“Well, I think old Mel was equal to it,” Mr. George pursued. “He gave me pretty broad hints; and this is how it was, if it really happened, you know. Old Mel had a friend; some say he was more. Well, that was a fellow, a great gambler. I dare say you’ve heard of him—Burley Bennet—him that won Ryelands Park of one of the royal dukes—died worth upwards of £100,000; and old Mel swore he ought to have had it, and would if he hadn’t somehow offended him. He left the money to Admiral Harrington, and he was a relation of Mel’s.”
“But are we then utterly mixed up with tailors?” exclaimed Mrs. Barrington.
“Well, those are the facts,” said Mr. George.
The wine made the young squire talkative. It is my belief that his suspicions were not awake at that moment, and that, like any other young country squire, having got a subject he could talk on, he did not care to discontinue it. The Countess was past the effort to attempt to stop him. She had work enough to keep her smile in the right place.
Every dinner may be said to have its special topic, just as every age has its marked reputation. They are put up twice or thrice, and have to contend with minor lights, and to swallow them, and then they command the tongues of men and flow uninterruptedly. So it was with the great Mel upon this occasion. Curiosity was aroused about him. Aunt Bel agreed with Lady Jocelyn that she would have liked to know the mighty tailor. Mrs. Shorne but very imperceptibly protested against the notion, and from one to another it ran. His Grace of Belfield expressed positive approval of Mel as one of the old school.
“Si ce n’est pas le gentilhomme, au moins, c’est le gentilhomme manqué,” said Lady Jocelyn. “He is to be regretted, Duke. You are right. The stuff was in him, but the Fates were unkind. I stretch out my hand to the pauvre diable.”
“I think one learns more from the mock magnifico than from anything else,” observed his Grace.
“When the lion saw the donkey in his own royal skin,” said Aunt Bel, “add the rhyme at your discretion—he was a wiser lion, that’s all.”
“And the ape that strives to copy one—he’s an animal of judgement,” said Lady Jocelyn. “We will be tolerant to the tailor, and the Countess must not set us down as a nation of shopkeepers: philosophically tolerant.”
The Countess started, and ran a little broken “Oh!” affably out of her throat, dipped her lips to her tablenapkin, and resumed her smile.