Czytaj książkę: «The Martins Of Cro' Martin, Vol. II (of II)», strona 15

CHAPTER XVIII. MR. MERL’S EXPERIENCES IN THE WEST

“What card is this? – who left it?” said Mary, as she took up one from her breakfast-table.

“It is a gentleman that came to the inn late last night, miss, and sent a boy over to ask when he could pay his respects at the castle.”

“‘Mr. Herman Merl,’ – a name I never heard of,” muttered Mary to herself. “Doubtless some stranger wishing to see the house. Say, whenever he pleases, George; and order Sorrel to be ready, saddled and at the door, within an hour. This must be a busy day,” said she, still speaking to herself, as the servant left the room. “At Oughterard before one; a meeting of the Loan Fund – I shall need some aid for my hospital; the Government order for the meal to be countersigned by a justice – Mr. Nelligan will do it. Then there ‘s Taite’s little boy to be balloted for in the Orphan House; and Cassidy’s son to be sent up to Dublin. Poor fellow, he has a terrible operation to go through. And I shall need Priest Rafferty’s name to this memorial from the widows; the castle authorities seem to require it. After that, a visit to Kyle-a-Noe, to see all my poor sick folk: that will be a long business. I hope I may be able to get down to the shore and learn some tidings of poor Joan. She never leaves my thoughts, and yet I feel that no ill has befallen her.”

“The gentleman that sent the card, miss, is below stairs. He is with Mr. Crow, at the hall-door,” said George.

“Show him into the drawing-room, George, and tell Mr. Crow to come here, I wish to speak to him.” And before Mary had put away the papers and letters which littered the table, the artist entered.

“Good morning, Mr. Crow,” said Mary, in return for a number of most courteous salutations, which he was performing in a small semicircle in front of her. “Who is your friend Mr. – ‘Mr. Herman Merl ‘?” read she, taking up the card.

“A friend of your cousin’s, Miss Mary, – of the Captain’s. He brought a letter from him; but he gave it to Scanlan, and somehow Mr. Maurice, I believe, forgot to deliver it.”

“I have no recollection of it,” said she, still assorting the papers before her. “What is this visit meant for, – curiosity, pleasure, business? Does he wish to see the house?”

“I think it’s Miss Martin herself he’d like to see,” said Crow, half slyly.

“But why so? It’s quite clear that I cannot show him any attentions. A young girl, living as I do here, cannot be expected to receive guests. Besides, I have other things to attend to. You must do the honors of Cro’ Martin, Mr. Crow. You must entertain this gentleman for me. I ‘ll order luncheon before I go out, and I ‘m sure you ‘ll not refuse me this service.”

“I wish I knew a real service to render you, Miss Mary,” said he, with unfeigned devotedness in his look as he spoke.

“I think I could promise myself as much,” said Mary, smiling kindly on him. “Do you happen to know anything of this stranger, Mr. Crow?”

“Nothing, miss, beyond seeing him this week back at Kilkieran.”

“Oh, I have heard of him, then,” broke in Mary. “It is of him the people tell me such stories of benevolence and goodness. It was he that sent the yawl out to Murran Island with oatmeal and potatoes for the poor. But I thought they called him Mr. Barry?”

“To be sure they do; and he’s another guess man from him below stairs. This one here” – Mr. Crow now spoke in a whisper – “this one here is a Jew, I ‘d take the Testament on it, and I ‘d not be surprised if he was one of them thieving villains that they say robbed the Captain! All the questions he does be asking about the property, and the rents, if they ‘re well paid, and what arrears there are, shows me that he isn’t here for nothing.”

“I know nothing of what you allude to, Mr. Crow,” said she, half proudly; “it would ill become me to pry into my cousin’s affairs. At the same time, if the gentleman has no actual business with me, I shall decline to receive him.”

“He says he has, miss,” replied Crow. “He says that he wants to speak to you about a letter he got by yesterday’s post from the Captain.”

