Part 5 (1/2)

'I shaved the day before yesterday,' said he, 'my dear, and that's not what I'm thinking of now; but anything to oblige you, and to have peace and quietness, my dear'--and presently I had a glimpse of him at the cracked gla.s.s over the chimney-piece, standing up shaving himself to please my lady. But she took no notice, but went on reading her book, and Mrs. Jane doing her hair behind.

'What is it you're reading there, my dear?--phoo, I've cut myself with this razor; the man's a cheat that sold it me, but I have not paid him for it yet. What is it you're reading there? Did you hear me asking you, my dear?'

'THE SORROWS OF WERTHER,' replies my lady, as well as I could hear.

'I think more of the sorrows of Sir Condy,' says my master, joking like.

'What news from Mount Juliet's Town?'

'No news,' says she, 'but the old story over again; my friends all reproaching me still for what I can't help now.'

'Is it for marrying me?' said my master, still shaving. 'What signifies, as you say, talking of that, when it can't be help'd now?'

With that she heaved a great sigh that I heard plain enough in the pa.s.sage.

'And did not you use me basely, Sir Condy,' says she, 'not to tell me you were ruined before I married you?'

'Tell you, my dear!' said he. 'Did you ever ask me one word about it.

And had not your friends enough of your own, that were telling you nothing else from morning to night, if you'd have listened to them slanders?'

'No slanders, nor are my friends slanderers; and I can't bear to hear them treated with disrespect as I do,' says my lady, and took out her pocket-handkerchief; 'they are the best of friends, and if I had taken their advice--But my father was wrong to lock me up, I own. That was the only unkind thing I can charge him with; for if he had not locked me up, I should never have had a serious thought of running away as I did.'

'Well, my dear,' said my master, 'don't cry and make yourself uneasy about it now, when it's all over, and you have the man of your own choice, in spite of 'em all.'

'I was too young, I know, to make a choice at the time you ran away with me, I'm sure,' says my lady, and another sigh, which made my master, half-shaved as he was, turn round upon her in surprise.

'Why, Bell,' says he, 'you can't deny what you know as well as I do, that it was at your own particular desire, and that twice under your own hand and seal expressed, that I should carry you off as I did to Scotland, and marry you there.'

'Well, say no more about it, Sir Condy,' said my lady, pettish-like; 'I was a child then, you know.'

'And as far as I know, you're little better now, my dear Bella, to be talking in this manner to your husband's face; but I won't take it ill of you, for I know it's something in that letter you put into your pocket just now that has set you against me all on a sudden, and imposed upon your understanding.'

'It's not so very easy as you think it, Sir Condy, to impose upon my understanding,' said my lady.

'My dear,' says he, 'I have, and with reason, the best opinion of your understanding of any man now breathing; and you know I have never set my own in compet.i.tion with it till now, my dear Bella,' says he, taking her hand from her book as kind as could be--'till now, when I have the great advantage of being quite cool, and you not; so don't believe one word your friends say against your own Sir Condy, and lend me the letter out of your pocket, till I see what it is they can have to say.'

'Take it then,' says she; 'and as you are quite cool, I hope it is a proper time to request you'll allow me to comply with the wishes of all my own friends, and return to live with my father and family, during the remainder of my wretched existence, at Mount Juliet's Town.'

At this my poor master fell back a few paces, like one that had been shot.

'You're not serious, Bella,' says he; 'and could you find it in your heart to leave me this way in the very middle of my distresses, all alone' But recollecting himself after his first surprise, and a moment's time for reflection, he said, with a great deal of consideration for my lady, 'Well, Bella, my dear, I believe you are right; for what could you do at Castle Rackrent, and an execution against the goods coming down, and the furniture to be canted, and an auction in the house all next week? So you have my full consent to go, since that is your desire; only you must not think of my accompanying you, which I could not in honour do upon the terms I always have been, since our marriage, with your friends. Besides, I have business to transact at home; so in the meantime, if we are to have any breakfast this morning, let us go down and have it for the last time in peace and comfort, Bella.'

Then as I heard my master coming to the pa.s.sage door, I finished fastening up my slate against the broken pane; and when he came out I wiped down the window-seat with my wig, I and bade him a 'good-morrow'

as kindly as I could, seeing he was in trouble, though he strove and thought to hide it from me.

[Wigs were formerly used instead of brooms in Ireland for sweeping or dusting tables, stairs, etc. The Editor doubted the fact till he saw a labourer of the old school sweep down a flight of stairs with his wig; he afterwards put it on his head again with the utmost composure, and said, 'Oh, please your honour, it's never a bit the worse.

It must be acknowledged that these men are not in any danger of catching cold by taking off their wigs occasionally, because they usually have fine crops of hair growing under their wigs. The wigs are often yellow, and the hair which appears from beneath them black; the wigs are usually too small, and are raised up by the hair beneath, or by the ears of the wearers.]

'This window is all racked and tattered,' says I, 'and it's what I'm striving to mend.'