“You've immortalised yourself,” said O'Grady, with a roar of laughter. “Your bill at twelve months for five hundred pounds is as good this moment as bank paper.”
“What is it?” said I, losing all patience. “Who is she?”
“Mrs. Paul Rooney, my boy, the gem of attorneys' wives, the glory of Stephen's-green, with a villa at Bray, a box at the theatre, champagne suppers every night in the week, dinners promiscuously, and lunch à discrétion: there's glory for you. You may laugh at a latitat, sneer at the King's Bench, and snap your fingers at any process-server from here to Kilmainham!”
“May the devil fly away with her!” said I, wiping my forehead with passion and excitement.
“The Heavens forbid!” said O'Grady, piously. “Our exchequer may be guilty of many an extravagance, but it could not permit such a flight as that. It is evident, Hinton, that you did not see the pretty girl beside her in the carriage.”
“Yes, yes, I saw her,” said I, biting my lip with impatience, “and she seemed evidently enjoying the infernal blunder I was committing. And Mrs. Paul—oh, confound her! I can never endure the sight of her again!”
“My dear young friend,” replied O'Grady, with an affected seriousness, “I see that already the prejudices of your very silly countrymen have worked their effect upon you. Had not Lord Dudley de Vere given you such a picture of the Rooney family, you would probably be much more lenient in your judgment: besides, after all, the error was yours, not hers. You told her that the Duke had sent you; you told her the Duchess wished her carriage beside her own.”
“You take a singular mode,” said I, pettishly, “to bring a man back to a good temper, by showing him that he has no one to blame for his misfortunes but himself. Confound them! look how they are all laughing about us. Indeed, from the little I've seen, it is the only thing they appear to do in this country.”
At a signal from the Duke, O'Grady put spurs to his horse and cantered down the line, leaving me to such reflections as I could form, beneath the gaze of some forty persons, who could not turn to look without laughing at me.
“This is pleasant,” thought I; “this is really a happy début: that I, whose unimpeachable accuracy of manner and address should have won for me, at the Prince's levee, the approbation of the first gentleman of Europe, should here, among these semi-civilised savages, become an object of ridicule and laughter. My father told me they were very different; and my mother———” I had not patience to think of the frightful effects my absurd situation might produce upon her nerves. “Lady Julia, too—ah! there's the rub—my beautiful cousin, who, in the slightest solecism of London manners, could find matter for sarcasm and raillery. What would she think of me now? And this it is they persuaded me to prefer to active service! What wound to a man's flesh could equal one to his feelings? I would rather be condoled with than scoffed at any day; and see! by Jove, they're laughing still. I would wager a fifty that I furnish the dinner conversation for every table in the capital this day.”