Davenport Dunn, a Man of Our Day. Volume 1

“That’s a piece of good luck, anyhow,” said Driscoll, quickly.

“How so? What d’ ye mean?”

“Why, we could just get a kind of travelling opinion out of him about this case.”

“What nonsense you talk!” said Dunn, angrily; “as if a lawyer of standing and ability would commit himself by pronouncing on a most complicated question, the details of which he was to gather from you!” The look and emphasis that accompanied the last word were to the last degree insulting, but they seemed to give no offence whatever to him to whom they were addressed; on the contrary, he met them with a twinkle of the eye, and a droll twist of the mouth, as he muttered half to himself, —

“Yes, God help me, I ‘ll never set the Liffey on fire!”

“You might, though, if you had it heavily insured,” said Dunn, with a savage irony in his manner that might well have provoked rejoinder; but Driscoll was proof against whatever he didn’t want to resent, and laughed pleasantly at the sarcasm.

“You were dining at the Lodge, I suppose, to-day?” asked he, eager to get the conversation afloat at any cost.

“No, at Luscombe’s, – the Chief Secretary’s,” said Dunn, curtly.

“They say he’s a clever fellow,” said Driscoll.

“They are heartily welcome to this opinion who think so,” broke in Dunn, peevishly. “Let them call him a fortunate one if they like, and they ‘ll be nearer the mark. – What of this affair?” said he, at last “Have you found out Conway?”

“No; but I learned that he dined and passed the evening with ould Paul Kellett He came over to Ireland to bring him some news of his son, who served in the same regiment, and so I went out to Kellett to pump them; but for some reason or other they’re as close as wax. The daughter beats all ever you saw! She tried a great stroke of cunning with me, but it wouldn’t do.”

“It was your poor head and the spotted fever, – eh?” said Dunn, laughing.

“Yes,” said Driscoll; “I never was rightly myself since that” And he laughed heartily.

“This is too slow for me, Driscoll; you must find out the young fellow at once, and let me see him. I have read over the statement again, and it is wonderfully complete. Hatch-ard has it now before him, and will give me his opinion by Sunday next On that same day Mr. Beecher is to dine with me; now if you could manage to have Conway here on Monday morning, I ‘d probably be in a condition to treat openly with him.”

“You’re going too fast, – too fast, entirely,” said Driscoll; “sure, if Conway sees the road before him, he may Just thravel it without us at all.”

“I ‘ll take care he shall not know which path to take, Driscoll; trust me for that. Remember that the documents we have are all-essential to him. Before he sees one of them our terms must be agreed on.”

“I’ll have ten thousand paid down on the nail. ‘Tis eight years I am collectin’ them papers. I bought that shooting-lodge at Banthry, that belonged to the Beechers, just to search the old cupboard in the dinner-room. It was plastered over for fifty years, and Denis Magrath was the only man living knew where it was.”

“I am aware of all that. The discovery – if such it prove – was all your own, Driscoll; and as to the money remuneration, I ‘ll not defraud you of a sixpence.”

“There was twelve hundred pounds,” continued Driscoll, too full of his own train of thought to think of anything else, “for a wretched ould place with the roof fallin’ in, and every stack of it rotten! Eight years last Michaelmas, – that’s money, let me tell you! and I never got more than thirty pounds any year out of it since.”

“You shall be paid, and handsomely paid.”

“Yes,” said Terry, nodding.

“You can have good terms on either side.”

“Yes, or a little from both,” added Driscoll, dryly.

CHAPTER XX. AN EVENING WITH GROG DAVIS

It was late at night, and Grog Davis sat alone by a solitary candle in his dreary room. The fire had long burned out, and great pools of wet, driven by the beating rain through the rickety sashes, soaked the ragged carpet that covered the floor, while frequent gusts of storm scattered the slates, and shook the foundations of the frail building.

To all seeming, he paid little attention to the poor and comfortless features of the spot. A short square bottle of Hollands, and a paper of coarse cigars beside him, seemed to offer sufficient defence against such cares, while he gave up his mind to some intricate problem which he was working out with a pack of cards. He dealt, and shuffled, and dealt again, with marvellous rapidity. There was that in each motion of the wrist, in every movement of the finger, that bespoke practised manipulation, and a glance quick as lightning on the board was enough to show him how the game fared.

