Davenport Dunn, a Man of Our Day. Volume 1

“I’m afraid I don’t quite catch your meaning.”

“It was alluding to the bucketing, you know. They ‘d just given Blue Nose corrosive sublimate, which is a kind of quicksilver.”

“Oh, I perceive,” said Conway.

“Good, – wasn’t it?” said Beecher, chuckling. “Let A. B. alone to ‘sarve them out,’ – that’s what all the legs said!” And then he heaved a little sigh, as though to say that, after all, even wit and smartness were only a vanity and a vexation of spirit, and that a “good book” was better than them all.

“I detest the whole concern,” said Conway. “So long as gentlemen bred and trained to run their horses in honorable rivalry, it was a noble sport, and well became the first squirearchy of the world; but when it degenerated into a field for every crafty knave and trickster, – when the low cunning of the gambler succeeded to the bold daring of the true lover of racing, – then the turf became no better than the rouge et noir table, without even the poor consolation of thinking that chance was any element in the result.”

“Why, what would you have? It’s a game where the best player wins, that’s all,” broke in Beecher.

“If you mean it is always a contest where the best horse carries away the prize, I enter my denial to the assertion. If it were so, the legs would have no existence, and all that classic vocabulary of ‘nobbling,’ ‘squaring,’ and so on, have no dictionary.”

“It’s all the same the whole world over,” broke in Beecher. “The wide-awake ones will have the best seat on the coach.”

Conway made no reply; but the increased energy with which he puffed his cigar bespoke the impatience he was suffering under.

“What became of the daughter?” asked Beecher, abruptly; and then, not awaiting the answer, went on: “A deuced good-looking girl, if properly togged out, but she had n’t the slightest notion of dressing herself.”

“Their narrow fortune may have had something to say to that,” said Conway, gravely.

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way, – that ‘s my idea. I was never so hard up in life but I could make my tailor torn me out like a gentleman. I take it,” added he, returning to the former theme, “she was a proud one. Old Kellett was awfully afraid of doing many a thing from the dread of her knowing it. He told me so himself.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed Conway, with evident pleasure in the tone.

“I could have helped him fifty ways. I knew fellows who would have ‘done’ his bills, – small sums, of course, – and have shoved him along pleasantly enough, but she would n’t have it at any price.”

“I was not aware of that,” remarked Conway, inviting, by his manner, further revelations.

Beecher, however, mistaking the source of the interest he had thus excited, and believing that his own craft and shrewdness were the qualities that awakened respect, went on to show how conversant he was with all financial operations amongst Jews and money-lenders, proudly declaring that there was not a “man on town” knew the cent per centers as he did.

“I’ve had my little dealings with them,” said he, with some vanity in the manner. “I ‘ve had my paper done when there was n’t a fellow on the ‘turf’ could raise a guinea. You see,” added he, lowering his voice to a whisper that implied secrecy, “I could do them a service no money could repay. I was up to all that went on in life and at the clubs. When Etheridge got it so heavy at the ‘Rag,’ I warned Fordyce not to advance him beyond a hundred or two. I was the only gentleman knew Brookdale’s horse could win ‘the Ripsley.’ The legs, of course, knew it well before the race came off. Jemmy could have had ten thousand down for his ‘book.’ Ah! if you and I had only known each other six years ago, what a stroke of work we might have done together! Even now,” said he, with increased warmth of voice, “there’s a deuced deal to be done abroad. Brussels and Florence are far from worked out; not among the foreigners, of course, but our own fellows, – the young Oxford and Cambridge ‘saps,’ – the green ones waiting for their gazette in the Guards! Where are you bound for? – what are you doing?” asked he, as if a sudden thought had crossed his mind.

“I am endeavoring to get back to the Crimea,” said Conway, smiling at the prospect which the other had with such frankness opened to him.

“The Crimea!” exclaimed Beecher, “why, that is downright madness; they ‘re fighting away there just as fresh as ever. The very last paper I saw is filled with an account of a Russian sortie against our lines, and a lot of our fellows killed and wounded.”

“Of course there are hard knocks – ”

“It’s all very well to talk of it that way, but I think you might have been satisfied with what you saw, I ‘d just as soon take a cab down to Guy’s, or the Middlesex Hospital, and ask one of the house-surgeons to cut me up at his own discretion, as go amongst those Russian savages. I tell you it don’t pay, – not a bit of it!”

