about.
Some twenty paces away a man was waiting in an easy attitude. He was of the middle height, and, judged by his travelling dress and bearing, a gentleman. His face was thin, hard, and sallow of complexion, the features rather peaked, the eyes dark, and deepset beneath the brows. Without any pretension to good looks, the stranger had a certain sinister distinction—stranger, for that he was to the two men at this time, whatever he may have been to Lady Oxford. Yet George thought he had seen the man's eyes before, at Avignon, when the King was there; and Wogan later remembered his voice, perhaps at Genoa, which he had used much at one time. He stood just within the opening in the hedge, and must needs have come through the trees beyond, while Lady Oxford and her guests were discussing the Parson's good fortune.
As soon as he saw the faces turned towards him, he took off his hat, made a step forwards, and flourished a bow.
'Your ladyship's most humble and obedient servant.'
He laid a stress upon the word 'obedient,' and uttered it with a meaning smile. Lady Oxford returned his bow, but instinctively shifted her position on the bench towards Kelly, and timidly put out a hand as though she would draw him nearer.
The stranger took another step forwards. There was no change in his expression, but the step was perhaps more swiftly taken.
'Mr. George Kelly,' he said quietly, and bowed again. 'The Reverend Mr. George Kelly, I think,' and he bowed a third time, but lower, and with extreme gravity.
Wogan started as the stranger pronounced the name. Instantly the stranger turned to him.
'Ah,' said he, 'Captain Nicholas Wogan, I think,' and he took a third step. His foot struck in a tuft of grass, and he stumbled forward; he fell plump upon his knees. For a gentleman of so much dignity the attitude was sufficiently ridiculous. Wogan grinned in no small satisfaction.
'Sure, my unknown friend,' said he, 'I think something has tripped you up.'
'Yes,' said the stranger, and, as he stood up, he picked up a book from the grass.
'It is,' said he, 'a copy of Virgil.'
CHAPTER
A LITERARY DISCUSSION IN WHICH A CRITIC, NOT FOR THE FIRST TIME, TURNS THE TABLES UPON AN AUTHOR
KELLY frowned at Wogan, enjoining silence by a shake of the head. Her ladyship was still too discomposed to speak; she drew her breath in quick gasps; her colour still came fitfully and went. The only person entirely at ease in that company was the disconcerting stranger, and even behind his smiling mask of a face one was somehow aware of sleeping fires; and underneath the suave tones of his voice one somehow felt that there ran an implacable passion.
'Upon my word,' said he, 'I find myself for a wonder in the most desirable company. A revered clergyman, a fighting captain, a lady worthy of her quality, and a poet.' He tapped the Virgil as he spoke, and it fell open between his hands. His speech had been uttered with a provocative politeness, and since no one responded to the provocation, he continued in the same strain. 'The story of Dido'—the book was open at the soiled pages—'and all spluttered with tears.'
'It has lain open in the dew since yesterday,' interrupted Wogan.
'Tears no less because the night has shed them,' he replied; 'and indeed it is a sad story, though not all true as the poet relates it. For Dido had a gout-ridden husband hidden discreetly away in a dark corner of the Palace, and Æneas was no more than an army chaplain, though he gave himself out for a general.'
Kelly flushed at the words, and took half a step towards the speaker of them.
'It is very true, Mr. Kelly. A chaplain, my soul upon it, a chaplain. Didn't he invoke his religion when he was tired of the lady, and so sail away with a clear conscience? A very parsonical fellow, Mr. Kelly. O infelix Dido! he burst out, 'that met with an army chaplain, and so became food for worms before her time!'
He shut up the book with a bang, and, as ill-luck would have it, Mr. Wogan's poem peeped out from the covers as if in answer to his knock.
'Oho,' says he, 'another poet,' and he read out the dedication.
'Strephon to his Smilinda running barefoot in a gale of wind.'
Kelly laughed aloud, and a faint smile flickered for the space of a second about Lady Oxford's lips. Wogan felt his cheeks grow red, but constrained himself to a like silence with his companions. His opportunity would come later; meanwhile some knowledge was needed of who the stranger was.
'A pretty conceit,' resumed the latter, 'though consumption in its effects. Will the author pardon me?'
He took the sheet of paper in his hand, dropped the Virgil carelessly on the grass, and read out the verses with an absolute gravity which mocked at them more completely than any ridicule would have done. 'It breaks off,' he added, 'most appropriately just when the gentleman claims the lady's obedience. There is generally a break at that point. "At least, that is what I expect,"' he quoted. Then he looked at each of his two adversaries. For adversaries his language and their faces alike proved them to be. 'Now which is Strephon?' he asked, with an insinuating smile, as he calmly put the verses in his pocket. 'Is it the revered clergyman or the fighting captain?'
Kelly's face flushed darkly.
'The revered clergyman,' he broke in, and his voice shook a little, 'would be happy to be reminded of the occasion which brought him the honour of your acquaintance.'
'A sermon,' replied the stranger. 'I was much moved by a sermon which you preached in Dublin upon the text of "Render unto Cæsar the things that are Cæsar's."'
Mr. Kelly could not deny that he had preached that sermon; and for all he knew the stranger might well have been among his audience. He contented himself accordingly with a bow. So Wogan stepped in.
'And the fighting captain,' he said, with a courtesy of manner no whit inferior to his questioner's, 'would be glad to know when he ever clapped eyes upon your honour's face, if you please.'
'Never,' answered the other with a bow. 'Captain Nicholas Wogan never in his life saw the faces of those who fought behind him. He had eyes only for the enemy.'
Now, Mr. Wogan had fought upon more than one field of which he thought it imprudent to speak. So he copied the Parson's example and bowed.
'Does her ladyship also wish to be reminded of the particulars of our acquaintance?' said the stranger, turning now to Lady Oxford. There was just a tremor, a hint of passion discernible in his voice as he put the question. Both Wogan and Kelly had been waiting for it, had restrained themselves to silence in the expectation of it. For only let the outburst come, and the man's design would of a surety tumble out on the top. Lady Oxford, however, suddenly interposed and prevented it. It may be that she, too, had caught the threatening tremble of his words, and dreaded the outburst as heartily as the others desired it. At all events, she rose from the bench as though some necessity had spurred her to self-possession.
'No, Mr. Scrope,' she said calmly, 'I do not wish to be reminded of our acquaintance either in particular or in general. It was a slight thing at its warmest, and I thank God none of my seeking. Mr. Kelly, will you give me your arm to the house?'
The stranger for a second was plainly staggered by her words. Kelly cast a glance at Wogan which the 'fighting captain' very well understood, offered his arm to Lady Oxford, and before the stranger recovered himself, the pair were up the steps and proceeding down the avenue.
'A slight thing!' muttered Mr. Scrope in a sort of stupor. 'God, what's a strong thing, then?' and at that the passion broke out of him. 'It's the Parson now, is it?' he cried. 'Indeed, Mr. Wogan, a parson is very much like a cat. Whether he throws his cassock over the wall, or no, it is still the same sly, soft-footed, velvety creature, with a keen eye for a soft lap to make his bed in,' and with an oath he started at a run after Kelly. Wogan, however, ran too, and he ran the faster. He got first