“Passed twelve times,” muttered he to himself; then added aloud, “Make your game, gentlemen, make your game. The game is made. Red, thirty-two. Now for it, Grog, – man or a mouse, my boy. Mouse it is! by – ,” cried he, with an infamous oath. “Red wins! Confound the cards!” cried he, dashing them on the floor. “Two minutes ago I had enough to live on the rest of my days. I appeal to any man in the room,” said he, with a look of peculiar defiance around him, “if he ever saw such ill luck! There’s not another fellow breathing ever got it like me!” And as he spoke, he arose and walked up and down the chamber, frowning savagely, and turning glances of insolent meaning on every side of him. At last, approaching the table, he filled out a glass of gin and drank it off; and then, stooping down, he gathered up the cards and reseated himself. “Take you fifty on the first ace,” cried he, addressing an imaginary bettor, while he began to deal out the cards in two separate heaps. “Won!” exclaimed he, delightedly. “Go you double or quits, sir? – Any gentleman with another fifty? – A pony if you like, sir? – Done! Won again, by jingo! This is the only game, after all; decided in a second. I make the bank, gentlemen, two hundred in the bank. Why, where are the bettors this evening? This is only punting, gentlemen. Any one say five hundred – four – three – one hundred – for the first knave?” And the cards fell from his hands with wondrous rapidity. “Now, if no one is inclined to play, let ‘s have a broiled bone,” said he, rising, and bowing courteously around him.

“Second the motion!” cried a cheery voice, as the door opened and Annesley Beecher entered. “Why, Grog, my hearty, I thought you had a regular flock of pigeons here. I heard you talking as I came up the stairs, and fancied you were doing a smart stroke of work.”

“What robbery have you been at with that white choker and that gimcrack waistcoat?” said Davis, sulkily.

“Dining with Dunn, and a capital dinner he gave me. I ‘m puzzled to say whether I like his wine or his cookery best.”

“Were there many there?”

“None but ourselves.”

“Lord! how he must have worked you!” cried Davis, with an insolent grin.

“Ain’t such a flat as you think me, Master Grog. Solomon was a wise man, and Samson a strong one, and A. B. can hold his own with most ‘in the ruck.’”

A most contemptuous look was the only answer Davis condescended to this speech. At last, after he had lighted a fresh cigar, and puffed it into full work, he said, “Well, what was it he had to say to you?”

“Oh, we talked away of everything; and, by Jupiter! he knows a little of everything. Such a memory, too; remembers every fellow that was in power the last fifty years, and can tell you how he was ‘squared,’ for it ‘s all on the ‘cross’ with them, Grog, just as in the ring. Every fellow rides to order, and half the running one sees is no race! Any hot water to be had?”

“No, there’s cold in that jug yonder. Well, go on with Dunn.”

“He is very agreeable, I must say; for, besides having met everybody, he knows all their secret history, – how this one got out of his scrape, and why that went into the hole. You see in a moment how much he must be trusted, and that he can make his book on life as safe as the Bank of England. Fearfully strong that gin is!”

“No, it ain’t,” said Grog, rudely; “it’s not the velvety tipple Dunn gave you, but it’s good British gin, that’s what it is.”

“You would n’t believe, too, how much he knows about women! He’s up to everything that’s going on in town. Very strange that, for a fellow like him! Don’t you think so?”

Davis made no answer, but puffed away slowly. “And after women, what came next?”

“He talked next – let me see – about books. How he likes Becky Sharp, – how he enjoys her! He says that character will do the same service as the published discovery of some popular fraud; and that the whole race of Beckys now are detected swindlers, – nothing less.”

“And what if they are? Is that going to prevent their cheating? Hasn’t the world always its crop of flats coming out in succession like green peas? What did he turn to after that?”

“Then we had a little about the turf.”

“He don’t know anything about the turf!” said Grog, with intense contempt.

“I ‘m not so sure of that,” said Beecher, cautiously.

“Did he speak of me at all?” said Grog, with a peculiar grin.

“No; only to ask if you were the same Captain Davis that was mentioned in that affair at Brighton.”

“And what did you say?”

“Said! Not knowing, could n’t tell, Master Grog. Knew you were a great friend of my brother Lackington’s, and always hand and glove with Blanchard and the swells.”