‘I am not a rich man,’ said the major, with that strain it always cost him to speak of himself, ‘but I have got enough to live on. A goodish old house, and a small estate, underlet as it is, bringing me about two thousand a year, and some expectations, as they call them, from an old grand-aunt.’
‘You have enough, if you marry a prudent girl,’ muttered Kearney, who was never happier than when advocating moderation and discretion.
‘Enough, at least, not to look for money with a wife.’
‘I’m with you there, heart and soul,’ cried Kearney. ‘Of all the shabby inventions of our civilisation, I don’t know one as mean as that custom of giving a marriage-portion with a girl. Is it to induce a man to take her? Is it to pay for her board and lodging? Is it because marriage is a partnership, and she must bring her share into the “concern”? or is it to provide for the day when they are to part company, and each go his own road? Take it how you like, it’s bad and it’s shabby. If you’re rich enough to give your daughter twenty or thirty thousand pounds, wait for some little family festival—her birthday, or her husband’s birthday, or a Christmas gathering, or maybe a christening—and put the notes in her hand. Oh, major dear,’ cried he aloud, ‘if you knew how much of life you lose with lawyers, and what a deal of bad blood comes into the world by parchments, you’d see the wisdom of trusting more to human kindness and good feeling, and above all, to the honour of gentlemen—things that nowadays we always hope to secure by Act of Parliament.’
‘I go with a great deal of what you say.’
‘Why not with all of it? What do we gain by trying to overreach each other? What advantage in a system where it’s always the rogue that wins? If I was a king to-morrow, I’d rather fine a fellow for quoting Blackstone than for blasphemy, and I’d distribute all the law libraries in the kingdom as cheap fuel for the poor. We pray for peace and quietness, and we educate a special class of people to keep us always wrangling. Where’s the sense of that?’
While Kearney poured out these words in a flow of fervid conviction, they had arrived at a little open space in the wood, from which various alleys led off in different directions. Along one of these, two figures were slowly moving side by side, whom Lockwood quickly recognised as Walpole and Nina Kostalergi. Kearney did not see them, for his attention was suddenly called off by a shout from a distance, and his son Dick rode hastily up to the spot.
‘I have been in search of you all through the plantation,’ cried he. ‘I have brought back Holmes the lawyer from Tullamore, who wants to talk to you about this affair of Gorman’s. It’s going to be a bad business, I fear.’
‘Isn’t that more of what I was saying?’ said the old man, turning to the major. ‘There’s law for you!’
‘They’re making what they call a “National” event of it,’ continued Dick. ‘The Pike has opened a column of subscriptions to defray the cost of proceedings, and they’ve engaged Battersby with a hundred-guinea retainer already.’