'Certainly I will; but what will you say to the Tramplaras?—to Miss Orange?'
'Say—say! why, that I am indisposed. That will be strictly within the bounds of truth, and what is consistent with a gentleman to say. Indisposed—the word was coined for my case. I'll send to Tramplara himself, and get it over as soon as I am in bed.'
'You are joking.'
'I am perfectly serious. I have cause to be so. I am, or was, not so very far from my marriage day, and I do not relish the prospect. Bring old Tramplara here. When he sees me embedded and indisposed to rise, he will grow uneasy and the money will be forthcoming. I have no doubt in the world that he is meditating a trick upon me. He is wonderfully clever; but he met his equal in the matter of the Patagonians—I'll tell you all about them some day. Herring, by some infernal blunder I was pricked as sheriff of the county one year. It was supposed that I was worth about five times my actual income. I could not endure the cost of office, and I did not want to pay the fine for refusal, so I went to bed, and wrote to the Lord Lieutenant from bed. I said that I was confined to my couch, and could not rise from it, which was true, strictly true, under the circumstances, and that I could not say that I would live through the year, which was also true, strictly true; and I got off without fine. On another occasion my creditors were unreasonable and urgent. I took to my bed again, and after I had laid there a fortnight, they mellowed; at the end of a month they were ripe for a composition of eight shillings in the pound. I find that, in difficulties, if I take at once to my bed I constitute myself master of the situation. It is the Hougoumont of all my Waterloos.'
Herring was still laughing.
'You may laugh,' pursued Trecarrel, 'but my plan is superlative. Judge of it by the faces of Tramplara and his son when they visit me. You know the look that comes over a chess-player, when his adversary says "checkmate." I suspect you will see some very similar expression steal over the countenances of Tramplara and young Hopeful. The old man will coax, and the young one bluster. They can do nothing. Here I lie, and they bite their nails and rack their brains. They are powerless. They cannot bring Orange and a parson here and have me married in bed. I should bury my head under the clothes. They would not attempt it. It would hardly be decent. I do not think it would be legal.'
'You will write, I suppose, to Miss Orange?'
'No; I shall send for her father. I do not put hand to paper if I can help it. I never commit myself. Litera scripta manet. You have no idea, Herring, how successful my system is. Difficulties solve themselves; mountains melt into molehills; tangles unravel of their own accord. The perfectness of the system consists in its extreme simplicity. Polly! run the warming-pan through the sheets before I retire. Whilst I am upstairs, Herring, there is a good fellow, keep a sharp look out on Ophir.'
CHAPTER XXV.
A LEVÉE.