Delphi Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu

by J. Sheridan le Fanu

  At the same instant the Lord Lieutenant, having made up his mind to retire, rose with much dignity, and received a large lemon on his back; and I myself saw a mutton kidney in the eye of the Attorney-General, in the box opposite to ours.

  It was indeed high time for all who had ladies to look after to beat a retreat, and we were soon in the corridor, and making our way down the stairs. Theodora was on my arm. I was afraid she might faint before we got her into the coach.

  “Are you ill?” I whispered, squeezing her arm gently to the lapel of my coat with my elbow. “I hope you were not very much frightened?”

  Upon this the channing girl treated me to a dazzling stare of her fine black eyes, and burst out laughing.

  “Ah! Then, is it what you’re jokin’ me, you are, Mr. Toole?” says she. “Affeard, indeed! I wish you saw the stones and claealpins hoppin’ on and off the boys’ polls at the Fair of Killbattery. Ha, ha! Papa’s nothing the worse, ye see; and, indeed, the smack of it took a start out of me, for I only saw it with the corner of my eye, and I could not tell but it was a paving-stone was in it, and the pulp flying out alarmed me for a moment for the dear man’s brains. And mamma got it, too; that was a cat, or my name’s not Theodora. Mamma! Who’s she with? Oh, Mundy, I see. Mamma, dear, how’s your head?”

  “Bad enough, joole,” rejoined Mrs. Molloy. My beautiful turbot’s rooned and smathered on my head!”

  The people who looked round to see who the speaker was who had suffered in so unusual a way, beheld Mrs. Molloy with old Molloy’s red and yellow silk pockethandkerchief tied under her chin, holding her wig and turban down in their place, and looking, certainly, not unlike that class of ladies who used to carry flat-fish on their heads, and certainly I did feel a little bashful about her, for one side of her wig was dangling from under Molloy’s handkerchief between her shoulders, and the Figgesses, who were coming down the stairs behind us, were laughing like hyænas. I don’t think there was an unlucky thing happened to us that night but the eyes of that same beastly family were upon us.

  I was thankful when Mrs. Molloy was shut up in her hack coach, and her daughter, her husband, and myself in ours.

  We had all recovered our spirits by the time we had reached our destination on Ormond Quay. Up the stairs we stumbled, talking all together, and into the front drawingroom, where Juggy Hanlon had already lighted candles. Mrs. Molloy slipped quietly upstairs to restore her distracted head to order, while we talked on in the room where we had first mustered, and we could hear the servants tramping up and down the back drawingroom, clinking plates, and jingling spoons and knives and forks, and squabbling in loud and voluble accents over the arrangement of the supper.

  “Mr. Lieutenant Kramm has just been telling me, Miss Theodora, that your music is all that I should have anticipated,” said I, “would it be asking too great a favour from a nightingale to sing us a song from the perch of that music-stool, and to accompany itself with a few harmonious touches of that forte-piano?”

  I give you this pretty speech in full, to show you how much pains I was taking to gain the beautiful creature’s heart.

  “Lieutenant Kramm says more than his prayers, I’m afraid,” says she, sitting down carelessly before the instrument. “Not that I sing like a nightingale, for I know very well that I don’t.”

  But she looked all the time as if she thought that she did.

  “You don’t sing like the nightingale in this one respect,” said I, “that you excel it beyond all calculation.”

  “I don’t mind a word you’re saying, Mr. Toole; I think it’s what you want to make a fool of me,” said the young lady.

  “Miss Molloy does not sing like the nightingale for all listeners,” says Kramm, “only for her particular friends.

  “That’s it, I hope,” said I, “and I devoutly entreat that I may be included among the number.”

  “Sing that glorious thing you astonished me with the other morning,” said Mundy, joining the chorus of supplication. “If you don’t, I’ll beg of Mr. Molloy to use his influence as a father.”

  “Well, then, I suppose I may as well,” says she. I’ll sing you one of Tommy Moore’s melodies.”

  And, by the powers, so she did! She struck up on the piano, and I was delighted and, I do assure you, half-frightened by the power of her voice. Since I heard old “Whisky Tay” in the black-hole I had never listened to anything in the way of music half so loud! She had a way of throwing her voice into the words and swelling them out, that I never heard equalled; and when she came to the part:

  “The mo-hoon hid her li-hight,

  In the heavens that ni-hi-hight,

  And wept behind a clou-houd,

  O’er the maiden’s shee-aim.”

  I was perfectly ravished.

