“Pardon me,” said Clarence, as a damsel in waiting opened the door, “but a very severe attack of rheumatism obliges me to keep on my hat: you will, I hope, indulge me in my rudeness.”
“To be sure, to be sure, sir. I myself suffer terribly from rheumatism in the winter; though you look young, sir, very young, to have an old man’s complaint. Ah, the people of my day were more careful of themselves, and that is the reason we are such stout fellows in our age.”
And the worthy steward looked complacently down at legs which very substantially filled their comely investments. “True, sir,” said Clarence, laying his hand upon that of the steward, who was just about to open the door of an apartment; “but suffer me at least to request you not to introduce me to any of the ladies of your family. I could not, were my very life at stake, think of affronting them by not doffing my hat. I have the keenest sense of what is due to the sex, and I must seriously entreat you, for the sake of my health during the whole of the coming winter, to suffer our conversation not to take place in their presence.”
“Sir, I honour your politeness,” said the prim little steward: “I, myself, like every true Briton, reverence the ladies; we will therefore retire to my study. Mary, girl,” turning to the attendant, “see that we have a nice chop for supper in half an hour; and tell your mistress that I have a gentleman of quality with me upon particular business, and must not be disturbed.”
With these injunctions, the steward led the way to the farther end of the house, and, having ushered his guest into a small parlour, adorned with sundry law-books, a great map of the estate, a print of the late owner of it, a rusty gun slung over the fireplace, two stuffed pheasants, and a little mahogany buffet,—having, we say, led Clarence to this sanctuary of retiring stewardship, he placed a seat for him and said,—“Between you and me, sir, be it respectfully said, I am not sorry that our little confabulation should pass alone. Ladies are very delightful, very delightful, certainly: but they won’t let one tell a story one’s own way; they are fidgety, you know, sir,—fidgety, nothing more; ‘t is a trifle, but it is unpleasant. Besides, my wife was Master Clinton’s foster-mother, and she can’t hear a word about him, without running on into a long rigmarole of what he did as a baby, and so forth. I like people to be chatty, sir, but not garrulous; I can’t bear garrulity, at least in a female. But, suppose, sir, we defer our story till after supper? A glass of wine or warm punch makes talk glide more easily; besides, sir, I want something to comfort me when I talk about Master Clinton. Poor gentleman, he was so comely, so handsome!”
“Did you think so?” said Clarence, turning towards the fire.
“Think so!” ejaculated the steward, almost angrily; and forthwith he launched out into an encomium on the perfections, personal, moral, and mental, of Master Clinton which lasted till the gentle Mary entered to lay the cloth. This reminded the old steward of the glass of wine which was so efficacious in making talk glide easily; and, going to the buffet before mentioned, he drew forth two bottles, both of port. Having carefully and warily decanted both, he changed the subject of his praise; and, assuring Clarence that the wine he was about to taste was at least as old as Master Clinton, having been purchased in joyous celebration of the young gentleman’s birthday, he whiled away the minutes with a glowing eulogy on its generous qualities, till Mary entered with the supper.
Clarence, with an appetite sharpened, despite his romance, by a long fast, did ample justice to the fare; and the old steward, warming into familiarity with the virtues of the far-famed port, chatted and laughed in a strain half simple and half shrewd.
The fire being stirred up to a free blaze, the hearth swept, and all the tokens of supper, save and except the kingly bottle and its subject glasses, being removed, the steward and his guest drew closer to each other, and the former began his story.