“And do they say why, Kinshela?”
“Yes, sir; they say you won't take advice; and no matter what Mr. Withering counsels, or is settled in consultation, you go your own way and won't mind them; and that you have been heard to declare you 'll have all, or nothing.”
“They give me more credit than I deserve, Kinshela. It is, perhaps, what I ought to have said, for I have often thought it. But in return for all the kind interest my neighbors take about me, let them know that matters look better for us than they once did. Perhaps,” added he, with a laugh,—“perhaps I have overcome my obstinacy, or perhaps my opponents have yielded to it. At all events, Joe, I believe I see land at last, and it was a long 'lookout' and many a fog-bank I mistook for it.”
“And what makes you think now you'll win?” said the other, growing bolder by the confidence reposed in him.
Barrington half started at the presumption of the question; but he suddenly remembered how it was he himself who had invited the discussion, so he said calmly,—
“My hope is not without a foundation. I expect by the mail to-night a friend who may be able to tell me that I have won, or as good as won.”
Kinshela was dying to ask who the friend was, but even his curiosity had its prudential limits; so he merely took out his watch, and, looking at it, remarked that the mail would pass in about twenty minutes or so.
“By the way, I must n't forget to send a servant to wait on the roadside;” and he rang the bell and said, “Let Darby go up to the road and take Major Stapylton's luggage when he arrives.”
“Is that the Major Stapylton is going to be broke for the doings at Manchester, sir?” asked Kinshela.
“He is the same Major Stapylton that a rascally press is now libelling and calumniating,” said Barrington, hotly. “As to being broke, I don't believe that we have come yet to that pass in England that the discipline of our army is administered by every scribbler in a newspaper.”