Le Fanu Joseph Sheridan
The Cock and Anchor
CHAPTER XXII
THE SPINET
In no very pleasant frame of mind did Lord Aspenly retrace his steps toward the old house. His lordship had, all his life, been firmly persuaded that the whole female creation had been sighing and pining for the possession of his heart and equipage. He knew that among those with whom his chief experience lay, his fortune and his coronet were considerations not to be resisted; and he as firmly believed, that even without such recommendations, few women, certainly none of any taste or discrimination, could be found with hearts so steeled against the archery of Cupid, as to resist the fascinations of his manner and conversation, supported and directed, as both were, by the tact and experience drawn from a practice of more years than his lordship cared to count, even to himself. He had, however, smiled, danced, and chatted, in impregnable celibacy, through more than half a century of gaiety and frivolity – breaking, as he thought, hearts innumerable, and, at all events, disappointing very many calculations – until, at length, his lordship had arrived at that precise period of existence at which old gentlemen, not unfrequently, become all at once romantic, disinterested, and indiscreet – nobody exactly knows why – unless it be for variety, or to spite an heir presumptive, or else that, as a preliminary to second childhood, nature has ordained a second boyhood too. Certain, however, it is, that Lord Aspenly was seized, on a sudden, with a matrimonial frenzy; and, tired of the hackneyed schemers, in the centre of whose manœuvres he had stood and smiled so long in contemptuous security, he resolved that his choice should honour some simple, unsophisticated beauty, who had never plotted his matrimony.
Fired with this benevolent resolution, he almost instantly selected Mary Ashwoode as the happy companion of his second childhood, acquainted Sir Richard with his purpose, of course received his consent and blessing, and forthwith opened his entrenchments with the same certainty of success with which the great Duke of Marlborough might have invested a Flanders village. The inexperience of a girl who had mixed, comparatively, so little in gay society, her consequent openness to flattery, and susceptibility of being fascinated by the elegance of his address, and the splendour of his fortune – all these considerations, accompanied by a clear consciousness of his own infinite condescension in thinking of her at all, had completely excluded from all his calculations the very possibility of her doing anything else than jump into his arms the moment he should open them to receive her. The result of the interview which had just taken place, had come upon him with the overwhelming suddenness of a thunderbolt. Rejected! – Lord Aspenly rejected! – a coronet, and a fortune, and a man whom all the male world might envy – each and all rejected! – and by whom? – a chit of a girl, who had no right to look higher than a half-pay captain with a wooden leg, or a fox-hunting boor, with a few inaccessible acres of bog and mountain – the daughter of a spendthrift baronet, who was, as everyone knew, on the high road to ruin. Death and fury! was it to be endured?
The little lover, absorbed in such tranquilizing reflections, arrived at the house, and entered the drawing-room. It was not unoccupied; seated by a spinet, and with a sheet of music-paper in her lap, and a pencil in her hand, was the fair Emily Copland. As he entered, she raised her eyes, started a little, became gracefully confused, and then, with her archest smile, exclaimed, —
"What shall I say, my lord? You have detected me. I have neither defence nor palliation to offer; you have fairly caught me. Here am I engaged in perhaps the most presumptuous task that ever silly maiden undertook – I am wedding your beautiful verses to most unworthy music of my own. After all, there is nothing like a simple ballad. Such exquisite lines as these inspire music of themselves. Would that Henry Purcell had had but a peep at them! To what might they not have prompted such a genius – to what, indeed?"
So sublime was the flight of fancy suggested by this interrogatory, that Miss Copland shook her head slowly in poetic rapture, and gazed fondly for some seconds upon the carpet, apparently unconscious of Lord Aspenly's presence.
