‘Well, sir, I thought so thin. An’’—she pauses, and looks straight at him—‘an’ ye’ll nivver regret it, sir. If ye saw her a bit afther she came, an’ her delight at yer purty place! “Why, there’s flowers growin’,” she’d say, as if she never see them before, except whin sellin’! “And, Mrs. Denis,” says she, “I like these walls,” says she. “They is so high,” says she. “An’ it would be very hard for anyone,” says she, “to git through thim, or even to look over thim.” Faith, ’tis little the crayture knows of the boys round here, I said to meself whin she said that. But I declare to ye, sir, it went to me heart whin she said it, for it made it plain to me like that there was someone in her life that she was thinkin’ of, that she didn’t want to get through these walls or over thim aither. If he did, I could gather from what she said that it would be wid no good intintions towards herself.’
‘Has she said anything as to where she came from or who she is?’ asks Wyndham, with most disgraceful want of sympathy for this moving story.
‘No, sir, sorra a word, barrin’ that she was very unhappy until yer honour sint her here.’
‘Till I sent her here! What on earth do you mean?’ says Wyndham indignantly. ‘You must know very well that it was that blundering idiot of a husband of yours that brought her here.’
‘Fegs, ’tis plain that ye know Denis, any way,’ says Denis’s wife complacently. ‘Idjit is the word for him, sure enough! But however it is, sir, the poor young lady is very continted here entirely, an’’—waxing enthusiastic—‘’twould do your heart good to hear her singin’ about the garden, for all the world like wan o’ thim nate little thrushes.’
This expectation on Mrs. Denis’s part, that he will find delight in the thought of the unwelcome stranger making herself at home in his garden and singing there like a ‘nate little thrush,’ naturally adds fuel to the fire that already is burning vigorously in Wyndham’s breast.
‘Look here,’ says he, so fiercely that Mrs. Denis starts backwards, ‘you’ve taken a wrong impression of me altogether, if you think I shall for one moment sanction the presence of that girl here. Your husband has got me into this mess with his confounded stupidity, but I can trust myself to get out of it—and I expect you to understand at once that your “thrush”’—scornfully—‘will be out of this within twenty-four hours.’
With this he brushes by her, his temper—never very sweet—now considerably the worse for wear.
Nice situation, by Jove! If it comes to the old man’s ears there will be the devil to pay; and it’s sure to. He had felt there was something queer in his aunt’s and Josephine’s manner yesterday when he called at their house in Fitzwilliam Square. Why, if it gets about, there isn’t one in forty amongst his acquaintances who will believe in the real facts of the case.... It is a most confounded affair altogether. If he hadn’t gone abroad, trusting—like the fool that he was—in Denis’s ability to get her out of the Cottage at once, he could have done it himself, and so speedily that no one would ever have been the wiser about it. But now it has gone a little too far; people, no doubt, are beginning to talk. Well, it shall go no farther. He will put an end to it at once—this moment.