a Radical, and then turned Tory, and now is a Whig. Blue and yellow when mixed always make green. But how did it end?”

“As well as I could perceive, sir, without any promise. My master was to deliberate and send his answer.”

“Let neither have access to him till you hear from me again, – mark that.”

“You shall be obeyed, sir.”

“Did Lord Kilgoff call?”

“Twice, sir; but my master was out. I followed your directions, however, and said that her Ladyship was with him, and he seemed much provoked at not finding him at home.”

“Well, how did he take it, – did he make any remark?”

“A half smile, sir; nothing more.”

“But said nothing?”

“Not a word, sir.”

Linton arose and walked the room in deep meditation; at last he said, —

“You had better let him have those letters we held back the last two days, to-day. He’ll not think deeply over his losses on the Derby while dwelling on this missing letter.”

“I don’t suspect his losses, sir, will cause much uneasiness on any score; money occupies very little of his thoughts.”

“True; but here the sum is a very heavy one. I made the book myself, and stood to win thirty thousand pounds; but, no matter, – it can’t be helped now, – better luck another time. Now, another point. It strikes me of late that he seems bored somewhat by the kind of life he is leading, and that these carouses at the messes are becoming just as distasteful to him as the heavy dinner-parties with the Dean and the rest of them. Is that your opinion?”

“Perfectly, sir. He even said as much to me t’other evening, when he came back from a late supper. He is always wishing for the yacht to come over, – speaks every now and then of taking a run over to London and Paris; in fact, sir, he is bored here. There is no disguising it.”

“I feared as much, George; I suspected, many a day ago, he would not be long satisfied with the provincial boards. But this must not be; once away from Dublin, he is lost to us forever. I know, and so do you know, the hands he would fall into in town. Better let him get back to his old prairie haunts, for a while, than that.”

“Not so very unlikely, sir. He sits poring over maps and charts for hours together, and scans the new coast survey like a man bent on exploring the scenes for himself. It is hard to say what is best to do with him.”

“I’ll tell you what he must not be permitted to do with himself: he must not leave Ireland; he must not marry; he must not enter Parliament; and, for the moment, to employ his thoughts and banish ennui, we ‘ll get up the house-warming at Tubbermore. I mean to set off thither to-morrow.”

“Without Mr. Cashel, sir?”

“Of course; be it your care that matters are well looked to in my absence, and as Kennyfeck’s house is safer than the barracks, he may dine there as often as he pleases. Keep a watch on Jones, – not that I think he ‘ll be very dangerous; see after Lord Charles, whether he may try to profit by my absence; and, above all, write me a bulletin each day.”

Mr. Phillis promised a strict obedience to orders, and rose to retire, pleading the necessity of his being at home when his master returned.

“What of this letter, sir? Shall I contrive to place it in his pocket, and discover it as he is undressing? He never suspects anything or anybody.”

“No, George, – I ‘ll keep it; it may turn out useful to us one of these days; there’s no knowing when or how. I ‘m curious, too, to see how he will act with reference to it, – whether he will venture on any confidence towards me. I suspect not; he never alludes to his bygones. The only terror his mind is capable of would seem the fear of fashionable contempt. If he ever lose this, he’s lost to us forever.” This was said rather in soliloquy than addressed to Phillis, who did not appear to catch the meaning of the remark. “You’ll leave this note on his table, and take care he sees it. It is to remind him of an appointment here to-morrow with Hoare, the money-lender, at eleven o’clock punctually.”

Phillis took the note, and after a very respectful leave-taking, withdrew.

“Yes,” said Linton, musing, as he leaned against the window, “all goes fairly so far. Mr. Phillis may live to see himself once more a merchant tailor in Cheapside, and Tom Linton, under the buckler of his M.P., defy duns and bums, and be again a denizen of the only city worth living in.”

He then reseated himself in an easy-chair, and prepared to con over the letter, to which he had only given a passing attention. The narrative of Enrique, full of exciting details and hair-breadth ‘scapes, was, however, far less an object of interest to Linton than the consideration how far a character like this might be made use of for the purpose of threat and intimidation over Cashel.