"She is a fine creature," half murmured he, with an emphasis upon the identity which implied a contrast not very favourable to Mary – "and – and very pretty – nay, she looks almost beautiful, and so – so lively – so much vivacity. Never was poor poet so much flattered," continued his lordship, approaching, as he spoke, and raising his voice, but not above its most mellifluous pitch; "to have his verses read by such eyes, to have them chanted by such a minstrel, were honour too high for the noblest bards of the noblest days of poetry: for me it is a happiness almost too great; yet, if the request be not a presumptuous one, may I, in all humility, pray that you will favour me with the music to which you have coupled my most undeserving – my most favoured lines?"
The young lady looked modest, glanced coyly at the paper which lay in her lap, looked modest once more, and then arch again, and at length, with rather a fluttered air, she threw her hands over the keys of the instrument, and to a tune, of which we say enough when we state that it was in no way unworthy of the words, she sang, rather better than young ladies usually do, the following exquisite stanzas from his lordship's pen: —
"Tho' Chloe slight me when I woo,
And scorn the love of poor Philander;
The shepherd's heart she scorns is true,
His heart is true, his passion tender.
"But poor Philander sighs in vain,
In vain laments the poor Philander;
Fair Chloe scorns with high disdain,
His love so true and passion tender.
"And here Philander lays him down,
Here will expire the poor Philander;
The victim of fair Chloe's frown,
Of love so true and passion tender.
"Ah, well-a-day! the shepherd's dead;
Ay, dead and gone, the poor Philander;
And Dryads crown with flowers his head,
And Cupid mourns his love so tender."
During this performance, Lord Aspenly, who had now perfectly recovered his equanimity, marked the time with head and hand, standing the while beside the fair performer, and every note she sang found its way through the wide portals of his vanity, directly to his heart.
"Brava! brava! bravissima!" murmured his lordship, from time to time. "Beautiful, beautiful air – most appropriate – most simple; not a note that accords not with the word it carries – beautiful, indeed! A thousand thanks! I have become quite conceited of lines of which heretofore I was half ashamed. I am quite elated – at once overpowered by the characteristic vanity of the poet, and more than recompensed by the reality of his proudest aspiration – that of seeing his verses appreciated by a heart of sensibility, and of hearing them sung by the lips of beauty."
"I am but too happy if I am forgiven," replied Emily Copland, slightly laughing, and with a heightened colour, while the momentary overflow of merriment was followed by a sigh, and her eyes sank pensively upon the ground.
This little by-play was not lost upon Lord Aspenly.
"Poor little thing," he inwardly remarked, "she is in a very bad way – desperate – quite desperate. What a devil of a rascal I am to be sure! Egad! it's almost a pity – she's a decidedly superior person; she has an elegant turn of mind – refinement – taste – egad! she is a fine creature – and so simple. She little knows I see it all; perhaps she hardly knows herself what ails her – poor, poor little thing!"
While these thoughts floated rapidly through his mind, he felt, along with his spite and anger towards Mary Ashwoode, a feeling of contempt, almost of disgust, engendered by her audacious non-appreciation of his merits – an impertinence which appeared the more monstrous by the contrast of Emily Copland's tenderness. She had made it plain enough, by all the artless signs which simple maidens know not how to hide, that his fascinations had done their fatal work upon her heart. He had seen, this for several days, but not with the overwhelming distinctness with which he now beheld it.
"Poor, poor little girl!" said his lordship to himself; "I am very, very sorry, but it cannot be helped; it is no fault of mine. I am really very, very, confoundedly sorry."
In saying so to himself, however, he told himself a lie; for, instead of being grieved, he was pleased beyond measure – a fact which he might have ascertained by a single glance at the reflection of his wreathed smiles in the ponderous mirror which hung forward from the pier between the windows, as if staring down in wondering curiosity upon the progress of the flirtation. Not caring to disturb a train of thought which his vanity told him were but riveting the subtle chains which bound another victim to his conquering chariot-wheels, the Earl of Aspenly turned, with careless ease, to a table, on which lay some specimens of that worsted tapestry-work, in which the fair maidens of a century and a half ago were wont to exercise their taste and skill.
