“I don't think we have any other. There's our crib,—that little cabin under the rocks yonder.”
“How pretty it is,—the snuggest spot I ever saw!”
“You're a good fellow to say so,” cried Tony; and his eyes swam in tears as he turned away.
What a change has come over Tony Butler within the last twenty-four hours! All his fears and terrors as to what Skeffy would think of their humble cottage and simple mode of life have given way, and there he goes about from place to place, showing to his friend how comfortable everything is, and how snug. “There are grander dining-rooms, no doubt, but did you ever see a warmer or a 'cosier'? And as to the drawing-room,—match the view from the window in all Europe; between that great bluff of Fairhead and the huge precipice yonder of the Causeway there is a sweep of coast unrivalled anywhere. Those great rocks are the Skerries; and there, where you see that one stone-pine tree,—there, under that cliff, is the cove where I keep my boat; not much of a boat,” added he, in a weaker voice, “because I used always to have the cutter,—Sir Arthur's yacht Round that point there is such a spot to bathe in; twenty feet water at the very edge, and a white gravel bottom, without a weed. Passing up that little pathway, you gain the ledge yonder; and there—do you mark the two stones, like gate-piers?—there you enter Sir Arthur Lyle's demesne. You can't see the shrubberies, for the ground dips, and the trees will only grow in the valleys here!” And there was a despondent tenderness in the last words that seemed to say, “If it were not for that, this would be paradise!”
Nor was it mere politeness, and the spirit of good breeding, that made Skeffy a genial listener to these praises. What between the sense of a holiday, the delight of what cockneys call an “outing,” the fine fresh breezy air of the place, the breadth and space,—great elements of expansiveness,—Skeffy felt a degree of enjoyment that amounted to ecstasy.
“I don't wonder that you like it all, Tony,” said he. “You 'll never, in all your wanderings, see anything finer.”
“I often say as much to myself,” replied Tony. “As I sit here of an evening, with my cigar, I often say, 'Why should I go over the world in search of fortune, when I have all that one wants here,—here at my very hand?' Don't you think a fellow might be content with it?”
“Content! I could be as happy as a king here!” and for a moment or two Skeffy really revelled in delighted thoughts of a region where the tinkle of a minister's hand-bell had never been heard, where no “service messengers” ever came, where no dunning tailors invaded; a paradise that knew not the post nor dreamed of the telegraph.
“And as to money,” continued Tony, “one does not want to be rich in such a place. I 'm as well off here with, we 'll say, two hundred a year—we have n't got so much, but I 'll say that—as I should be in London with a thousand.”