His reflections ran somewhat thus: “The day may come – is, perhaps, even now nigh – when Cashel shall reject my influence and ascendency. There never has been anything which could even counterfeit friendship between us, – close intimacy has been all. To maintain that hold over him so necessary to my fortunes, I must be in a position to menace. Roland himself has opened the way to this by his own reserve. The very concealment he has practised implies fear; – otherwise, why, in all the openness of our familiar intercourse, never have mentioned Enrique’s name; still more, never once alluded to this Maritaña? It is clear enough with what shame he looks back on the past. Let mine be the task to increase that feeling, and build up the fear of the world’s ridicule, till he shall be the slave of every whisper that syllables his name! The higher his path in society, the greater the depth to which disclosures may consign him; and what disclosures so certainly ruinous as to connect him with the lawless marauders of the Spanish main, – the slaver and the pirate? His dear friend, a felon, taken in open fight by a British cruiser! Maritaña, too, may serve us; her name as mistress – or, if need be, as wife – will effectually oppose any matrimonial speculations here. So far this letter has been a rare piece of fortune!”

For some moments he walked the room with excited and animated looks, the alternating shades of pleasure and its opposite flitting rapidly across his strong features. At last he broke out in words: “Ay, Cashel, I am as suddenly enriched as yourself, – but with a different heritage. Yours was Gold; mine, Revenge! And there are many to whom I could pay the old debt home. There’s Forster, with his story of Ascot, and his black-ball at Graham’s! – a double debt, with years of heavy interest upon it; there’s Howard, too, that closed his book at Tattersall’s, after tearing out the leaf that had my name! Frobisher himself daring his petty insolence at every turn! – all these cry for acquittance, and shall have it There are few men of my own standing, that with moneyed means at my command, I could not ruin! and, ungallant as the boast may be, some fair ladies, too! How I have longed for the day, how I have schemed and plotted for it! and now it comes almost unlooked for.

“Another month or two of this wasteful extravagance, and Cashel will be deeply, seriously embarrassed. Kennyfeck will suggest retrenchment and economy; that shall be met with an insidious doubt of the good man’s honesty. And how easy to impeach it! The schemes of his wife and daughter will aid the accusation. Roland shall, meanwhile, learn the discomfort of being ‘hard up.’ The importunity – nay, the insolence – of duns shall assail him at every post and every hour. From this there is but one bold, short step, – and take it he must, – make me his agent. That done, all the rest is easy. Embarrassment and injurious reports will soon drive him from the country, and from an estate he shall never revisit as his own! So far, – the first act of the drama! The second discovers Tom Linton the owner of Tubbermore, and the host of Lord and Lady Kilgoff, who have condescendingly agreed to pass the Easter recess with him. Mr. Linton has made a very splendid maiden speech, which, however, puzzles the ministers and the ‘Times;’ and, if he were not a man perfectly indifferent to place, would expose him to the imputation of courting it.

“And Laura all this while!” said he, in a voice whose accents trembled with intense feeling, “can she forgive the past? Will old memories revive old affections, or will they rot into hatred? Well,” cried he, sternly, “whichever way they turn, I ‘m prepared.”

There was a tone of triumphant meaning in his last words that seemed to thrill through his frame, and as he threw himself back upon his seat, and gazed out upon the starry sky, his features wore the look of proud and insolent defiance. “So is it,” said he, after a pause; “one must be alone – friendless, and alone – in life, to dare the world so fearlessly.” He filled a goblet of sherry, and as he drank it off, cried, “Courage! Tom Linton against ‘the field!’”

CHAPTER XXI. THE CONSPIRATORS DISTURBED

Eternal friendship let us swear,In fraud at least – “nous serons frères.”Robert Macaire.

Cashel passed a night of feverish anxiety. Enrique’s uncertain fate was never out of his thoughts; and if for a moment he dropped off to sleep, he immediately awoke with a sudden start, – some fancied cry for help, some heart-uttered appeal to him for assistance breaking in upon his weary slumber.

