The colonel diffidently extended the member thus demanded; and the gallant Irishman shook it with such hearty good will, that its owner winced and writhed with the pain of the iron pressure.
“And now we’ll spake no more on milithary matthers,” said Gorman O’Blunderbuss; “but dhrink potheen at our aise, and converse on all kinds of things.”
By this little arrangement the captain got rid of the necessity of giving any explanation relative to his own military career; and Colonel Tickner, speedily forgetting the deep humiliation to which the bullying character of the Irishman and his own craven spirit had subjected him, paid his respects with so much earnestness to the whiskey, that Frank was soon compelled to sally forth and procure another bottle—Mrs. Pitkin having returned to her own domicile under the plea of being “very ill,” which in plain English meant “very drunk.”
The conviviality was maintained until half-past ten, when Captain O’Blunderbuss and Frank Curtis rose to take their leave of Mr. Scales and the colonel. But before they departed, the Irishman renewed his expressions of gratitude and his protestations of friendship to the worthy Brother who had manifested so much kindness towards him;—and, highly delighted with their evening’s entertainment, the two “inseparables” walked off arm-in-arm together.
Now how gloomy—how truly monastic appeared the Charter House, as they traversed the spacious court, bounded by the low, uniform ranges of buildings. Most of the windows were dark; but here and there a flickering light was gleaming—feeble and faint as the spirit of the old man for whose long lonely hours even that poor candle was a species of companion.
In spite of the natural liveliness of the two friends’ dispositions—in spite of the whiskey they had imbibed—they shuddered as the aspect of the place, in the more than semi-obscurity of the starlight, seemed cold and cheerless to the view,—aye, and struck so to their very hearts.
Their footsteps raised echoes which sounded hollow and gloomy, as if coming from the midst of tombs; and if they paused for a moment, the silence was so deep—so profound, it seemed impossible that the place was in the very midst of the mightiest metropolis in the world.
The feelings of the two friends were such, that they could not have uttered a ribald word nor given vent to a jest or a laugh, as they traversed an enclosure where the stillness was so awful and the cloistral aspect of the scene so coldly, sternly monastic.
Had their way lay through a vast cathedral, at the silent midnight hour, they could not have experienced a sense of more painful oppression; nor would a deeper gloom have fallen upon their spirits.
It was a great relief when the porter closed the wicket of the massive gates behind them;—and as they hastily skirted Charterhouse Square—keeping a good look-out for fear of unpleasant prowlers in that region—the captain whispered to his companion, “Well, Frank—and, be Jasus! I’d sooner be knocked about the wor-r-ld as you and I are at times, me boy, than take up my quar-r-ters altogether in that place. It’s all very pritty, no doubt, while one has his frinds with him; but whin they’re gone, Frank, it strikes me that the loneliness becomes tin thousand times more lonely.”