“I must confess I should like to see her!” exclaimed Mr. Usher.
“An’, sure, what’s to hinder ye? That’s aisy enough, if ye will give yerself the trouble to walk up some afternoon to Foley’s farm; there ye will see Mary herself standing in the doorway, ready for a word and a joke, and the house behind her just anyhow! She has no great heart for work, though she has a kind heart for the poor, and all the dumb creatures.”
“Well, you have told me a most interesting story,” said Mr. Usher, as he came to a halt, “and I shall do my best to make the acquaintance of Mary Foley. Look here!” he added, as if struck by a sudden thought, “don’t say a word of what you’ve been telling me, to your wife. Women talk.”
“Sure, man alive, don’t I know that, when I’ve buried three!”
“Three wives?” repeated the old bachelor incredulously. “Three?”
“Yes, faix--and all had a bit in the bank.”
“Then you must be what they call a warm man.”
“Augh, not at all”--with a gesture of repudiation--“what with bringing them home, and putting them out, they cost me a sight of money! As for what I’m after telling ye, sir, ’tis Bible truth, and here our roads goes different ways. Augh, not at all!” he exclaimed. “Sure, I would not be taking your silver, sor--it was a relief to me to spake. Well, well, then, I’ll not say agin the tobacco! I’m thankful fer your company and yer kindness to a bothered old man, listening to his quare, foolish talk”; and, with a hasty nod, Mike turned his back on Mr. Usher and hobbled away.
“But was it all quare, foolish talk?” the lawyer asked himself, as he stood gazing after the retreating figure. “Was it one of two things: a mere ‘mare’s nest,’ or ‘a pretty kettle of fish’?”
He was, by one of the strange coincidences (which really occur more frequently than is supposed), Lord Mulgrave’s solicitor, agent, and man of business. Five-and-twenty years previously he had succeeded his father in the same responsible and lucrative billet. Mr. Usher remembered perfectly, and with a poignant regret, the first Lady Mulgrave, a truly exquisite creature. Her reception by the family had been cool and suspicious; she brought but a small fortune, and she was half French: a member of a great race (ruined and scattered by the Terror), the head of which, on small means, and in a contracted circle, still endeavoured to maintain their ancient pride and traditions.