Mary heard this announcement with evident impatience; her head was, indeed, too full of other cares to wish to occupy her attention with a ceremonial visit. She was in no mood to accept the unmeaning compliments of a new acquaintance. Shall we dare to insinuate, what after all is a mere suspicion on our part, that a casual glance at her pale cheeks, sunken eyes, and careworn features had some share in the obstinacy of her refusal? She was not, indeed, “in looks,” and she knew it. “Must I repeat it, Mr. Crow,” said she, peevishly, “that you can do all this for me, and save me a world of trouble and inconvenience besides? If there should be – a very unlikely circumstance – anything confidential to communicate, this gentleman may write it.” And with this she left the room, leaving poor Mr. Crow in a state of considerable embarrassment. Resolving to make the best of his difficulty, he returned to the drawing-room, and apologizing to Merl for Miss Martin’s absence on matters of great necessity, he conveyed her request that he would stop for luncheon.

“She ain’t afraid of me, I hope?” said Merl.

“I trust not. I rather suspect she is little subject to fear upon any score,” replied Crow.

“Well, I must say it’s not exactly what I expected. The letter I hold here from the Captain gives me to understand that his cousin will not only receive me, but confer with and counsel me, too, in a somewhat important affair.”

“Oh, I forgot,” broke in Crow; “you are to write to her, she said, – that is, if there really were anything of consequence, which you deemed confidential, you know, – you were to write to her.”

“I never put my hand to paper, Mr. Crow, without well knowing why. When Herman Merl signs anything, he takes time to consider what’s in it,” said the Jew, knowingly.

“Well, shall I show you the house, – there are some clever specimens of the Dutch masters here?” asked Crow, anxious to change the topic.

“Ay, with all my heart. I suppose I must accept this privilege as my experience of the much-boasted Irish hospitality,” said he with a sneer, which required all Crow’s self-control to resist answering. To master the temptation, and give himself a few moments’ repose, he went about opening windows and drawing back curtains, so as to admit a fuller and stronger light upon the pictures along the walls.

“There now,” said he, pointing to a large landscape, “there’s a Both, and a fine one too; as mellow in color and as soft in distance as ever he painted.”

“That’s a copy,” said the other. “That picture was painted by Woeffel, and I ‘ll show you his initials, too, A. W., before we leave it.”

“It came from the Dordrecht gallery, and is an undoubted Both!” exclaimed Crow, angrily.

“I saw it there myself, and in very suitable company, too, with a Snyders on one side and a Rubens on t’ other, the Snyders being a Faltk, and the Rubens a Metziger; the whole three being positively dear at twenty pounds. Ay, here it is,” continued he, pointing to the hollow trunk of a decayed tree: “there’s the initials. So much for your original by Both.”

“I hope you’ll allow that to be a Mieris?” said Crow, passing on to another.

“If you hadn’t opened the shutters, perhaps I might,” said Merl; “but with a good dash of light I see it is by Jansens, – and a clever copy, too.”

“A copy!” exclaimed the other.

“A good copy,” I said. “The King of Bavaria has the original. It is in the small collection at Hohen Schwangau.”

“There, that’s good!” cried he, turning to a small unfinished sketch in oils.

“I often wondered who did it,” cried Crow.

“That! Why, can you doubt, sir? That’s a bit of Vandyke’s own. It was one of the hundred and fifty rough things he threw off as studies for his great picture of St. Martin parting his cloak.”

“I’m glad to hear you say so,” said Crow, in delight. “I felt, when I looked at it, that it was a great hand threw in them colors.”

“You call this a Salvator Rosa, don’t you?” said Merl, as he stood before a large piece representing a bandit’s bivouac in a forest, with a pale moonlight stealing through the trees.

“Yes, that we do,” said Crow, stoutly.

“Of course, it’s quite sufficient to have blended lights, rugged foregrounds, and plenty of action to make a Salvator; but let me tell you, sir, that it’s not even a copy of him. It is a bad – ay, and a very bad – Haemlens, – an Antwerp fellow that lived by poor facsimiles.”

“Oh dear, oh dear!” cried Crow, despairingly. “Did I ever hear the like of this!”

“Are these your best things, Mr. Crow?” said Merl, surveying the room with an air of consummate depreciation.

“There are others. There are some portraits and a number of small cabinet pictures.”

