"My Novel" — Volume 01

MRS. DALE.—"I wonder the squire does not ask Signor Riccabocca here more often. Such an acquisition we find him!"

The squire's voice from the card-table.—"Whom ought I to ask more often, Mrs. Dale?"

Parson's voice, impatiently.—"Come, come, come, squire: play to my queen of diamonds,—do!"

SQUIRE.—"There, I trump it! pick up the trick, Mrs. H."

PARSON.—"Stop! Stop! trump my diamond?"

THE CAPTAIN (solemnly).—"'Trick turned; play on, Squire."

SQUIRE.—"The king of diamonds."

MRS. HAZELDEAN.—"Lord! Hazeldean, why, that's the most barefaced revoke,—ha, ha, ha! trump the queen of diamonds and play out the king! well, I never! ha, ha, ha!"

CAPTAIN BARNABAS (in tenor).—"Ha, ha, ha!"

SQUIRE.—"Ho, ho, ho! bless my soul! ho, ho, ho!"

CAPTAIN BARNABAS (in bass).—"Ho, ho, ho!"

Parson's voice raised, but drowned by the laughter of his adversaries and the firm, clear tone of Captain Barnabas.—"Three to our score!—game!"

SQUIRE (wiping his eyes).—"No help for it; Harry, deal for me. Whom ought I to ask, Mrs. Dale?" (Waxing angry.) "First time I ever heard the hospitality of Hazeldean called in question!"

MRS. DALE.—"My dear sir, I beg a thousand pardons, but listeners—you know the proverb."

SQUIRE (growling like a bear).—"I hear nothing but proverbs ever since we had that Mounseer among us. Please to speak plainly, ma'am."

Mrs. DALE (sliding into a little temper at being thus roughly accosted). —"It was of Mounseer, as you call him, that I spoke, Mr. Hazeldean."

SQUIRE.—"What! Rickeybockey?"

MRS. DALE (attempting the pure Italian accentuation).—"Signor Riccabocca."

PARSON (slapping his cards on the table in despair).—"Are we playing at whist, or are we not?"

The squire, who is fourth player, drops the king to Captain Higginbotham's lead of the ace of hearts. Now the captain has left queen, knave, and two other hearts, four trumps to the queen, and nothing to win a trick with in the two other suits. This hand is therefore precisely one of those in which, especially after the fall of that king of hearts in the adversary's hand, it becomes a matter of reasonable doubt whether to lead trumps or not. The captain hesitates, and not liking to play out his good hearts with the certainty of their being trumped by the squire, nor, on the other hand, liking to open the other suits, in which he has not a card that can assist his partner, resolves, as becomes a military man in such dilemma, to make a bold push and lead out trumps in the chance of finding his partner strong and so bringing in his long suit.

SQUIRE (taking advantage of the much meditating pause made by the captain).—"Mrs. Dale, it is not my fault. I have asked Rickeybockey,— time out of mind. But I suppose I am not fine enough for those foreign chaps. He'll not come,—that's all I know."

PARSON (aghast at seeing the captain play out trumps, of which he, Mr. Dale, has only two, wherewith he expects to ruff the suit of spades, of which he has only one, the cards all falling in suits, while he has not a single other chance of a trick in his hand).—"Really, Squire, we had better give up playing if you put out my partner in this extraordinary way,—jabber, jabber, jabber!"

SQUIRE.—"Well, we must be good children, Harry. What!—trumps, Barney? Thank ye for that!" And the squire might well be grateful, for the unfortunate adversary has led up to ace king knave, with two other trumps. Squire takes the parson's ten with his knave, and plays out ace king; then, having cleared all the trumps except the captain's queen and his own remaining two, leads off tierce major in that very suit of spades of which the parson has only one,—and the captain, indeed, but two,— forces out the captain's queen, and wins the game in a canter.

PARSON (with a look at the captain which might have become the awful brows of Jove, when about to thunder).—"That, I suppose, is the new- fashioned London play! In my time the rule was, 'First save the game, then try to win it.'"

CAPTAIN.—"Could not save it, sir."

PARSON (exploding)—"Not save it!—two ruffs in my own hand,—two tricks certain till you took them out! Monstrous! The rashest trump."—Seizes the cards, spreads them on the table, lip quivering, hands trembling, tries to show how five tricks could have been gained,—N.B. It is /short/ whist which Captain Barnabas had introduced at the Hall,—can't make out more than four; Captain smiles triumphantly; Parson in a passion, and not at all convinced, mixes all the cards together again, and falling back in his chair, groans, with tears in his voice.—"The cruellest trump! the most wanton cruelty!"

