“To be sure, I have. Ring the bell, Musters, and send up the two bottles of your ’20 port that I ordered and some glasses. A glass of Musters’ ’20 port, Mr. Mottisfont, won’t hurt you this cold day. And we must drink your health. And, Musters, when these gentlemen go down, see that they have what they call for.”
The port was sipped, tasted. Mr. Mottisfont’s health was drunk, and various compliments were paid to his father. The rector took his two glasses; so did young Mottisfont, who woke up and vowed that he had tasted none better in St. James’s Street. “Is it Garland’s?” he asked.
“It is, sir,” Musters said, much pleased.
“I thought it was—none better!” said young Mottisfont, also pleased. “The old Duke drinks no other.”
“Fine tipple! Fine tipple!” said the other “Duke.” In the end a third bottle was ordered, of which Musters and old Hayward drank the better part.
At one of these meetings a sad thing had happened. A rash tradesman had proposed his lordship’s health. Of course he had been severely snubbed. It had been considered most indecent. But on this occasion no one was so simple as to name my lord, and Stubbs felt with satisfaction that all had passed as it should. So had candidates been chosen as long as he could remember.
But call no man happy until the day closes. As he left the house Bagenal the maltster tacked himself on to him. “I’d a letter from George this morning,” he said. George was his son, articled to Mr. Stubbs, and now with Mr. Stubbs’s agents in town. “He saw his lordship one day last week.”
“Ay, ay. I suppose Master George was in the West End? Wasting his time, Bagenal, I’ll be bound.”
“I don’t know about that. Young fellows like to see things. He went with a lot of chaps to see the crowd outside Sir Robert’s. They’d read in a paper that all the nobs were to be seen going in and out. Anyway, he went, and the first person he saw going in was his lordship!”
Mr. Stubbs walked a few yards in silence. Then, “Well, he’s no sight to George,” he said. “It seems to me they were both wasting their time. I told his lordship he’d do no good. When half the dukes in England have been at Peel, d—n him, it wasn’t likely he’d change his course for his lordship! It wasn’t to be expected, Bagenal. Did George stop to see him come out?”