Volume Ii Part 28 (1/2)
”I have been half over the town after you this morning, General,” said Withering, as he entered; ”and your son, too, could make nothing of your absence. He is in the carriage at the door now, not knowing whether he ought to come up.”
”I 'll soon rea.s.sure him on that score,” said Barrington, as he left the room, and hastened downstairs with the step of one that defied the march of time.
CHAPTER XVII. MEET COMPANIONs.h.i.+P
In a very modest chamber of a house in one of the streets which lead from the Strand to the Thames, two persons sat at supper. It is no time for lengthened introductions, and I must present Captain Duff Brown very hurriedly to my reader, as he confronted his friend Stapylton at table.
The Captain was a jovial-looking, full-whiskered, somewhat corpulent man, with a ready reply, a ready laugh, and a hand readier than either, whether the weapon wielded was a billiard-cue or a pistol.
The board before them was covered with oysters and oyster-sh.e.l.ls, porter in its pewter, a square-shaped decanter of gin, and a bundle of cigars.
The cloth was dirty, the knives unclean, and the candles ill-matched and of tallow; but the guests did not seem to have bestowed much attention to these demerits, but ate and drank like men who enjoyed their fare.
”The best country in Europe,--the best in the world,--I call England for a fellow who knows life,” cried the Captain. ”There is nothing you cannot do; nothing you cannot have in it.”
”With eight thousand a year, perhaps,” said Stapylton, sarcastically.
”No need of anything like it. Does any man want a better supper than we have had to-night? What better could he have? And the whole cost not over five, or at most six s.h.i.+llings for the pair of us.”
”You may talk till you are hoa.r.s.e, Duff, but I'll not stay in it When once I have settled these two or three matters I have told you of, I'll start for--I don't much care whither. I'll go to Persia, or perhaps to the Yankees.”
”_I_ always keep America for the finis.h.!.+” said the other. ”It is to the rest of the world what the copper h.e.l.l is to Crockford's,--the last refuge when one walks in broken boots and in low company. But tell me, what have you done to-day; where did you go after we parted?”
”I went to the Horse Guards, and saw Blanchard,--pompous old humbug that he is. I told him that I had made up my mind to sell out; that I intended to take service in a foreign army,--he hates foreigners,--and begged he would expedite my affairs with his Royal Highness, as my arrangements could not admit of delay.”
”And he told you that there was an official routine, out of which no officer need presume to expect his business could travel?”
”He told me no such thing. He flatly said, 'Your case is already before the Commander-in-Chief, Major Stapylton, and you may rely on it there will be no needless delay in dealing with it.”
”That was a threat, I take it.”
”Of course it was a threat; and I only said, 'It will be the first instance of the kind, then, in the department,' and left him.”
”Where to, after that?”
”I next went to Gregory's, the magistrate of police. I wanted to see the informations the black fellow swore to; and as I knew a son of Gregory's in the Carbiniers, I thought I could manage it; but bad luck would have it that the old fellow should have in his hands some unsettled bills with my indors.e.m.e.nts on them,--fact; Gregory and I used to do a little that way once,--and he almost got a fit when he heard my name.”
”Tried back after that, eh?”
”Went on to Renshaw's and won fifty pounds at hazard, took Blake's odds on Diadem, and booked myself for a berth in the Boulogne steamer, which leaves at two this morning.”
”You secured a pa.s.sport for me, did n't you?”
”No. You'll have to come as my servant. The Emba.s.sy fellows were all strangers to me, and said they would not give a separate pa.s.sport without seeing the bearer.”
”All right. I don't dislike the second cabin, nor the ladies'-maids.
What about the pistols?”
[Ill.u.s.tration: 508]