The Hazeldeans in chorus.—"Ho, ho, ho! Ha, ha, ha!" The captain, who does not laugh this time, and whose turn it is to deal, shuffles the cards for the conquering game of the rubber with as much caution and prolixity as Fabius might have employed in posting his men. The squire gets up to stretch his legs, and, the insinuation against his hospitality recurring to his thoughts, calls out to his wife, "Write to Rickeybockey to-morrow yourself, Harry, and ask him to come and spend two or three days here. There, Mrs. Dale, you hear me?"

"Yes," said Mrs. Dale, putting her hands to her ears in implied rebuke at the loudness of the squire's tone. "My dear sir, do remember that I'm a sad nervous creature."

"Beg pardon," muttered Mr. Hazeldean, turning to his son, who having got tired of the caricatures, had fished out for himself the great folio County History, which was the only book in the library that the squire much valued, and which he usually kept under lock and key, in his study, together with the field-books and steward's accounts, but which he had reluctantly taken into the drawing-room that day, in order to oblige Captain Higginbotham. For the Higginbothams—an old Saxon family, as the name evidently denotes—had once possessed lands in that very county; and the captain, during his visits to Hazeldean Hall, was regularly in the habit of asking to look into the County History, for the purpose of refreshing his eyes, and renovating his sense of ancestral dignity, with the following paragraph therein:

To the left of the village of Dunder, and pleasantly situated in a hollow, lies Botham Hall, the residence of the ancient family of Higginbotham, as it is now commonly called. Yet it appears by the county rolls, and sundry old deeds, that the family formerly styled itself Higges, till the Manor House lying in Botham, they gradually assumed the appellation of Higges-in-Botham, and in process of time, yielding to the corruptions of the vulgar, Higginbotham."

"What, Frank! my County History!" cried the squire. "Mrs. H., he has got my County History!"

"Well, Hazeldean, it is time he should know something about the county."

"Ay, and history too," said Mrs. Dale, malevolently, for the little temper was by no means blown over.

FRANK.—"I'll not hurt it, I assure you, sir. But I'm very much interested just at present."

THE CAPTAIN (putting down the cards to cut).—"You've got hold of that passage about Botham Hall, page 706, eh?"

FRANK.—"No; I was trying to make out how far it is to Mr. Leslie's place, Rood Hall. Do you know, Mother?"

MRS. HAZELDEAN.—"I can't say I do. The Leslies don't mix with the county; and Rood lies very much out of the way."

FRANK.—"Why don't they mix with the county?"

MRS. HAZELDEAN.—"I believe they are poor, and therefore I suppose they are proud; they are an old family."

PARSON (thrumming on the table with great impatience).—" Old fiddle- dee!—talking of old families when the cards have been shuffled this half-hour!"

CAPTAIN BARNABAS.—"Will you cut for your partner, ma'am?"

SQUIRE (who has been listening to Frank's inquiries with a musing air).— "Why do you want to know the distance to Rood Hall?"

FRANK (rather hesitatingly).—"Because Randal Leslie is there for the holidays, sir."

PARSON.—-"Your wife has cut for you, Mr. Hazeldean. I don't think it was quite fair; and my partner has turned up a deuce,—deuce of hearts. Please to come and play, if you mean to play."

The squire returns to the table, and in a few minutes the game is decided by a dexterous finesse of the captain against the Hazeldeans. The clock strikes ten; the servants enter with a tray; the squire counts up his own and his wife's losings; and the captain and parson divide sixteen shillings between them.

SQUIRE.—"There, Parson, I hope you'll be in a better humour. You win enough out of us to set up a coach-and-four."

"Tut!" muttered the parson; "at the end of the year, I'm not a penny the richer for it all."

And, indeed, monstrous as that assertion seemed, it was perfectly true, for the parson portioned out his gains into three divisions. One-third he gave to Mrs. Dale, for her own special pocket-money; what became of the second third he never owned even to his better half,—but certain it was, that every time the parson won seven-and-sixpence, half-a-crown, which nobody could account for, found its way to the poor-box; while the remaining third, the parson, it is true, openly and avowedly retained; but I have no manner of doubt that, at the year's end, it got to the poor quite as safely as if it had been put into the box.

The party had now gathered round the tray, and were helping themselves to wine and water, or wine without water,—except Frank, who still remained poring over the map in the County History, with his head leaning on his hands, and his fingers plunged in his hair.

"Frank," said Mrs. Hazeldean, "I never saw you so studious before."