Delphi Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu

by J. Sheridan le Fanu

  Signor Parucci would have given a good round sum to have had the engaging boy by the ears; but this he knew was out of the question; he therefore (for he was a philosopher) played and sung on without evincing the smallest consciousness of what was going forward. His plans of vengeance were, however, speedily devised and no less quickly executed. There lay upon the windowsill a fragment of biscuit, which in the course of an ecstatic flourish the little man kicked carelessly over. The bait had hardly touched the ground beneath the casement when Jacopo, continuing to play and sing the while, and apparently unconscious of anything but his own music, to his infinite delight beheld the boy first abate his exertions, and finally put an end to his affronting pantomime altogether, and begin to manœuvre in the direction of the treacherous windfall. The youth gradually approached it, and just at the moment when it was within his grasp, Signor Parucci, with another careless touch of his foot, sent over a large bow-pot well stored with clay, which stood upon the window-block. The descent of this ponderous missile was followed by a most heart-stirring acclamation from below; and good Mr. Parucci, clambering along the windowsill, and gazing downward, was regaled by the spectacle of the gesticulating youth stamping about the grass among what appeared to be the fragments of a hundred flower-pots, writhing and bellowing in transports of indignation and bodily torment.

  “Povero ragazzo — Carissimo figlio,” exclaimed the valet, looking out with an expression of infinite sweetness, “my dear child and charming boy, how ‘av you broke my flower-pote, and when ‘av you come here. Ah! per Bacco, I think I ‘av see you before. Ah! yees, you are that sweetest leetel boy that was leestening at my music — so charming just now. How much clay is on your back! a cielo! amiable child, you might ‘av keel yourself. Sacro numine, what an escape! Say your prayer, and thank heaven you are safe, my beautiful, sweetest, leetel boy. God blace you. Now rone away very fast, for fear you pool the other two flower-potes on your back, sweetest child. Gode bless you, amiable boy — they are very large and very heavy.”

  The youth took the hint, and having had quite enough of Mr. Parucci’s music for the evening, withdrew under the combined influences of fury and lumbago. The little man threw himself back in his chair, and hugged his shins in sheer delight, grinning and chattering like a delirious monkey, and rolling himself about, and laughing with the most exquisite relish. At length, after this had gone on for some time, with the air of a man who has had enough of trifling, and must now apply himself to matters of graver importance, he arose, hung up his guitar, sent his chair, which was upon casters, rolling to the far end of the room, and proceeded to arrange the curls of one of the two magnificent perukes, on which it was his privilege to operate. After having applied himself with uncommon attention to this labour of taste for some time in silence, he retired a few paces to contemplate the effect of his performance — whereupon he fell into a musing mood, and began after his fashion to soliloquize with a good deal of energy and volubility in that dialect which had become more easy to him than his mother tongue.

  “Corpo di Bacco! what thing is life! who would believe thirty years ago I should be here now in a barbaroose island to curl the wig of an old gouty blackguard — but what matter. I am a philosopher — damnation — it is very well as it is — per Bacco! I can go way when I like. I am reech leetle fellow, and with Sir Richard, good Sir Richard, I do always whatever I may choose. Good Sir Richard,” he continued, addressing the block on which hung the object of his tasteful labours, as if it had been the baronet in person— “good Sir Richard, why are you so kind to me, when you are so cross as the old devil in hell with all the rest of the world? — why, why, why? Shall I say to you the reason, good, kind Sir Richard? Well, I weel. It is because you dare not — dare not — dare not-da-a-a-are not vaix me. I am, you know, dear Sir Richard, a poor, leetle foreigner, who is depending on your goodness. I ‘ave nothing but your great pity and good charity — oh, no! I am nothing at all; but still you dare not vaix me — you moste not be angry — note at all — but very quiet — you moste not go in a passion — oh! never — weeth me — even if I was to make game of you, and to insult you, and to pool your nose.”

  Here the Italian seized, with the tongs which he had in his hand, upon that prominence in the wooden block which corresponded in position with the nose, which at other times the peruke overshadowed, and with a grin of infinite glee pinched and twisted the iron instrument until the requirements of his dramatic fancy were satisfied, when he delivered two or three sharp knocks on the smooth face of the block, and resumed his address.

  “No, no — you moste not be angry, fore it would be great misfortune — oh, it would — if you and I should quarrel together; but tell me now, old truffatore — tell me, I say, am I not very quiet, goodnature, merciful, peetying faylow? Ah, yees — very, very — Madre di Dio — very moche; and dear, good Sir Richard, shall I tell you why I am so very goodnature? It is because I love you joste as moche as you love me — it is because, most charitable patron, it is my convenience to go on weeth you quietly and ‘av no fighting yet — bote you are going to get money. Oh! so coning you are, you think I know nothing — you think I am asleep — bote I know it — I know it quite well. You think I know nothing about the land you take from Miss Mary. Ah! you are very coning — oh! very; but I ‘av hear it all, and I tell you — and I swear per sangue di D —— , when you get that money I shall, and will, and moste — mo-ooste ‘av a very large, comfortable, beeg handful — do you hear me? Oh, you very coning old rascal; and if you weel not geeve it, oh, my dear Sir Richard, echellent master, I am so moche afaid we will ‘av a fight between us — a quarrel — that will spoil our love and friendship, and maybe, helas! horte your reputation — shoking — make the gentlemen spit on you, and avoid you, and call you all the ogly names — oh! shoking.”

  Here he was interrupted by a loud ringing in Sir Richard’s chamber.

  “There he is to pool his leetle bell — damnation, what noise. I weel go up joste now — time enough, dear, good, patient Sir Richard — time enough — oh, plainty, plainty.”

  The little man then leisurely fumbled in his pocket until he brought forth a bunch of keys, from which, having selected one, he applied it to the lock of the little press which we have already mentioned, whence he deliberately produced one of the flasks which we have hinted at, along with a tall glass with a spiral stem, and filling himself a bumper of the liquor therein contained, he coolly sipped it to the bottom, accompanied throughout the performance by the incessant tinkling of Sir Richard’s hand-bell.

  “Ah, very good, most echellent — thank you, Sir Richard, you ‘av give me so moche time and so moche music, I ‘av drunk your very good health.”

  So saying, he locked up the flask and glass again, and taking the block which had just represented Sir Richard in the imaginary colloquy in his hand, he left his own chamber, and ran upstairs to the baronet’s dressing-room. He found his master alone.

  “Ah, Jacopo,” exclaimed the baronet, looking somewhat flushed, but speaking, nevertheless, in a dulcet tone enough, “I have been ringing for nearly ten minutes; but I suppose you did not hear me.”

  “Joste so as you ‘av say,” replied the man. “Your signoria is very seldom wrong. I was so charmed with my work I could not hear nothing.”

  “Parucci,” rejoined Sir Richard, after a slight pause, “you know I keep no secrets from you.”

  “Ah, you flatter me, Signor — you flatter me — indeed you do,” said the valet, with ironical humility.

  His master well understood the tone in which the fellow spoke, but did not care to notice it.

  “The fact is, Jacopo,” continued Sir Richard, “you already know so many of my secrets, that I have now no motive in excluding you from any.”

  “Goode, kind — oh, very kind,” ejaculated the valet.

  “In short,” continued his master, who felt a little uneasy under the praises of his attendant— “in short, to speak plainly, I want your assistance. I know your talents
well. You can imitate any handwriting you please to copy with perfect accuracy. You must copy, in the handwriting of this manuscript, the draft of a letter which I will hand you this evening. You require some little time to study the character; so take the letter with you, and be in my room at ten tonight. I will then hand you the draft of what I want written. You understand?”

  “Understand! To be sure — most certilly I weel do it,” replied the Italian, “so that the great devil himself will not tell the writing of the two, l’un dall’ altro, one from the other. Never fear — geeve me the letter. I must learn the writing. I weel be here tonight before you are arrive, and I weel do it very fast, and so like — bote you know how well I can copy. Ah! yees; you know it, Signor. I need not tell.”

  “No more at present,” said the baronet, with a gesture of caution. “Assist me to dress.”

  The Italian accordingly was soon deep in the mysteries of his elaborate functions, where we shall leave him and his master for the present.

  CHAPTER XVII.

  DUBLIN CASTLE BY NIGHT — THE DRAWINGROOM — LORD WHARTON AND HIS COURT.

  Sir Richard Ashwoode had set his heart upon having Lord Aspenly for his son-in-law; and all things considered, his lordship was, perhaps, according to the standard by which the baronet measured merit, as good a son-in-law as he had any right to hope for. It was true, Lord Aspenly was neither very young nor very beautiful. Spite of all the ingenious arts by which he reinforced his declining graces, it was clear as the light that his lordship was not very far from seventy; and it was just as apparent that it was not to any extraordinary supply of bone, muscle, or flesh that his vitality was attributable. His lordship was a little, spindle-shanked gentleman, with the complexion of a consumptive frog, and features as sharp as edged tools. He condescended to borrow from the artistic talents of his valet the exquisite pencilling of his eyebrows, as well as the fine black line which gave effect to a set of imaginary eyelashes, and depth and brilliancy to a pair of eyes which, although naturally not very singularly effective, had, nevertheless, nearly as much vivacity in them as they had ever had. His smiles were perennial and unceasing, very winning and rather ghastly. He used much gesticulation, and his shrug was absolutely Parisian. To all these perfections he added a wonderful facility in rounding the periods of a compliment, and an inexhaustible affluence of something which passed for conversation. Thus endowed, and having, moreover, the additional recommendation of a handsome income, a peerage, and an unencumbered celibacy, it is hardly wonderful that his lordship was unanimously voted by all prudent and discriminating persons, without exception, the most fascinating man in all Ireland. Sir Richard Ashwoode was not one whit more in earnest in desiring the match than was Lord Aspenly himself. His lordship had for some time begun to suspect that he had nearly sown his wild oats — that it was time for him to reform — that he was ripe for the domestic virtues, and ought to renounce scamp-hood. He therefore, in the laboratory of his secret soul, compounded a virtuous passion, which he resolved to expend upon the first eligible object who might present herself. Mary Ashwoode was the fortunate damsel who first happened to come within the scope and range of his lordship’s premeditated love; and he forthwith in a matrimonial paroxysm applied, according to the good old custom, not to the lady herself, but to Sir Richard Ashwoode, and was received with open arms.

  The baronet indeed, as the reader is aware, anticipated many difficulties in bringing the match about; for he well knew how deeply his daughter’s heart was engaged, and his misgivings were more sombre and frequent than he cared to acknowledge even to himself. He resolved, however, that the thing should be; and he was convinced, that if his lordship only were firm, spite of fate he would effect it. In order then to inspire Lord Aspenly with this desirable firmness, he not unwisely believed that his best course was to exhibit him as much as possible in public places, in the character of the avowed lover of Mary Ashwoode; a position which, when once unequivocally assumed, afforded no creditable retreat, except through the gates of matrimony. It was arranged, therefore, that the young lady, under the protection of Lady Stukely, and accompanied by Lord Aspenly and Henry Ashwoode, should attend the first drawingroom at the Castle, a ceremonial which had been fixed to take place a few days subsequently to the arrival of Lord Aspenly at Morley Court. Those who have seen the Castle of Dublin only as it now stands, have beheld but the creation of the last sixty or seventy years, with the exception only of the wardrobe tower, an old grey cylinder of masonry, very dingy and dirty, which appears to have gone into half mourning for its departed companions, and presents something of the imposing character of an overgrown, mouldy bandbox. At the beginning of the last century, however, matters were very different. The trim brick buildings, with their spacious windows and symmetrical regularity of structure, which now complete the quadrangles of the castle, had not yet appeared; but in their stead masses of building, constructed with very little attention to architectural precision, either in their individual formation or in their relative position, stood ranged together, so as to form two irregular and gloomy squares. That portion of the building which was set apart for state occasions and the viceregal residence, had undergone so many repairs and modifications, that very little if any of it could have been recognized by its original builder. Not so, however, with other portions of the pile: the ponderous old towers, which have since disappeared, with their narrow loopholes and iron-studded doors looming darkly over the less massive fabrics of the place with stern and gloomy aspect, reminded the passer every moment, that the building whose courts he trod was not merely the theatre of stately ceremonies, but a fortress and a prison.

  The viceroyalty of the Earl of Wharton was within a few weeks of its abrupt termination; the approaching discomfiture of the Whigs was not, however, sufficiently clearly revealed, to thin the levees and drawingrooms of the Whig lord-lieutenant. The castle yards were, therefore, upon the occasion in question, crowded to excess with the gorgeous equipages in which the Irish aristocracy of the time delighted. The night had closed in unusual darkness, and the massive buildings, whose summits were buried in dense and black obscurity, were lighted only by the red reflected glow of crowded flambeaux and links — which, as the respective footmen, who attended the crowding chairs and coaches flourished them according to the approved fashion, scattered their wide showers of sparks into the eddying air, and illumined in a broad and ruddy glare, like that of a bonfire, the gorgeous equipages with which the square was now thronged, and the splendid figures which they successively discharged. There were coaches-and-four — outriders — running footmen and hanging footmen — crushing and rushing — jostling and swearing — and burly coachmen, with inflamed visages, lashing one another’s horses and their own. Lackeys collaring and throttling one another, all “for their master’s honour,” in the hot and disorderly dispute for precedence, and some even threatening an appeal to the swords — which, according to the barbarous fashion of the day, they carried, to the no small peril of the public and themselves. Others dragging the reins of strangers’ horses, and backing them to make way for their own — a proceeding which, of course, involved no small expenditure of blasphemy and vociferation. On the whole, it would not be easy to exaggerate the scene of riot and confusion which, under the very eye of the civil and military executive of the country, was perpetually recurring, and that, too, ostensibly in honour of the supreme head of the Irish Government.

  Through all this crash, and clatter, and brawling, and vociferation, the party whom we are bound to follow made their way with some difficulty and considerable delay.

  The Earl of Wharton with his countess, surrounded by a brilliant staff, and amid all the pomp and state of viceregal dignity, received the distinguished courtiers who thronged the castle chambers. At the time of which we write, Lord Wharton was in his seventieth year. Few, however, would have guessed his age at more than sixty, though many might have supposed it under that. He was rather a spare figure, with an erect and dignified bearing, and a
countenance which combined vivacity, goodhumour, and boldness in an eminent degree. His manners were, to those who did not know how unreal was everything in them that bore the promise of good, singularly engaging, and that in spite of a very strong spice of coarseness, and a very determined addiction to profane swearing. He had, however, in his whole air and address a kind of rollicking, goodhumoured familiarity, which was very generally mistaken for the quintessence of candour and good-fellowship, and which consequently rendered him unboundedly popular among those who were not aware of the fact that his complimentary speeches meant just nothing, and were very often followed, the moment the object of them had withdrawn, by the coarsest ridicule, and even by the grossest abuse. For the rest, he was undoubtedly an able statesman, and had clearly discerned and adroitly steered his way through the straits and perils of troublous and eventful times. He was, moreover, a steady and uncompromising Whig, upon whom, throughout a long and active life, the stain of inconsistency had never rested; a thorough partisan, a quick and ready debater, and an unscrupulous and daring political intriguer. In private, however, entirely profligate — a sensualist and an infidel, and in both characters equally without shame.

  Through the rooms there wandered a very wild, madcap boy of some ten or eleven years, venting his turbulent spirits in all kinds of mischievous pranks — sometimes planting himself behind Lord Wharton, and mimicking, with ludicrous exaggeration, which the courtly spectators had enough to do to resist, the ceremonious gestures and gracious nods of the viceroy; at other times assuming a staid and manly carriage, and chatting with his elders with the air of perfect equality, and upon subjects which one would have thought immeasurably beyond his years, and this with a sound sense, suavity, and precision which would have done honour to many grey heads in the room. This strange, bold, precocious boy of eleven was Philip, afterwards Duke of Wharton, the wonder and the disgrace of the British peerage.