One autumn evening the noise of a passing vehicle brought me to the window, and I saw a carriage pull up at the Rose and Crown. My unele had been about to inflict one of his unwelcome visits on his brother; but he stopped in the street, peering after the post-chaise, until he saw the passenger alight and enter the inn. The commonest occurrences never failed to excite his curiosity; and in a village where a stranger was rarely seen, the arrival of one who travelled post, was indeed an event that caused a general sensation.
“I wonder who that chap is who put up at Jobson’s. All I could make out was that he was wrapped up in a blue cloak, and wore a cap with a gold band and tassel. I wish I knew his name, and what his business is,” and the lawyer having settled himself upon a chair, took hold of the Geneva bottle, and proceeded to compound his punch. “You heard,” he continued, “that the Hotham bank failed yesterday? Smith, the grocer, round the corner, had a hundred in their notes. He’s ruined!--serve him right. What business had he to take them?”
“May Heaven comfort him, poor fellow!” ejaculated the quartermaster. “More is the pity that misfortune should light upon an honest and industrious man, with a young family to support, and his wife dying of consumption. From the bottom of my heart I pity him.”
“That’s a nice business of Patty Meadows’s, too. I always foretold what would happen.”
“It’s a villanous fabrication!” exclaimed my father, passionately; “I don’t believe a syllable of the story.”
“All true,” returned the lawyer, “all true. Last Saturday evening, George Gripe, my clerk, heard the squire’s voiee as he passed the garden; so he clapped his ear close to the fence, and--”
“I wish to Heaven it had been nailed against the paling,” said the soldier; “the sneaking eaves-dropping scoundrel! Were I to catch him skulking about my house, I would break every rib in his carcase.”
“Ay, and render yourself liable to an action. Gripp would get sweeping damages.”
“Curse your damages!” returned the quarter-master. “Every body wonders that you employ a ruffian who swears black or white as bidden, and swallows oaths as he would bolt poached eggs.”
“I keep him,” said the lawyer, coolly, “because he’s useful. What capital stuff that Hollands is? Does Bill run it?”