The priest left them soon,—but not till
it had been arranged that Neville should go back to
Ennis to prepare for his reception of the Captain,
and return to the cottage on the day after that interview
was over. He assumed on a sudden the practical
views of a man of business. He would take care
to have an Ennis attorney with him when speaking to
the Captain, and would be quite prepared to go to
the extent of two hundred a year for the Captain’s
life, if the Captain could be safely purchased for
that money. “A quarter of it would do,”
said Mrs. O’Hara. The priest thought L2
a week would be ample. “I’ll be as
good as my word,” said Fred. Kate sat looking
into his face thinking that he was still a god.
“And you will certainly be here by noon on Sunday?”
said Kate, clinging to him when he rose to go.
“Most certainly.”
“Dear, dear Fred.” And so he walked
down the hill to the priest’s house almost triumphantly.
He thought himself fortunate in not finding the priest
who had ridden off from Ardkill to some distant part
of the parish;—and then drove himself back
to Ennis.
Fred Neville is again called
home to Scroope.
Neville was intent upon business, and had not been
back in Ennis from the cottage half an hour before
he obtained an introduction to an attorney. He
procured it through the sergeant-major of the troop.
The sergeant-major was intimate with the innkeeper,
and the innkeeper was able to say that Mr. Thaddeus
Crowe was an honest, intelligent, and peculiarly successful
lawyer. Before he sat down to dinner Fred Neville
was closeted at the barracks with Mr. Crowe.
He began by explaining to Mr. Crowe who he was.
This he did in order that the attorney might know
that he had the means of carrying out his purpose.
Mr. Crowe bowed, and assured his client that on that
score he had no doubts whatever. Nevertheless
Mr. Crowe’s first resolve, when he heard of
the earldom and of the golden prospects, was to be
very careful not to pay any money out of his own pocket
on behalf of the young officer, till he made himself
quite sure that it would be returned to him with interest.
As the interview progressed, however, Mr. Crowe began
to see his way, and to understand that the golden prospects
were not pleaded because the owner of them was himself
short of cash. Mr. Crowe soon understood the
whole story. He had heard of Captain O’Hara,
and believed the man to be as thorough a blackguard
as ever lived. When Neville told the attorney
of the two ladies, and of the anxiety which he felt
to screen them from the terrible annoyance of the Captain’s
visits, Mr. Crowe smiled, but made no remark.
“It will be enough for you to know that I am
in earnest about it,” said the future Earl, resenting
even the smile. Mr. Crowe bowed, and asked his
client to finish the story. “The man is
to be with me to-morrow, here, at twelve, and I wish
you to be present. Mr. Crowe, my intention is
to give him two hundred pounds a year as long as he
lives.”