"Your work is very, very beautiful," said he, after a considerable pause, and laying down the canvas, upon whose unfinished worsted task he had been for some time gazing.
"That is my cousin's work," said Emily, not sorry to turn the conversation to a subject upon which, for many reasons, she wished to dwell; "she used to work a great deal with me before she grew romantic – before she fell in love."
"In love! – with whom?" inquired Lord Aspenly, with remarkable quickness.
"Don't you know, my lord?" inquired Emily Copland, in simple wonder. "May be I ought not to have told you – I am sure I ought not. Do not ask me any more. I am the giddiest girl – the most thoughtless!"
"Nay, nay," said Lord Aspenly, "you need not be afraid to trust me– I never tell tales; and now that I know the fact that she is in love, there can be no harm in telling me the less important particulars. On my honour," continued his lordship, with real earnestness, and affected playfulness – "upon my sacred honour! I shall not breathe one syllable of it to mortal – I shall be as secret as the tomb. Who is the happy person in question?"
"Well, my lord, you'll promise not to betray me," replied she. "I know very well I ought not to have said a word about it; but as I have made the blunder, I see no harm in telling you all I know; but you will be secret?"
"On my honour – on my life and soul, I swear!" exclaimed his lordship, with unaffected eagerness.
"Well, then, the happy man is a Mr. Edmond O'Connor," replied she.
"O'Connor – O'Connor – I never saw nor heard of the man before," rejoined the earl, reflectively. "Is he wealthy?"
"Oh! no; a mere beggarman," replied Emily, "and a Papist to boot!"
"Ha, ha, ha – he, he, he! a Papist beggar," exclaimed his lordship, with an hysterical giggle, which was intended for a careless laugh. "Has he any conversation – any manner – any attraction of that kind?"
"Oh! none in the world! – both ignorant, and I think, vulgar," replied Emily. "In short, he is very nearly a stupid boor!"
"Excellent! Ha, ha – he, he, he! – ugh! ugh! – very capital – excellent! excellent!" exclaimed his lordship, although he might have found some difficulty in explaining in what, precisely the peculiar excellence of the announcement consisted. "Is he – is he – a – a —handsome?"
"Decidedly not what I consider handsome!" replied she; "he is a large, coarse-looking fellow, with very broad shoulders – very large – and as they say of oxen, in very great condition – a sort of a prize man!"
"Ha, ha! – ugh! ugh! – he, he, he, he, he! – ugh, ugh, ugh! – de – lightful – quite delightful!" exclaimed the earl, in a tone of intense chagrin, for he was conscious that his own figure was perhaps a little too scraggy, and his legs a leetle too nearly approaching the genus spindle, and being so, there was no trait in the female character which he so inveterately abhorred and despised as their tendency to prefer those figures which exhibited a due proportion of thew and muscle. Under a cloud of rappee, his lordship made a desperate attempt to look perfectly delighted and amused, and effected a retreat to the window, where he again indulged in a titter of unutterable spite and vexation.
"And what says Sir Richard to the advances of this very desirable gentleman?" inquired he, after a little time.
"Sir Richard is, of course, violently against it," replied Emily Copland.
"So I should have supposed," returned the little nobleman, briskly. And turning again to the window, he relapsed into silence, looked out intently for some minutes, took more snuff, and finally, consulting his watch, with a few words of apology, and a gracious smile and a bow, quitted the room.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE DARK ROOM – CONTAINING PLENTY OF SCARS AND BRUISES AND PLANS OF VENGEANCE
On the same day a very different scene was passing in another quarter, whither for a few moments we must transport the reader. In a large and aristocratic-looking brick house, situated near the then fashionable suburb of Glasnevin, surrounded by stately trees, and within furnished with the most prodigal splendour, combined with the strictest and most minute attention to comfort and luxury, and in a large and lofty chamber, carefully darkened, screened round by the rich and voluminous folds of the silken curtains, with spider-tables laden with fruits and wines and phials of medicine, crowded around him, and rather buried than supported among a luxurious pile of pillows, lay, in sore bodily torment, with fevered pulse, and heart and brain busy with a thousand projects of revenge, the identical Nicholas Blarden, whose signal misadventure in the theatre, upon the preceding evening, we have already recorded. A decent-looking matron sate in a capacious chair, near the bed, in the capacity of nurse-tender, while her constrained and restless manner, as well as the frightened expression with which, from time to time, she stole a glance at the bloated mass of scars and bruises, of which she had the care, pretty plainly argued the sweet and patient resignation with which her charge endured his sufferings. In the recess of the curtained window sate a little black boy, arrayed according to the prevailing fashion, in a fancy suit, and with a turban on his head, and carrying in his awe-struck countenance, as well as in the immobility of his attitude, a woeful contradiction to the gaiety of his attire.
