Edwin Brothertoft/Part III Chapter XII

Chapter XII.
Eight o’clock, and Major Kerr sat sipping Madeira in the dining-room at Brothertoft Manor.

“What’s the use of eight candles?” he said to Voltaire.

“Only four, sir,” says the butler, depositing two branches on the table.

“I see eight, — no, sixteen. Well, let ’em burn! Economy be hanged! I say, nigger!”

“What, sir?” Voltaire perceived that his deteriorating process had been effectual. Kerr saw double and spoke thick.

“I’m tired of sitting here alone. Can’t you sing me a song?”

“I used to sing like a boblink, sir; but since I lost my front tooth the music all leaks out in dribbles. There’s a redcoat sargeant just come into the kitchen. He looks like a most a mighty powerful singer. Shall I bring him in?”

“Yes. I ain’t proud. A Kerr can associate with anybody.”

As Voltaire left the room, he picked up the Major’s sword and pistols from the sideboard. Plato was in the hall, stationed to watch the door of the parlor where the lady of the Manor was sitting solitary. His father handed him the arms. The seven seals of mystery had been opened, and Plato was deep in the plot.

“Take ’em, boy,” says Voltaire, “and be ready!”

Ready for what? Neither divined. But Plato took the weapons with dignity, and became a generalissimo in his own estimation. He brandished the sword, and made a lunge at some imaginary antagonist. Then he lifted a cocked pistol, and took aim. It was comic in the dim hall to see him going through his silent pantomime. He thrust, he parried, he dropped his point, he bowed like an accomplished master of fence. He raised a pistol, bowed graciously, as if to say, “Apres vous, Monsieur” touched trigger, assumed a look half triumph, half concern, then laid his hand upon his heart and smiled the smile of one whose wounded honor is avenged. All this was done without so much as a chuckle.

While Plato was at his noiseless gymnastics, Voltaire, through the pantry, had conducted the Sergeant into Major Kerr’s presence.

Skerrett, with his moustache off, and in a disguise a world too shrunk for his shanks and shoulders, looked much less the hero than when he first stepped forth upon these pages. Indeed, at this moment he did not feel very heroic.

He was sailing under false colors. He was acting a lie. He did not like the business, whatever the motive was. He took his seat vis-à-vis the rival Major, and thought, “If fair play is a jewel, I must give the effect of paste set in pinchbeck at this moment.”

“Glad to see you, Sargeant,” says Kerr, speaking thick. “That’s right,” — to Voltaire. “Give him some wine! Fine stuff they have in this house. Better than regulation grog, Sargeant.”

The new-comer nodded, and went at his supper vigorously.

“Goshshave th’ King, Sargn! Buppers!” says Kerr, holding up his glass aslant and spilling a little.

“Bumpers!” responded the other.

“Frustrate their politics. Confound their knavish tricks,” chanted Kerr. “Rebblstricksh, I mean, Sargn. Cuffoud ’em. Buppers!”

“Bumpers!” Skerrett rejoined, still feeling great compunction at the part he was playing.

“Sargeant,” says Kerr, “I’m going to tell you something.”

Skerrett looked attention.

“I’m going to be married to-morrow,” — spoken confidentially.

“Ah!”

“Don’t say, ‘Ah!’ Sargeant. Ah expreshes doubtsh. Say, Oh! Sargeant. I askitshpussonlefaver, Sargn. Say, Oh!”

“Oh!”

“That’s right. Oh is congratulation.” He made muddy work with the last word. “Yes, Sargeant, doocid pretty girl, doocid pretty property. Want to see her, Sargeant?”

“No, I thank you.”

“Yes, you do, Sargeant. Don’t tell me! I’m a lucky fellow, Sargeant. Always was with women. I’ll have her down in the parlor, by and by, and you can look through the crack of the door and see her. She loves me so much, Sargeant, that she’s gone up stairs to look at her wedding-dress and wish for to-morrow.”

This discourse, spoken thick, and the leer that emphasized it, quite dissipated all Major Skerrett’s scruples.

“Faugh!” thought he. “Everything is fair play against such a beast. I never comprehended before what a horror to a delicate woman must be marriage with such a creature. Life would drag on one long indignity, and every day fresh misery and fresh disgust. Faugh! sitting here and hearing him talk gives me qualms, — me, a man of the world, who have certainly had time to outgrow my squeamishness. I could not tolerate the thought of giving up any woman, even one with heart deflowered, to the degradation of this fellow’s society. He shall not have Mr. Brothertoft’s gentle daughter. No, not if I have to shoot him where he sits. No, not if I have to stab the lady.”

Peter looked at his watch. Time was not up. He was compelled to bottle his indignation and listen civilly.

Kerr grew more and more confidential in his cups. Faugh! the jokes he made! the staves he trolled! the winks he winked! the imbecile laughs he roared! the conquests he recounted in love and war! Faugh, that such brutes have sometimes dragged the pure and the gentle down to their level! Faugh, that they still grovel on our earth, so that the artist, compelled by the conditions of his work to paint such a Silenus, finds his unpleasant models thick about him, and paints under the sharp spur of personal disgust and personal harm!

The two Majors in the dining-room, the Lady of the Manor in a drowsy revery over the parlor fire, Lucy eager and trembling in her chamber, — for Voltaire has whispered that the hero has come, — Volante saddled, Plato gesticulating with sword and pistols; — now let us see what the plotters without the Manor-House are doing.