YORKE REPORTS PROGRESS.
I trust it will not be imagined, and far less hoped for, by any reader
of this sober narrative, that the phrase which concluded the last
chapter implies that he or she is about to be introduced to bad company.
The fair sex will not be without their representatives in our story, and
that soon; but they will not be such as blushed unseen (if they blushed
at all) in the bowers at Crompton. Mr. Ryll's suggestion, "Let us join
the ladies," was only an elegant way he had, and which was well
understood by his audience, of proposing an adjournment to the
billiard-room. If that worthy old gentleman could be said to have had
any source of income whatever, it was the billiard-table; and hence it
was that he was always ready to proceed thither. Nor had he boasted
without reason, a while ago, of his powers of self-denial, for he would
often forego a glass of generous wine (when he felt that he had had
enough), in order to keep his hand steady for the game at pool, which
invariably took place at Crompton after dinner. His extreme obesity,
though it deprived him of some advantages in the way of "reach," was,
upon the whole, a benefit to him. His antagonists lost the sense of his
superiority of skill in their enjoyment of the ridiculous and
constrained postures in which he was compelled to place himself, and he
was well content to see them laugh and lose. None but a first-rate
player could have held his own among that company, whose intelligence
had been directed to this particular pursuit for most of their natural
lives; and even "Tub Ryll," as they called him, had to supplement his
dexterity by other means to make success secure. His liveliest sallies,
his bitterest jests, were all reserved for these occasions, so that
mirth or anger was forever unstringing the nerves of his competitors,
and diminishing their chance of gain. It was difficult to unstring the
nerves of Parson Whymper, who ran him very close in skill, and sometimes
divided the spoil with him; but on the present occasion he had a wordy
weapon to baffle even that foe. This consisted in constant allusion to
the latter's supposed reversionary interest in the living at Crompton,
the incumbent whereof was ancient and infirm, and which was in the
Squire's gift. This piece of preferment was the object of the chaplain's
dearest hopes, and the last subject he would have chosen to jest upon,
especially in the presence of its patron.
"Is he to have it, Squire, or is he not?" would be Tub Ryll's serious
inquiry, just as it was the parson's turn to play on him, or, "Who backs
the vicar elect?"--observations which seldom failed to cost that
expectant divine a sovereign, for the play at the Hall table, although
not so high as was going on in the Library with those who patronized
cards, was for considerable stakes. Carew, who enjoyed, above all
things, this embarrassing pleasantry, would return an ambiguous reply,
so that the problem remained without a solution. But when the disgusted
chaplain at last threw up his cue, in a most unusual fit of dudgeon, the
Squire put the question to the company, as a case of church preferment
of which he was unwilling to take the sole responsibility. "The sum," he
said, "which had been offered to him for the next presentation would
exactly defray the cost of his second pack of hounds, which his chaplain
himself had advised him to put down; so the point to be considered--"
"The hounds, the hounds!" broke in this impatient audience, amidst roars
of laughter. And nobody knew better than poor Parson Whymper that this
verdict would be more final than that of most other ecclesiastical
synods, and that he had lost his preferment. It was Carew's humor to
take jest for earnest (as it was to turn into ridicule what was
serious), and to pretend that his word was pledged to decisions to which
nobody else would have attached the slightest weight; it pleased him to
feel that his lightest word was law, or perhaps it was a part of the
savage adoration which he professed to pay to truth.
Byam Ryll felt a genuine regret that he had pushed matters so far,
though Whymper himself was to blame for having shown temper, and thereby
precipitated the catastrophe. But he did not play the less skillfully on
that account; and, moreover, had no rival to divide the pool with him.
"I would give five pounds if somebody would beat him," muttered the
discontented parson within Yorke's hearing, who was standing aloof with
his cigar watching the game.
"I think I _could_," said the young man, quietly, "if I _had_ five
pounds."
As the pool was two pounds, and the lives were one, this was exactly the
amount of pecuniary risk to be run, and which want of the necessary
funds had alone prevented the young man from incurring.
"Here is a fiver," replied the parson, softly.
"But I really have no money," remonstrated Yorke, though his fine face
lit up for a moment with delight (for he was a gambler to the core),
"nor any expectation of--"
"Yes, yes; you have expectations enough," answered the other, hurriedly.
"You may give me that living yet yourself--who knows? Take a ball,
man--take a ball."