"Drink – drink – where's that d – d hag? – give me drink, I say!" howled the prostrate gambler.
The woman started to her feet, and with a step which fell noiselessly upon the deep-piled carpets which covered the floor, she hastened to supply him.
He had hardly swallowed the draught, when a low knock at the door announced a visitor.
"Come in, can't you?" shouted Blarden.
"How do you feel now, Nicky dear?" inquired a female voice – and a handsome face, with rather a bold expression, and crowned by a small mob-cap, overlaid with a profusion of the richest lace, peeped into the room through the half-open door – "how do you feel?"
"In hell– that's all," shouted he.
"Doctor Mallarde is below, love," added she, without evincing either surprise or emotion of any kind at the concise announcement which the patient had just delivered.
"Let him come up then," was the reply.
"And a Mr. M'Quirk – a messenger from Mr. Chancey."
"Let him come up too. But why the hell did not Chancey come himself? – That will do – pack – be off."
The lady tossed her head, like one having authority, looked half inclined to say something sharp, but thought better of it, and contented herself with shutting the door with more emphasis than Dr. Mallarde would have recommended.
The physician of those days was a solemn personage: he would as readily have appeared without his head, as without his full-bottomed wig; and his ponderous gold-headed cane was a sort of fifth limb, the supposition of whose absence involved a contradiction to the laws of anatomy; his dress was rich and funereal; his step was slow and pompous; his words very long and very few; his look was mysterious; his nod awful; and the shake of his head unfathomable: in short, he was in no respect very much better than a modern charlatan. The science which he professed was then overgrown with absurdities and mystification. The temper of the times was superstitious and credulous, the physician, being wise in his generation, framed his outward man (including his air and language) accordingly, and the populace swallowed his long words and his electuaries with equal faith.
Doctor Mallarde was a doctor-like person, and, in theatrical phraseology, looked the part well. He was tall and stately, saturnine and sallow in aspect, had bushy, grizzled brows, and a severe and prominent dark eye, a thin, hooked nose, and a pair of lips just as thin as it. Along with these advantages he had a habit of pressing the gold head of his professional cane against one corner of his mouth, in a way which produced a sinister and mysterious distortion of that organ; and by exhibiting the medical baton, the outward and visible sign of doctorship, in immediate juxtaposition with the fountain of language, added enormously to the gravity and authority of the words which from time to time proceeded therefrom.
In the presence of such a spectre as this – intimately associated with all that was nauseous and deadly on earth – it is hardly to be wondered at that even Nicholas Blarden felt himself somewhat uneasy and abashed. The physician felt his pulse, gazing the while upon the ceiling, and pressing the gold head of his cane, as usual, to the corner of his mouth; made him put out his tongue, asked him innumerable questions, which we forbear to publish, and ended by forbidding his patient the use of every comfort in which he had hitherto found relief, and by writing a prescription which might have furnished a country dispensary with good things for a twelvemonth. He then took his leave and his fee, with the grisly announcement, that unless the drugs were all swallowed, and the other matters attended to in a spirit of absolute submission, he would not answer for the life of the patient.
