THE BARGAIN, AND THE NEW CONFEDERATES.
At length the evening came--darkness closed over the old place, and as
the appointed hour approached, Ashwoode became more and more excited.
"I must," thought he, "keep every faculty intensely on the stretch, to
detect, if possible, the nature of their schemes. Blarden and Chancey
have unquestionably hatched some other d----d plot, though what worse
can befall me? _I_ am netted as completely as their worst malice can
desire. It is now seven o'clock. Another hour will determine all my
doubts. Hark you, sirrah!" continued he, raising his voice, and
addressing a servant who had entered the chamber, "I expect a gentleman
upon particular business at eight o'clock. On his arrival conduct him
directly to this room."
He then relapsed into the same train of gloomy and agitated thought.
Chancey and his burly companion both sat snugly before the fire smoking
their pipes in silent enjoyment, while their miserable host paced the
room from wall to wall in mental torments indescribable.
At length the weary interval expired, and within a few minutes of the
appointed hour, Nicholas Blarden was admitted by the servant, and
ushered into the chamber in which Ashwoode expected his arrival.
"Well, Sir Henry," exclaimed Blarden, as he swaggered into the room,
"you seem a little flustered still--eh? Hope you found your company
pleasant. My friends' society is considered uncommon agreeable."
The visitor here threw himself into a chair, and continued--
"By the holy Saint Paul, as I rode up your cursed old dusky avenue, I
began to think the chances were ten to one you had brought your throat
and a razor acquainted before this. I have known men do it under your
circumstances--of course I mean _gentlemen_, with fine friends and
delicate habits, and who could not stand exposure and all that kind of
thing. I say, Mr. Grimes, my sweet fellow, you may leave the room, but
keep within call, do ye mind. Mr. Chancey and I want to have a little
confidential conversation with my friend, Sir Henry. Bundle out, and
the moment you hear me call your name, bolt in again like a shot."
Mr. Grimes, without answering, rose and lounged out of the room.
"Chancey, shut that door," continued Blarden. "Shut it tight, as tight
as a drum. There, to your seat again. _Now_ then, Sir Henry, we may as
well to business; but first of all, sit down. I have no objection to
your sitting. Don't be shy."
Sir Henry Ashwoode _did_ seat himself, and the three members of this
secret council drew their chairs around the table, each with very
different feelings.
"I take it for granted," said Blarden, planting his elbow upon the
table, and supporting his chin upon his hand, while he fixed his
baleful eyes upon the young man, "I take it for granted, and as a
matter of course, that you have been puzzling your brains all day to
come at the reason why I allow you to be sitting in this house, instead
of clapping your four bones under lock and key, in another place."
He paused here, as if to allow his exordium to impress itself upon the
memory of his auditory, and then resumed,--
"And I take it for granted, moreover, that you are not quite fool
enough to imagine that I care one blast if you were strung up by the
hangman, and carved by the doctors, to-morrow--eh?"
He paused again.
"Well, then, it's possible you think I have some end of my own to
serve, by letting the matter stand over this way. And so I _have_, by
----. You think right, if you never thought right before. I _have_ an
object in view, and it lies with you whether it's gained or lost. Do
you mind?"
"Go on--go on--go on," repeated Ashwoode, gloomily.
"What a devil of a hurry you're in," observed Blarden, with a scornful
chuckle. "But don't tear yourself; you'll have it all time enough. Now
I'm going to do great things for you--do you mind me? I'm going, in the
first place, to give you your life and your character--such as it is;
and, what's more, I'll not let you go to jail for debt neither. I'll
not let you be ruined; for Nickey Blarden was never the man to do
things by halves. Do you hear all I'm saying?"
"Yes, yes," said Ashwoode, faintly; "but the condition--come to
that--the condition."
"Well, I _will_ come to that. I will tell you the terms," rejoined
Blarden. "I suppose you need not be told that I am worth a good penny,
no matter how much. At any rate I'm _rich_--that much you _do_ know.
Well, perhaps you'll think it odd that I have not taken up a little to
live more quiet and orderly; in short, that I have not sown my wild
oats, and settled down, and all that, and become what they call an
ornament to society--eh? You, perhaps, wonder how it comes I have not
taken a rib--why I have not got married--eh? Well, I think myself it
_is_ a wonder, especially for such an admirer of the sex as I am, and I
think it's a pity besides, and so I've made up my mind to mend the
matter, do you see, and to take a wife without loss of time. She must
have family, for I want that, and she must have beauty, for I would not
marry the queen without it--family and beauty. I don't ask money; I
have more of my own than I well know what to do with. Family and beauty
is what I require. And I have settled the thing in my own mind, that
the very article I want, just the thing to a nicety, is your
sister--little, bright-eyed Mary--sporting Molly. I wish to marry her,
and her I'll _have_--and that's the long and the short of the whole
business."
"You--_you_ marry my sister," exclaimed Ashwoode, returning the
fellow's insolent gaze with a look of indescribable scorn and
astonishment.
"Yes--I--I myself--I, Nicholas Blarden, with more gold than a man could
count in three lives," shouted Blarden, returning his gaze with a scowl
of defiance--"_I_ condescend to marry the sister of a ruined, beggared
profligate--a common _forger_, who has one foot in the dock at this
minute. Down upon your marrow-bones, and thank me for my
condescension--down, I say."
Overwhelmed with indignation and disgust, Ashwoode could not answer.