“I suppose, as to the paying part, you ‘re quite right; but, remember, there are different modes of estimating the same thing. Now, I like soldiering – ”

“No accounting for tastes,” broke in Beecher. “I knew a fellow who was so fond of the Queen’s Bench Prison he would n’t let his friends clear him out; but, seriously speaking, the Crimea ‘s a bad book.”

“I should be a very happy fellow to-night if I knew how I could get back there. I ‘ve been trying in various ways for employment in any branch of the service. I ‘d rather be a driver in the Wagon Train than whip the neatest four-in-hand over Epsom Downs.”

“There ‘s only one name for that,” said Beecher; “at least, out of Hanwell.”

“I ‘d be content to be thought mad on such terms,” said Conway, good-humoredly, “and not even quarrel with those who said so!”

“I ‘ve got a better scheme than the Crimea in my head,” said Beecher, in a low, cautious voice, like one afraid of being overheard. “I’ve half a mind to tell you, though there ‘s one on board here would come down pretty heavily on me for peaching.”

“Don’t draw any indignation on yourself on my account,” said Conway, smiling. “I’m quite unworthy of the confidence, and utterly unable to profit by it.”

“I ‘m not so sure of that,” responded Beecher. “A fellow who has got it so hot as you have, has always his eyes open ever after. Come a little to this side,” whispered he, cautiously. “Did you remark my going forward two or three times when I came on board?”

“Yes, I perceived that you did so.”

“You never guessed why?”

“No; really I paid no particular attention to it.”

“I ‘ll tell you, then,” whispered he, still lower, “it was to look after a horse I ‘ve got there. ‘Mumps,’ that ran such a capital second for the Yarmouth, and ran a dead heat afterwards with Stanley’s ‘Cross-Bones,’ he’s there!” and his voice trembled between pride and agitation.

“Indeed!” exclaimed Conway, amused at the eagerness of his manner.

“There he is, disguised as a prize bull for the King of Belgium. Nobody suspects him, – nobody could suspect him, he ‘s so well got up, horns and all. Got him on board in the dark in a large roomy box, clap posters to it on the other side, and ‘tool’ him along to Brussels. That’s what I call business! Now, if you wait a week or two, you can lay on him as deep as you like. We’ll let the Belgians ‘in,’ before we ‘ve done with them. We run him under the name of ‘Klepper;’ don’t forget it, – Klepper!”

“I’ve already told you I ‘m unworthy of such a confidence; you only risk yourself when you impart a secret to indiscretion like mine.”

“You’d not blow us?” cried Annesley, in terror.

“The best security against my doing so accidentally is that I may be hundreds of miles away before your races come off.”

For a minute or two Beecher’s misery was extreme. He saw how his rashness had carried him away to a foolish act of good-nature, and had not even reaped thanks for his generosity. What would he not have given to recall his words? – what would he not have done to obliterate their impression? At last a sudden thought seemed to strike him, and he said, —

“There are two of us in ‘the lay,’ and my ‘pal’ is the readiest pistol in Europe.”

“I ‘ll not provoke any display of his skill, depend on ‘t,” said Conway, controlling, as well as he could, the inclination to laugh out.

“He’d tumble you over like winking if you sold him. He ‘d make it as short work with myself if he suspected me.”

“I’d rather have a quieter sort of colleague,” said Conway, dryly.

“Oh! but he’s a rare one to ‘work the oracle.’ Solomon was a wise man – ”

“What infernal balderdash are you at with Solomon and Samson, there?” shouted out Grog Davis, who had just been looking after the horse-box in the bow. “Come down below, and have a glass of brandy-and-water.”

“I ‘ll stay where I am,” said Beecher, sulkily, and walked away in dudgeon from the spot.

“I think I recognize your friend’s voice,” said Conway, when Beecher next joined him. “If I ‘m right, it’s a fellow I ‘ve an old grudge against.”

“Don’t have it out, then, – that ‘s all,” broke in Beecher, hastily. “I ‘d just as soon go into a cage and dispute a bone with one of Van Amburgh’s tigers, as I ‘d ‘bring him to book.’”

“Make your mind easy about that,” said Conway. “I never go in search of old scores. I would only say, don’t leave yourself more in his power than you can easily escape from. As for myself, it’s very unlikely I shall ever see him again.”

