Part 4 (1/2)
”Anything--with salad,” Mangan answered; he was examining a series of old engravings that hung around the walls.
”On a warm night like this what do you say to cold lamb, salad, and some hock and iced soda-water?”
”All right.”
Supper was speedily forthcoming, and, as they took their places, Mangan said,
”You don't often go down to see the old people, Linn?”
”I'm so frightfully busy!”
”Has Miss Francie ever been up to the theatre--to see 'The Squire's Daughter,' I mean?”--this question he seemed to put rather diffidently.
”No. I've asked her often enough; but she always laughs and puts it off.
She seems to be as busy down there as I am up here.”
”What does she think of the great name and fame you have made for yourself?”
”How should I know?”
Then there was silence for a second or two.
”I wish you'd run down to see them some Sunday, Linn; I'd go down with you.”
”Why not go down by yourself?--they'd be tremendously glad to see you.”
”I should be more welcome if I took you with me. You know your cousin likes you to pay a little attention to the old people. Come! Say Sunday week.”
”My dear fellow, Sunday is my busiest day. Sunday night is the only night I have out of the seven. And I fancy that it is for that very Sunday evening that Lord Rockminster has engaged the Lansdowne Gallery; he gives a little dinner-party, and his sisters have a big concert afterwards--we've all got to sing the chorus of the new marching-song Lady Sybil has composed for the army.”
”Who is Lady Sybil?”
”The sister of the auth.o.r.ess whose novel you were reading.”
”My gracious! is there another genius in the family?”
”There's a third,” said Lionel, with a bit of a smile. ”What would you say if Lady Rosamund Bourne were to paint a portrait of me as Harry Thornhill for the Royal Academy?”
”I should say the betting was fifty to one against its getting in.”
”Ah, you're unjust, Maurice; you don't know them. I dare say you judged that novel by some high literary standard that it doesn't pretend to reach. I am sure of this, that if it's half as clever as Lady Adela Cunyngham herself, it will do very well.”
”It will do very well for the kind of people who will read it,” said the other, indifferently.
This was a free-and-easy place; when they had finished supper, Lionel Moore lit a cigarette, and his friend a briar-root pipe, without moving from the table; and Mangan's prayer was still that his companion should fix Sunday week for a visit to the little Surrey village where they had been boys together, and where Lionel's father and mother (to say nothing of a certain Miss Francie Wright, whose name cropped up more than once in Mangan's talk) were still living. But during this entreaty Lionel's attention happened to be attracted to the gla.s.s door communicating with the hall; and instantly he said, in an undertone:
”Here's a stroke of luck, Maurice; Quirk has just come in. How am I to sound him? What should I do?”
”Haven't I told you?” said Mangan, curtly. ”Get your swell friends to feed him.”
Nevertheless, this short, fat man, who now strode into the room and nodded briefly to these two acquaintances, speedily showed that on occasion he knew how to feed himself. He called a waiter, and ordered an underdone beefsteak with Spanish onions, toasted cheese to follow, and a large bottle of stout to begin with; then he took the chair at the head of the table, thus placing himself next to Lionel Moore.