“I know, papa,” said Effie, as if she were very knowing to know that.
“—when my uncle came into the room, looking like Sintram with Death and the Other One after him—that’s the nonsense you read to me the other day, isn’t it; Effie?”
“Not nonsense, dear papa,” remonstrated Effie; and I loved her for saying it, for surely that is not nonsense.
“I didn’t mean it,” said my father; and turning to my mother, added: “It must be your fault, my dear, that my children are so serious that they always take a joke for earnest. However, it was no joke with my uncle. If he didn’t look like Sintram he looked like t’other one.
“ ‘The roads are frozen—I mean snowed up,’ he said. ‘There’s just one bottle of port left, and what Captain Calker will say—I dare say I know, but I’d rather not. Damn this weather!—God forgive me!—that’s not right—but it is trying—ain’t it, my boy?’
“ ‘What will you give me for a dozen of port, uncle?’ was all my answer.
“ ‘Give you? I’ll give you Culverwood, you rogue.’
“ ‘Done,’ I cried.
“ ‘That is,’ stammered my uncle, ‘that is,’ and he reddened like the funnel of one of his hated steamers, ‘that is, you know, always provided, you know. It wouldn’t be fair to Lady Georgiana, now, would it? I put it to yourself—if she took the trouble, you know. You understand me, my boy?’
“ ‘That’s of course, uncle,’ I said.
“ ‘Ah! I see you’re a gentleman like your father, not to trip a man when he stumbles,’ said my uncle. For such was the dear old man’s sense of honour, that he was actually uncomfortable about the hasty promise he had made without first specifying the exception. The exception, you know, has Culverwood at the present hour, and right welcome he is.
“ ‘Of course, uncle,’ I said—‘between gentlemen, you know. Still, I want my joke out, too. What will you give me for a dozen of port to tide you over Christmas Day?’
“ ‘Give you, my boy? I’ll give you—’
“But here he checked himself, as one that had been burned already.
“ ‘Bah!’ he said, turning his back, and going towards the door; ‘what’s the use of joking about serious affairs like this?’
“And so he left the room. And I let him go. For I had heard that the road from Liverpool was impassable, the wind and snow having continued every day since that night of which I told you. Meantime, I had never been able to summon the courage to say one word to your mother—I beg her pardon, I mean Miss Thornbury.
“Christmas Day arrived. My uncle was awful to behold. His friends were evidently anxious about him. They thought he was ill. There was such a hesitation about him, like a shark with a bait, and such a flurry, like a whale in his last agonies. He had a horrible secret which he dared not tell, and which yet would come out of its grave at the appointed hour.
“Down in the kitchen the roast beef and turkey were meeting their deserts. Up in the storeroom—for Lady Georgiana was not above housekeeping, any more than her daughter—the ladies of the house were doing their part; and I was oscillating between my uncle and his niece, making myself amazingly useful now to one and now to the other. The turkey and the beef were on the table, nay, they had been well eaten, before I felt that my moment was come. Outside, the wind was howling, and driving the snow with soft pats against the windowpanes. Eager-eyed I watched General Fortescue, who despised sherry or Madeira even during dinner, and would no more touch champagne than he would eau sucrée, but drank port after fish or with cheese indiscriminately—with eager eyes I watched how the last bottle dwindled out its fading life in the clear decanter. Glass after glass was supplied to General Fortescue by the fearless cockswain, who, if he might have had his choice, would rather have boarded a Frenchman than waited for what was to follow. My uncle scarcely ate at all, and the only thing that stopped his face from growing longer with the removal of every dish was that nothing but death could have made it longer than it was already. It was my interest to let matters go as far as they might up to a certain point, beyond which it was not my interest to let them go, if I could help it. At the same time I was curious to know how my uncle would announce—confess the terrible fact that in his house, on Christmas Day, having invited his oldest friends to share with him the festivities of the season, there was not one bottle more of port to be had.
“I waited till the last moment—till I fancied the admiral was opening his mouth; like a fish in despair, to make his confession. He had not even dared to make a confidante of his wife in such an awful dilemma. Then I pretended to have dropped my table-napkin behind my chair, and rising to seek it, stole round behind my uncle, and whispered in his ear:
“ ‘What will you give me for a dozen of port now, uncle?’
“ ‘Bah!’ he said, ‘I’m at the gratings; don’t torture me.’
“ ‘I’m in earnest, uncle.’
“He looked round at me with a sudden flash of bewildered hope in his eye. In the last agony he was capable of believing in a miracle. But he made me no reply. He only stared.
“ ‘Will you give me Kate? I want Kate,’ I whispered.
“ ‘I will, my boy. That is, if she’ll have you. That is, I mean to say, if you produce the true tawny.’
“ ‘Of course, uncle; honour bright—as port in a storm,’ I answered, trembling in my shoes and everything else I had on, for I was not more than three parts confident in the result.
“The gentlemen beside Kate happening at the moment to
