Barrington. Volume 1

“I must read over Withering’s letter again, brother,” said Miss Dinah, by way of changing the subject “He writes, you say, from the Home?”

“Yes; he was obliged to go down there to search for some papers he wanted, and he took Stapylton with him; and he says they had two capital days at the partridges. They bagged, – egad! I think it was eight or ten brace before two o’clock, the Captain or Major, I forget which, being a first-rate shot.”

“What does he say of the place, – how is it looking?”

“In perfect beauty. Your deputy, Polly, would seem to have fulfilled her part admirably. The garden in prime order; and that little spot next your own sitting-room, he says, is positively a better flower-show than one he paid a shilling to see in Dublin. Polly herself, too, comes in for a very warm share of his admiration.”

“How did he see her, and where?”

“At the Home. She was there the evening they arrived, and Withering insisted on her presiding at the tea-table for them.”

“It did not require very extraordinary entreaty, I will make bold to say, Peter.”

“He does not mention that; he only speaks of her good looks, and what he calls her very pretty manners. In a situation not devoid of a certain awkwardness he says she displayed the most perfect tact; and although doing the honors of the house, she, with some very nice ingenuity, insinuated that she was herself but a visitor.”

“She could scarce have forgotten herself so far as to think anything else, Peter,” said Miss Dinah, bridling up. “I suspect her very pretty manners were successfully exercised. That old gentleman is exactly of the age to be fascinated by her.”

“What! Withering, Dinah, – do you mean Withering?” cried he, laughing.

“I do, brother; and I say that he is quite capable of making her the offer of his hand. You may laugh, Peter Barrington, but my observation of young ladies has been closer and finer than yours.” And the glance she gave at Josephine seemed to say that her gun had been double-shotted.

“But your remark, sister Dinah, rather addresses itself to old gentlemen than to young ladies.”

“Who are much the more easily read of the two,” said she, tartly. “But really, Peter, I will own that I am more deeply concerned to know what Mr. Withering has to say of our lawsuit than about Polly Dill’s attractions.”

“He speaks very hopefully, – very hopefully, indeed. In turning over George’s papers some Hindoo documents have come to light, which Stapylton has translated, and it appears that there is a certain Moonshee, called Jokeeram, who was, or is, in the service of Meer Rustum, whose testimony would avail us much. Stapylton inclines to think he could trace this man for us. His own relations are principally in Madras, but he says he could manage to institute inquiries in Bengal.”

“What is our claim to this gentleman’s interest for us, Peter?”

“Mere kindness on his part; he never knew George, except from hearsay. Indeed, they could not have been contemporaries. Stapylton is not, I should say, above five-and-thirty.”

“The search after this creature with the horrid name will be, of course, costly, brother Peter. It means, I take it, sending some one out to India; that is to say, sending one fool after another. Are you prepared for this expense?”

“Withering opines it would be money well spent. What he says is this: The Company will not willingly risk another inquiry before Parliament, and if we show fight and a firm resolve to give the case publicity, they will probably propose terms. This Moonshee had been in his service, but was dismissed, and his appearance as a witness on our side would occasion great uneasiness.”

“You are going to play a game of brag, then, brother Peter, well aware that the stronger purse is with your antagonist?”

“Not exactly, Dinah; not exactly. We are strengthening our position so far that we may say, ‘You see our order of battle; would it not be as well to make peace?’ Listen to what Withering says.” And Peter opened a letter of several sheets, and sought out the place he wanted.

“Here it is, Dinah. ‘From one of these Hindoo papers we learn that Ram Shamsoolah Sing was not at the Meer’s residence during the feast of the Rhamadan, and could not possibly have signed the document to which his name and seal are appended. Jokeeram, who was himself the Moon-shee interpreter in Luckerabad, writes to his friend Cossien Aga, and says – ‘”

“Brother Peter, this is like the Arabian Nights in all but the entertainment to me, and the jumble of these abominable names only drives me mad. If you flatter yourself that you can understand one particle of the matter, it must be that age has sharpened your faculties, that’s all.”

“I’m not quite sure of that, Dinah,” said he, laughing. “I ‘m half disposed to believe that years are not more merciful to our brains than to our ankles; but I’ll go and take a stroll in the shady alleys under the linden-trees, and who knows how bright it will make me!”

“Am I to go with you, grandpapa?” said the young girl, rising.

“No, Fifine; I have something to say to you here,” said Miss Dinah; and there was a significance in the tone that was anything but reassuring.

CHAPTER XXX. UNDER THE LINDEN

That shady alley under the linden-trees was a very favorite walk with Peter Barrington. It was a nice cool lane, with a brawling little rivulet close beside it, with here and there a dark silent pool for the dragon-fly to skim over and see his bronzed wings reflected in the still water; and there was a rustic bench or two, where Peter used to sit and fancy he was meditating, while, in reality, he was only watching a speckled lizard in the grass, or listening to the mellow blackbird over his head. I have had occasion once before to remark on the resources of the man of imagination, but I really suspect that for the true luxury of idleness there is nothing like the temperament devoid of fancy. There is a grand breadth about those quiet, peaceful minds over which no shadows flit, and which can find sufficient occupation through the senses, and never have to go “within” for their resources. These men can sit the livelong day and watch the tide break over a rock, or see the sparrow teach her young to fly, or gaze on the bee as he dives into the deep cup of the foxglove, and actually need no more to fill the hours. For them there is no memory with its dark bygones, there is no looming future with its possible misfortunes; there is simply a half-sleepy present, with soft sounds and sweet odors through it, – a balmy kind of stupor, from which the awaking comes without a shock.