“I wish you’d given up the Crimea,” said Beecher, who, by one of the strange caprices of his strange nature, began to feel a sort of liking for Conway.

“Why should I give it up? It’s the only career I ‘m fit for, – if I even be fit for that, which, indeed, the Horse Guards don’t seem to think. But I ‘ve got an old friend in the Piedmontese service who is going out in command of the cavalry, and I ‘m on my way now to Turin to see whether he cannot make me something, – anything, in short, from an aide-de-camp to an orderly. Once before the enemy, it matters wonderfully little what rank a man holds.”

“The chances of his being knocked over are pretty much alike,” said Beecher, “if that’s what you mean.”

“Not exactly,” said Conway, laughing, “not exactly, though even in that respect the calculation is equal.”

They now walked the deck step for step together in silence. The conversation had arrived at that point whence, if not actually confidential, it could proceed no further without becoming so, and so each appeared to feel it, and yet neither was disposed to lead the way. Beecher was one of those men who regard the chance persons they meet with in life just as they would accidental spots where they halt when on a journey, – little localities to be enjoyed at the time, and never, in all likelihood, revisited. In this way they obtained far more of his confidence than if he was sure to be in constant habits of intercourse with them. He felt they were safe depositaries, just as he would have felt a lonely spot in a wood a secure hiding-place for whatever he wanted to conceal. Now he was already – we are unable to say why – disposed to like Conway, and he would gladly have revealed to him much that lay heavily at his heart, – many a weighty care, many a sore misgiving. There was yet remaining in his nature that reverence and respect for honesty of character which survives very often a long course of personal debasement, and he felt that Conway was a man of honor. Such men he very well knew were usually duped and done, – they were the victims of the sharp set he himself fraternized with; but, with all that, there was something about them that he still clung to, just as he might have clung to a reminiscence of his boy-days.

“I take it,” said he, at last, “that each of us have caught it as heavily as most fellows going. You, to be sure, worse than myself, – for I was only a younger son.”

“My misfortunes,” said Conway, “were all of my own making. I squandered a very good fortune in a few years, without ever so much as suspecting I was in any difficulty; and, after all, the worst recollection of the past is, how few kindnesses, how very few good-natured things a fellow does when he leads a life of mere extravagance. I have enriched many a money-lender, I have started half a dozen rascally servants into smart hotel-keepers, but I can scarcely recall five cases of assistance given to personal friends. The truth is, the most selfish fellow in the world is the spendthrift.”

“That ‘s something new to me, I must own,” said Beecher, thoughtfully; but Conway paid no attention to the remark. “My notion is this,” said Beecher, after a pause, – “do what you will, say what you will, the world won’t play fair with you!”

Conway shook his head dissentingly, but made no reply, and another and a longer silence ensued.

“You don’t know my brother Lackington?” said Beecher, at length.

“No. I have met him in the world and at clubs, but don’t know him.”

“I ‘ll engage, however, you ‘ve always heard him called a clever fellow, a regular sharp fellow, and all that, just because he’s the Viscount; but he is, without exception, the greatest flat going, – never saw his way to a good thing yet, and if you told him of one, was sure to spoil it. I ‘m going over to see him now,” added he, after a pause.

“He ‘s at Rome, I think, the newspapers say?”

“Yes, he’s stopping there for the winter.” Another pause followed, and Beecher threw away the end of his cigar, and, sticking an unlighted one in his mouth, walked the deck in deep deliberation. “I ‘d like to put a case to you for your opinion,” said he, as though screwing himself to a great effort. “If you stood next to a good fortune, – next in reversion, I mean, – and that there was a threat – just a threat, and no more – of a suit to contest your right, would you accept of a life interest in the property to avoid all litigation, and secure a handsome income for your own time?”

“You put the case too vaguely. First of all, a mere threat would not drive me to a compromise.”

“Well, call it more than a threat; say that actual proceedings had been taken, – not that I believe they have; but just say so.”

“The matter is too complicated for my mere Yes or No to meet it; but on the simple question of whether I should compromise a case of that nature, I’d say No. I’d not surrender my right if I had one, and I ‘d not retain possession of that which did n’t belong to me.”

“Which means, that you ‘d reject the offer of a life interest?”

“Yes, on the terms you mention.”

