“Supper, at last,” said the major, with a loud voice, to arouse us from our trance of happiness without taking any mean opportunity of looking unobserved. “Supper, Sparks, O’Malley; come now, it will be some time before we all meet this way again.”
“Perhaps not so long, after all,” said I, knowingly.
“Very likely not,” echoed Sparks, in the same key.
“I’ve proposed for Fanny,” said he, whispering in my ear.
“Matilda’s mine,” replied I, with the look of an emperor.
“A word with you, Major,” said Sparks, his eye flashing with enthusiasm, and his cheek scarlet. “One word,—I’ll not detain you.”
They withdrew into a corner for a few seconds, during which Mrs. Dalrymple amused herself by wondering what the secret could be, why Mr. Sparks couldn’t tell her, and Fanny meanwhile pretended to look for something at a side table, and never turned her head round.
“Then give me your hand,” said the major, as he shook Sparks’s with a warmth of whose sincerity there could be no question. “Bess, my love,” said he, addressing his wife. The remainder was lost in a whisper; but whatever it was, it evidently redounded to Sparks’s credit, for the next moment a repetition of the hand-shaking took place, and Sparks looked the happiest of men.
“A mon tour,” thought I, “now,” as I touched the major’s arm, and led him towards the window. What I said may be one day matter for Major Dalrymple’s memoirs, if he ever writes them; but for my part I have not the least idea. I only know that while I was yet speaking he called over Mrs. Dal, who, in a frenzy of joy, seized me in her arms and embraced me. After which, I kissed her, shook hands with the major, kissed Matilda’s hand, and laughed prodigiously, as though I had done something confoundedly droll,—a sentiment evidently participated in by Sparks, who laughed too, as did the others; and a merrier, happier party never sat down to supper.
“Make your company pleased with themselves,” says Mr. Walker, in his Original work upon dinner-giving, “and everything goes on well.” Now, Major Dalrymple, without having read the authority in question, probably because it was not written at the time, understood the principle fully as well as the police-magistrate, and certainly was a proficient in the practice of it.