Old Friends: Essays in Epistolary Parody. Lang Andrew
Bacco, quaffed a carafon of green Chartreuse, holding at least a quart, which stood by him in its native pewter. Young Ponto merely muttered, “Egad!” I leaped through the open window and landed at her feet.
The racing steeds were within ten yards of us. Calmly I cast my eye over their points. Far the fleetest, though he did not hold the lead, was Marmalada’s charger, the Atys gelding, by Celerima out of Sac de Nuit. With one wave of my arm I had placed her on his crupper, and, with the same action, swung myself into the saddle. Then, in a flash and thunder of flying horses, we swept like tawny lightning down the Pincian. The last words I heard from the club window, through the heliotrope-scented air, were “Thirty to one on Atys, half only if declared.” They were wagering on our lives; the slang of the paddock was on their lips.
Onward, downward, we sped, the fair stranger lifeless in my arms. Past scarlet cardinals in mufti, past brilliant έτᾶιραὶ like those who swayed the City of the Violet Crown; past pifferari dancing in front of many an albergo; through the Ghetto with its marmorine palaces, over the Fountain of Trevi, across the Cascine, down the streets of the Vatican we flew among yells of “Owner’s up,” “The gelding wins, hard held,” from the excited bourgeoisie. Heaven and earth swam before my eyes as we reached the Pons Sublicia, and heard the tawny waters of Tiber swaying to the sea.
The Pons Sublicia was up!
With an oath of despair, for life is sweet, I rammed my persuaders into Atys, caught him by the head, and sent him straight at the flooded Tiber!
“Va-t-en donc, espèce de type!” said the girl on my saddle-bow, finding her tongue at last. Fear, or girlish modesty, had hitherto kept her silent.
Then Atys rose on his fetlocks! Despite his double burden, the good steed meant to have it. He deemed, perchance, he was with the Quorn or the Baron’s. He rose; he sprang. The deep yellow water, cold in the moon’s rays, with the farthest bank but a chill grey line in the mist, lay beneath us! A moment that seemed an eternity! Then we landed on the far-off further bank, and for the first time I could take a pull at his head. I turned him on the river’s brim, and leaped him back again.
The runaway was now as tame as a driven deer in Richmond Park.
Well, Camarada, the adventure is over. She was grateful, of course. These pervenche eyes were suffused with a dewy radiance.
“You can’t call,” she said, “for you haven’t been introduced, and Mrs. Walker says we must be more exclusive. I’m dying to be exclusive; but I’m very much obliged to you, and so will mother be. Let’s see. I’ll be at the Colosseum to-morrow night, about ten. I’m bound to see the Colosseum, by moonlight. Good-bye;” and she shook her pale parasol at me, and fluttered away.
Ah, Camarada, shall I be there? Que scais-je? Well, ’tis time to go to the dance at the Holy Father’s. Adieu, Carissima. – Tout à vous,
III
Mr. Redmond Barry (better known as Barry Lyndon) tells his uncle the story of a singular encounter at Berlin with Mr. Alan Stuart, called Alan Breck, and well known as the companion of Mr. David Balfour in many adventures. Mr. Barry, at this time, was in the pay of Herr Potzdorff, of his Prussian Majesty’s Police, and was the associate of the Chevalier, his kinsman, in the pursuit of fortune.
Uncle Barry, – I dictate to Pippi, my right hand being wounded, and that by no common accident. Going down the Linden Strasse yesterday, I encountered a mob; and, being curious in Potzdorff’s interest, penetrated to the kernel of it. There I found two men of my old regiment – Kurz and another – at words with a small, dark, nimble fellow, who carried bright and dancing eyes in a pock-marked face. He had his iron drawn, a heavy box-handled cut-and-thrust blade, and seemed ready to fall at once on the pair that had been jeering him for his strange speech.
“Who is this, lads?” I asked.
“Ein Engländer,” answered they.
“No Englishman,” says he, in a curious accent not unlike our brogue, “but a plain gentleman, though he bears a king’s name and hath Alan Breck to his by-name.”
“Come, come,” says I in German, “let the gentleman go his way; he is my own countryman.” This was true enough for them; and you should have seen the Highlander’s eyes flash, and grow dim again.
I took his arm, for Potzdorff will expect me to know all about the stranger, and marched him down to the Drei Könige.
“I am your host, sir; what do you call for, Mr. Stuart of – ?” said I, knowing there is never a Scot but has the name of his kailyard tacked to his own.
“A King’s name is good enough for me; I bear it plain. Mr. – ?” said he, reddening.
“They call me the Chevalier Barry, of Ballybarry.”
“I am in the better company, sir,” quoth he, with a grand bow.
When a bowl of punch was brought he takes off his hat, and drinks, very solemnly, “To the King!”
“Over the water?” I asked.
“Nay, sir, on this side,” he said; and I smoked the Jacobite. But to shorten the story, which amuses my tedium but may beget it in you, I asked him if he knew the cards.
“I’m just daft when I get to the cartes,” he answered in his brogue, and we fell to piquet. Now my Scot wore a very fine coat, and on the same very large smooth silver buttons, well burnished. Therefore, perceiving such an advantage as a skilled player may enjoy, I let him win a little to whet his appetite, but presently used his buttons as a mirror, wherein I readily detected the strength of the cards he held. Before attempting this artifice, I had solemnly turned my chair round thrice.
“You have changed the luck, sir,” says Mr. Breck, or Stuart, presently; and, rising with a mighty grave air, he turned his coat and put it on inside out.
“Sir,” says I, “what am I to understand by this conduct?”
“What for should not I turn my coat, for luck, if you turn your chair?” says he. “But if you are not preceesely satisfied, I will be proud to step outside with you.”
I answered that we were not in a Highland wilderness, and that if no malice were meant no affront was taken. We continued at the game till, though deprived of my mirror, I had won some 500 Fredericks. On this he rose, saying, “Sir, in this purse you will find the exact sum that I am owing you, and I will call for my empty sporran the morn. It was Rob Roy’s before it was mine.” Therewith he laid on the table a sort of goatskin pouch, such as Highlanders gird about their loins, and marched forth.
I set to work at opening his pouch, that was fastened by a spring and button, seeming easy enough of access. But I had scarce pressed the button when lo! a flash, a pistol shot, and my right hand is grazed with a bullet that flew out of the bag. This Highlander of the Devil had some mechanism in his purse that discharged a small steel pistol when unwarily opened. My hand is but slightly wounded, yet I cannot hold my sword, nor hath my search brought me any news of Alan Breck. He has vanished like an emissary of the Devil or the Pretender, as I doubt not he is. But I will have his blood, if he is not one of their Scotch fairies. – Your loving Nephew,
Redmond Barry, of Ballybarry.
P.S. – The Fredericks were in the bag, all told.
IV
Mrs. Gamp nurses an old friend who is under a singular delusion.
My precious Betsy, – Which when last we parted it was not as I could wish, but bearing malice in our hearts. But, as often and often Mrs. Harris have said it before me, with the tears in her angel eyes – one of them having a slight cast from an accident with the moderator lamp, Harris being quick in his temper – often and often have she said to me: “Ah, Sairey, the quarrels of friends is affection’s best restorer.” And good reason to know it she have, with a husband as