Part 9 (1/2)
Intense gravity marked the features of the groom, who stood, hat in hand, tapping the side of his top-boot with a silver-mounted riding-whip. He met Haco's steady frown with a calm and equally steady gaze of his clear grey eyes; and then, relaxing into a smile, nodded familiarly, and inquired if the weather was fine up there, bekaise, judgin' from his, (Haco's), face he would be inclined to think it must be raither cowld!
Haco smiled grimly: ”Ye was to wait an answer, was ye?”
”If I may venture to make so bowld as to say so in the presence of your highness, I was.”
”Then wait,” said Haco, smiling a little less grimly.
”Thank ye, sir, for yer kind permission,” said Dan in a tone and with an air of a.s.sumed meekness.
The skipper returned to the bed, which creaked as if taxed to its utmost, when he sat down on it, and drew Susan close to his side.
”This is from Mr Stuart, Haco,” said I, running my eye hastily over the note; ”he consents to my sending the men in your vessel, but after what you have told me--”
”Don't mind wot I told ye, Captain Bingley. I'll see Mr Stuart to-day, an'll call on you in the afternoon. The `Coffin' ain't quite so bad as she looks. Have 'ee any answer to send back?”
”No,” said I, turning to Dan, who still stood at the door tapping his right boot with a jaunty air; ”tell your master, with my compliments, that I will see him about this matter in the evening.”
”And hark'ee, lad,” cried Haco, again springing up and confronting the groom, ”d'ye see this young 'ooman?” (pointing to Susan.)
”Sure I do,” replied Dan, with a smile and a nod to Susan, ”an' a purty cratur she is, for the eye of man to rest upon.”
”And,” shouted Haco, shaking his enormous fist within an inch of the other's nose, ”d'ye see them there knuckles?”
Dan regarded them steadfastly for a moment or two without winking or flinching.
”They're a purty bunch o' fives,” he said at length, drawing back his head, and placing it a little on one side in order to view the ”bunch,”
with the air of a connoisseur; ”very purty, but raither too fat to do much damage in the ring. I should say, now, that it would get `puffy'
at the fifth round, supposin' that you had wind and pluck left, at your time of life, to survive the fourth.”
”Well now, lad,” retorted the skipper, ”all I've to say is, that you've seed it, an' if you don't mind yer eye ye'll _feel_ it. `A nod's as good as a wink to a blind horse.'”
Haco plunged the ”bunch of fives” into his coat-pocket, and sat down again beside his agitated daughter.
”I can speak purfessionally,” said Dan, ”in regard to yer last obsarvation consarnin' blind hosses, and I belave that ye're c'rect. It _don't_ much matter whether ye nod or wink to a blind hoss; though I can't spake from personal exparience 'caise I niver tried it on, not havin' nothin' to do with blind hosses. Ye wouldn't have a weed, would ye, skipper?” he added, pulling out a neat leather case from which he drew a cigar!
”Go away, Dan, directly,” said I with some asperity, for I was nettled at the impudence of the man in my presence, and not a little alarmed lest the angry Haco should kick him down-stairs.
Dan at once obeyed, bowing respectfully to me, and, as I observed, winking to Susan as he turned away. He descended the stair in silence, but we heard him open the door of the public room and address the Russians, who were a.s.sembled there, warming themselves at the fire, and enjoying their pipes.
”Hooray! my hearties,” said Dan; ”got yer broken legs rewived I hope, and yer spurrits bandaged up? Hey,--och! I forgot ye can swaller nothin' but Toorko--c.u.m, squaki lorum ho po, doddie jairum frango whiskie looro--whack?--eh! Arrah! ye don't need to answer for fear the effort opens up yer wounds afresh. Farewell, lads, or may be it's wis.h.i.+n' ye fair-wind would be more nat'ral.”
So saying he slammed the door, and we heard him switching his boots as he pa.s.sed along the street under the windows, whistling the air of ”The girls we left behind us,” followed, before he was quite out of earshot, by ”Oh my love is like the red red rose, that's newly sprung in June.”
Immediately after Dan's departure I left Haco and Susan together, and they held the following conversation when left alone. I am enabled to report it faithfully, reader, because Susan told it word for word to her mistress, who has a very reprehensible habit of listening to the gossip of her maid. Of course Mrs B told it to me, because she tells everything to me, sometimes a good deal more than I care to hear. This I think a very reprehensible habit also. I am bound to listen, because when my strong-minded wife begins to talk I might as well try to stop a runaway locomotive as attempt to silence her. And so it comes about that I am now making the thing public!
”Susan,” said Haco, earnestly looking at his daughter's downcast face, on which the tell tale blood was mantling. ”Are you fond o' that--that feller?”
”Ye-yes, father,” replied Susan, with some hesitation.
”Humph! an' is he fond o' _you_?”