“Gerard Dows, and Jansens, and such like?” resumed Merl; “I understand: a mellow brown tint makes them, just as a glossy white satin petticoat makes a Terburg. Mr. Crow, you ‘ve caught a Tartar,” said he, with a grin. “There’s not a man in Europe can detect a copy from the original sooner than him before you. Now seven out of every eight of these here are veritable ‘croûtes,’ – what we call ‘croûtes,’ sir, – things sold at Christie’s, and sent off to the Continent to be hung up in old châteaux in Flanders, or dilapidated villas in Italy, where your exploring Englishman discovers them by rare good luck, and brings them home with him as Cuyps or Claudes or Vandykes. I’ll undertake,” said he, looking around him, – “I’ll undertake to furnish you with a gallery, in every respect the duplicate of this, for – let me see – say three hundred pounds. Now, Mr. Crow,” said Merl, taking a chair, and spreading out his legs before the fire, “will you candidly answer me one question?”

“Tell me what it is,” said Crow, cautiously.

“I suppose by this time,” said Merl, “you are tolerably well satisfied that Herman Merl is not very easily duped? I mean to say that at least there are softer fellows to be found than the humble individual who addresses you.”

“I trust there are, indeed,” said the other, sighing, “or it would be a mighty poor world for Simmy Crow and the likes of him.”

“Well, I think so too,” said Merl, chuckling to himself. “The wide-awake ones have rather the best of it. But, to come back to my question, I was simply going to ask you if the whole of the Martin estate – house, demesne, woods, gardens, quarries, farms, and fisheries – was not pretty much of the same sort of thing as this here gallery?”

“How? What do you mean?” asked Crow, whose temper was barely, and with some difficulty, restrainable.

“I mean, in plain words, a regular humbug, – that’s all! and no more the representative of real value than these daubs here are the works of the great masters whose names they counterfeit.”

“Look here, sir,” said Crow, rising, and approaching the other with a face of angry indignation, “for aught I know, you may be right about these pictures. The chances are you are a dealer in such wares, – at least you talk like one, – but of the family that lived under this roof, and whose bread I have eaten for many a day, if you utter one word that even borders on disrespect, – if you as much as hint at – ”

What was to be the conclusion of Mr. Crow’s menace we have no means of recording, for a servant, rushing in at the instant, summoned the artist with all speed to Miss Martin’s presence. He found her, as he entered, with flushed cheeks and eyes flashing angrily, in one of the deep recesses of a window that looked out upon the lawn.

“Come here, sir,” cried she, hurriedly, – “come here, and behold a sight such as you scarcely ever thought to look upon from these windows. Look here!” And she pointed to an assemblage of about a hundred people, many of whom were rudely armed with stakes, gathered around the chief entrance of the castle. In the midst was a tall man, mounted upon a wretched horse, who seemed from his gestures to be haranguing the mob, and whom Crow speedily recognized to be Magennis of Barnagheela.

“What does all this mean?” asked he, in astonishment.

“It means this, sir,” said she, grasping his arm and speaking in a voice thick from passionate eagerness. “That these people whom you see there have demanded the right to enter the house and search it from basement to roof. They are in quest of one that is missing; and although I have given my word of honor that none such is concealed here, they have dared to disbelieve me, and declare they will see for themselves. They might know me better,” added she, with a bitter smile, – “they might know me better, and that I no more utter a falsehood than I yield to a menace. See!” exclaimed she, “they are passing through the flower-garden, – they are approaching the lower windows. Take a horse, Mr. Crow, and ride for Kiltimmon; there is a police-station there, – bring up the force with you, – lose no time, I entreat you.”

“But how – leave you here all alone?”

“Have no fears on that score, sir,” said she, proudly; “they may insult the roof that shelters me, to myself they will offer no outrage. But be quick; away at once, and with speed!”

Had Mr. Crow been, what it must be owned had been difficult, a worse horseman than he was, he would never have hesitated to obey this behest. Ere many minutes, therefore, he was in the saddle and flying across country at a pace such as he never imagined any energy could have exacted from him.

“They have got a ladder up to the windows of the large drawing-room, Miss Mary,” said a servant; “they’ll be in before many minutes.”

