The ladies were quite interested in madame's narrative. Ladies will be interested about good-looking young men who are suffering from that romantic complaint, an incurable melancholy. But as madame's narrative, eloquent and pathetic though it was, left them in much the same state of enlightenment as before with regard to the interesting stranger, all they could do was sigh a little, remount, and resume their gay tone. Just as they were commencing the descent, a hare started and frightened the horse of the young lady who had attracted George's attention. A plunge, a rear, and an instant after it was out of sight, thundering down the steep road at a speed that mocked pursuit.
George was strolling along in his listless way, stopping now at this turn, now at that, to admire the scenery, pluck a flower or a leaf, and muse a little. He had almost arrived at the foot of the hill, when a cry from above and a clatter of hoofs broke on his ear. He stood at a narrow turn between two high banks opening into the last bend of the road, to listen and observe. A moment after, a horse with a lady on his back came tearing down at a mad speed right on him. A glance showed that the rider stood in imminent danger of her life, and that the only means of saving her was to stop the animal in the midst of its wild career. The thought and determination to do something had scarcely time to flash through his brain, when the horse was on him; and how he never knew, but he found himself dragging at the reins—a stumble of the steed against the bank as it swerved, a fainting lady in his arms, and a moment after a crowd of persons around them. He surrendered her to the care of her friends, and, seeing her revive whilst they were engaged in tending her, took occasion to slink away unobserved, as though he had been guilty of some mean action. And the Maison Plaquet saw him no more.
About a week after this occurrence, he was taking one of his usual moody walks along the beach, his hands clasped behind him, and his eyes following the golden path that led away over the waters down to the sinking sun. He walked along listlessly, insensible to everything save the subtle solemnity of the hour, when the brooding calm of the evening began to settle over the crimson wave and the flushed earth. He did not observe a figure leaning against a huge boulder that lay rosy-red right in his path. The leaning figure was that of a young man, who, like George, was surveying the scene, but with an air of genuine admiration curiously tempered by the eye of a connoisseur examining a painting as to the merits or defects of which his oracular opinion might be called for at any moment by a listening world. Let us look at him as he leans back there, so contented, to all seeming, with the world in general, and possibly with himself in particular; for notwithstanding an occasional touch of what in others would be called impertinence, but in him was really rather assumed than natural, and, as he was wont to say, often got him out of difficulties, Ned Fitzgerald was a fellow you would like.
His slim, well-knit figure, clad in a light summer suit, his pleasant, animated face surmounted by a straw hat that became him, his bright eyes glancing around and taking all in in a sweep—the sinking sun, the mingling colors on the waters, the flush on the hills, the blood-red glow on the sands, the quiet circles of a solitary sea-bird that turned and dipped its snow-white wings in the rosy light—to one looking at him, he made nature seem all the more lovely and enjoyable for having one who could feel its loveliness so thoroughly and so evidently.
The quick eye did not take long to pick out the slightly stooped figure that seemed so wrapt in silent thought, and, as it neared him, never turned its gaze from the dying sun. Mr. Ned Fitzgerald watched its approach, and, with his usual tendency to be sociable, evidently contemplated addressing it; when, as it came close enough to distinguish the features, he started from his recumbent position, took off his hat and tossed it wildly in the air, never waiting to catch it again, but, rushing towards George, seized that astounded and miserable mortal in his arms, and hugged him almost to suffocation before he could see who it was, whilst the exclamation burst from him:
"Why, George Howard, by all that's impossible!"
Another hug and a longer one, and a hearty laugh, and a shake of both hands up and down, and a look of genuine pleasure in the bright eyes that seemed to throw a light over the kindly face—Ned's pleasantry was contagious, and the first flush of surprise on George's face was succeeded by a faint smile as soon as he recognized his old friend and school-fellow, whilst a sort of moisture forced itself into his own eyes. It was as though he had come back from the grave a moment to find that after all the hand shaken so vigorously by an old friend—the best-liked old friend of them all, who had studied with him, and fought with him, and played with him, and got into all sorts of scrapes and out of them with him, and built with him those bubble castles that boys will build at school, destitute of nothing save foundation—was still real flesh and blood, and that the heart throbbing within him was still human.
"Why, Ned, old fellow, what in the name of wonder brought you here?"
"Destiny, my boy, destiny, fate—anything you please that may give a sufficiently solemn turn to a landslip close by which interfered considerably with locomotion, and forced me bag and baggage out of my snug coupé, to set me down in this unknown corner of the earth, absolutely without a soul to speak to, for one night. But I do believe I could have endured a broken head as well as a broken journey for the sake of dropping on you again, old boy."
Why young gentlemen, supposed to know the meaning of words, should find such a secret fund of special endearment in the terms which they so lavishly apply to one another of "old boy," "old fellow," or "old man," is a mystery whose solution is still to appear. Young persons of the opposite sex, as it is called—goodness knows why—are not in the habit of addressing each other as "old woman," "old duck," or "old maid." Such terms would be esteemed in them as anything but endearing, although married ladies have been known to speak of their lord and master as "a dear, good old thing." However, to return from this digression, which is becoming dangerous, to the "old" men in question: