One Of Them

“It’s the good conscience, I suppose,” said he, laughing. “That and a good digestion help a man very far on his road through life. And how are you, Loo?”

“As you see,” said she, laughingly. “With some of those family gifts you speak of, I rub on through the world tolerably well.”

“You are not in mourning, I perceive. How is that?” asked he, looking at the amber-colored silk of her dress.

“Not to-night, papa, for I was just dressing for a masked ball at the Pergola, whither I was about to go on the sly, having given out that I was suffering from headache, and could not leave my room.”

“Fretting over poor Penthony, eh?” cried he, laughing.

“Well, of course that might also be inferred. Not but I have already got over my violent grief. I am beginning to be what is technically called ‘resigned.’”

“Which is, I believe, the stage of looking out for another!” laughed he again.

She gave a little faint sigh, and went on with her dressing. “And what news have you for me, papa? What is going on at home?”

“Nothing, – absolutely nothing, dear. You don’t care for political news?”

“Not much. You know I had a surfeit of Downing Street once. By the way, papa, only think of my meeting George!”

“Ogden, – George Odgen?”

“Yes, it was a strange accident. He came to fetch away a young lad that happened to be stopping with us, and we met face to face – fortunately, alone – in the garden.”

“Very awkward that!” muttered he.

“So it was; and so he evidently felt it. By the way, how old he has grown! George can’t be more than – let me see – forty-six. Yes, he was just forty-six on the 8th of August. You ‘d guess him fully ten years older.”

“How did he behave? Did he recognize you and address you?”

“Yes; we talked a little, – not pleasantly, though. He evidently is not forgiving in his nature, and you know he had never much tact, – except official tact, – and so he was flurried and put out, and right glad to get away.”

“But there was no éclat, – no scandal?”

“Of course not. The whole incident did not occupy ten minutes.”

“They ‘ve been at me again about my pension, —his doing, I’m sure,” muttered he, – “asking for a return of services, and such-like rubbish.”

“Don’t let them worry you, papa; they dare not push you to publicity. It’s like a divorce case, where one of the parties, being respectable, must submit to any terms imposed.”

“Well, that’s my own view of it, dear; and so I said, ‘Consult the secret instructions to the Under-Secretary for Ireland for an account of services rendered by N. H.’”

“You ‘ll hear no more of it,” said she, flippantly. “What of Ludlow? Where is he?”

“He’s here. Don’t you know that?”

“Here! Do you mean in Florence?”

“Yes; he came with Stocmar. They are at the same hotel.”

“I declare I half suspected it,” said she, with a sort of bitter laugh. “Oh, the cunning Mr. Stocmar, that must needs deceive me!”

“And you have seen him?”

“Yes; I settled about his taking Clara away with him. I want to get rid of her, – I mean altogether, – and Stocmar is exactly the person to manage these little incidents of the white slave-market. But,” added she, with some irritation, “that was no reason why you should dupe me, my good Mr. Stocmar! particularly at the moment when I had poured all my sorrows into your confiding breast!”

“He’s a very deep fellow, they tell me.”

“No, papa, he is not. He has that amount of calculation – that putting this, that, and t’ other together, and seeing what they mean – which all Jews have; but he makes the same blunder that men of small craft are always making. He is eternally on the search after motives, just as if fifteen out of every twenty things in this life are not done without any motive at all!”

“Only in Ireland, Loo, – only in Ireland.”

“Nay, papa, in Ireland they do the full twenty,” said she, laughing. “But what has brought Ludlow here? He has certainly not come without a motive.”

“To use some coercion over you, I suspect.”

“Probably enough. Those weary letters, – those weary letters!” sighed she. “Oh, papa dear, – you who were always a man of a clear head and a subtle brain, – how did you fall into the silly mistake of having your daughter taught to write? Our nursery-books are crammed with cautious injunctions, – ‘Don’t play with fire,’ &c, – and of the real peril of all perils not a word of warning is uttered, and nobody says, ‘Avoid the inkstand.’”

“How could you have fallen into such a blunder?” said he, half peevishly.

“I gave rash pledges, papa, just as a bankrupt gives bad bills. I never believed I was to be solvent again.”

“We must see what can be done, Loo. I know he is very hard up for money just now; so that probably a few hundreds might do the business.”

She shook her head doubtingly, but said nothing.

“A fellow-traveller of mine, unacquainted with him personally, told me that his bills were seen everywhere about town.”

“Who is your companion?”

“An Irishman called O’Shea.”

“And is the O’Shea here too?” exclaimed she, laughingly.

“Yes; since he has lost his seat in the House, England has become too hot for him. And, besides,” added he, slyly, “he has told me in confidence that if ‘the party,’ as he calls them, should not give him something, he knows of a widow somewhere near this might suit him. ‘I don’t say that she’s rich, mind you,’ said he, ‘but she’s ‘cute as a fox, and would be sure to keep a man’s head above water somehow.’”

Mrs. Morris held her handkerchief to her mouth, but the sense of the ridiculous could not be suppressed, and she laughed out.

“What would I not have given to have heard him, papa!” said she, at last

“Well, it really was good,” said he, wiping his eyes; for he, too, had indulged in a very hearty laugh, particularly when he narrated all the pains O’Shea had been at to discover who Penthony Morris was, where he came from, and what fortune he had. “‘It was at first all in vain,’ said he, ‘but no sooner did I begin to pay fellows to make searches for me, than I had two, or maybe three Penthony Morrises every morning by the post; and, what’s worse, all alive and hearty!’”

“What did he do under these distressing circumstances?” asked she, gayly.

“He said he ‘d give up the search entirely. ‘There ‘s no such bad hunting country,’ said he, ‘as where there’s too many foxes, and so I determined I ‘d have no more Penthony Morrises, but just go in for the widow without any more inquiry.’”

“And have you heard the plan of his campaign?” asked she.

“He has none, – at least, I think not. He trusts to his own attractions and some encouragement formerly held out to him.”