How ardently did he wish for some one friend to whom he might confide his difficulty, and from whom receive advice and counsel. Linton’s shrewdness and knowledge of life pointed him out as the fittest; but how to reveal to his fashionable friend the secrets of that buccaneering life he had himself so lately quitted? How expose himself to the dreaded depreciation a “fine gentleman” might visit on a career passed amid slavers and pirates? A month or two previous, he could not have understood such scruples; but already the frivolities and excesses of daily habit had thrown an air of savage rudeness over the memory of his Western existence, and he had not the courage to brave the comments it might suggest To this false shame had Linton brought him, acting on a naturally sensitive nature, by those insidious and imperceptible counsels which represent the world – meaning, thereby, that portion of it who are in the purple and fine linen category – as the last appeal in all cases, not alone of a man’s breeding and pretensions, but of his honor and independence.

It was not without many a severe struggle, and many a heartfelt repining, Cashel felt himself surrender the free action of his natural independence to the petty and formal restrictions of a code like this. But there was an innate dread of notoriety, a sensitive shrinking from remark, that made him actually timid about transgressing whatever he was told to be an ordinance of fashion. To dress in a particular way; to frequent certain places; to be known to certain people; to go out at certain hours; and so on, – were become to his mind as the actual requirements of his station, and often did he regret the hour when he had parted with his untrammelled freedom to live a life of routine and monotony.

Shrinking, then, from any confidence in Linton, he next thought of Kennyfeck; and, although not placing a high value on his skill and correctness in such a difficulty, he resolved, at all hazards, to consult him on the course to be followed. He had been often told how gladly Government favors the possessor of fortune and influence. “Now,” thought he, “is the time to test the problem. All of mine is at their service, if they but liberate my poor comrade.”

So saying to himself, he had just reached the hall, when the sound of wheels approached the door. A carriage drew up, and Linton, followed by Mr. Hoare, the money-lender, descended.

“Oh, I had entirely forgotten this affair,” cried Cashel, as he met them; “can we not fix another day?”

“Impossible, sir; I leave town to-night.”

“Another hour to-day, then?” said Cashel, impatiently.

“This will be very difficult, sir. I have some very pressing engagements, all of which were formed subject to your convenience in this business.”

“But while you are discussing the postponement, you could finish the whole affair,” cried Linton, drawing his arm within Cashel’s, and leading him along towards the library. “By Jove! it does give a man a sublime idea of wealth, to be sure,” said he, laughing, “to see the cool indifference with which you can propose to defer an interview that brings you some fifteen thousand pounds. As for me, I ‘d make the Viceroy himself play ‘ante-chamber,’ if little Hoare paid me a visit.”

“Well, be it so; only let us despatch,” said Cashel, “for I am anxious to catch Kennyfeck before he goes down to court.”

“I ‘ll not detain you many minutes, sir,” said Hoare, drawing forth a very capacious black leather pocket-book, and opening it on the table. “There are the bills, drawn as agreed upon, – at three and six months, – here is a statement of the charges for interest, commission, and – ”

“I am quite satisfied it is all right,” said Cashel, pushing the paper carelessly from him. “I have borrowed money once or twice in my life, and always thought anything liberal which did not exceed cent per cent.”

“We are content with much less, sir, as you will perceive,” said Hoare, smiling. “Six per cent interest, one-half commission – ”

“Yes, yes; it is all perfectly correct,” broke in Cashel. “I sign my name here – and here?”

“And here, also, sir. There is also a policy of insurance on your life.”

“What does that mean?”

“Oh, a usual kind of security in these cases,” said Linton; “because if you were to die before the bills came due – ”

“I see it all; whatever you please,” said Cashel, taking up his hat and gloves. “Now, will you pardon me for taking a very abrupt leave?”

“You are forgetting a very material point, sir,” said Hoare; “this is an order on Frend and Beggan for the money.”

“Very true. The fact is, gentlemen, my head is none of the clearest to-day. Good-bye – good-bye.”

