CHAPTER XLVIII.
SWANS ON THE WATER.
At about half-past six that evening, Puddock arrived at Captain Cluffe's
lodgings, and for the last time the minstrels rehearsed their lovelorn
and passionate ditties. They were drest 'all in their best,' under that
outer covering, which partly for mystery and partly for bodily
comfort—the wind, after the heavy rains of the last week, having come
round to the east—these prudent troubadours wore.
Though they hardly glanced at the topic to one another, each had his
delightful anticipations of the chances of the meeting. Puddock did not
value Dangerfield a rush, and Cluffe's mind was pretty easy upon that
point from the moment his proposal for Gertrude Chattesworth had taken
wind.
Only for that cursed shower the other night, that made it incumbent on
Cluffe, who had had two or three sharp little visits of his patrimonial
gout, and no notion of dying for love, to get to his quarters as quickly
as might be—he had no doubt that the last stave of their first duet
rising from the meadow of Belmont, with that charming roulade—devised
by Puddock, and the pathetic twang-twang of his romantic instrument, would have been answered by the opening of the drawing-room window, and Aunt Becky's imperious summons to the serenaders to declare themselves, and come in and partake of supper!
The only thing that at all puzzled him, unpleasantly connected with that
unsuccessful little freak of musical love-making, was the fellow they
saw getting away from under the open window—the very same at which
Lilias Walsingham had unintentionally surprised her friend Gertrude. He
had a surtout on, with the cape cut exactly after the fashion of
Dangerfield, and a three-cocked hat with very pinched corners, in the
French style, which identical hat Cluffe was ready to swear he saw upon
Dangerfield's head very early one morning, as he accidentally espied him
viewing his peas and tulips in the little garden of the Brass Castle by
the river side.
'Twas fixed, in fact, in Cluffe's mind that Dangerfield was the man; and
what the plague need had a declared lover of any such clandestine
manoeuvres. Was it possible that the old scoundrel was, after all, directing his night visits differently, and keeping the aunt in play, as a reserve, in the event of the failure of his suit to the niece? Plans as gross, he knew, had succeeded; old women were so devilish easily won, and loved money too, so well sometimes.
These sly fellows agreed that they must not go to Belmont by
Chapelizod-bridge, which would lead them through the town, in front of
the barrack, and under the very sign-board of the Phoenix. No, they
would go by the Knockmaroon-road, cross the river by the ferry, and
unperceived, and unsuspected, enter the grounds of Belmont on the
further side.
So away went the amorous musicians, favoured by the darkness, and
talking in an undertone, and thinking more than they talked, while
little Puddock, from under his cloak, scratched a faint little arpeggio
and a chord, ever and anon, upon 'the inthrument.'
When they reached the ferry, the boat was tied at the near side, but
deuce a ferryman could they see. So they began to shout and hallo, singly, and together, until Cluffe, in much ire and disgust, exclaimed—
'Curse the sot—drunk in some whiskey-shop—the blackguard! That is the
way such scoundrels throw away their chances, and help to fill the high
roads with beggars and thieves; curse him, I sha'n't have a note left if
we go on bawling this way. I suppose we must go home again.'
'Fiddle-thtick!' exclaimed the magnanimous Puddock. 'I pulled myself
across little more than a year ago, and 'twas as easy as—as—anything. Get in, an' loose her when I tell you.'
This boat was managed by means of a rope stretched across the stream
from bank to bank; seizing which, in both hands, the boatman, as he
stood in his skiff, hauled it, as it seemed, with very moderate exertion
across the river.
Cluffe chuckled as he thought how sold the rascally boatman would be, on
returning, to find his bark gone over to the other side.