Sir Richard Ashwoode limped downstairs to receive his intended son-in-law, Lord Aspenly, on the day following the events which we have detailed in our last and the preceding chapters. That n.o.bleman had intimated his intention to be with Sir Richard about noon. It was now little more than ten, and the baronet was, nevertheless, restless and fidgety. The room he occupied was a large parlour, commanding a view of the approach to the house. Again and again he consulted his watch, and as often hobbled over, as well as he could, to the window, where he gazed in evident discontent down the long, straight avenue, with its double row of fine old giant lime-trees.

"Nearly half-past ten," muttered Sir Richard, to himself, for at his desire he had been left absolutely alone--"ay, fully half-past, and the fellow not come yet. No less than, two notes since eight this morning, both of them with gratuitous mendacity renewing the appointment for ten o'clock; and ten o'clock comes and goes, and half-an-hour more along with it, and still no sign of Mr. Craven. If I had fixed ten o'clock to pay his accursed, unconscionable bill of costs, he'd have been prowling about the grounds from sunrise, and pounced upon me before the last stroke of the clock had sounded."

While thus the baronet was engaged in muttering his discontent, and venting secret imprecations on the whole race of attorneys, a vehicle rolled up to the hall-door. The bell pealed, and the knocker thundered, and in a moment a servant entered, and announced Mr. Craven--a square-built man of low stature, wearing his own long, grizzled hair instead of a wig--having a florid complexion, hooked nose, beetle brows, and long-cut, Jewish, black eyes, set close under the bridge of his nose--who stepped with a velvet tread into the room. An unvarying smile sate upon his thin lips, and about his whole air and manner there was a certain indescribable sanctimoniousness, which was rather enhanced by the puritanical plainness of his attire.

"Sir Richard, I beg pardon--rather late, I fear," said he, in a dulcet, insinuating tone--"hard work, nevertheless, I do a.s.sure you--ninety-seven skins--splendidly engrossed--quite a treat--five of my young men up all night--I have got one of them outside to witness it along with me. Some reading in the thing, I promise you; but I hope--I _do_ hope, I am not very late?"

"Not at all--not at all, my dear Mr. Craven," said Sir Richard, with his most engaging smile; for, as we have hinted, "dear Mr. Craven" had not made the science of conveyancing peculiarly cheap in practice to the baronet, who accordingly owed him more costs than it would have been quite convenient to pay upon a short notice--"I'll just, with your a.s.sistance, glance through these parchments, though to do so be but a matter of form. Pray take a chair beside me--there. Now then to business."

Accordingly to business they went. Practice, they say, makes perfect, and the baronet had had, unfortunately for himself, a great deal of it in such matters during the course of his life. He knew how to read a deed as well as the most experienced counsel at the Irish bar, and was able consequently to detect with wonderfully little rummaging and fumbling in the ninety-seven skins of closely written verbiage, the seven lines of sense which they enveloped. Little more than half-an-hour had therefore satisfied Sir Richard that the ma.s.s of parchment before him, after reciting with very considerable accuracy the deeds and process by which the lands of Glenvarlogh were settled upon his daughter, went on to state that for and in consideration of the sum of five shillings, good and lawful money, she, being past the age of twenty-one, in every possible phrase and by every word which tautology could acc.u.mulate, handed over the said lands, absolutely to her father, Sir Richard Ashwoode, Bart., of Morley Court, in the county of Dublin, to have, and to hold, and to make ducks and drakes of, to the end of time, constantly affirming at the end of every sentence that she was led to do all this for and in consideration of the sum of five shillings, good and lawful money. As soon as Sir Richard had seen all this, which was, as we have said, in little more than half-an-hour, he pulled the bell, and courteously informing Mr. Craven, the immortal author of the interesting doc.u.ment which he had just perused, that he would find chocolate and other refreshments in the library, and intimating that he would perhaps disturb him in about ten minutes, he consigned that gentleman to the guidance of the servant, whom he also directed to summon Miss Ashwoode to his presence.

