Thrusting aside Brooks, who protested that non-members might not enter the club rooms, Fitzgerald flew upstairs, and entered the room without any further ceremony than a bow, saying to the members, who indignantly rose at the intrusion: “Your servant, gentlemen; I beg ye will be sated.”
Walking up to the fireplace, he thus addressed Admiral Stewart: “So, my dear Admiral, Mr. Brooks informs me that I have been elected three times.”
“You have been balloted for, Mr. Fitzgerald, but I am sorry to say you have not been chosen,” said Stewart.
“Well, then,” replied the duellist, “did you blackball me?”
“My good sir,” answered the Admiral, “how could you suppose such a thing?”
“Oh, I supposed no such thing, my dear fellow; I only want to know who it was that dropped the black balls in by accident, as it were.”
Fitzgerald now went up to each individual member, and put the same question to all in turn, “Did you blackball me, sir?” until he made the round of the whole club, and in each case he received a reply similar to that of the Admiral. When he had finished his investigations, he thus addressed the whole body: “You see, gentlemen, that, as none of ye have blackballed me, I must be elected—it is Mr. Brooks that has made the mistake. I was convinced it would end in this way, and am only sorry that so much time has been lost as to prevent honourable gentlemen from enjoying each other’s company sooner.” He then desired the waiter to bring him a bottle of champagne, that he might drink long life to the club and wish them joy of their unanimous election of a “raal gentleman by father and mother, and who never missed his man.”
After this nothing more was said by the members, who determined to ignore the presence of their dangerous visitor, who drank three bottles of champagne in enforced silence, for no one would answer him when he spoke. With cool effrontery the latter sat drinking toasts and healths, to the terror of the waiter. At length everyone was much relieved to see him rise and prepare to depart. Before going, however, he took leave with a low bow, at the same time promising to “come earlier next night and have a little more of it.” It was then agreed that half a dozen stout constables should be in waiting the next evening to bear him off to the watch-house if he attempted again to intrude, but Mr. Fitzgerald, aware probably of the reception he might get, never did.
The eccentricities of Fighting Fitzgerald bordered closely upon madness, and there is, indeed, reason to think that he was insane. According to the custom of his day, he had in early life been obliged to fight a duel with a man called Swords, who at the first discharge of his pistol had shot off a part of Fitzgerald’s skull, materially injuring the fore part of his brain. The consequence was delirium for a considerable time; but those who knew him intimately were of opinion that he was affected by a certain aberration of intellect until the day of his death, for from the period of this wound he became hot-headed, insolent, quarrelsome, cunning, and ferocious.
In the more turbulent days of the past, incidents occurred in clubland which would now be impossible.