The Tenants of Malory. Volume 1. Le Fanu Joseph Sheridan

at night, like the ghost in "Hamlet," and never speaks, and there's a beautiful young lady, and a gray old woman who calls herself Anne Sheckleton. They shut themselves up so closely – you can't imagine. Some people think the old man is a maniac or a terrible culprit."

      "Highly probable," said Tom; "and the old woman a witch, and the young lady a vampire."

      "Well, hardly that," laughed Miss Agnes, "for they came to church to-day."

      "How you can both talk such folly," interposed Miss Charity.

      "But you know they would not let Mr. Pritchard up to the house," pleaded Miss Agnes. "Mr. Pritchard, the curate, you know" – this was to Tom Sedley – "he's a funny little man – he preached to-day – very good and zealous, and all that – and he wanted to push his way up to the house, and the cross old man they have put to keep the gate, took him by the collar, and was going to beat him. Old Captain Shrapnell says he did beat him with a child's cricket-bat; but he hates Mr. Pritchard, so I'm not sure; but, at all events, he was turned out in disgrace, and blushes and looks dignified ever since whenever Malory is mentioned. Now, everyone here knows what a good little man poor Mr. Pritchard is, so it must have been sheer hatred of religion that led to his being turned out in that way."

      "But the ladies were in church, my dear Aggie; we saw them, Mr. Sedley, to-day; they were in the Malory pew."

      "Oh, indeed?" said Tom Sedley, artfully; "and you saw them pretty distinctly, I dare say."

      "The young lady is quite beautiful, we thought. I'm so sorry you were not in our seat; though, indeed, people ought not to be staring about them in church; but you would have admired her immensely."

      "Oh, I saw them. They were the people nearly opposite to the Verneys' seat, in the small pew? Yes, they were– that is, the young lady, I mean, was perfectly lovely," said little Tom, who could not with any comfort practise a reserve.

      "See, the people are beginning to hurry off to church; it must be time to go," said Charity.

      So the little party walked up by the court-house into Castle Street, and turned into quaint old Church Street, walking demurely, and talking very quietly to the solemn note of the old bell.

      CHAPTER V

      A VISIT TO HAZELDEN

      They all looked toward the Malory seat on taking their places in their own; but that retreat was deserted now, and remained so, as Tom Sedley at very brief intervals ascertained, throughout the afternoon service; after which, with a secret sense of disappointment, honest Sedley escorted the Etherage "girls" up the steep road that leads through the wooded glen of Hazelden to the hospitable house of old Vane Etherage.

      Everyone in that part of the world knows that generous, pompous, and boisterous old gentleman. You could no more visit Cardyllian without seeing Vane Etherage, than you could visit Naples without seeing Vesuvius. He is a fine portly bust, but little more. In his waking hours he lives alternately in his Bath chair and in the great leathern easy chair in his study. He manages to shuffle very slowly, leaning upon his servant on one side, and propped on his crutch at the other, across the hall of the Cardyllian Club, which boasts about six-and-thirty members, besides visitors, and into the billiard-room, where he takes possession of the chair by the fire, and enjoys the agreeable conversation of Captain Shrapnell, hears all about the new arrivals, who they are, what screws are loose, and where, and generally all the gossip and scandal of the little commonwealth of Cardyllian.

      Vane Etherage had served in the navy, and, I believe, reached the rank of captain. In Cardyllian he was humorously styled "the Admiral," when people spoke of him, not to him; for old Etherage was fiery and consequential, and a practical joke which commenced in a note from an imaginary secretary, announcing that "The Badger Hunt" would meet at Hazelden House on a certain day, and inducing hospitable preparations, for the entertainment of those nebulous sportsmen, was like to have had a sanguinary ending. It was well remembered that when young Sniggers of Sligh Farm apologised on that occasion, old Etherage had arranged with Captain Shrapnell, who was to have been his second, that the Admiral was to fight in his Bath chair – an evidence of resource and resolution which was not lost upon his numerous friends.

      "How do you do, Sedley? Very glad to see you, Tom – very glad indeed, sir. You'll come to-morrow and dine; you must, indeed – and next day. You know our Welsh mutton – you do – you know it well; it's better here than in any other place in the world – in the whole world, sir – the Hazelden mutton, and, egad, you'll come here – you shall, sir – and dine here with us to-morrow; mind, you shall."

      The Admiral wore a fez, from beneath which his gray hair bushed out rather wildly, and he was smoking through an enormous pipe as Tom Sedley entered his study, accompanied by the ladies.

      "He says he's to go away to-morrow," said Miss Charity, with an upbraiding look at Sedley.

      "Pooh – nonsense – not he– not you, Tom – not a bit, sir. We won't let you. Girls, we won't allow him to go. Eh? – No – no – you dine here to-morrow, and next day."

      "You're very kind, sir; but I promised, if I am still in Cardyllian to-morrow, to run over to Ware, and dine with Verney."

      "What Verney?"

      "Cleve Verney."

      "D – him."

      "Oh, papa!" exclaimed Miss Charity, grimly.

      "Boh! – I hate him – I hate all the Verneys," bawled old Vane Etherage, as if hating were a duty and a generosity.

      "Oh – no, papa – you know you don't – that would be extremely wicked," said Miss Charity, with that severe superiority with which she governed the Admiral.

      "Begad, you're always telling me I'm wicked – and we know where the wicked go – that's catechism, I believe – so I'd like to know where's the difference between that and d – ing a fellow?" exclaimed the portly bust, and blew off his wrath with a testy laugh.

      "I think we had better put off our bonnets and coats? – The language is becoming rather strong – and the tobacco," said Miss Charity, with dry dignity, to her sister, leaving the study as she did so.

      "I thought it might be that Kiffyn Verney – the uncle fellow – Honourable Kiffyn Verney —dis-honourable, I call him – that old dog, sir, he's no better than a cheat – and I'd be glad of an opportunity to tell him so to his face, sir – you have no idea, sir, how he has behaved to me!"

      "He has the character of being a very honourable, sir – I'm sorry you think so differently," said honest Tom Sedley, who always stood up for his friends, and their kindred – "and Cleve, I've known from my childhood, and I assure you, sir, a franker or more generous fellow I don't suppose there is on earth."

      "I know nothing about the jackanape, except that he's nephew of his roguish uncle," said the florid old gentleman with the short high nose and double chin. "He wants to take up Llanderis, and he shan't have it. He's under covenant to renew the lease, and the devil of it is, that between me and Wynne Williams we have put the lease astray – and I can't find it – nor he either – but it will turn up – I don't care two-pence about it – but no one shall humbug me – I won't be gammoned, sir, by all the Verneys in England. Stuff– sir!"

      Then the conversation took a happier turn. The weather was sometimes a little squally with the Admiral – but not often – genial and boisterous – on the whole sunny and tolerably serene – and though he sometimes threatened high and swore at his servants, they knew it did not mean a great deal, and liked him.

      People who lived all the year round in Cardyllian, which from November to May, every year, is a solitude, fall into those odd ways and little self-indulgences which gradually metamorphose men of the world into humorists and grotesques. Given a sparse population, and difficult intercommunication, which in effect constitute solitude, and you have the conditions of barbarism. Thus it was that Vane Etherage had grown uncouth to a degree that excited the amazement of old contemporaries who happened, from time to time, to look in upon his invalided retirement at Cardyllian.

      The