Pending these melodies, Jane, whom I now discovered to be a lady of a certain force of character and an inquiring turn of mind, “put me through my facings,” if I may use the expression, on a variety of subjects, concerning most of which it has since occurred to me I must have betrayed remarkable ignorance. When you have been out in the cold all day, then enjoyed a good dinner, and a good deal of it, washed down by copious libations of excellent wine, in a warm room, I believe, if you are blessed with a healthy constitution, drowsiness is the inevitable result. Then, suppose yourself placed in a very comfortable arm-chair, opposite a blazing fire, with the hum of quiet voices and the tones of a pianoforte falling soothingly on your ear, and you can exactly imagine my position.
I am aware of having confessed truthfully enough to my fair inquisitor, that I could neither play cricket, billiards, nor rackets; that I did not care a great deal for shooting: should be likely to upset if I ventured to drive four horses; and had never had a pair of skates on in my life. I feel sure, at the same time, that I sustained the contempt she could not but entertain for me with wonderful equanimity, and that I further sank my intellectual powers to a level with my physical incapacity, by an avowal of my inability to read a word of German. But Jane was not to be thus choked off: she was one of those energetic young ladies who, in their zeal to be doing, must needs have as many strings to their bow as Phœbus could count upon his lyre. She collected autographs, she discovered character from handwriting, she pestered all her friends for their old postage-stamps; though what she did with them, or what anybody does with them, even when the amount rises to a million, is to me a profound mystery. Amongst other inquisitorial objects, she possessed a wonderful book, in which the sufferer was requested to place on record his opinions on sundry matters to which in all probability he had never before given a thought;—such as his favourite authors in prose and verse, the characters he most admired in modern and ancient history, his pet preacher, and the names he should prefer to give his sons and daughters, if he had any: all topics on which it is obvious none but a man of profound forethought and reflection can be expected to have made up his mind. I have a distinct recollection of skipping all these questions till I came to the important one that required to know my favourite food, and falling asleep then and there in an abortive attempt to write the word “plum-pudding.”
Jem’s mellow voice, joining his sister’s in one of the Negro melodies, awoke me in a state of great penitence and confusion. I was pleased to observe, however, that I was not the only culprit, for old Plumtree, with his head sunk into his voluminous white waistcoat, was accompanying his children with a grand chorus of snores. But the vacant chair next my own inflicted a tacit reproach that spoke whole pages of sarcasm; and I felt it an inexpressible relief when, voting it too late for whist, hand-candles were rung for, and the ladies betook themselves to bed, followed, after a brief interval, by the three gentlemen.
The Jovial, of course, went to smoke. Nobody now-a-days seems able to go to bed without that narcotic; but I declined his invitation to accompany him, and laid my weary head as soon as I possibly could upon my pillow.
Determined to have nothing more to do with Crafty Kate, I had taken the precaution of telling my servant to order a chaise to be ready for me at an early hour the following morning; and when I discovered that it had been freezing hard in the night, and the ground was one sheet of ice, I felt I had no reason to repent of my precaution.
We assembled at breakfast at the early hour of nine; the Jovial coming down in a shooting suit of marvellous fabrication and device, avowing his intention of going out “to look for ducks,” a pastime in which I cannot but think I was wise to decline joining him. The squire was off to his farm the instant he had swallowed his breakfast, not, however, without giving me a pressing and hospitable invitation to remain with him another day. This I felt compelled to refuse. I longed to be back at my quiet lodging once more; and, like all men who have not room for a great many ideas at a time, felt that I had now got hold of one which took entire possession of me. This was neither more nor less than a morbid desire to see Miss Merlin.
I do not think either Rebecca or Jane regretted my departure. I am not a ladies’ man—I know it; nor can I bring myself greatly to regret that failure in my character. But they took leave of me with cordiality and politeness, Jane even offering to lend me a book, of which we had been talking, to read in the post-chaise.
As I drew up the windows and drove away from the door, I could not sufficiently congratulate myself that I was not in that tall dog-cart, at the mercy of “Jovial Jem” and “Crafty Kate.”
On my arrival at the Haycock, my first inquiry was for Miss Merlin. “She was gone to Castle-Cropper,” the waiter said. “Maid and things followed her yesterday. Gone to stay, sir? Yes, sir. Didn’t know for how long; but the groom rather thought as she wouldn’t be back under a fortnight.”