"I am d – d glad he's gone at last," exclaimed Blarden, with a kind of gasp, as if a weight had been removed from his breast. "Curse me, if I did not feel all the time as if my coffin was in the room. Are you there, M'Quirk?"
"Here I am, Mr. Blarden," rejoined the person addressed, whom we may as well describe, as we shall have more to say about him by-and-by.
Mr. M'Quirk was a small, wiry man, of fifty years and upwards, arrayed in that style which is usually described as "shabby genteel." He was gifted with one of those mean and commonplace countenances which seem expressly made for the effectual concealment of the thoughts and feelings of the possessor – an advantage which he further secured by habitually keeping his eyes as nearly closed as might be, so that, for any indication afforded by them of the movements of the inward man, they might as well have been shut up altogether. The peculiarity, if not the grace, of his appearance, was heightened by a contraction of the muscles at the nape of the neck, which drew his head backward, and produced a corresponding elevation of the chin, which, along with a certain habitual toss of the head, gave to his appearance a kind of caricatured affectation of superciliousness and hauteur, very impressive to behold. Along with the swing of the head, which we have before noticed, there was, whenever he spoke, a sort of careless libration of the whole body, which, together with a certain way of jerking or twitching the right shoulder from time to time, were the only approaches to gesticulation in which he indulged.
"Well, what does your master say?" inquired Blarden – "out with it, can't you."
"Master – master – indeed! Cock him up with master," echoed the man, with lofty disdain.
"Ay! what does he say?" reiterated Blarden, in no very musical tones. "D – you, are you choking, or moonstruck? Out with it, can't you?"
"Chancey says that you had better think the matter over – and that's his opinion," replied M'Quirk.
"And a fine opinion it is," rejoined Blarden, furiously. "Why, in hell's name, what's the matter with him – the – drivelling idiot? What's law for – what's the courts for? Am I to be trounced and cudgelled in the face of hundreds, and – and half murdered, and nothing for it? I tell you, I'll be beggared before the scoundrel shall escape. If every penny I'm worth in the world can buy it, I'll have justice. Tell that sleepy sot Chancey that I'll make him work. Ho – o – o – oh!" bawled the wretch, as his anguish all returned a hundredfold in the fruitless attempt to raise himself in bed.
"Drink, here —drink– I'm choking! Hock and water. D – you, don't look so stupid and frightened. I'll not be bamboozled by an old 'pothecary. Quick with it, you fumbling witch."
He finished the draught, and lay silently for a time.
"See – mind me, M'Quirk," he said, after a pause, "tell Chancey to come out himself – tell him to be here before evening, or I'll make him sorry for it, do you mind; I want to give him directions. Tell him to come at once, or I'll make him smoke for it, that's all."
"I understand – all right – very well; and so, as you seem settling for a snooze, I wish you good-evening, Mr. Blarden, and all sorts of pleasure and happiness," rejoined the messenger.
The patient answered by a grin and a stifled howl, and Mr. M'Quirk, having his head within the curtains, which screened him effectually from the observation of the two attendants, and observing that Mr. Blarden's eyes were closely shut in the rigid compression of pain, put out his tongue, and indulged for a few seconds in an exceedingly ugly grimace, after which, repeating his farewell in a tone of respectful sympathy, he took his departure, chuckling inwardly all the way downstairs, for the little gentleman had a playful turn for mischief.
When Gordon Chancey, Esquire, barrister-at-law, in obedience to this summons, arrived at Cherry Hill, for so the residence of the sick voluptuary was called, he found his loving friend and patron, Nicholas Blarden, babbling not of green fields, but of green curtains, theatres, dice-boxes, bright eyes, small-swords, and the shades infernal – in a word, in a high state of delirium. On calling next day, however, he beheld him much recovered; and after an extremely animated discussion, these two well-assorted confederates at length, by their united ingenuity, succeeded in roughly sketching the outlines of a plan of terrific vengeance, in all respects worthy of the diabolical council in which it originated, and of whose progress and development this history very fully treats.
