Roland Cashel Volume I Part 45

"Certainly. Now, when shall we begin?"

"Have you not begun already?"

"I fancy not. Do you remember two evenings ago, when I came suddenly into the drawing-room and found you pencil in hand, and you, instead of at once showing me what you had been sketching, shut the portfolio, and carried it off, despite all my entreaties--nay, all my just demands?"

"Oh, but," said she, smiling, "confidence is one thing--confession is another."

"Too subtle distinctions for me," cried Cashel. "I foolishly supposed that there was to be an unreserved--"

"Speak lower, for mercy sake!--don't you perceive Lady Janet trying to hear everything you say?" This was said in a soft whisper, while she added aloud, "I think you said it was a Correggio, Mr. Cashel," as they stood before a very lightly-clad Magdalen, who seemed endeavoring to make up for the deficiency of her costume by draping across her bosom the voluptuous ma.s.ses of her golden hair.

"I think a Correggio," said Cashel, confused at the sudden artifice; "but who has the catalogue?--oh, Sir Andrew; tell us about number fifty-eight."

"Fefty-eight, fefty-eight?" mumbled Sir Andrew a number of times to himself, and then, having found the number, he approached the picture and surveyed it attentively.

"Well, sir, what is it called?" said Olivia.

"It's vara singular," said Sir Andrew, still gazing at the canvas, "but doubtless Correggio knew weel what he was aboot. This," said he, "is a picture of Sain John the Baaptist in a raiment of caamel's hair."

No sense of propriety was proof against this announcement; a laugh, loud and general, burst forth, during which Lady Janet, s.n.a.t.c.hing the book indignantly from his hands, cried,--

"You were looking at sixty-eight, Sir Andrew, not fifty-eight; and you have made yourself perfectly ridiculous."

"By my saul, I believe so," muttered the old gentleman, in deep anger.

"I 've been looking at 'saxty-eight' ower long already!"

Fortunately, this sarcasm was not heard by her against whom it was directed, and they who did hear it were fain to suppress their laughter as well as they were able. The party was now increased by the arrival of the Dean and his "ancient," Mr. Softly, to the manifest delight of Mrs.

Kennyf.e.c.k, who at once exclaimed,--

"Ah, we shall now hear something really instructive."

[Ill.u.s.tration: 288]

The erudite churchman, after a very abrupt notice of the company, started at speed without losing a moment.

His attention being caught by some curious tableaux of the interior of the great Pyramid, he immediately commenced an explanation of the various figures, the costumes and weapons, which he said were all masonic, showing that Pharaoh wore an ap.r.o.n exactly like the Duke of Suss.e.x, and that every emblem of the "arch" was to be found among the great of Ancient Egypt.

While thus employed, Mr. Howie, seated in a corner, was busily sketching the whole party for an ill.u.s.tration to his new book on Ireland, and once more Cashel and his companion found themselves, of course by the merest accident, standing opposite the same picture in a little boudoir off the large gallery. The subject was a scene from Faust, where Marguerite, leaning on her lover's arm, is walking in a garden by moonlight, and seeking by a mode of divination common in Germany to ascertain his truth, which is by plucking one by one the petals of a flower, saying alternately, "He loves me, he loves me not;" and then, by the result of the last-plucked leaf, deciding which fate is accomplished. Cashel first explained the meaning of the trial, and then taking a rose from one of the flower vases, he said,--

"Let me see if you can understand my teaching; you have only to say, 'Er liebt mich,' and, 'Er liebt mich nicht.'"

"But how can I?" said she, with a look of beaming innocence, "if there be none who--"

"No matter," said Cashel; "besides, is it not possible you could be loved, and yet never know it? Now for the ordeal."

"Er liebt mich nicht," said Olivia, with a low, silvery voice, as she plucked the first petal off, and threw it on the floor.

"You begin inauspiciously, and, I must say, unfairly, too," said Cashel.

"The first augury is in favor of love."