“Ten to one all that haste is to keep some appointment with one of Kennyfeck’s daughters,” said Hoare, as he shook the sand over the freshly-signed bills, when the heavy bang of the hall-door announced Cashel’s departure.

“I fancy not,” said Linton, musing; “I believe I can guess the secret.”

“What am I to do with these, Mr. Linton?” said the other, not heeding the last observation, as he took two pieces of paper from the pocket of his book.

“What are they?” said Linton, stretching at full length on a sofa.

“Two bills, with the endorsement of Thomas Linton.”

“Then are two ten-shilling stamps spoiled and good for nothing,” replied Linton, “which, without that respectable signature, might have helped to ruin somebody worth ruining.”

“‘One will be due on Saturday, the twelfth. The other – ”

“Don’t trouble yourself about the dates, Hoare. I ‘ll renew as often as you please – I ‘ll do anything but pay.”

“Come, sir, I’ll make a generous proposition: I have made a good morning’s work. You shall have them both for a hundred.”

“Thanks for the liberality,” said Linton, laughing. “You bought them for fifty.”

“I know that very well; but remember, you were a very depreciated stock at that time. Now, you are at a premium. I hear you have been a considerable winner from our friend here.”

“Then you are misinformed. I have won less than the others, – far less than I might have done. The fact is, Hoare, I have been playing a back game, – what jockeys call, holding my stride.”

“Well, take care you don’t wait too long,” said Hoare, sententiously.

“How do you mean?” said Linton, sitting up, and showing more animation than he had exhibited before.

“You have your secret – I have mine,” replied Hoare, dryly, as he replaced the bills in his pocket-book and clasped it.

“What if we exchange prisoners, Hoare?”

“It would be like most of your compacts, Mr. Linton, all the odds in your own favor.”

“I doubt whether any man makes such compacts with you,” replied Linton; “but why higgle this way? ‘Remember,’ as Peacham says, ‘that we could hang one another;’ and there is an ugly adage about what happens when people such as you and I ‘fall out.’”

“So there is; and, strange enough, I was just thinking of it. Come, what is your secret?”

“Read that,” said Linton, placing Enrique’s letter in his hand, while he sat down, directly in front, to watch the effect it might produce.

Hoare read slowly and attentively; some passages he re-read three or four times; and then, laying down the letter, he seemed to reflect on its contents.

“You scarcely thought what kind of company our friend used to keep formerly?” asked Linton, sneeringly.

“I knew all about that tolerably well. I was rather puzzling myself a little about this Pedro Rica; that same trick of capturing the slavers, and then selling the slaves, is worthy of one I could mention, not to speak of the double treachery of informing against his comrades, and sending the English frigate after them.”

“A deep hand he must be,” remarked Linton, coolly.

“A very deep one; but what is Cashel likely to do here?”

“Nothing; he has no clew whatever to the business; the letter itself he had not time to read through, when he dropped it, and – ”

“I understand – perfectly. This accounts for his agitation. Well, I must say, my secret is the better of the two, and, as usual, you have made a good bargain.”

“Not better than your morning’s work here, Hoare; confess that”

“Ah, there will not be many more such harvests to reap,” said he, sighing.

“How so? his fortune is scarcely breached as yet”

“He spends money fast,” said Hoare, gravely; “even now, see what sums he has squandered; think of the presents he has lavished, – diamonds, horses – ”

“As to the Kennyfeck affair, it was better than getting into a matrimonial scrape, which I fancy I have rescued him from.”

“Oh, no, nothing of the kind. Pirate as he is, he would n’t venture on that.”

“Why so? – what do you mean?”

“Simply, that he is married already; at least, that species of betrothal which goes for marriage in his free and easy country.”

“Married!” exclaimed Linton, in utter amazement; “and he never even hinted in the most distant manner to this.”

“And yet the obligation is sufficiently binding, according to Columbian law, to give his widow the benefit of all property he might die possessed of in that Republic.”

“And he knows this himself?”

“So well, that he has already proposed a very large sum as forfeit to break the contract.”

