Lady Kilpatrick. Robert Williams Buchanan
but they never mean it.’
‘I mean it. I think marriage is absurd. Don’t you?’
‘Sure I do,’ responded Desmond. ‘But the priest says it’s convenient, if the world is to continue. Tell me, now, what d’ye think of Master Richard?’
‘Think of him?’ said Dulcie slowly. ‘Oh, I think—I think he’s my cousin, and as stupid as girls’ cousins always are.’
‘That’s mighty hard on boys in general,’ said Desmond laughingly, ‘for they’re mostly some girl’s cousin. I may be myself, for all I know. But Richard’s as fond of you as a fox of a goose—a duck, I mean. And that’s why he hates me.’
‘For shame, Desmond! How has he ever shown that he hates you?’
‘Shown it? Faith, he doesn’t need to show it. It just comes out of him like steam from boiling water. Much I care for the hate or the love of the likes o’ him! I can run him out of breath, fight him out of time, gallop him out of hearing, swim him out of seeing, chaff him out of temper—and as for loving, sure if he loves you, I’ll just adore you, and so beat him at that as well!’
The girl smiled, with her face concealed by the brim of her sun-bonnet, and turned a little away from this brisk wooer, whose bursts of affectionate impudence were generally followed by long intervals of silence.
‘You adore too many, Desmond,’
‘Sorra one but yourself.’
‘Nonsense!’ cried Dulcie. ‘What were you doing with Rosie this morning in the stable-yard?’
‘I mistook her for her mistress,’ said Desmond. ‘No, sure,’ he added, as the girl flushed a little angrily, ‘I don’t mane that.’
‘I should think you didn’t “mane that!” ’ said the young lady. ‘I should like to catch you kissing me.’
‘I’m agreeable to be caught,’ returned the unabashable.
‘Oh, you Irish boys!’ cried Dulcie, with a transparent simulation of contempt. ‘You kiss anybody, so it’s no compliment.’
‘That depends,’ said Desmond. ‘There’s kissing for duty, and kissing for interest, and kissing for love. There’s a mighty difference between kissing a rose and kissing a thorn. But, after all, what’s a kiss but a salutation?’
‘You’re a great deal too forward,’ said Dulcie, with an almost matronly air of reproof.
‘Then get behind me,’ responded Desmond, ‘and I’ll go backward.’
The battle of wit was interrupted at this point by the sudden appearance of a man at the end of the ascent leading to the Castle. As he approached, the young couple fell apart a little, and advanced to meet him with a proper and respectful distance between them.
‘It’s Blake of Blake’s Hall,’ said Desmond, as he neared them.
‘In his usual condition of an afternoon,’ said Dulcie.
The man, tall and strongly built, with a mane of black hair and whiskers streaked heavily with gray, and a flushed face, was reeling and tacking along the narrow path. His hat reposed at a dangerous angle at the back of his head, and his waistcoat was open to catch the cooling breeze. There was an air of jolly ferocity about him; but in spite of that and of the disorder of his dress and the other signs of dissipation he carried about with him, the least observant person in the world would hardly have taken him for anything but a gentleman. As he came level with the young people he stopped in his walk and in the scrap of Irish song he was chanting, and saluted the young lady with a wide and unsteady sweep of the hat.
‘Good morning, Lady Dulcie.’ The voice, though husky, and at that moment a little thick with liquor, was sound and full and sweet, and the brogue simply defied phonetics to render it. ‘Ye’re a cure for sore eyes. Desmond, ye divil, give us your fin.’
‘You have been dining with my uncle, Mr. Blake?’ asked Lady Dulcie.
‘Faith, I have, then,’ returned Mr. Blake; ‘and if the company had only been as good as the dinner and the wine—and the whisky—’tis not yet I’d been after leaving it.’
‘And what was the matter with the company?’ asked Desmond.
‘It appears to me, Mr. Desmond Macartney,’ said Blake, with portentous, drunken dignity—‘it appears to me, sor, that a gentleman of the long descent and the high breedin’ of Lord Kilpatrick might have thought twice before inviting a man o’ my blood to sit at the same table with a low, dirty, six-an-eight-scrapin’ thief of an attorney. The back o’ my hand and the sole of my foot to ’m! the filthy reptile! I’ve left my mark on ’m, an’ I’ve spoke my mind of him, and ’twill be a long day ere he forgets Patrick Blake, of Blake’s Hall.’
‘My uncle?’ cried Lady Dulcie in a tone of half amaze, half question.
‘Your uncle, Lady Dulcie!’ answered Blake. ‘’Tis not in that fashion that a gentleman of my figure behaves to a gentleman of his. ’Tis not at the head of a nobleman that I throw bottles, nor, sor,’ he continued to Desmond, as if the interruption had come from him, ‘’tis not him I’d call a dirty thief nor a filthy reptile, and that I’d have ye to know, sor.’
‘You’ve been quarrelling with somebody at his lordship’s table?’ said Desmond.
‘I have, then! And if Dick Conseltine and that white-livered boy of his, and old Peebles—may the devil fly away with the whole boodle of ’m—if they hadn’t interfered and spoilt the sport, I’d have had the ruffian’s blood. By the lud, I’d have smashed him like an egg!’ He drove one powerful fist into the palm of the other with such force as to overbalance himself, and was only prevented by Desmond’s restraining hand from coming to the ground. ‘’Tis an insult before Heaven; ’tis an insult to ask a gentleman to put his legs under the mahogany with such a snake as that!’
‘You had your legs under the mahogany a pretty long time before you found ’twas an insult, from the looks of you,’ said Desmond dryly. ‘Now, look here, Mr. Blake, ’tis not for a boy of my years to be after offering lessons in politeness to a gentleman of yours, but I’ll just ask you to remember that the host whose hospitality you’re insulting is this lady’s uncle.’
Blake’s ferocity vanished with ludicrous suddenness. He began to stammer apologies to Lady Dulcie.
‘And then, too, Mr. Blake,’ continued Desmond, ‘you’d claim the right to choose the guests at your own table—if you had one,’ he interpolated sotto voce; ‘and Lord Kilpatrick, or any gentleman, has the same right.’
‘And that’s true, if the devil spoke it,’ cried Blake. ‘Desmond Macartney, ye’re a gentleman. Ye can carry a gentleman’s apology to a gentleman without demeaning yourself. Present my apologies to his lordship, and tell him that I’ll honour myself by presenting them personally when I hear that he’s got rid of his present company.’
‘’Tis Mr. Feagus, of Ballymote, that you’ve had the row with?’
‘Faith then, it is, and ye can tell him that if he has the spunk to stand up at twenty paces I’ll do sufficient violence to my feelings as a gentleman to honour him by lettin’ daylight into him.’
‘Nonsense, Mr. Blake,’ said Desmond. ‘Men don’t fight duels nowadays.’
‘No, by the saints!’ cried Blake; ‘they stab each other with inky pens, and suck each other dry with lawsuits, by the help of such parchmint-scrapin’ vermin as Jack Feagus. ’Tis a dirty world we live in, Desmond, my boy, but sure that’s all the more reason that the few decent men should stick together. I’m goin’ on to Widdy Daly’s shebeen, and if ye’re inclined for a drink at the stone cow, I’ll be proud of your company.’
‘Later, perhaps,’