Sir Jasper Carew Part 4

A sudden gesture to enforce caution followed these words; and at the same time MacNaghten's merry voice was heard, singing as he came along,--

"'Kneel down there, and say a prayer, Before my hounds shall eat you.'

'I have no prayer,' the Fox replied, 'For I was bred a Quaker.'

"All right, Miss Polly. Out of compliment to you, I suppose, Kitty Dwyer, that would never suffer a collar over her head for the last six weeks, has consented to be harnessed as gently as a lamb; and my own namesake, 'Dan the Smasher,' has been traced up, without as much as one strap broken. They 're a little pair I have been breaking in for Carew; for he's intolerably lazy, and expects to find his nags trained to perfection. Look at them, how they come along,--no bearing reins, no blinkers. That 's what I call a very neat turn-out."

The praise was, a.s.suredly, not unmerited, as two highbred black ponies swept past with a beautiful phaeton, and drew up at the door of the conservatory.

The restless eyes, the wide-spread nostrils and quivering flanks of the animals, not less than the noiseless caution of the grooms at their heads, showed that their education had not yet been completed; and so f.a.gan remarked at once.

"They look rakish,--there's no denying it!" said Mac-Naghten; "but they are gentleness itself. The only difficulty is to put the traps on them; once fairly on, there's nothing to apprehend. You are not afraid of them, Miss Polly?" said he, with a strong emphasis on the "you."

"When you tell me that I need not be, I have no fears," said she, calmly.

"I must be uncourteous enough to say that I do not concur in the sentiment," said f.a.gan; "and, with your leave, Mr. MacNaghten, we will walk."

"Walk! why, to see anything, you'll have twelve miles a-foot. It must n't be thought of, Miss Polly,--I cannot hear of it!" She bowed, as though in half a.s.sent; and he continued: "Thanks for the confidence; you shall see it is not misplaced. Now, f.a.gan--"

"I am decided, Mr. MacNaghten; I'll not venture; nor will I permit my daughter to risk her life."

"Neither would I, I should hope," said MacNaghten; and, although the words were uttered with something of irritation, there was that in the tone that made Polly blush deeply.

"It's too bad, by Jove!" muttered he, half aloud, "when a man has so few things that he really can do, to deny his skill in the one he knows best."

"I am quite ready, sir," said Polly, in that tone of determination which she was often accustomed to a.s.sume, and against which her father rarely or never disputed.

"There now, f.a.gan, get up into the rumble. I 'll not ask you to be the coachman. Come, come,--no more opposition; we shall make them impatient if we keep them standing much longer."

As he spoke, he offered his arm to Polly, who, with a smile,--the first she had deigned to give him,--accepted it, and then, hastily leading her forward, he handed her into the carriage. In an instant MacNaghten was beside her. With the instinct of hot-tempered cattle, they no sooner felt a hand upon the reins than they became eager to move forward, and, while one pawed the ground with impatience, the other, retiring to the very limit of the pole-strap, prepared for a desperate plunge.

"Up with you, f.a.gan; be quick--be quick!" cried Dan. "It won't do to hold them in. Let them go, lads, or they 'll smash everything!" and the words were hardly out, when, with a tremendous bound, that carried the front wheels off the road, away they went. "Meet us at the other gate,--they 'll show you the way," cried MacNaghten, as, standing up, he pointed with his whip in the direction he meant. He had no time for more; for all his attention was now needed to the horses, as, each exciting the other, they dashed madly on down the road.

"This comes of keeping them standing," muttered Dan; "and the scoundrels have curbed them up too tight. You're not afraid, Miss Polly? By Jove, that was a dash,--Kitty showed her heels over the splash-board. Look at that devil Dan,--see how he 's bearing on the pole-piece!--an old trick of his."

A tremendous cut on his flank now drove him almost furious, and the enraged animal set off at speed.

"We must let them blow themselves, Miss Polly. It all comes of their standing so long. You're not afraid?--Well, then, they may do their worst."

By this time the pace had become a tearing gallop, and seeing that nothing short of some miles would suffice to tame them down, MacNaghten turned their heads in the direction of a long avenue which led towards the sea.

It was all in vain that f.a.gan fastened through the flower-garden, and across a private shrubbery; when he reached the "gate," there was no sign of the phaeton. The cuckoo and the thrush were the only voices heard in the stillness; and, at intervals, the deep booming of the sea, miles distant, told how unbroken was the silence around. His mind was a conflict of fear and anger; terrible anxieties for his daughter were mixed up with pa.s.sion at this evidence of her wayward nature, and he walked along, reproaching himself bitterly for having accepted the civilities of MacNaghten.

f.a.gan's own schemes for a high alliance for his daughter had made him acquainted with many a counterplot of adventurers against himself.

He well knew what a prize Polly f.a.gan was deemed amongst the cla.s.s of broken-down and needy spendthrifts who came to him for aid. Often and often had he detected the first steps of such machinations, till at length he had become suspectful of everything and everybody. Now, MacNaghten was exactly the kind of man he most dreaded in this respect.

There was that recklessness about him that comes of broken fortune; he was the very type of a desperate adventurer, ready to seize any chance to restore himself to fortune and independence. Who could answer for such a man in such an emergency?