  “More power! My blessing! May I never, but that teas singing!” said I, in a state of extraordinary enthusiasm; and I do assure yon I hardly knew whether I was on my head or my heels. “Thank yon! thank you!! THANK YOU!!!” I cried with growing fervour. “God bless yon, my darling Miss Theodora, that was astonishing!”

  Mundy was laughing all this time with a “Ha! ha! ha!” and no more disguise than he would at a clown in a circus.

  “What are you laughing at, Mundy?” said J, turning on him as if I’d eat him up, with a stamp on the floor, for which I afterwards apologised to Miss Molloy, for it raised such a dust between me and Mundy I could scarcely see him, and I heard the young lady blowing and phewing, and slapping her hair with her pockethandkerchief; and old Molloy was taken with a fit of coughing.

  “Laughing!” says Mundy. “Ha! ha! ha! phew! I say, where’s the good of smothering us? Ha! ha! ha! why, man, I tell you it is — ha! ha! ha! — hys-sis-sis-sisterical — ha! ha! ha! I can’t help it, I tell you, I — ha! ha! ha! — have a sort of trembling inside whenever I’m very much moved. Miss Molloy knows all about it. Don’t be a fool; I told her long ago. I’ve had it on parade, and at funerals, and at divine service, by Jove, and I’ll not be cross-questioned, nor bamboozled, nor made more nervous by any man living. You believe me, Miss Molloy, and that’s all I care about.”

  “Ah! Be quiet, Toole, will ye?” It was the first time she called me by my surname, and I felt so happy I could have forgiven Mundy if he had pulled me by the nose. “It’s true for him; he does really — he laughs whenever he’s near cryin’. It happened to myself once, when I was getting well o’ the swine-pock. Sure didn’t I — see the way he was over the beautiful verses my poor Uncle Barney wrote, when he was leaving Ireland in a decline, and he called the pome a ‘Farewell to Allyballycarick-o-dooley,’ which was the name of his place, and there’s hardly one in the world could read it without crying; and I give you my word, it was from one split of laughing with him into another! Not but what I think it would be better manners if he ran his head in a pittaytie-pot, and clapped it out o’ the windy, sooner than offend people by his weakness, when he felt the fit cornin’ on him,” she concluded, with a little severity.

  The discussion was ended at this point by the return of Mrs. Molloy, with her second best wig and “turbot” on her head; and just as we were going into supper in came Sidebotham. His eye was little more than sky-blue and yellow now, and a small slip of black plaister, instead of the bit of basilicon, as big as a turnpike-ticket, that was stuck across the bridge of his nose. He was not by any means so stand-off with me as when I last met him, and seemed disposed to be conciliatory, and indeed he went the length of borrowing five pounds from me as we went away.

  I don’t know how we bundled in to supper. I only know that I found myself beside Theodora. It was really an elegant supper. I remember it well, and I may as well tell you that old Molloy had a loin of roast pork before him; there was a big square of bacon, with greens, before Sidebotham — we were running, you see, a good deal on the pigs; before Mrs. Molloy, and as fat as herself, there was a grand roast goose, that came all the way from Connaught, and more fool it, considering all the good it got by the journey! And there wa
s cow-heel and tripe, a dish that old Molloy fondly lost himself in, whenever he could get at it. There was enough cold-cannon to load a hod with; potatoes with and without the skins; there was a mountain of pancakes you might put a child to bed on; and such a good smell of stuffing, and onions, and gravy over all, that I declare to you I don’t think the Prince Regent had a finer supper that night.

  We were mortal hungry, and for a time conversation was a little dull; but I had the pleasure of hearing Theodora’s beautiful voice every now and then, between the sounds of chumping, and munching, and gulping all round, calling on me for those little refined attentions that constitute, I may say, all the chivalry of the supper-table. Now it was:

  “Mr. Toole, may I be troublesome to you for the gherkins?” And again —

  “Another help o’ the stuffin’, ask mamma, Mr. Toole.” Or —

  “Show me the mustard, if you please?” Or —

  “Will ye give me a dust of that pepper, Mr. Toole?

  I do assure you it was one delightful round of similar requests and attentions all through the supper-time, and as the glorious girl had a fine appetite, she worked me, in that way, to my heart’s content.

  But this was only child’s play compared with what followed, when the old lady called out “ Come, Molloy, where’s the punch? What are you foosthering about? We’re all choking with the drooth, and lookin’ at ye like so many dying fishes out o’ water. There’s Mr. Upside— “

  “Sidebotham,” said the lieutenant.

