Part 92 (1/2)
”Nay, I don't know that he means to marry at all; I am only surmising; but if he did fall in love with a foreigner--”
”A foreigner! Ah, then Harry was--” The squire stopped short.
”Who might, perhaps,” observed Randal--not truly, if he referred to Madame di Negra--”who might, perhaps, speak very little English?”
”Lord ha' mercy!”
”And a Roman Catholic--”
”Wors.h.i.+pping idols, and roasting people who don't wors.h.i.+p them.”
”Signor Riccabocca is not so bad as that.”
”Rickeybockey! Well, if it was his daughter! But not speak Englis.h.!.+
and not go to the parish church! By George, if Frank thought of such a thing, I'd cut him off with a s.h.i.+lling. Don't talk to me, sir; I would.
I 'm a mild man, and an easy man; but when I say a thing, I say it, Mr.
Leslie. Oh, but it is a jest,--you are laughing at me. There 's no such painted good-for-nothing creature in Frank's eye, eh?”
”Indeed, sir, if ever I find there is, I will give you notice in time. At present, I was only trying to ascertain what you wished for a daughter-in-law. You said you had no prejudice.”
”No more I have,--not a bit of it.”
”You don't like a foreigner and a Catholic?”
”Who the devil would?”
”But if she had rank and t.i.tle?”
”Rank and t.i.tle! Bubble and squeak! No, not half so good as bubble and squeak. English beef and good cabbage. But foreign rank and t.i.tle!--foreign cabbage and beef!--foreign bubble and foreign squeak!”
And the squire made a wry face, and spat forth his disgust and indignation.
”You must have an Englishwoman?”
”Of course.”
”Money?”
”Don't care, provided she is a tidy, sensible, active la.s.s, with a good character for her dower.”
”Character--ah, that is indispensable?”
”I should think so, indeed. A Mrs. Hazeldean of Hazeldean--You frighten me. He's not going to run off with a divorced woman, or a--”
The squire stopped, and looked so red in the face that Randal feared he might be seized with apoplexy before Frank's crimes had made him alter his will.
Therefore he hastened to relieve Mr. Hazeldean's mind, and a.s.sured him that he had been only talking at random; that Frank was in the habit, indeed, of seeing foreign ladies occasionally, as all persons in the London world were; but that he was sure Frank would never marry without the full consent and approval of his parents. He ended by repeating his a.s.surance, that he would warn the squire if ever it became necessary.
Still, however, he left Mr. Hazeldean so disturbed and uneasy that that gentleman forgot all about the farm, and went moodily on in the opposite direction, reentering the park at its farther extremity. As soon as they approached the house, the squire hastened to shut himself with his wife in full parental consultation; and Randal, seated upon a bench on the terrace, revolved the mischief he had done, and its chances of success.
While thus seated, and thus thinking, a footstep approached cautiously, and a low voice said, in broken English, ”Sare, sare, let me speak vid you.”