So, when another game commenced, the young landscape-painter, who had
spent at least as much of his short life at those boards of green cloth
called "public tables" as in studying the verdant hues of nature, made
one of the combatants, and not a little astonished them by his
performance. He had the eye of a hawk, with the litheness of a young
panther; and his prudence during the late debauch had preserved his
steadiness of hand. Mr. Theodore Fane had the misfortune to be his
immediate predecessor, and was "potted" at long distances.
"By Jove!" exclaimed he, sulkily, upon losing his last life by a double,
"you must have lived by your wits, young gentleman, to have learned to
play pool like that."
"I have," returned Yorke, without moving a muscle, and preparing to
strike again. "You will come to do the same, if you play much at this
game--but your sad end will not be protracted. You will starve to death
with considerable rapidity."
"My dear Mr. Yorke," said Byam Ryll, approvingly, "you have won my
heart, though I can't afford to let you win my sovereigns; I like you,
but I must kill you off, I see."
"Unless--" said Yorke.
"Unless what?" inquired Ryll, as he made his stroke at Yorke's ball,
which was quite safe, and grazed it with his own, which, gliding off
another ball, found its way into a pocket. For once, he had really
allowed himself to be "put off" his aim.
"Unless you commit suicide," replied the young fellow, smiling. "I was
about to warn you of the danger of that kiss."
"You are worse than a highway robber, young Sir," said the annoyed old
gentleman.
"That's true," returned Yorke, "for I take your money and your 'life.'"
The young fellow repaid his loan that night, besides putting half a
dozen sovereigns into his own pocket; and there was other fruit from
that investment.
Carew was delighted with his son's skill, though his wit was somewhat
wasted on him. "Why the deuce did you not play in the first game?" said
he, when the party broke up to adjourn to the hazard-table. "I suppose
it was your confounded cunning" (and here his face grew dark, as though
with some recollection of the past); "you wanted to see how they played
before you pitted yourself against them--did you? How like, how like!"
"I had no money, Sir, until Parson Whymper lent me some."
"Oh, that was it--was it?" said the Squire. "Well, well, that was not
your fault, lad, nor shall it be mine--here, catch," and out of his
breeches-pocket he took a roll of crumpled notes and flung them at him;
then suddenly turned upon his heels, with what sounded like a muttered
execration at his own folly.
Yorke did not risk this unexpected treasure on the chances of the dice,
but retired to his own room. It was a dainty chamber, as we have said,
and offered in its appointments a curious contrast to his late
sleeping-room in the keeper's lodge. He opened the door of communication
to which the Squire had referred, and found himself in a sort of
boudoir, in which, as in his own room, a good fire was burning. By the
lover of art-furniture, this latter apartment would have been pronounced
a perfect gem. Here also every article was of ebony, and flashed back
the blaze from the red coals like dusky mirrors. Yorke lit the
candles--huge waxen ones, such as the pious soul in peril sees in his
mind's eye, and promises to his saint--and looked around him with
curiosity. Like the little Marchioness of Mr. Richard Swiveller, he had
never seen such things, "except in shops;" or rather, he had seen single
specimens of such exposed in windows of great furniture warehouses,
rather as a wonder and a show than with any hope to tempt a purchaser.
On one hand stood an ebony cabinet, elaborately carved with fruit and
flowers; it was divided into three parts, and their shut doors faced
with plate-glass gave it the appearance of a tripartite altar with its
sacred fire kindled. A casket almost as large glowed close beside it,
enriched with figures and landscapes, and with shining locks and hinges,
as he afterward discovered, of solid gold. A book-case of the same
precious wood was filled with volumes bound in scarlet--all French
novels, superbly if not very decorously illustrated. But the article
which astonished the new tenant of this chamber most was the ebony
escritoire that occupied its centre, with every thing set out for
ornament or use that is seen on a lady's writing-table. It was
impossible that such nick-nacks as he there beheld could be intended for
male use, and still less for such men as were the Squire's guests. Did
this chamber and its neighbor apartment usually own a female
proprietress? and if so, why was _he_ placed there? This idea by no
means alarmed the young landscape-painter, who had no more _mauvaise
honte_, nor dislike to adventures of gallantry, than Gil Blas de
Santillane. He sat down at the escritoire, and, taking up a gilt pen
with a ridiculous silk tassel, began a letter to the same person to whom
that day he had already dispatched a missive; but this time it was not
so brief: the day of brilliant dies and illuminated addresses had not as
yet set in, so he wrote at the top of the little scented sheet, in a
bold free hand, the word Crompton! and put a note of admiration after
it. Had you seen his face as he did so, you would have said it was a
note of triumph.