  “Upsidedownbotham — well, whatever it is, the young captain there, that we knew in Athlone, is makin’ signs to me this half hour for drink. Come, man, stir. Juggy, good girl, bring the kittle; there’s two bottle of the right sort at your elbow, and half a dozen elegant lemons. Putt down the bowl before him, Juggy, that’s a darlint, and don’t be sousing the wather in as if you were drownding so many rats. Do you know what, Mr. Upside, Mr. Downbotham, that’s it; just look at that bowl — it houlds seven pints and about a wine-glass; that’s the very bowl Molloy was baptized in!” And she nodded impressively at Sidebotham, just as Molloy squeezed a lemon into the sacred vessel. “As sore as you sit there, Mr. Back — what your name? — no matter, I wish there was no such things as names, barrin’ Christian names, of course, for the sake of religion; but what was I saying? Yes; he was baptized in that very bowl!”

  “Not ducked in it?” says Sidebotham.

  “No; but sprinkled out of it by the Reverend Father Haddock.”

  “He drank like a fish, I dare say, ma’am,” said Sidebotham, who didn’t care a fig what he said to any one.

  “I don’t know, my dear, but he baptized like a Christian; and he met his death, most unfortunately, by being drownded in a bog-hole. He being a portly man, standing too near the edge, the bank gave way, and himself, and a child, and an ass and cart was all drownded together. I remember seeing him myself.”

  “Not in the bog-hole?” said the lieutenant.

  “No, honey! It was in the high street of Athlone, when I was only a little slip of a colleen.”

  “We must drink to his memory, ma’am,” said Sidebotham.

  “With all my heart, joole,” said Mrs. Molloy, who, barring a few political toasts, did not object to drink to anything.

  By this time the punch, one of the few good things we unquestionably owe to England, was brewed; and infinite credit it did its “composer.”

  Our Philomel was the only one of the party who partook of that wonderful elixir with extreme moderation. That nightingale only touched it lightly, as it were, with her musical beak, once or twice, and, content with this little sip, listened to our agreeable conversation, our toasts, and sentiments, and to a great deal of fiery and confidential nonsense from your humble servant.

  After this, I can recall nothing distinctly, except the general consciousness that I never was so happy in the course of my life; only I once or twice observed that Kramm, who sat at Theodora’s other side, and did not seem to hear a word I said, kept interrupting the girl with his long-winded stories; and then I remember Sidebotham seeing me home, and talking to him a great deal about Theodora, and something very touching was said that affected me, for I remember crying while he held my hand, and I held the railings, and I lent him some money, and how I got to my bed I don’t know.

  [This amusing story, by the gifted author of ‘Uncle Silas’ and ‘In a Glass Darkly,’ was left at the time of the author’s death unfinished as it is here, but the Editor ventures nevertheless to give it in this state to the readers of ‘TEMPLE Bar.’ Humour is not a product of this furiously earnest age, and we cannot afford to lose any contribution to our mirth which comes in our way. — EDITOR.]

  The Tales

  In 1826, the Le Fanu family moved to Abington in County Limerick, where Le Fanu spent his youth.

  LIST OF TALES IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDE

  R

  Please note: uncollected tales will appear later in the list than tales appearing in collections.

  THE GHOST AND THE BONE SETTER.

  THE FORTUNES OF SIR ROBERT ARDAGH.

  THE LAST HEIR OF CASTLE CONNOR.

  THE DRUNKARD’S DREAM.

  PASSAGE IN THE SECRET HISTORY OF AN IRISH COUNTESS.

  THE BRIDAL OF CARRIGVARAH.

  STRANGE EVENT IN THE LIFE OF SCHALKEN THE PAINTER.

  SCRAPS OF HIBERNIAN BALLADS.

  JIM SULIVAN’S ADVENTURES IN THE GREAT SNOW.

  A CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF A TYRONE FAMILY

  AN ADVENTURE OF HARDRESS FITZGERALD, A ROYALIST CAPTAIN.

  THE QUARE GANDER.

  BILLY MALOWNEY’S TASTE OF LOVE AND GLORY.

