Part 40 (2/2)

”That is really a subject on which there is more cause to rejoice than to weep. This imprisoning, or placing within limits, so near a relative of the crown, is an affair that must have unpleasant consequences, and which offends sadly against all propriety.”

”It is awful, my lord! If it be not sacrilege by the law, the greater the shame of the opposition in Parliament, who defeat so many other wholesome regulations, intended for the good of the subject.”

”Faith, I am not sure I may not be driven to join them myself, bad as they are, Carnaby; for this neglect of ministers, not to call it by a worse name, might goad a man to even a more heinous measure.'

”I am sure n.o.body could blame your lords.h.i.+p, were your lords.h.i.+p to join any body, or any thing but the French! I have often told Mrs. Carnaby as much as that, in our frequent conversations concerning the unpleasant situation in which your lords.h.i.+p is just now placed.”

”I had not thought the awkward transaction attracted so much notice,”

observed the other, evidently wincing under the allusion.

”It attracts it only in a proper and respectful way, my lord. Neither Mrs.

Carnaby, nor myself, ever indulges in any of these remarks, but in the most proper and truly English manner.”

”The reservation might palliate a greater error. That word proper is a prudent term, and expresses all one could wish. I had not thought you so intelligent and shrewd a man, Master Carnaby: clever in the way of business, I always knew you to be; but so apt in reason, and so matured in principle, is what I will confess I had not expected. Can you form no conjecture of the business of this man?”

”Not in the least, my lord. I pressed the impropriety of a personal interview; for, though he alluded to some business or other, I scarcely know what, with which he appeared to think your lords.h.i.+p had some connexion, I did not understand him, and we had like to have parted without an explanation.”

”I will not see the fellow.”

”Just as your lords.h.i.+p pleases--I am sure that, after so many little affairs have pa.s.sed through my hands, I might be safely trusted with this; and I said as much,--but as he positively refused to make me an agent, and he insisted that it was so much to your lords.h.i.+p's interests--why, I thought, my lord, that perhaps--just now----”

”Show him in.”

Carnaby bowed low and submissively, and after busying himself in placing the chairs aside, and adjusting the table more conveniently for the elbow of his guest, he left the room.

”Where is the man I bid you keep in the shop?” demanded the retailer, in a coa.r.s.e, authoritative voice, when without; addressing a meek and humble-looking lad, who did the duty of clerk. ”I warrant me, he is left in the kitchen, and you have been idling about on the walk! A more heedless and inattentive lad than yourself is not to be found in America, and the sun never rises but I repent having signed your indentures. You shall pay for this, you----”

The appearance of the person he sought, cut short the denunciations of the obsequious grocer and the domestic tyrant. He opened the door, and, having again closed it, left his two visiters together.

Though the degenerate descendant of the great Clarendon had not hesitated to lend his office to cloak the irregular and unlawful trade that was then so prevalent in the American seas, he had paid the sickly but customary deference to virtue, of refusing on all occasions, to treat personally with its agents. Sheltered behind his official and personal rank, he had soothed his feelings, by tacitly believing that cupidity is less venal when its avenues are hidden, and that in protecting his station from an immediate contact with its ministers, he had discharged an important, and, for one in his situation, an imperative, duty. Unequal to the exercise of virtue itself, he thought he had done enough in preserving some of its seemliness. Though far from paying even this slight homage to decency, in his more ordinary habits, his pride of rank had, on the subject of so coa.r.s.e a failing, induced him to maintain an appearance which his pride of character would not have suggested. Carnaby was much the most degraded and the lowest of those with whom he ever condescended to communicate directly; and even with him there might have been some scruple, had not his necessities caused him to stoop so far as to accept pecuniary a.s.sistance from one he both despised and detested.

When the door opened, therefore, the lord Cornbury rose, and, determined to bring the interview to a speedy issue, he turned to face the individual who entered, with a mien, into which he threw all the distance and hauteur that he thought necessary for such an object. But he encountered, in the mariner of the India-shawl, a very different man from the flattering and obsequious grocer who had just quitted him. Eye met eye; his gaze of authority receiving a look as steady, if not as curious, as his own. It was evident, by the composure of the fine manly frame he saw, that its owner rested his claims on the aristocracy of nature. The n.o.ble forgot his acting under the influence of surprise, and his voice expressed as much of admiration as command when he said--

”This, then, is the Skimmer of the Seas!”

”Men call me thus: if a life pa.s.sed on oceans gives a claim to the t.i.tle, it has been fairly earned.”

”Your character--I may say that some portions of your history, are not unknown to me. Poor Carnaby, who is a worthy and an industrious man, with a growing family dependent on his exertions, has entreated me to receive you, or there might be less apology for this step than I could wish. Men of a certain rank, Master Skimmer, owe so much to their station, that I rely on your discretion.”

”I have stood in n.o.bler presences, my lord, and found so little change by the honor, that I am not apt to boast of what I see. Some of princely rank have found their profit in my acquaintance.”

”I do not deny your usefulness, Sir; it is only the necessity of prudence, I would urge. There has been, I believe, some sort of implied contract between us--at least, so Carnaby explains the transaction, for I rarely enter into these details, myself--by which you may perhaps feel some right to include me in the list of your customers. Men in high places must respect the laws, and yet it is not always convenient, or even useful, that they should deny themselves every indulgence, which policy would prohibit to the ma.s.s. One who has seen as much of life as yourself, needs no explanations on this head; and I cannot doubt, but our present interview will have a satisfactory termination.”

The Skimmer scarce deemed it necessary to conceal the contempt that caused his lip to curl, while the other was endeavoring to mystify his cupidity; and when the speaker was done, he merely expressed an a.s.sent by a slight inclination of the head. The ex-governor saw that his attempt was fruitless, and, by relinquis.h.i.+ng his masquerade, and yielding more to his natural propensities and tastes, he succeeded better.

<script>