He was on the point of breaking out into a still worse passion, but
controlled himself. "A clergyman!" he cried: "I would as soon see the
undertaker. What could he do but tell me I was going to be damned--a
fact I know better than he can? That is, if it's not all an invention
of the cloth, as, in my soul, I believe it is. I've said so any time
these forty years."
"Oh, my lord! my lord! do not fling away your last hope."
"You imagine me to have a chance, then? Good soul! you don't know any
better."
"The Lord is merciful."
The marquis laughed--that is, he tried, failed, and grinned.
"Mr. Cairns is in the dining-room, my lord."
"Bah! A low pettifogger, with the soul of a bullock. Don't let me hear
the fellow's name. I've been bad enough, God knows, but I haven't sunk
to the level of _his_ help yet. If he's God Almighty's factor, and the
saw holds, 'Like master, like man,' well, I would rather have nothing
to do with either."
"That is, if you had the choice, my lord," said Mrs. Courthope, her
temper yielding somewhat, though in truth his speech was not half so
irreverent as it seemed to her.
"Tell him to go to hell. No, don't: set him down to a bottle of port
and a great sponge-cake, and you needn't tell him to go to heaven,
for he'll be there already. Why, Mrs. Courthope, the fellow isn't a
gentleman. And yet all he cares for the cloth is that he thinks it
makes a gentleman of him--as if anything in heaven, earth or hell
could work that miracle!"
In the middle of the night, as Malcolm sat by his bed, thinking
him asleep, the marquis spoke suddenly.
Pages:
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177