All his self-command was required to resist his vehement internal
impulse to strike the fellow to the ground and trample upon him. This
strong emotion, however, had its spring in no generous source. No
thought or care for Mary's feelings or fate crossed his mind; but only
the sense of insulted pride, for even in the midst of all his misery
and abasement, his hereditary pride of birth survived: that this low,
this entirely blasted, this branded ruffian should dare to propose to
ally himself with the Ashwoodes of Morley Court--a family whose blood
was as pure as centuries of aristocratic transmission, and repeated
commixture with that of nobility, could make it--a family who stood, in
consideration and respect, one of the very highest of the country!
Could flesh and blood endure it?
"Make your mind up at once--I have no time to spare; and just remember
that the locality of your night's lodging depends upon your decision,"
said Blarden, coolly, looking at his watch. "If, unfortunately for
yourself, you should resolve against the connection, then you must have
the goodness to accompany us into town to-night, and the law takes its
course quietly with you, and your neck-bone must only reconcile itself
to an ugly bit of a twist. If otherwise, you're a made man. Run the
matter fairly over in your mind, and see which of us two should desire
the thing most. As for me, I tell you plainly, it's a bit of a
fancy--no more--and may pass off in a day or two, for I don't pretend
to be extraordinarily steady in love affairs, and always had rather a
roving eye; and if I _should_ happen to cool, by ----, you'll be in a
nice hobble. So I think you had best take the ball at the hop--do you
mind--and make no mouths at your good fortune."
Blarden paused, and looked at his huge chased-gold watch again, and
laid it on the table, as if to measure Ashwoode's deliberation by the
minute. Meanwhile the young baronet had ample time to recollect the
desperate pressure of his circumstances, which outraged pride had for a
moment half obliterated from his mind, and the process of remembrance
was in no small degree assisted by the heavy tread of the constable,
distinctly audible from the hall.
"Blarden," said Ashwoode, in a voice low and husky with agitation,
"she'll never consent--you can't expect it: she'll never marry you."
"I'm not talking of the girl's consent just now," replied Blarden: "I'm
asking only for _yours_ in the first place. Am I to understand that
you're agreed?"
"Yes," replied Ashwoode, sullenly; "what is there left to me, but to
agree?"
"Then leave me alone to gain _her_ consent," retorted Blarden, with a
brutal smile. "I have a bit of a winning way with me--a knack of my
own--for coming round a girl; and if she don't yield to that, why we
must only try another course. When love is wanting, _obedience_ is the
next best thing: although we can't charm her, she's no girl if we can't
frighten her--eh?"
Ashwoode was silent.
"Now mind, I require your active co-operation," continued Blarden;
"there's to be no shamming. I'm no greenhorn, and know a loaded die
from a fair one. It's not safe to try hocus pocus with me, and if I
don't get the girl, of course you're no brother of mine, and must not
expect me to forget the old score that's between us. Do you understand
me? Unless you bring this marriage about, you must only take the
consequences, and I promise you they'll be of the very ugliest possible
description."
"Agreed, agreed; talk no more of it just now," said Ashwoode,
vehemently--"we understand one another. Tomorrow we may talk of it
again; meanwhile torment me no more!"
"Well, I have said my say," rejoined Blarden, "and have nothing more to
do but to inform you, that I intend passing the night here, and, in
short, to make a visit of a week or so, for it's right the young lady
should have an opportunity of knowing my geography before she marries
me; and besides, I have heard a great account of old Sir Richard's
cellar. Chancey, do you tell my servant to bring my things up to the
room that Sir Henry will point out. Sir Henry, you'll see about my
room--have a bit of fire in it--see to it yourself, mind; for do you
mind, between ourselves, I think it's on the whole your better course
to be uncommonly civil to me. Stir yourselves, gentlemen. And, Chancey,
hand Grimes his fee, and let him be off. We'll try a jug of your
claret, Sir Henry, and a spatchcock, or some little thing of the kind,
and then to our virtuous beds--eh?"
After a carousal protracted to nearly three hours, during which Nickey
Blarden treated his two companions to sundry ballads, and other vocal
efforts somewhat more boisterous than elegant, and supplying frequent
allusion, and not of the most delicate kind, to his contemplated change
of condition, that interesting person proceeded somewhat unsteadily
upstairs to his bed-chamber. With a suspicion, which even his tipsiness
could not overcome, he jealously bolted the door upon the inside, and
laid his sword and pistols upon the table by his bed, remembering that
it was just possible that his entertainer might conceive an expeditious
project for relieving himself of all his troubles, or at least the
greater part of them. These pleasant precautions taken, Mr. Blarden
undressed himself with all celerity and threw himself into bed.
This gentleman's opinion of mankind was by no means exalted, nor at all
complimentary to human nature. Utter, hardened selfishness he believed
to be the master-passion of the human race, and any appeal which
addressed itself to that, he looked upon as irresistible. In applying
this rule to Sir Henry Ashwoode he happened, indeed, to be critically
correct, for the young baronet was in very nearly all points fashioned
precisely according to honest Nickey's standard of humanity. That
gentleman experienced, therefore, no misgivings as to his young
friend's preferring at all hazards to remain at Morley Court, rather
than quit the country, and enter upon a life of vagabond beggary.
"No, no," thought Blarden, "he'll not take leg bail, just because he
can gain nothing earthly by it now; the only thing I can see that could
serve him at all--that is, supposing him to be against the match--is to
cut my throat; however, I don't think he's wild enough to run that
risk, and if he does try it, by ----, he'll have the worst of the
game."
Thus, after a day of unclouded triumph, did Mr. Blarden compose himself
to light and happy slumbers.