Part 65 (2/2)
”Sir Paul Mabworth?”
”Ay, the same old bore as ever! He has got off one of Burke's speeches on the India Bill by heart, and says that he spoke it on the question of the grant for Maynooth. Oh, if poor Burke could only look up!”
”Look down! you ought to say, Scaresby; depend upon't, he 's not on the Opposition benches still!”
”I hate the fellow,” said Scaresby, whose ill-temper was always augmented by any attempted smartness of those he conversed with. ”He has taken Walmsley's cook away from him, and never gives any one a dinner.”
”That is shameful; a perfect dog in the manger!”
”Worse; he 's a dog without any manger! For he keeps his house on board-wages, and there's literally nothing to eat! That poor thing, Strejowsky.”
”Oh, Olga Strejowsky, do you mean? What of her?”
”Why, there's another husband just turned up. They thought he was killed in the Caucasus, but he was only pa.s.sing a few years in Siberia; and so he has come back, and claims all the emeralds. You remember, of course, that famous necklace, and the great drops! They belonged once to the Empress Catherine, but Mabworth says that he took the concern with all its dependencies; he 'll give up his bargain, but make no compromise.”
”She's growing old, I fancy.”
”She's younger than the Sabloukoff by five good years, and they tell me _she_ plays Beauty to this hour.”
Ah, Scaresby, had you known what words were these you have just uttered, or had you only seen the face of him who heard them, you had rather bitten your tongue off than suffered it to fas.h.i.+on them!
”Brignolles danced with her at that celebrated _fete_ given by the Prince of Orleans something like eight-and-thirty years ago.”
”And how is the dear Duke?” asked Upton, sharply.
”Just as you saw him at the Court of Louis XVIII.; he swaggers a little more as he gets more feeble about the legs, and he shows his teeth when he laughs, more decidedly since his last journey to Paris. Devilish clever fellows these modern dentists are! He wants to marry; I suppose you 've heard it.”
”Not a word of it. Who is the happy fair?”
”The Nina, as they call her now. She was one of the Delia Torres, who married, or didn't marry, Glencore. Don't you remember him? He was Colonel of the Eleventh, and a devil of a martinet he was.”
”I remember him,” said Upton, dryly.
”Well, he ran off with one of those girls, and some say they were married at Capri,--as if it signified what happened at Capri! She was a deuced good-looking girl at the time,--a coquette, you know,--and Glencore was one of those stiff English fellows that think every man is making up to his wife; he drank besides.”
”No, pardon me, there you are mistaken. I knew him intimately; Glencore was as temperate as myself.”
”I have it from Lowther, who used to take him home at night; _he_ said Glencore never went to bed sober! At all events, she hated him, and detested his miserly habits.”
”Another mistake, my dear Major. Glencore was never what is called a rich man, but he was always a generous one!”
”I suppose you'll not deny that he used to thrash her? Ay, and with a horsewhip too!”
”Come, come, Scaresby; this is really too coa.r.s.e for mere jesting.”
”Jest? By Jove! it was very bitter earnest. She told Brignolles all about it. I 'm not sure she didn't show him the marks.”
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