"He's gone off with Mark to Larne. They said they 'd not be back to dinner."
"Here's more of it; we shall have this foreign fellow on our hands till he comes,--this Italian Count. I found him at M'Grotty's, and brought him back with me."
"And what is he like? is he as captivating as his portrait bespeaks?"
"He is, to my mind, as vulgar a dog as ever I met: he smoked beside me all the road, though he saw how his vile tobacco set me a-coughing; and he stretched his legs over the front seat of the carriage, where, I promise you, his boots have left their impress on the silk lining; and he poked his cane at Crattle's wig, and made some impertinent remark which I could n't catch. I never was very enthusiastic about foreigners, and the present specimen has not made a convert of me."
"Maitland likes him," said she, languidly.
"Well, then, it is an excellent reason not to like Maitland. There's the second bell already. By the way, this Count, I suppose, takes you in to dinner?"
"I suppose so, and it is very unpleasant, for I am out of the habit of talking French. I 'll make Alice sit on the other side of him and entertain him."
The news that the distinguished Italian friend of Mr. Norman Maitland had arrived created a sort of sensation in the house; and as the guests dropped into the drawing-room before dinner, there was no other topic than the Count. The door at last opened for his _entree_; and he came in unannounced, the servant being probably unable to catch the name he gave. In the absence of her father and mother, Mrs. Trafford did the honors, and received him most courteously, presenting the other guests to him, or him to them, as it might be. When it came to the turn of the Commodore, he started, and muttered, "Eh, very like, the born image of him!" and coloring deeply at his own awkwardness, mumbled out a few unmeaning commonplaces. As for the Major, he eyed him with one of his steadiest stares,--unflinching, un-blenching; and even said to Mrs. Trafford in a whisper, "I didn't catch the name; was it Green you said?" Seated between Lady Lyle and Mrs. Trafford, M'Caskey felt that he was the honored guest of the evening: Maitland's absence, so feelingly deplored by the others, gave him little regret; indeed, instinct told him that they were not men to like each other, and he was all the happier that he had the field for a while his own. It was not a very easy task to be the pleasant man of an Irish country-house, in a foreign tongue; but if any man could have success, it was M'Caskey. The incessant play of his features, the varied tones of his voice, his extraordinary gestures, appealed to those who could not follow his words, and led them very often to join in the laughter which his sallies provoked from others. He was, it is true, the exact opposite to all they had been led to expect,--he was neither well-looking, nor distinguished, nor conciliatory in manner,--there was not a trace of that insinuating softness and gentleness Maitland had spoken of,--he was, even to those who could not follow his speech, one of the most coolly unabashed fellows they had ever met, and made himself at home with a readiness that said much more for his boldness than for his breeding; and yet, withal, each was pleased in turn to see how he out-talked some heretofore tyrant of conversation, how impudently he interrupted a bore, and how mercilessly he pursued an antagonist whom he had vanquished. It is not at all improbable, too, that he owed something of bis success to that unconquerable objection people feel at confessing that they do not understand a foreign language,--the more when that language is such a cognate one as French. What a deal of ecstasy does not the polite world expend upon German drama and Italian tragedy, and how frequently are people moved to every imaginable emotion, without the slightest clew to the intention of the charmer! If he was great at the dinner-table, he was greater in the drawing-room. Scarcely was coffee served than he was twanking away with a guitar, and singing a Spanish muleteer song, with a jingling imitation of bells for the accompaniment; or seated at the piano, he carolled out a French canzonette descriptive of soldier life, far more picturesque than it was proper; and all this time there was the old Commodore cruising above and below him, eying and watching him,--growing perfectly feverish with the anxiety of his doubts, and yet unable to confirm or refute them. It was a suspicious craft; he felt that he had seen it before, and knew the rig well, and yet he was afraid to board and say, "Let me look at your papers."