"Her signing this deed," thought he, as he awaited her arrival, "will make her absolutely dependent upon me--it will make rebellion, resistance, murmuring, impossible; she then _must_ do as I would have her, or--Ah? my dear child," exclaimed the baronet, as his daughter entered the room, addressing her in the sweetest imaginable voice, and instantaneously dismissing the sinister menace which had sat upon his countenance, and clothing it instead as suddenly with an absolute radiance of affection, "come here and kiss me and sit down by my side--are you well to-day? you look pale--you smile--well, well! it cannot be anything _very_ bad. You shall run out just now with Emily.

But first, I must talk with you for a little, and, strange enough, on business too." The old gentleman paused for an instant to arrange the order of his address, and then continued. "Mary, I will tell you frankly more of my affairs than I have told to almost any person breathing. In my early days, and indeed _after_ my marriage, I was far, _far_ too careless in money matters. I involved myself considerably, and owing to various circ.u.mstances, tiresome now to dwell upon, I have never been able to extricate myself from these difficulties. Henry too, your brother, is fearfully prodigal--fearfully; and has within the last three or four years enormously aggravated my embarra.s.sments, and of course multiplied my anxieties most grievously, most distractingly. I feel that my spirits are gone, my health declining, and, worse than all, my temper, yes--my _temper_ soured. You do not know, you cannot know, how bitterly I feel, with what intense pain, and sorrow, and contrition, and--and _remorse_, I reflect upon those bursts of ill-temper, of acrimony, of pa.s.sion, to which, spite of every resistance, I am becoming every day more and more p.r.o.ne." Here the baronet paused to call up a look of compunctious anguish, an effort in which he was considerably a.s.sisted by an acute twinge in his great toe.

"Yes," he continued, when the pain had subsided, "I am now growing old, I am breaking very fast, sinking, I feel it--I cannot be very long a trouble to anybody--embarra.s.sments are closing around me on all sides--I have not the means of extricating myself--despondency, despair have come upon me, and with them loss of spirits, loss of health, of strength, of everything which makes life a blessing; and, all these privations rendered more horrible, more agonizing, by the reflection that my ill-humour, my peevish temper, are continually taxing the patience, wounding the feelings, perhaps alienating the affections of those who are nearest and dearest to me."

Here the baronet became _very_ much affected; but, lest his agitation should be seen, he turned his head away, while he grasped his daughter's hand convulsively: the poor girl covered his with kisses. He had wrung her very heart.

"There is one course," continued he, "by adopting which I might extricate myself from all my difficulties"--here he raised his eyes with a haggard expression, and glared wildly along the cornice--"but I confess I have great hesitation in leaving _you_."

He wrung her hand very hard, and groaned slightly.

"Father, dear father," said she, "do not speak thus--do not--you frighten me."

"I was wrong, my dear child, to tell you of struggles of which none but myself ought to have known anything," said the baronet, gloomily. "One person indeed has the power to a.s.sist, I may say, to _save_ me."

"And who is that person, father?" asked the girl.

"Yourself," replied Sir Richard, emphatically.

"How?--I!" said she, turning very pale, for a dreadful suspicion crossed her mind--"how can _I_ help you, father?"

The old gentleman explained briefly; and the girl, relieved of her worst fears, started joyously from her seat, clapped her hands together with gladness, and, throwing her arms about her father's neck, exclaimed,--

"And is that all?--oh, father; why did you defer telling me so long?

you ought to have known how delighted I would have been to do anything for you; indeed you ought; tell them to get the papers ready immediately."

"They _are_ ready, my dear," said Sir Richard, recovering his self-possession wonderfully, and ringing the bell with a good deal of hurry--for he fully acknowledged the wisdom of the old proverb, which inculcates the expediency of striking while the iron's hot--"your brother had them prepared yesterday, I believe. Inform Mr. Craven," he continued, addressing the servant, "that I would be very glad to see him now, and say he may as well bring in the young gentleman who has accompanied him."

Mr. Craven accordingly appeared, and the "young gentleman," who had but one eye, and a very seedy coat, entered along with him. The latter personage bustled about a good deal, slapped the deeds very emphatically down on the table, and rumpled the parchments sonorously, looked about for pen and ink, set a chair before the doc.u.ment, and then held one side of the parchment, while Mr. Craven screwed his knuckles down upon the other, and the parties forthwith signed; whereupon Mr.

