Wie sie schnarchen, wie sie blasen!'
This was the first time he had addressed himself directly to Mary, who sat close to her brother's side, and never took her eyes from his face, ready to pour out his wine or to change his plate, for the serving-men had been dismissed at the beginning of this unceremonious meal.
Mary looked at the stranger almost as superciliously as Lesbia might have done. She was not inclined to be friendly to her brother's friend.
'Do you read German?' she inquired, with a touch of surprise.
'You had better ask him what language he does not read or speak,' said her brother. 'Hammond is an admirable Crichton, my dear—by-the-by, who was admirable Crichton?—knows everything, can twist your little head the right way upon any subject.'
'Oh,' thought Mary, 'highly cultivated, is he? Very proper in a man who was educated on charity to have worked his hardest at the University.'
She was not prepared to think very kindly of young men who had been successful in their college career, since poor Maulevrier had made such a dismal failure of his, had been gated and sent down, and ploughed, and had everything ignominious done to him that could be done, which ignominy had involved an expenditure of money that Lady Maulevrier bemoaned and lamented until this day. Because her brother had not been virtuous, Mary grudged virtuous young men their triumphs and their honours. Great, raw-boned fellows, who have taken their degrees at Scotch Universities, come to Oxford and Cambridge and sweep the board, Maulevrier had told her, when his own failures demanded explanation. Perhaps this Mr. Hammond had graduated north of the Tweed, and had come southward to rob the native. Mary was not any more inclined to be civil to him because he was a linguist. He had a pleasant manner, frank and easy, a good voice, a cheery laugh. But she had not yet made up her mind that he was a gentleman.
'If some benevolent old person were to take a fancy to Charles Ford, the wrestler, and send him to a Scotch University, I daresay he would turn out just as fine a fellow,' she thought, Ford being somewhat of a favourite as a local hero.
The two young men went off to the billiard-room after they had dined. It was half-past ten by this time, and, of course, Mary did not go with them. She bade her brother good-night at the dining-room door.
'Good-night, Molly; be sure you are up early to show me the dogs,' said Maulevrier, after an affectionate kiss.