Taking down two splendidly ornamented pistols from above the chimney-piece, Mary examined the priming, and ordering the servant away, she descended by a small private stair to the drawing-room beneath. Scarcely, however, had she crossed the threshold than she was met by a man eagerly hurrying away. Stepping back in astonishment, and with a face pale as death, he exclaimed, “Is it Miss Martin?”

“Yes, sir,” replied she, firmly; “and your name?”

“Mr. Merl – Herman Merl,” said he, with a stealthy glance towards the windows, on the outside of which two fellows were now seated, communicating with those below.

“This is not a moment for much ceremony, sir,” said she, promptly; “but you are here opportunely. These people will have it that I am harboring here one that they are in pursuit of. I have assured them of their error, I have pledged my word of honor upon it, but they are not satisfied. They declare that they will search the house, and I as firmly declare they-shall not.”

“But the person is really not here?” broke in Merl.

“I have said so, sir,” rejoined she, haughtily.

“Then why not let them search? Egad, I’d say, look away to your heart’s content, pry into every hole and corner you please, only don’t do any mischief to the furniture – don’t let any – ”

“I was about to ask your assistance, sir, but your counsel saves me from the false step. To one who proffers such wise advice, arguments like these” – and she pointed to the pistols – “arguments like these would be most distasteful; and yet let us see if others may not be of your mind too.” And steadily aiming her weapon for a second or two, she sent a ball through the window, about a foot above the head of one of the fellows without. Scarcely had the report rung out and the splintering glass fallen, than the two men leaped to the ground, while a wild cheer, half derision, half anger, burst from the mob beneath. “Now, sir,” continued she, with a smile of a very peculiar meaning, as she turned towards Merl, – “now, sir, you will perceive that you have got into very indiscreet company, such as I ‘m sure Captain Martin’s letter never prepared you for; and although it is not exactly in accordance with the usual notions of Irish hospitality to point to the door, perhaps you will be grateful to me when I say that you can escape by that corridor. It leads to a stair which will conduct you to the stable-yard. I’ll order a saddle-horse for you. I suppose you ride?” And really the glance which accompanied these words was not a flattery.

However the proposition might have met Mr.’ Merl’s wishes there is no means of knowing, for a tremendous crash now interrupted the colloquy, and the same instant the door of the drawing-room was burst open, and Magennis, followed by a number of country people, entered.

“I told you,” cried he, rudely, “that I’d not be denied. It’s your own fault if you would drive me to enter here by force.”

“Well, sir, force has done it,” said she, taking a seat as she spoke. “I am here alone, and you may be proud of the achievement!” The glance she directed towards Merl made that gentleman shrink back, and eventually slide noiselessly from the room, and escape from the scene altogether.

“If you’ll send any one with me through the house, Miss Martin,” began Magennis, in a tone of much subdued meaning – “No, sir,” broke she in – “no, sir, I’ll give no such order. You have already had my solemn word of honor, assuring you that there was not any one concealed here. The same incredulous disrespect you have shown to my word would accompany whatever direction I gave to my servants. Go wherever you please; for the time you are the master here. Mark me, sir,” said she, as, half crestfallen and in evident shame, he was about to move from the room – “mark me, sir, if I feel sorry that one who calls himself a gentleman should dishonor his station by discrediting the word, the plighted word, of a lady, yet I can forgive much to him whose feelings are under the impulse of passion. But how shall I speak my contempt for you,” – and she turned a withering look of scorn on the men who followed him, – “for you, who have dared to come here to insult me, – I, that if you had the least spark of honest manhood in your natures, you had died rather than have offended? Is this your requital for the part I have borne amongst you? Is it thus that you repay the devotion by which I have squandered all that I possessed, and would have given my life, too, for you and yours? Is it thus, think you, that your mothers and wives and sisters would requite me? Or will they welcome you back from your day’s work, and say, Bravely done? You have insulted a lone girl in her home, outraged the roof whence she never issued save to serve you, and taught her to believe that the taunts your enemies cast upon you, and which she once took as personal affronts to herself, that they are just and true, and as less than you merited. Go back, men,” added she, in a voice trembling with emotion, – “go back, while it is time. Go back in shame, and let me never know who has dared to offer me this insult!” And she hid her face between her hands, and bent down her head upon her lap. For several minutes she remained thus, overwhelmed and absorbed by intensely painful emotion, and when she lifted up her head, and looked around, they were gone! A solemn silence reigned on every side; not a word, nor a footfall, could be heard. She rushed to the window just in time to see a number of men slowly entering the wood, amidst whom she recognized Magennis, leading his horse by the bridle, and following the others, with bent-down head and sorrowful mien.

