It was only as he lifted the latch that he remembered how deficient he was in all the information his mother would expect from him. Of the fortunes of the whist-table he actually knew nothing; and had he been interrogated as to the “toilette” of the party, his answers would have betrayed a lamentable degree of ignorance. Fortunately for him, his mother did not display her habitual anxiety on these interesting themes. She neither asked after the Captain's winnings,—he was the terror of the party,—nor whether Miss Busk astonished the company by another new gown. Poor Mrs. Nelligan was too brimful of another subject to admit of one particle of extraneous matter to occupy her. With a proud consciousness, however, of her own resources, she affected to have thoughts for other things, and asked Joe if he passed a pleasant day?
“Yes, very—middling—quite so—rather stupid, I thought,” replied he, in his usual half-connected manner, when unable to attach his mind to the question before him.
“Of, course, my dear, it's very unlike what you 're used to up in Dublin, though I believe that Captain Bodkin, when he goes there, always dines with the Lord-Lieutenant; and Miss Busk, I know, is second cousin to Ram of Swainestown, and there is nothing better than that in Ireland. I say this between ourselves, for your father can't bear me to talk of family or connections, though I am sure I was always brought up to think a great deal about good blood; and if my father was a Finnerty, my mother was a Moore of Crockbawn, and her family never looked at her for marrying my father.”
“Indeed!” said Joe, in a dreamy semi-consciousness.
“It's true what I 'm telling you. She often said it to me herself, and told me what a blessing it was, through all her troubles and trials in life; and she had her share of them, for my father was often in drink, and very cruel at times. 'It supports me,' she used to say, 'to remember who I am, and the stock I came from, and to know that there 's not one belonging to me would speak to me, nor look at the same side of the road with me, after what I done; and, Matty,' said she to me, 'if ever it happens to you to marry a man beneath you in life, always bear in mind that, no matter how he treats you, you 're better than him.' And, indeed, it's a great support and comfort to one's feelings, after all,” said she, with a deep sigh.
“I'm certain of it,” muttered Joe, who had not followed one word of the harangue.
“But mind that you never tell your father so. Indeed, I would n't let on to him what happened this evening.”
“What was that?” asked the young man, roused by the increased anxiety of her manner.
“It was a visit I had, my dear,” replied the old lady, with a simpering consciousness that she had something to reveal,—“it was a visit I had paid me, and by an elegant young lady, too.”
“A young lady? Not Miss Cassidy, mother. I think she left yesterday morning.”