“I believe you ‘re right. Put the bold face on, and stand the battle. Now the real case is this. My brother Lack-ington has just been served with notice – ”

Just as Beecher had uttered the last word, his arm, which rested on the binnacle against which he was standing, was grasped with such force that he almost cried out with the pain, and at the same instant a muttered curse fell upon his ear.

“Go on,” said Conway, as he waited to hear more.

Beecher muttered some unintelligible words about feeling suddenly chilled, and “wanting a little brandy,” and disappeared down the stairs to the cabin.

“I heard you,” cried Davis, as soon as the other entered, – “I heard you! and if I hadn’t heard you with my own ears, I ‘d not have believed it! Have n’t I warned you, not once but fifty times, against that confounded peaching tongue of yours? Have n’t I told you that if every act of your life was as pure and honest as you know it is not, your own stupid talk would make an indictment against you? You meet a fellow on the deck of a steamer – ”

“Stop there!” cried Beecher, whose temper was sorely tried by this attack. “The gentleman I talked with is an old acquaintance; he knows me, – ay, and what’s more, he knows you!”

“Many a man knows me, and does not feel himself much the better for his knowledge!” said Davis, boldly.

“Well, I believe our friend here would n’t say he was the exception to that rule,” said Beecher, with an ironical laugh.

“Who is he? – what’s his name?”

“His name is Conway; he was a lieutenant in the 12th Lancers, but you will remember him better as the owner of Sir Aubrey.”

“I remember him perfectly,” replied Davis, with all his own composure, – “I remember him perfectly, – a tall, good-looking fellow, with short moustaches. He was – except yourself – the greatest flat I ever met in the betting-ring; and that’s a strong word, Mr. Annesley Beecher, – ain’t it?”

“I suspect you ‘d scarcely like to call him a flat to-day, at least, to his face,” said Beecher, angrily.

A look of mingled insolence and contempt was all the answer Davis gave this speech; and then half filling a tumbler with brandy, he drank it off, and said slowly, —

“What I would dare to do, you certainly would never suspect, – that much I ‘m well aware of. What you would dare is easily guessed at.”

“I don’t clearly understand you,” said Beecher, timidly.

“You ‘d dare to draw me into a quarrel on the chance of seeing me ‘bowled over,’” said Davis, with a bitter laugh. “You ‘d dare to see me stand opposite another man’s pistol, and pray heartily at the same time that his hand might n’t shake, nor his wrist falter; but I’ve got good business habits about me, Master Beecher. If you open that writing-desk, you ‘ll own few men’s papers are in better order, or more neatly kept; and there is no satisfaction I could have to offer any one would n’t give me ample time to deposit in the hands of justice seven forged acceptances by the Honorable Annesley Beecher, and the power of attorney counterfeited by the same accomplished gentleman’s hand.”

Beecher put out his hand to catch the decanter of brandy; but Davis gently removed the bottle, and said, “No, no; that’s only Dutch courage, man; nerve yourself up, and learn to stand straight and manfully, and when you say, ‘Not guilty,’ do it with a bold look at the jury box.’”

Beecher dropped into his seat, and buried his head between his hands.

“I often think,” said Davis, as he took out his cigar-case and proceeded to choose a cigar, – “I often think it would be a fine sight when the swells – the fashionable world, as the newspapers call them – would be pressing on to the Old Bailey to see one of their own set in the dock. What nobs there would be on the Bench! All Brookes’s and the Wyndham scattered amongst the bar. The ‘Illustrated News’ would have a photographic picture of you, and the descriptive fellows would come out strong about the way you recognized your former acquaintances in court. Egad! old Grog Davis would be quite proud to give his evidence in such company!’ How long have you been acquainted with the prisoner in the dock, Mr. Davis?’ cried he, aloud, imitating the full and imperious accents of an examining counsel. ‘I have known him upwards of fifteen years, my Lord. We went down together to Leeds in the summer of 1840 on a little speculation with cogged dice – ‘”

Beecher looked up and tried to speak, but his strength failed him, and his head fell heavily down again on the table.

“There, ‘liquor up,’ as the Yankees say,” cried Davis, passing the decanter towards him. “You ‘re a poor chicken-hearted creature, and don’t do much honor to your ‘order.’”

“You ‘ll drive me to despair yet,” muttered Beecher, in a voice scarcely above a whisper.

