“Why, then, he’ll find Mr Freyne ready to meet him with open arms, and Miss in the background, all smiles and tears and blushes——”
“I protest, madam, you’re too bad!” I cried. “One might fancy I was——”
“A boarding-school Miss? and so you are, my dear, or was, not so very long ago. But she shan’t be rallied if she don’t like it. And what of all the other lovers who en’t able to pay down five thousand pounds to win their freedom?”
“Why, Mr Menotti’s forbidden the house by my papa.”
“And he has quarrelled with your mamma as well? Oh, I know it; Mrs Mapletoft told me about it yesterday. ’Twas at her house, under colour of a dispute at cards. The gentleman accused the lady of having played him false, and she retorted by threatening to betray what she knew of him, to which he replied that he also had tales to tell if necessary. What do you think of that?”
“Sure their falling-out is the best thing that could be for me.”
“Why, yes, if they remain unreconciled. But they won’t, my dear. With the hold he has over her, she don’t dare disobey him, and the easiest way of gaining his favour is to sacrifice you. So my dear Miss must look to herself. Be careful about your palanqueen-bearers at night, for remember your beloved Miss Byron was carried off by treacherous chairmen, and don’t suffer yourself to be persuaded into entering any chaise or budgero but your papa’s. You don’t want me to warn you not to wander away with Menotti at any party of pleasure.”
“Come, my dearest life,” it was Mr Hurstwood who entered, as gallant as ever, “tiffing is served, and sure you and our dear Miss Freyne must be prodigiously hungry after so long and serious a conversation. I have a piece of news, also, that Miss Freyne’s good papa will be glad to hear. Can you credit it, madam, that our Council have at last plucked up courage to defy the Nabob? It seems that seven or eight days since he sent by the hand of one Facquier[06] Tongar” (these facquiers, Amelia, are accounted holy men among the Moors, as the gioghis among the Gentoos) “to demand with threats the destruction of the new fortifications that he heard we were making; but the Presidency, seeing in the demand only an attempt to extort money from us, made bold to refuse it. To-day is come a second messenger, with a perwannah wrote on the day of the Soubah’s starting at the head of his army against the Purranea Nabob, with very stringent orders that the ditch and wall which, as he hears, we are making round our territory, should be instantly stopped. This wall and ditch, of course, are nothing but an invention of the French who have his ear; but Mr Drake has returned by the messenger a letter saying that the slight repairs in hand on our defences are needed in case of war with the French, and he won’t stop ’em, but that no new works have been devised. I did hear a rumour of the several messengers having been dismissed with contempt, too, but at least you see that we shall venture to hold up our heads to Surajah Dowlah yet.”
CHAPTER X.
IN WHICH THE FLOOD BEGINS TO RISE.
Calcutta, May ye 26th.