Craven and the one-eyed young gentleman both sat down, and began to sign away with a great deal of scratching and flourishing on the places allotted for witnesses; after all which, Mr. Craven, raising himself with a smile, told Miss Ashwoode, facetiously, that the Chancellor could not have done so much for the deed as she had done; and the one-eyed young gentleman held his nose contemplatively between his finger and thumb, and reviewed the signatures with his solitary optic.

Miss Ashwoode then withdrew, and Mr. Craven and the "young gentleman"

made their bows. Sir Richard beckoned to Mr. Craven, and he glided back and closed the door, having commanded the "young gentleman" to see if the coach was ready.

"You see, Mr. Craven," said Sir Richard, who, spite of all his philosophy, felt a little ashamed even that the attorney should have seen the transaction which had just been completed--"you see, sir, I may as well tell you candidly: my daughter, who has just signed this deed, is about immediately to be married to Lord Aspenly; _he_ kindly offered to lend me some fifteen thousand pounds, or thereabouts, and I converted this offer (which I, of course, accepted), into the a.s.signment, from his bride, that is to be, of this little property, giving, of course, to his lordship my personal security for the debt which I consider as owed to him: this arrangement his lordship preferred as the most convenient possible. I thought it right, in strict confidence, of course, to explain the real state of the case to you, as at first sight the thing looks selfish, and I do not wish to stand worse in my friends' books than I actually deserve to do." This was spoken with Sir Richard's most engaging smile, and Mr. Craven smiled in return, most artlessly--at the same time he mentally e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, "d----d sly!" "You'll bring this security, my dear Mr.

Craven," continued the baronet, "into the market with all dispatch--do you think you can manage twenty thousand upon it?"

"I fear not more than fourteen, or perhaps, sixteen, with an effort. I do not think Glenvarlogh would carry much more--I fear not; but rely upon me, Sir Richard; I'll do everything that can be done--at all events, I'll lose no time about it, depend upon it--I may as well take this deed along with me--I have the rest; and t.i.tle is very--_very_ satisfactory--good-morning, Sir Richard," and the man of parchments withdrew, leaving Sir Richard in a more benevolent mood than he had experienced for many a long day.

The attorney had not been many seconds gone, when a second vehicle thundered up to the door, and a perfect storm of knocking and ringing announced the arrival of Lord Aspenly himself.

CHAPTER XIV.

ABOUT A CERTAIN GARDEN AND A DAMSEL--AND ALSO CONCERNING A LETTER AND A RED LEATHERN BOX.

Several days pa.s.sed smoothly away--Lord Aspenly was a perfect paragon of politeness; but although his manner invariably a.s.sumed a peculiar tenderness whenever he approached Miss Ashwoode, yet that young lady remained in happy ignorance of his real intentions. She saw before her a grotesque old fop, who might without any extraordinary parental precocity have very easily been her grandfather, and in his airs and graces, his rappee and his rouge (for his lordship condescended to borrow a few attractions from art), and in the thousand-and-one _et ceteras_ of foppery which were acc.u.mulated, with great exact.i.tude and precision, on and about his little person, she beheld nothing more than so many indications of obstinate and inveterate celibacy, and, of course, interpreted the exquisite attentions which were meant to enchain her young heart, merely as so much of that formal target practice in love's archery, in which gallant single gentlemen of seventy, or thereabout, will sometimes indulge themselves. Emily Copland, however, at a glance, saw and understood the nature of Lord Aspenly's attentions, and she saw just as clearly the intended parts and the real position of the other actors in this somewhat ill-a.s.sorted drama, and thereupon she took counsel with herself, like a wise damsel, and arrived at the conclusion, that with some little management she might, very possibly, play her own cards to advantage among them.

We must here, however, glance for a few minutes at some of the subordinate agents in our narrative, whose interposition, nevertheless, deeply, as well as permanently, affected the destinies of more important personages.