“Not a bit of it, man; there’s pluck in despair! You ‘ll never go that far!”

Beecher grasped his glass convulsively; and as his eyes flashed wildly, he seemed for a moment as if about to hurl it in the other’s face. Davis’s look, however, appeared to abash him, and with a low, faint sigh he relinquished his hold, while his head fell forward on his bosom.

Davis now drew near the fire, and with a leg on either side of it, smoked away at his ease.

CHAPTER XXVII. A VISIT OF CONDOLENCE

“I think she will see me,” said Davenport Dunn, to the old woman servant who opened the door to him at the Kelletts’ cottage, “if you will tell her my name: Mr. Dunn, – Mr. Davenport Dunn.”

“She told me she ‘d not see anybody, sir,” was the obdurate reply.

“Yes; but I think when you say who it is – ”

“She would not see that young man that was in the regiment with her brother, and he was here every day, wet or dry, to ask after her.”

“Well, take in my card now, and I ‘ll answer for it she’ll not refuse me.”

The old woman took the card half sulkily from his hand, and returned in a few minutes to say that Miss Kellett would receive him.

Dressed in mourning of the very humblest and cheapest kind, and with all the signs of recent suffering and sorrow about her, Sybella Kellett yet received Mr. Dunn with a calm and quiet composure for which he was scarcely prepared.

“If I have been importunate, Miss Kellett,” said he, “it is because I desire to proffer my services to you. I feel assured that you will not take ill this assistance on my part I would wish to be thought a friend – ”

“You were so to my father, sir,” said she, interrupting, while she held her handkerchief to her eyes.

Dunn’s face grew scarlet at these words, but, fortunately for him, she could not see it.

“I had intended to have written to you, sir,” said she, with recovered composure. “I tried to do so this morning, but my head was aching so that I gave it up. I wanted your counsel, and indeed your assistance. I have no need to tell you that I ‘m left without means of support. I do not want to burden relatives, with whom, besides, I have had no intercourse for years; and my object was to ask if you could assist me to a situation as governess, or, if not, to something more humble still. I will not be difficult to please,” said she, smiling sadly, “for my pretensions are of the very humblest.”

“I ‘m aware how much you underrate them. I ‘m no stranger to Miss Kellett’s abilities,” said Dunn, bowing.

She scarcely moved her head in acknowledgment of this speech, and went on: “If you could insure me immediate occupation, it would serve to extricate me from a little difficulty at this moment, and relieve me from the embarrassment of declining ungraciously what I cannot accept of. This letter here is an invitation from a lady in Wales to accept the hospitality of her house for the present; and however deeply the kindness touches me, I must not avail myself of it. You may read the letter,” said she, handing it to him.

Dunn perused it slowly, and, folding it up, laid it on the table again.

“It is most kindly worded, and speaks well for the writer,” said he, calmly.

“I feel all its kindness,” said she, with a slight quivering of the lip. “It comes when such is doubly precious, but I have my reasons against accepting it.”

“Without daring to ask, I can assume them, Miss Kellett. I am one of those who believe that all efforts in life to be either good or great should strike root in independence; that he who leans upon another parts with the best features of identity, and loses himself in suiting his tastes to another’s.”

She made no reply, but a slight flush on her cheek, and an increased brightness in her eye, showed that she gave her full concurrence to the words.

“It is fortunate, Miss Kellett,” said he, resuming, “that I am the bearer of a proposition which, if you approve of, meets the case at once. I have been applied to by Lord Glengariff to find a lady who would accept the situation of companion to his daughter. He has so far explained the requirements he seeks for, that I can answer for Miss Kellett being exactly everything to fulfil them.”

“Oh, sir!” broke she in, “this is in no wise what I desired. I am utterly unfitted for such a sphere and such associations. Remember how and where my life has been passed. I have no knowledge of life, and no experience of society.”

“Let me interrupt you. Lord Glengariff lives completely estranged from the world in a remote part of the country. Lady Augusta, his only unmarried daughter, is no longer young; they see no company; indeed, their fortune is very limited, and all their habits of the very simplest and least expensive. It was remembering this very seclusion, I was glad to offer you a retreat so likely to meet your wishes.”

“But even my education is not what such persons would look for. I have not one of the graceful accomplishments that adorn society. My skill as a musician is very humble; I cannot sing at all; and though I can read some modern languages, I scarcely speak them.”