"Er liebt mich," said she, tremulously, and the leaf broke in her fingers. "Ha!" sighed she, "what does that imply? Is it, that he only loves by half his heart?"

"That cannot be," said Cashel; "it is rather that you treated his affection harshly."

"Should it not bear a little?--ought it to give way at once?"

"Nor will it," said he, more earnestly, "if you deal but fairly. Come, I will teach you a still more simple, and yet unerring test."

A heavy sigh from behind the Chinese screen made both the speakers start; and while Olivia, pale with terror, sank into a chair, Cashel hastened to see what had caused the alarm.

"Linton, upon my life!" exclaimed he, in a low whisper, as, on tiptoe, he returned to the place beside her.

"Oh, Mr. Cashel; oh dear, Mr. Cashel--"

"Dearest Olivia--"

"Heigho!" broke in Linton; and Roland and his companion slipped noiselessly from the room, and, unperceived, mixed with the general company, who sat in rapt attention while the Dean explained that painting was nothing more nor less than an optical delusion,--a theory which seemed to delight Mrs. Kennyf.e.c.k in the same proportion that it puzzled her. Fortunately, the announcement that luncheon was on the table cut short the dissertation, and the party descended, all more or less content to make material enjoyments succeed to intellectual ones.

"Well," whispered Miss Kennyf.e.c.k to her sister, as they descended the stairs, "did he?"

An almost inaudible "No" was the reply.

"Your eyes are very red for nothing, my dear," rejoined the elder.

"I dinna ken, sir," said Sir Andrew to Softly, as he made use of his arm for support,--"I dinna ken how ye understand your theory aboot optical delusions, but I maun say, it seems to me a vara strange way for men o'

your cloth to pa.s.s the mornin' starin' at naked weemen,--creatures, too, that if they ever leeved at all, must ha' led the maist abondoned lives.

I take it that Diana herself was ne better than a cuttie; do ye mark hoo she does no scruple to show a bra pair of legs--"

"With respect to the Heathen Mythology," broke in Softly, in a voice he hoped might subdue the discussion.

"Don't tell me aboot the hay thins, sir; flesh and bluid is a' the same, whatever Kirk it follows."

Before they were seated at table, Linton had joined them, explaining, in the most natural way in the world, that, having sat down to write in the boudoir, he had fallen fast asleep, and was only awakened by Mr. Phillis having accidentally discovered him. A look of quick intelligence pa.s.sed between Cashel and Olivia at this narrative; the young lady soon appeared to have recovered from her former embarra.s.sment, and the luncheon proceeded pleasantly to all parties. Mr. Howie enjoyed himself to the utmost, not only by the reflection that a hearty luncheon at two would save an hotel dinner at six, but that the Dean and Sir Andrew were two originals, worth five pound apiece even for "Punch." As to Cashel, a glance at the author's note-book would show how he impressed that gifted personage: "R. C.: a sn.o.b--rich--and gullible; his pictures, all the household G.o.ds at Christie's, the Vandyck, late a sign of the Marquis of Granby, at Windsor. Mem.: not over safe to quiz him." "But we 'll see later on." "Visit him at his country-seat, 'if poss.'"

"Who is our spectacled friend?" said Linton, as they drove away from the door.

"Some distinguished author, whose name I have forgotten."

"Shrewd looking fellow,--think I have seen him at Ascot. What brings him over here?"

"To write a book, I fancy."

"What a bore. This is the age of detectives, with a vengeance. Well, don't let him in again, that's all. By Jove! it's easier, now-a-days, to escape the Queen's Bench than the 'Ill.u.s.trated News.'"

"A note from Mr. Kennyf.e.c.k, sir," said Mr. Phillis, "and the man waits for an answer."

Linton, taking up a book, affected to read, but in reality placed himself so as to watch Cashel's features as he perused the letter, whose size and shape p.r.o.nounced to be something unusual. Hurriedly mumbling over a rather tedious exordium on the various views the writer had taken of a subject, Cashel's eyes suddenly flashed as he drew forth a small printed paragraph, cut from the column of a newspaper, and which went thus:--