“And this has been refused?”

“Yes. The girl’s father has thought it better to follow your own plan, and make ‘a waiting race,’ well knowing, that if Cashel does not return to claim her as his wife, – or that, which is not improbable, she may marry more advantageously, – he will always be ready to pay the forfeit.”

“May I learn his name?”

“No!”

“Nor his daughter’s – the Christian name, I mean.”

“To what end? It would be a mere idle curiosity, for I should exact a pledge of your never divulging it.”

“Of course,” said Linton, carelessly. “It was, as you say, a mere idle wish. Was this a love affair, then, for it has a most commercial air?”

“I really don’t know that; I fancy that they were both very young, and very ignorant of what they were pledging, and just as indifferent to the consequences.”

“She was handsome, this – ”

“Maritaña is beautiful, they say,” said Hoare, who inadvertently let slip the name he had refused to divulge.

Linton’s quick ear caught it at once, but as rapidly affected not to notice it, as he said, —

“But I really do not see as yet how this affects what we were just speaking of?”

“It will do so, however – and ere long. These people, who were immensely rich some time back, are now, by one of the convulsions so frequent in those countries, reduced to absolute poverty. They will, doubtless, follow Cashel here, and seek a fulfilment of his contract. I need not tell you, Mr. Linton, what must ensue on such a demand; it would be hard to say whether acceptance or refusal would be worse. In a word, the father-in-law is a man of such a character, there is only one thing would be more ruinous than his enmity, and that is, any alliance with him. Let him but arrive in this country, and every gentleman of station and class will fall back from Cashel’s intimacy; and even those – I ‘ll not mention names,” said he, smiling – “who could gloss over some of their prejudices with gold-leaf, will soon discover that a shrewder eye than Cashel’s will be on them, and that all attempts to profit by his easiness of temper and reckless nature will be met by one who has never yet been foiled in a game of artifice and deceit.”

“Then I perceive we have a very short tether,” said Linton, gravely; “when may this worthy gentleman be-looked for?”

“At any moment. I believe early in spring, however, will be the time.”

“Well, that gives us a few months; during which I must contrive to get in for this borough of Derraheeny – But hark! is that a carriage at the door? – yes, by Jove! the Kennyfecks. I remember, he had asked them to-day to come and see his pictures. I say, Hoare, step out by the back way; we must not be caught together here. I ‘ll make my escape afterwards.”

Already the thundering knock of the footman resounded through lie house, and Hoare, not losing a moment, left the library, and hastened through the garden at the rear of the house; while Linton, seizing some writing materials, hurried upstairs, and established himself in a small boudoir off one of the drawing-rooms, carefully letting down the Venetians as he entered, and leaving the chamber but half lighted; this done, he drew a screen in front of him, and waited patiently.

CHAPTER XXII. VISIT TO THE “CASHEL PICTURE GALLERY.”

Ignored the schools of France and Spain,And of the Netherlands not surer,He knew not Cuyp from Claude Lorraine,Nor Dow from Albert Durer.Bell: Images.

Scarcely had the Kennyfecks’ carriage driven from the door when the stately equipage of the MacFarlines drew up, which was soon after followed by the very small pony phaeton of Mrs. Leicester White, that lady herself driving, and having for her companion a large high-shouldered, spectacled gentleman, whose glances, at once inquiring and critical, pronounced him as one of her numerous protégés in art, science, or letters.

This visit to the “Cashel Gallery,” as she somewhat grandiloquently designated the collection, had been a thing of her own planning; first, because Mrs. White was an adept in that skilful diplomacy which so happily makes plans for pleasure at other people’s houses – and oh, what numbers there are! – delightful, charming people as the world calls them! whose gift goes no further than this, that they keep a registry of their friends’ accommodation, and know to a nicety the season to dine here, to sup there, to picnic at one place, and to “spend the day” – horrible expression of a more horrible fact – at another. But Mrs. White had also another object in view on the present occasion, which was, to introduce her companion, Mr. Elias Howie, to her Dublin acquaintance.