A pair of large tongues had been put before me, and as I began to carve them, I heard a lady say—“No fear. Downy will be flush of money now. Be down on him sharp; that’s the way to do it.”
“Are you sure it will come off?” asked the gentleman she was talking to; and I saw that it was Mr. Welch, a great man of the ring, speaking earnestly to Lady Kickloose.
“What is to prevent it? The fatal day is named. It is too good for him, as everybody says. But you know where marriages are made.”
“And where they end, with a fellow of that sort. But I can’t take it down—even now I can’t. Such a lot of brass, you know, my lady! And what has he got to show for it?”
“Brass—and his mother;” replied the lady, who had picked up the pithy style of the turf. “The old Earl is a duffer. Mother Bull can walk round him any Saturday.”
“Yes; but young ladies have wills of their own. It is out of my line, but I have always heard that Lady Clara could have the pick of England. What can there be in Downy, to fetch her so?”
“How can I tell you, Mr. Welch! Such things happen continually. All we have to do is to follow them up. I never liked the man; but that is no reason why she shouldn’t. Bread-sauce, I suppose goes with peacock.”
Sam was in his glory all this time, and the dinner went on very merrily, with plenty of laughing, and glasses clinking, and even the most demure ladies smiling. My uncle, who had cherished a pure contempt for sporting men, began to think better of them, and more and more as his opinion was asked, delivered it on subjects he had never heard of. Aunt Parslow also was exceedingly good-natured, and held a very interesting talk with a lady who had heard of her father. And I took the opportunity, before we went away, to remind Mrs. Henderson of our old doings, when she was the belle of Leatherhead; and I thought that she looked at me very nicely, and felt very deeply for my present sad condition; and after all I could not contradict my uncle, when he said—with five and sixpence in his pocket, which he had won by very fine play at whist—that we had been treated most handsomely and kindly, and if he should be asked to their Christmas dinner, he meant to make a point of going.