great shame; but don’t be telling Jason what I say.” “And what is it you say?” cries Sir Condy, leaning over betwixt us, which made Judy start greatly. “I know the time when Judy McQuirk would never have stayed so long talking at the door, and I in the house.” “Oh!” says Judy, “for shame, Sir Condy; times are altered since then, and it’s my Lady Rackrent you ought to be thinking of.” “And why should I be thinking of her, that’s not thinking of me now?” says Sir Condy. “No matter for that,” says Judy, very properly; “it’s time you should be thinking of her, if ever you mean to do it at all, for don’t you know she’s lying for death?” “My Lady Rackrent!” says Sir Condy, in a surprise; “why it’s but two days since we parted, as you very well know, Thady, in her full health and spirits, and she, and her maid along with her, going to Mount Juliet’s Town on her jaunting car.” “She’ll never ride no more on her jaunting car,” said Judy, “for it has been the death of her, sure enough.” “And is she dead then?” says his honour. “As good as dead, I hear,” says Judy; “but there’s Thady here as just learnt the whole truth of the story as I had it, and it’s fitter he or anybody else should be telling it you than I, Sir Condy: I must be going home to the childer.” But he stops her, but rather from civility in him, as I could see very plainly, than anything else, for Judy was, as his honour remarked at her first coming in, greatly changed, and little likely, as far as I could see—though she did not seem to be clear of it herself—little likely to be my Lady Rackrent now, should there be a second tossup to be made. But I told him the whole story out of the face, just as Judy had told it to me, and he sent off a messenger with his compliments to Mount Juliet’s Town that evening, to learn the truth of the report, and Judy bid the boy that was going call in at Tim McEnerney’s shop in O’Shaughlin’s Town and buy her a new shawl. “Do so,” said Sir Condy, “and tell Tim to take no money from you, for I must pay him for the shawl myself.” At this my shister throws me over a look, and I says nothing, but turned the tobacco in my mouth, whilst Judy began making a many words about it, and saying how she could not be beholden for shawls to any gentleman. I left her there to consult with my shister, did she think there was anything in it, and my shister thought I was blind to be asking her the question, and I thought my shister must see more into it than I did, and recollecting all past times and everything, I changed my mind, and came over to her way of thinking, and we settled it that Judy was very like to be my Lady Rackrent after all, if a vacancy should have happened.
The next day, before his honour was up, somebody comes with a double knock at the door, and I was greatly surprised to see it was my son Jason. “Jason, is it you?” said I; “what brings you to the Lodge?” says I; “is it my Lady Rackrent? we know that already since yesterday.” “Maybe so,” says he; “but I must see Sir Condy about it.” “You can’t see him yet,” says I; “sure he is not awake.” “What then,” says he, “can’t he be wakened? and I standing at the door?” “I’ll not be disturbing his honour for you, Jason,” says I; “many’s the hour you’ve waited in your time, and been proud to do it, till his honour was at leisure to speak to you. His honour,” says I, raising my voice, at which his honour wakens of his own accord, and calls to me from the room to know who it was I was speaking to. Jason made no more ceremony, but follows me into the room. “How are you, Sir Condy?” says he; “I’m happy to see you looking so well; I came up to know how you did today, and to see did you want for anything at the Lodge?” “Nothing at all, Mr. Jason, I thank you,” says he; for his honour had his own share of pride, and did not choose, after all that had passed, to be beholden, I suppose, to my son; “but pray take a chair and be seated, Mr. Jason.” Jason sat him down upon the chest, for chair there was none, and after he had sat there some time, and a silence on all sides, “What news is there stirring in the country, Mr. Jason McQuirk?” says Sir Condy, very easy, yet high like. “None that’s news to you, Sir Condy, I hear,” says Jason: “I am sorry to hear of my Lady Rackrent’s accident.” “I’m much obliged to you, and so is her ladyship, I’m sure,” answered Sir Condy, still stiff; and there was another sort of a silence, which seemed to lie the heaviest on my son Jason.
“Sir Condy,” says he at last, seeing Sir Condy disposing himself to go to sleep again, “Sir Condy, I daresay you recollect mentioning to me the little memorandum you gave to Lady Rackrent about the £500 a year jointure.” “Very true,” said Sir Condy; “it is all in my recollection.” “But if my Lady Rackrent dies, there’s an end of all jointure,” says Jason. “Of course,” says Sir Condy. “But it’s not a matter of certainty that my Lady Rackrent won’t recover,” says Jason. “Very true, sir,” says my master. “It’s a fair speculation, then, for you to consider what the chance of the jointure of those lands, when out of custodiam, will be to you.” “Just five hundred a