Driven almost mad with these terrors, he now hastened his steps, stopping at times to listen, and at times calling on his daughter in the wildest accents. Without knowing whither he went, he soon lost himself in the mazes of the wood, and wandered on for hours in a state bordering upon distraction. Suspicion had so mastered his reason that he had convinced himself the whole was a deliberate scheme,--that MacNaghten had planned all beforehand. In his disordered fancies, he did not scruple to accuse his daughter of complicity, and inveighed against her falsehood and treachery in the bitterest words.

And what was Dan MacNaghten doing all this time? Anything, everything, in short, but what he was accused of! In good truth, he had little time for love-making, had such a project even entered his head, so divided were his attentions between the care of the cattle and his task of describing the different scenes through which they pa.s.sed at speed,--the prospect being like one of those modern inventions called dissolving views,--no sooner presenting an object than superseding it by another.

In addition to all this, he had to reconcile Miss Polly to what seemed a desertion of her father; so that, what with his "cares of coachman, cicerone, and consoler," as he himself afterwards said, it was clean beyond him to slip in even a word on his own part. It is no part of my task to inquire how Polly enjoyed the excursion, or whether the dash of recklessness, so unlike every incident of her daily life, did not repay her for any discomfort of her father's absence: certain is it that when, after about six miles traversed in less than half an hour, they returned to the Castle, her first sense of apprehension was felt by not finding her father to meet her. No sooner had MacNaghten conducted her to the library than he set out himself in search of f.a.gan, having despatched messengers in all directions on the same errand. Dan, it must be owned, had far rather have remained to rea.s.sure Miss Polly, and convince her that her father's absence would be but momentary; but he felt that it was a point of duty with him to go--and go he did.

It chanced that, by dint of turning and winding, f.a.gan had at length approached the Castle again, so that MacNaghten came up with him within a few minutes after his search began. "Safe, and where?" were the only words the old man could utter as he grasped the other's arm. Dan, who attributed the agitation to but one cause, proceeded at once to rea.s.sure him on the score of his daughter's safety, detailing, at the same time, the circ.u.mstances which compelled him to turn off in a direction the opposite of that he intended. f.a.gan drank in every word with eagerness, his gray eyes piercingly fixed on the speaker all the while. Great as was his agitation throughout, it became excessive when MacNaghten chanced to allude to Polly personally, and to speak of the courage she displayed.

"She told you that she was not afraid?--she said so to yourself?" cried he, eagerly.

"Ay, a dozen times," replied Dan, freely. "It was impossible to have behaved better."

"You said so,--you praised her for it, I have no doubt," said the other, with a grim effort at a smile.

"To be sure I did, Tony. By Jove, you've reason to be proud of her.

I don't speak of her beauty,--that every one can see; but she's a n.o.ble-minded girl. She would grace any station in the land."

"She heard you say as much with pleasure, I 'm certain," said f.a.gan, with a smile that was more than half a sneer.

"Nay, faith, Tony, I did not go so far. I praised her courage. I told her that not every man could have behaved so bravely."

MacNaghten paused at this.

"And then--and then, sir," cried f.a.gan, impatiently.

Dan turned suddenly towards him, and, to his amazement, beheld a countenance tremulous with pa.s.sionate excitement.

"What then, sir? Tell me what then? I have a right to ask, and I will know it. I 'm her father, and I demand it."

"Why, what in Heaven's name is the matter?" exclaimed MacNaghten. "I have told you she is safe,--that she is yonder."

"I speak not of that, sir; and you know it," cried f.a.gan, imperiously.

"The dissimulation is unworthy of you. You ought to be a man of honor."

"Egad, good temper would be the best quality for me just now," said the other, with a smile; "for you seem bent on testing it."

"I see it all," cried f.a.gan, in a voice of anguish. "I see it all. Now hear me, Mr. MacNaghten. You are one who has seen much of the world, and will readily comprehend me. You are a man reputed to be kind-hearted, and you will not pain me by affecting a misunderstanding. Will you leave this to-morrow, and go abroad, say for a year or two? Give me your hand on it, and draw on me for one thousand pounds."

"Why, Tony, what has come over you? Is it the air of the place has disordered your excellent faculties? What can you mean?"

"This is no answer to my question, sir," said f.a.gan, rudely.

"I cannot believe you serious in putting it," said MacNaghten, half proudly. "Neither you nor any other man has the right to make such a proposal to me."

"I say that I have, sir. I repeat it. I am her father, and by one dash of my pen she is penniless to-morrow. Ay, by Heaven, it is what I will do if you drive me to it."

"At last I catch your meaning," said MacNaghten, "and I see where your suspicions have been pointing at. No, no; keep your money. It might be a capital bargain for me, Tony, if I had the conscience to close with it; and if you knew but all, you 've no right to offer so much temptation.

That path will bring you to the Castle. You 'll find Miss Polly in the library. Good-bye, f.a.gan."

And without waiting for a reply, MacNaghten turned abruptly away, and disappeared in the wood.

f.a.gan stood for a second or two deep in thought, and then bent his steps towards the Castle.