  THE WATCHER

  THE MURDERED COUSIN

  SCHALKEN THE PAINTER

  THE EVIL GUEST

  AN ACCOUNT OF SOME STRANGE DISTURBANCES IN AUNGIER STREET

  AN AUTHENTIC NARRATIVE OF A HAUNTED HOUSE

  ULTOR DE LACY: A LEGEND OF CAPPERCULLEN

  GHOST STORIES OF CHAPELIZOD

  THE MYSTERIOUS LODGER

  LAURA SILVER BELL

  WICKED CAPTAIN WALSHAWE, OF WAULING

  THE CHILD THAT WENT WITH THE FAIRIES

  STORIES OF LOUGH GUIR

  THE VISION OF TOM CHUFF

  DICKON THE DEVIL

  A STRANGE ADVENTURE IN THE LIFE OF MISS LAURA MILDMAY

  THE HAUNTED BARONET

  THE BIRD OF PASSAGE: A STORY OF A FIRST LOVE.

  GREEN TEA.

  THE FAMILIAR.

  MR. JUSTICE HARBOTTLE.

  THE ROOM IN THE DRAGON VOLANT.

  CARMILLA.

  SPALATRO

  A DEBT OF HONOR.

  DEVEREUX’S DREAM.

  CATHERINE’S QUEST.

  HAUNTED.

  PICHON & SONS, OF THE CROIX ROUSSE.

  THE PHANTOM FOURTH.

  THE SPIRIT’S WHISPER.

  DOCTOR FEVERSHAM’S STORY.

  THE SECRET OF THE TWO PLASTER CASTS.

  WHAT WAS IT?

  SOME ACCOUNT OF THE LATTER DAYS OF THE HON. RICHARD MARSTON

  MY AUNT MARGARET’S ADVENTURE

  MADAM CROWL’S GHOST

  THE DEAD SEXTON

  THE DREAM

  SQUIRE TOBY’S WILL

  THE WHITE CAT OF DRUMGUNNIOL

  SIR DOMINICK’S BARGAIN: A LEGEND OF DUNORAN

  HYACINTH O’TOOLE

  LIST OF TALES IN ALPHABETICAL ORDE

  R

  A CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF A TYRONE FAMILY

  A DEBT OF HONOR.

  A STRANGE ADVENTURE IN THE LIFE OF MISS LAURA MILDMAY

  AN ACCOUNT OF SOME STRANGE DISTURBANCES IN AUNGIER STREET

  AN ADVENTURE OF HARDRESS FITZGERALD, A ROYALIST CAPTAIN.

  AN AUTHENTIC NARRATIVE OF A HAUNTED HOUSE

  BILLY MALOWNEY’S TASTE OF LOVE AND GLORY.

  CARMILLA.

  CATHERINE’S QUEST.

  DEVEREUX’S DREAM.

  DICKON THE DEVIL

  DOCTOR FEVERSHAM’S STORY.
<
br />   GHOST STORIES OF CHAPELIZOD

  GREEN TEA.

  HAUNTED.

  HYACINTH O’TOOLE

  JIM SULIVAN’S ADVENTURES IN THE GREAT SNOW.

  LAURA SILVER BELL

  MADAM CROWL’S GHOST

  MR. JUSTICE HARBOTTLE.

  MY AUNT MARGARET’S ADVENTURE

  PASSAGE IN THE SECRET HISTORY OF AN IRISH COUNTESS.

  PICHON & SONS, OF THE CROIX ROUSSE.

  SCHALKEN THE PAINTER

  SCRAPS OF HIBERNIAN BALLADS.

  SIR DOMINICK’S BARGAIN: A LEGEND OF DUNORAN

  SOME ACCOUNT OF THE LATTER DAYS OF THE HON. RICHARD MARSTON

  SPALATRO

  SQUIRE TOBY’S WILL

  STORIES OF LOUGH GUIR

  STRANGE EVENT IN THE LIFE OF SCHALKEN THE PAINTER.

  THE BIRD OF PASSAGE: A STORY OF A FIRST LOVE.

  THE BRIDAL OF CARRIGVARAH.

  THE CHILD THAT WENT WITH THE FAIRIES

  THE DEAD SEXTON

  THE DREAM

  THE DRUNKARD’S DREAM.

  THE EVIL GUEST

  THE FAMILIAR.

  THE FORTUNES OF SIR ROBERT ARDAGH.

  THE GHOST AND THE BONE SETTER.

  THE HAUNTED BARONET

  THE LAST HEIR OF CASTLE CONNOR.

  THE MURDERED COUSIN

  THE MYSTERIOUS LODGER

  THE PHANTOM FOURTH.

  THE QUARE GANDER.

  THE ROOM IN THE DRAGON VOLANT.

  THE SECRET OF THE TWO PLASTER CASTS.

  THE SPIRIT’S WHISPER.

  THE VISION OF TOM CHUFF