CHAPTER L. THREE MET AGAIN

When, on the following morning, Charles Heathcote repaired to the hotel where he had left his friend Lord Agin-court, he was surprised to hear the sound of voices and laughter as he drew nigh the room; nor less astonished was he, on entering, to discover O'Shea seated at the breakfast-table, and manifestly in the process of enjoying himself. Had there been time to retire undetected, Heathcote would have done so, for his head was far too full of matters of deep interest to himself to desire the presence of a stranger, not to say that he had a communication to make to his friend both delicate and difficult.

O'Shea's quick glance had, however, caught him at once, and he cried out, "Here's the very man we wanted to make us complete,--the jolliest party of three that ever sat down together."

"I scarcely thought to see you in these parts," said Heathcote, with more of sulk than cordiality in the tone.

"Your delight ought to be all the greater, though, maybe, it is n't!

You look as glum as the morning I won your trap and the two nags."

"By the way, what became of them?" asked Heathcote.

"I sold the chestnut to a young cornet in the Carabineers. He saw me ride him through all the bonfires in Sackville Street the night the mob beat the police, and he said he never saw his equal to face fire; and he was n't far wrong there, for the beast was stone blind."

"And the gray?"

"The gray is here, in Rome, and in top condition; and if I don't take him over five feet of timber, my name is n't Gorman." A quick wink and a sly look towards Agincoort conveyed to Heathcote the full meaning of this speech.

"And you want a high figure for him?" asked he.

"If I sell him,--if I sell him at all; for you see, if the world goes well with me, and I have a trump or two in my hand, I won't part with that horse. It's not every day in the week that you chance on a beast that can carry fifteen stone over a stiff country,--ay, and do it four days in the fortnight!"

"What's his price?" asked Agincourt.

"Let him tell you," said O'Shea, with a most expressive look at Heathcote. "He knows him as well or better than I do."

"Yes," said Heathcote, tantalizing him on purpose; "but when a man sets out by saying, 'I don't want to sell my horse,' of course it means, 'If you will have him, you must pay a fancy price.'"

If O'Shea's expression could be rendered in words, it might be read thus: "And if that be the very game I'm playing, ain't you a downright idiot to spoil it?"

"Well," said Agincourt, after a pause, "I 'm just in the sort of humor this morning to do an extravagant thing, or a silly one."

"Lucky fellow!" broke in Heathcote, "for O'Shea's the very man to assist you to your project."

"I am!" said O'Shea, firmly and quickly; "for there's not the man living has scattered his money more freely than myself. Before I came of age, when I was just a slip of a boy, about nineteen--"

"Never mind the anecdote, old fellow," said Heathcote, laughingly, as he laid his hand on the other's shoulder. "Agincourt has just confessed himself in the frame of mind to be 'done.' Do him, therefore, by all means. Say a hundred and fifty for the nag, and he 'll give it, and keep your good story for another roguery."

"Isn't he polite?--isn't he a young man of charming manners and elegant address?" said O'Shea, with a strange mixture of drollery and displeasure.

"He's right, at all events," said Agincourt, laughing at the other's face; "he's right as regards me. I 'll give you a hundred and fifty for the horse without seeing him."

"Oh, mother of Moses! I wish your guardian was like you."

"Why so? What do you mean?"

"I mean this,--that I wish he 'd buy me, too, without seeing me!" And then, seeing that by their blank looks they had failed to catch his meaning, he added, "Is n't he one of the Cabinet now?"

"Yes, he is Colonial Secretary."

"That 's the very fellow I want. He 's giving away things every day, that any one of them would be the making of me."

"What would you take?"

"Whatever I 'd get. There's my answer, whatever I 'd get I'd be a Bishop, or a Judge, or a boundary Commissioner, or a Treasurer,--I 'd like to be that best,--or anything in reason they could offer a man of good family, and who had a seat in the House."

"I think you might get him something; I'm sure you might," said Heathcote.

"Well, I can try, at all events. I 'll write to-day."

"Will you really?"

"I give you my word on it I 'll say that, independently of all personal claims of your own, you 're an intimate and old friend, whose advancement I will accept as a favor done to myself."

"That's the ticket. But mind no examination,--no going before the Civil Service chaps. I tell you fairly, I would n't take the Governor-Generalship of India if I had to go up for the multiplication-table. I think I see myself sitting trembling before them, one fellow asking me, 'Who invented "pitch and toss"?' and another inquiring 'Who was the first man ever took pepper with oysters?'"

"Leave all that to Agincourt," said Heathcote; "he'll explain to his guardian that you were for several sessions a distinguished member of the House--"

"'T was I that brought 'crowing' in. I used to crow like a cock when old Sibthorp got up, and set them all off laughing."

"I 'll mention your public services--"

"And don't say that I 'm hard up. Don't make it appear that it 's because I 'm out at the elbows I 'm going, but just a whim,--the way Gladstone went to Greece the other day; that's the real dodge, for they keep the Scripture in mind up in Downing Street, and it's always the 'poor they send empty away.'"

"And you'll dine with us here, at seven?" said Agin-court, rising from the table.

"That 's as much as to say, 'Cut your lucky now, Gorman; we don't want you till dinner-time.'"

"You forget that he has got the letter to write about you," said Heathcote. "You don't want him to lose a post?"

"And the gray horse?"

"He's mine; I 've bought him."

"I suppose you 've no objection to my taking a canter on him this morning?"

"Ride him, by all means," said Agincourt, shaking his hand cordially while he said adieu.

"Why did you ask him to dinner to-day?" said Heathcote, peevishly. "I wanted you to have come over and dined with us. My father is eager to see you, and so is May."

"Let us go to tea, then. And how are they?--how is he looking?"

"Broken,--greatly broken. I was shocked beyond measure to see him so much aged since we met, and his spirits gone,--utterly gone."

"Whence is all this?"

"He says that I deserted him,--that he was forsaken."

"And is he altogether wrong, Charley? Does not conscience prick you on that score?"