There were few in the street as they passed along; a stray creature or so, houseless and ragged, shuffled onward; an odd loiterer stood for shelter in an archway, or a chance passer-by, with ample coat and umbrella, seemed to defy the pelting storm, while cold and dripping they plodded along in silence.
“That's old Barrington's house, Bella,” said he, as they passed a large and dreary-looking mansion at the corner of the square; “many's the pleasant evening I spent in it.”
She muttered something, but inaudibly, and they went on as before.
“I wonder what 's going on here to-day. It was Sir Dyke Morris used to live here when I knew it” And he stopped at an open door, where a flood of light poured forth into the street “That's the Bishop of Derry, Bella, that's just gone in. There's a dinner-party there to-day,” whispered he, as, half reluctant to go, he still peered into the hall.
She drew him gently forward, and he seemed to have fallen into a revery, as he muttered at intervals,—
“Great times—fine times—plenty of money—and fellows that knew how to spend it!”
Drearily plashing onward through wind and rain, their frail clothes soaked through, they seldom interchanged a word.
“Lord Drogheda lived there, Bella,” said he, stopping short at the door of a splendidly illuminated hotel; “and I remember the time I was as free and welcome in it as in my own house. My head used to be full of the strange things that happened there once. Brown, and Barry Fox, and Tisdall, and the rest of us, were wild chaps! Faith, my darling, it was n't for Mr. Davenport Dunn I cared in those times, or the like of him. Davenport Dunn, indeed!”
“It is strange that he has not written to us,” said the girl, in a low voice.
“Not a bit strange; it's small trouble he takes about us. I'll bet a five-pound note—I mean, I'll lay sixpence,” said he, correcting himself with some confusion,—“that since he left this he never as much as bestowed a thought on us. When he got me that beggarly place in the Custom House, he thought he 'd done with me out and out. Sixty pounds a year! God be with the time I gave Peter Harris, the butler, just double the money!”