“Oh, thank Heaven for this!” cried she, passionately, as the tears gushed out and coursed down her face. “Thank Heaven that they are not as others call them – cold-hearted and treacherous, craven in their hour of trial, and cruel in the day of their vengeance! I knew them better!” It was long before she could sufficiently subdue her emotion to think calmly of what had occurred. At last she bethought her of Mr. Merl, and despatched a servant in his pursuit, with a polite request that he would return. The man came up with Merl as he had reached the small gate of the park, but no persuasions, no entreaties, could prevail on that gentleman to retrace his steps; nay, he was frank enough to say, “He had seen quite enough of the West,” and to invoke something very unlike benediction on his head if he ever passed another day in Galway.

CHAPTER XIX. MR. MERL’S “LAST” IRISH IMPRESSION

Never once turning his head towards Cro’ Martin, Mr. Merl set out for Oughterard, where, weary and footsore, he arrived that same evening. His first care was to take some refreshment; his next to order horses for Dublin early for the following morning. This done, he sat down to write to Captain Martin, to convey to him what Merl designated as a “piece of his mind,” a phrase which, in popular currency, is always understood to imply the very reverse of any flattery. The truth was, Mr. Merl began to suspect that his Irish liens were a very bad investment, that property in that country was held under something like a double title, the one conferred by law, the other maintained by a resolute spirit and a stout heart; that parchments required to be seconded by pistols, and that he who owned an estate must always hold himself in readiness to fight for it.

Now, these were all very unpalatable considerations. They rendered possession perilous, they made sale almost impossible. In the cant phrase of Ceylon, the Captain had sold him a wild elephant; or, to speak less figuratively, disposed of what he well knew the purchaser could never avail himself of. If Mr. Merl was an emblem of blandness and good temper at the play-table, courteous and conceding at every incident of the game, it was upon the very wise calculation that the politeness was profitable. The little irregularities that he pardoned all gave him an insight into the character of his antagonists; and where he appeared to have lost a battle, he had gained more than a victory in knowledge of the enemy.

These blandishments were, however, no real part of the man’s natural temperament, which was eminently distrustful and suspicious, wary to detect a blot, prompt and sharp to hit it. A vague, undefined impression had now come over him that the Captain had overreached him; that even if unincumbered, – which was far from the case, – this same estate was like a forfeited territory, which to own a man must assert his mastery with the strong hand of force. “I should like to see myself settling down amongst those savages,” thought he, “collecting my rents with dragoons, or levying a fine with artillery. Property, indeed! You might as well convey to me by bill of sale the right over a drove of wild buffaloes in South America, or give me a title to a given number of tigers in Bengal. He’d be a bold man that would even venture to come and have a look at ‘his own.’”

It was in this spirit, therefore, that he composed his epistle, which assuredly lacked nothing on the score of frankness and candor. All his “Irish impressions” had been unfavorable. He had eaten badly, he had slept worse; the travelling was rude, the climate detestable; and lastly, where he had expected to have been charmed with the ready wit, and amused with the racy humor of the people, he had only been terrified – terrified almost to death – by their wild demeanor, and a ferocity that made his heart quake. “Your cousin,” said he, – “your cousin, whom, by the way, I only saw for a few minutes, seemed admirably adapted to the exigencies of the social state around her; and although ball practice has not been included amongst the ordinary items of young ladies’ acquirements, I am satisfied that it might advantageously form part of an Irish education.