When Barrington reached his favorite seat, and lighted his cigar, – it is painting the lily for such men to smoke, – he intended to have thought over the details of Withering’s letter, which were both curious and interesting; he intended to consider attentively certain points which, as Withering said, “he must master before he could adopt a final resolve;” but they were knotty points, made knottier, too, by hard Hindoo words for things unknown, and names totally unpronounceable. He used to think that he understood “George’s claim” pretty well; he had fancied it was a clear and very intelligible case, that half a dozen honest men might have come to a decision on in an hour’s time; but now he began to have a glimmering perception that George must have been egregiously duped and basely betrayed, and that the Company were not altogether unreasonable in assuming their distrust of him. Now, all these considerations coming down upon him at once were overwhelming, and they almost stunned him. Even his late attempt to enlighten his sister Dinah on a matter he so imperfectly understood now recoiled upon him, and added to his own mystification.

“Well, well,” muttered he, at last, “I hope Tom sees his way through it,” – Tom was Withering, – “and if he does, there’s no need of my bothering my head about it. What use would there be in lawyers if they hadn’t got faculties sharper than other folk? and as to ‘making up my mind,’ my mind is made up already, that I want to win the cause if he’ll only show me how.” From these musings he was drawn off by watching a large pike, – the largest pike, he thought, he had ever seen, – which would from time to time dart out from beneath a bank, and after lying motionless in the middle of the pool for a minute or so, would, with one whisk of its tail, skim back again to its hiding-place. “That fellow has instincts of its own to warn him,” thought he; “he knows he was n’t safe out there. He sees some peril that I cannot see; and that ought to be the way with Tom, for, after all, the lawyers are just pikes, neither more nor less.” At this instant a man leaped across the stream, and hurriedly passed into the copse. “What! Mr. Conyers – Conyers, is that you?” cried Barrington; and the young man turned and came towards him. “I am glad to see you all safe and sound again,” said Peter; “we waited dinner half an hour for you, and have passed all the time since in conjecturing what might have befallen you.”

“Did n’t Miss Barrington say – did not Miss Barrington know – ” He stopped in deep confusion, and could not finish his speech.

“My sister knew nothing, – at least, she did not tell me any reason for your absence.”

“No, not for my absence,” began he once more, in the same embarrassment; “but as I had explained to her that I was obliged to leave this suddenly, – to start this evening – ”

“To start this evening! and whither?”

“I cannot tell; I don’t know, – that is, I have no plans.”

“My dear boy,” said the old man, affectionately, as he laid his hand on the other’s arm, “if you don’t know where you are going, take my word for it there is no such great necessity to go.”

“Yes, but there is,” replied he, quickly; “at least Miss Barrington thinks so, and at the time we spoke together she made me believe she was in the right.”

“And are you of the same opinion now?” asked Peter, with a humorous drollery in his eye.

“I am, – that is, I was a few moments back. I mean, that whenever I recall the words she spoke to me, I feel their full conviction.”

“Come, now, sit down here beside me! It can scarcely be anything I may not be a party to. Just let me hear the case like a judge in chamber” – and he smiled at an illustration that recalled his favorite passion, “I won’t pretend to say my sister has not a wiser head – as I well know she has a far better heart – than myself, but now and then she lets a prejudice or a caprice or even a mere apprehension run away with her, and it’s just possible it is some whim of this kind is now uppermost.”

Conyers only shook his head dissentingly, and said nothing.

“Maybe I guess it, – I suspect that I guess it,” said Peter, with a sly drollery about his mouth. “My sister has a notion that a young man and a young woman ought no more to be in propinquity than saltpetre and charcoal. She has been giving me a lecture on my blindness, and asking if I can’t see this, that, and the other; but, besides being the least observant of mankind, I’m one of the most hopeful as regards whatever I wish to be. Now we have all of us gone on so pleasantly together, with such a thorough good understanding – such loyalty, as the French would call it – that I can’t, for the life of me, detect any ground for mistrust or dread. Have n’t I hit the blot, Conyers – eh?” cried he, as the young fellow grew redder and redder, till his face became crimson.

“I assured Miss Barrington,” began he, in a faltering, broken voice, “that I set too much store on the generous confidence you extended to me to abuse it; that, received as I was, like one of your own blood and kindred, I never could forget the frank trustfulness with which you discussed everything before me, and made me, so to say, ‘One of you.’ The moment, however, that my intimacy suggested a sense of constraint, I felt the whole charm of my privilege would have departed, and it is for this reason I am going!” The last word was closed with a deep sigh, and he turned away his head as he concluded.

“And for this reason you shall not go one step,” said Peter, slapping him cordially on the shoulder. “I verily believe that women think the world was made for nothing but love-making, just as the crack engineer believed rivers were intended by Providence to feed navigable canals; but you and I know a little better, not to say that a young fellow with the stamp gentleman indelibly marked on his forehead would not think of making a young girl fresh from a convent – a mere child in the ways of life – the mark of his attentions. Am I not right?”

“I hope and believe you are!”

“Stay where you are, then; be happy, and help us to feel so; and the only pledge I ask is, that whenever you suspect Dinah to be a shrewder observer and a truer prophet than her brother – you understand me – you’ll just come and say, ‘Peter Barrington, I’m off; good-bye!’”

“There’s my hand on it,” said he, grasping the old man’s with warmth. “There’s only one point – I have told Miss Barrington that I would start this evening.”

“She’ll scarcely hold you very closely to your pledge.”

“But, as I understand her, you are going back to Ireland?”

“And you are coming along with us. Isn’t that a very simple arrangement?”

“I know it would be a very pleasant one.”