It was the habit of the beautiful Mistress Betsy Carey, every morning, weather permitting, to enjoy a ramble in the grounds of Morley Court; and as chance (of course it was chance) would have it, this early ramble invariably led her through several quiet fields, and over a stile, into a prettily-situated, but neglected flower-garden, which was now, however, undergoing a thorough reform, according to the Dutch taste, under the presiding inspiration of Tobias Potts. Now Tobias Potts was a widower, having been in the course of his life twice disenc.u.mbered. The last Mrs. Potts had disappeared some five winters since, and Tobias was now well stricken in years; he possessed the eyes of an owl, and the complexion of a turkey-c.o.c.k, and was, moreover, extremely hard of hearing, and, withal, a man of few words; he was, however, hale, upright, and burly--perfectly sound in wind and limb, and free from vice and children--had a snug domicile, consisting of two rooms and a loft, enjoyed a comfortable salary, and had, it was confidently rumoured, put by a good round sum of money somewhere or other. It therefore struck Mrs. Carey very forcibly, that to be Mrs.

Potts was a position worth attaining; and accordingly, without incurring any suspicion--for the young women generally regarded Potts with awe, and the young men with contempt--she began, according to the expressive phrase in such case made and provided, to set her cap at Tobias.

In this, his usual haunt, she discovered the object of her search, busily employed in superintending the construction of a terrace walk, and issuing his orders with the brevity, decision, and clearness of a consummate gardener.

"Good-morning, Mr. Potts," said the charming Betsy. Mr. Potts did not hear. "Good-morning, Mr. Potts," repeated the damsel, raising her voice to a scream.

Tobias touched his hat with a gruff acknowledgment.

"Well, but how beautiful you are doing it," shouted the handmaid again, gazing rapturously upon the red earthen rampart, in which none but the eye of an artist could have detected the rudiments of a terrace, "it's wonderful neat, all must allow, and indeed it puzzles my head to think how you can think of it all; it _is_ now, _raly_ elegant, so it is."

Tobias did not reply, and the maiden continued, with a sentimental air, and still hallooing at the top of her voice--

"Well, of all the trades that is--and big and little, there's a plenty of them--there's none I'd choose, if I was a man, before the trade of a gardener."

"No, you would not, _I'm_ sure," was the laconic reply.

"Oh, but I declare and purtest _I would_ though," bawled the young woman; "for gardeners, old or young, is always so good-humoured, and pleasant, and fresh-like. Oh, dear, but I would like to be a gardener."

"Not an _old_ one, howsomever," growled Mr. Potts.

"Yes, but I would though, I declare and purtest to goodness gracious,"

persisted the nymph; "I'd rather of the two perfer to be an _old_ gardener" (this was a bold stroke of oratory; but Potts did not hear it); "I'd rather be an _old_ gardener," she screamed a second time; "I'd rather be an _old_ gardener of the two, so I would."

"That's more than _I_ would," replied Potts, very abruptly, and with an air of uncommon asperity, for he silently cherished a lingering belief in his own juvenility, and not the less obstinately that it was fast becoming desperate--a peculiarity of which, unfortunately, until that moment the damsel had never been apprised. This, therefore, was a turn which a good deal disconcerted the young woman, especially as she thought she detected a satirical leer upon the countenance of a young man in crazy inexpressibles, who was trundling a wheelbarrow in the immediate vicinity; she accordingly exclaimed not loud enough for Tobias, but quite loud enough for the young man in the infirm breeches to hear,--

"What an old fool. I purtest it's meat and drink to me to tease him--so it is;" and with a forced giggle she tripped lightly away to retrace her steps towards the house.

As she approached the stile we have mentioned, she thought she distinguished what appeared to be the inarticulate murmurings of some subterranean voice almost beneath her feet. A good deal startled at so prodigious a phenomenon, she stopped short, and immediately heard the following brief apostrophe delivered in a rich brogue:--

"Aiqually beautiful and engaging--vartuous Betsy Carey--listen to the voice of tindher emotion."

The party addressed looked with some alarm in all directions for any visible intimation of the speaker's presence, but in vain. At length, from among an unusually thick and luxuriant tuft of docks and other weeds, which grew at the edge of a ditch close by, she beheld something red emerging, which in a few moments she clearly perceived to be the cla.s.sical countenance of Larry Toole.

"The Lord _purtect_ us all, Mr. Toole. Why in the world do you frighten people this way?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the nymph, rather shrilly.