“As to your offer of a seat in Parliament, I can only say,” continued he, “that as the Member of Oughterard I should always feel as though I were seated over a barrel of gunpowder; while the very idea of meeting my constituency makes me shudder. I am, however, quite sensible of the honor intended me, both upon that score and in your proposal of my taking up my residence at Cro’ Martin. The social elevation, and so forth, to ensue from such a course of proceeding would have this disadvantage, – it would not pay! No, Captain Martin, the settlement between us must stand upon another basis, – the very simple and matter-of-fact one called £ s. d. I shall leave this to-morrow, and be in town, I hope, by Wednesday; you can, therefore, give your man of business, Mr. Saunders, his instructions to meet me at Wimpole’s, and state what terms of liquidation he is prepared to offer. Suffice it for the present to say that I decline any arrangement which should transfer to me any portion of the estate. I declare to you, frankly, I’d not accept the whole of it on the condition of retaining the proprietorship.”

When Mr. Merl had just penned the last sentence, the door slowly and cautiously was opened behind him, and a very much carbuncled face protruded into the room. “Yes, that’s himself,” muttered a voice; and ere Merl had been able to detect the speaker, the door was closed. These casual interruptions to his privacy had so frequently occurred since the commencement of his tour, that he only included them amongst his other Irish “disagreeables;” and so he was preparing to enter on another paragraph, when a very decisive knock at the door startled him, and before he could say “Come in,” a tall, red-faced, vulgar-looking man, somewhat stooped in the shoulders, and with that blear-eyed watery expression so distinctive in hard drinkers, slowly entered, and shutting the door behind him, advanced to the fire.

“My name, sir, is Brierley,” said he, with a full, rich brogue.

“Brierley – Brierley – never heard of Brierley before,” said Mr. Merl, affecting a flippant ease that was very remote from his heart.

“Better late than never, sir,” rejoined the other, coolly seating himself, and crossing his arms on his breast. “I have come here on the part of my friend Tom, – Mr. Magennis, I mean, – of Barnagheela, who told me to track you out.”

“Much obliged, I’m sure, for the attention,” said Merl, with an assumed smartness.

“That ‘s all right; so you should,” continued Brierley. “Tom told me that you were present at Cro’ Martin when he was outraged and insulted, – by a female of course, or he wouldn’t be making a complaint of it now, – and as he is not the man that ever lay under a thing of the kind, or ever will, he sent me here to you, to arrange where you ‘d like to have it, and when.”

“To have what?” asked Merl, with a look of unfeigned terror.

“Baythershin! how dull we are!” said Mr. Brierley, with a finger to his very red nose. “Sure it’s not thinking of the King’s Bench you are, that you want me to speak clearer.”

“I want to know your meaning, sir, – if you have a meaning.”

“Be cool, honey; keep yourself cool. Without you happen to find that warmth raises your heart, I ‘d say again, be cool. I’ve one simple question to ask you,” – here he dropped his voice to a low, cautious whisper, – “Will ye blaze?”

“Will I what?” cried Merl.

Mr. Brierley arose, and drawing himself up to his full height, extended his arm in the attitude of one taking aim with a pistol. “Eh!” cried he, “you comprehend me now, don’t you?”

“Fight – fight a duel!” exclaimed Merl, aloud.

“Whisht! whisht! speak lower,” said Brierley; “there’s maybe a chap listening at the door this minute!”

Accepting the intimation in a very different spirit from that in which it was offered, Merl rushed to the door, and threw it wide open. “Waiter! – landlord! – house! – waiter!” screamed he, at the top of his voice. And in an instant three or four slovenly-looking fellows, with dirty napkins in dirtier hands, surrounded him.

“What is it, your honer? – what is it?” asked they, in a breath.

“Don’t you hear what the gentleman’s asking for?” said Brierley, with a half-serious face. “He wants a chaise-to the door as quick as lightning. He ‘s off this minute.”

“Yes, by Jupiter! that I am,” said Merl, wiping the perspiration from his forehead.

“Take your last look at the West, dear, as you pass the Shannon, for I don’t think you ‘ll ever come so far again,” said Brierley, with a grin, as he moved by him to descend the stairs.

“If I do, may – ” But the slam of his room-door, and the rattle of the key as he locked it, cut short Mr. Merl’s denunciation.

In less than half an hour afterwards a yellow post-chaise left the “Martin Arms” at full speed, a wild yell of insult and derision greeting it as it swept by, showing how the Oughterard public appreciated its inmate!