"My DEAR MOTHER,--_Veni, vidi, vici_--I have come, I have seen him, and
I am at all events tolerated. The perilous moment was when I told him
who I was. He said he was half disposed to set his bull-dog at me, but
he didn't; on the contrary, he at once bid me exchange my bachelor's
quarters for the two chambers I at present occupy, and which remind me
of the _Arabian Nights_. I have never seen any thing like them; the
furniture of both is of ebony; but the most curious part of the affair
is, that they are evidently designed for a lady. Imagine your Richard
sleeping under a coverlet of real Brussels lace! Every thing in the
house, however, is magnificent, or was so once, before it was damaged by
barbarous revel. Such orgies as I have witnessed to-night would seem
incredible, if I wrote them; the _Modern Midnight Entertainment_ of old
Hogarth will supply you with the _dramatis personae_; but the splendor
of the surroundings immensely heightened the effect of it all. Carew and
his friends might have sat for Alaric and his Goths carousing amidst the
wreck of the art treasures of Rome. Nothing that he has affords him any
satisfaction; though, if it is of great cost, Chaplain Whymper tells me
that he derives a momentary pleasure from its willful damage. This man
and one other are the only persons of intelligence about Carew; but even
they have no influence with him that can be depended on. If madness were
always hereditary indeed, I might consider myself doomed. You were right
there, I own; but you must needs allow that in undertaking this
adventure contrary to your advice I have effected something. The
chaplain is already speculating upon my future fortunes, and he knows
his patron better than any body; at all events, if I am turned out of
doors to-morrow (which I am aware is quite on the cards), I shall have
three hundred pounds in my pocket, which Carew, with a 'Catch that,'
threw me in notes, exactly as you throw a chicken-bone to _Dandy_ as he
sits on his hind-legs, though I did not 'beg' for them, I do assure you.
The immediate cause of my being invited hither was as follows [here the
writer described his exploit with the stags]. This, with our match at
fisticuffs by moonlight, had greatly inclined Carew to favor me; yet,
when the disclosure of my identity was made, I thought for a moment all
my pains were lost. He resented the intrusion exceedingly; but then he
had himself invited me to be his guest; and he holds his word as good as
his bond. Indeed, by what the chaplain tells me, it will soon be held
something better, for even his vast estate is crumbling away, acre by
acre, beneath the load of lavish expenditure it has to bear. There must
be much, however, at the worst, to be picked up among the _debris_ of
such a fortune."
"I am aware that it is in the last degree improbable that Carew will be
persuaded to make a will in _any body's_ favor at present. He imagines,
I think, that the whole world is made for his sole enjoyment--it almost
might be so, for all he sees to the contrary--and never dreams that he
will die. But it is also certain that he will die early; and more than
likely that he will come to grief, when he has lost his nerve, in one or
other of the mad exploits which he will be too proud to discontinue.
Then will your Richard become the most assiduous and painstaking of
nurses that ever humored crack-brained patient. But there! I have made a
dozen programmes of what is to happen, and this is but a specimen. Who
can tell? I may be heir of Crompton yet, or I may come back to you
to-morrow like a bad penny, and with what the vulgar describe as a flea
in my ear."
"It will not surprise you to learn that you are personally held in great
disfavor here, though the chaplain (who has heard all from the Squire's
lips) speaks of you with due respect. The last thing that is desired at
Crompton is, of course, the return of its lawful mistress. Carew himself
is very bitter against you, which is doubtless owing to the good offices
of grandmamma. The clock has just struck four, which bids me close this
letter, though of all the Squire's guests, to judge by the wrangling
that is going on in the Library below stairs, the first to retire will
be your affectionate son, RICHARD YORKE."
"P.S.--I forgot to say that Carew made the most pointed inquiries as to
whether I had any other profession than that of landscape-painting.
Would it not be strangely comical if he should bestir himself to get me
some Civil appointment! I almost fancied he must have been thinking of
doing so, from some scraps of talk I heard him let fall at dinner.
Curiously enough, by-the-by, who should have been sitting at his
right-hand, but Frederick Chandos, Jack's brother! 'Good Heaven!' (you
will say), 'suppose it had been Jack himself;' however, it was not."