ILLUSTRATIONS
Barnabas frowned, tore the letter across in sudden fury, and looked up to find Cleone frowning also.
"Man Jack, 't is proud you should be to lie there."
"Oh, sir, I grieve to disappoint you," said she, and rose.
"Let me pass, I warn you!" For a minute they fronted each other, eye to eye.
"But this is murder—positive murder!" cried Mr. Dalton.
Sir Mortimer paused, and with a sudden gesture tore the rose from his coat and tossed it away.
"So you meant to buy me, sir, as you would a horse or dog?"
All at once, Sir Mortimer was on his feet and had caught up a heavy riding-whip.
Barnabas espied a face amid the hurrying throng
CHAPTER I
IN WHICH BABNABAS KNOCKS DOWN HIS FATHER, THOUGH AS DUTIFULLY AS MAY BE
John Barty, ex-champion of England and landlord of the "Coursing Hound," sat screwed round in his chair with his eyes yet turned to the door that had closed after the departing lawyer fully five minutes ago, and his eyes were wide and blank, and his mouth (grim and close-lipped as a rule) gaped, becoming aware of which, he closed it with a snap, and passed a great knotted fist across his brow.
"Barnabas," said he slowly, "I beant asleep an' dreaming be I,
Barnabas?"
"No, father!"
"But—seven—'undred—thousand—pound. It were seven—'undred thousand pound, weren't it, Barnabas?"
"Yes, father!"
"Seven—'undred—thou—! No! I can't believe it, Barnabas my bye."
"Neither can I, father," said Barnabas, still staring down at the papers which littered the table before him.
"Nor I aren't a-going to try to believe it, Barnabas."
"And yet—here it is, all written down in black and white, and you heard what Mr. Crabtree said?"
"Ah,—I heered, but arter all Crabtree's only a lawyer—though a good un as lawyers go, always been honest an' square wi' me—leastways I 've never caught him trying to bamboozle John Barty yet—an' what the eye don't ob-serve the heart don't grieve, Barnabas my bye, an' there y'are. But seven 'undred thousand pound is coming it a bit too strong—if he'd ha' knocked off a few 'undred thousand I could ha' took it easier Barnabas, but, as it is—no, Barnabas!"
"It's a great fortune!" said Barnabas in the same repressed tone and with his eyes still intent.
"Fortun'," repeated the father, "fortun'—it's fetched me one in the ribs—low, Barnabas, low!—it's took my wind an' I'm a-hanging on to the ropes, lad. Why, Lord love me! I never thought as your uncle Tom 'ad it in him to keep hisself from starving, let alone make a fortun'! My scapegrace brother Tom—poor Tom as sailed away in a emigrant ship (which is a un-common bad kind of a ship to sail in—so I've heered, Barnabas) an' now, to think as he went an' made all that fortun'—away off in Jamaiky—out o' vegetables."
"And lucky speculation, father—!"
"Now, Barnabas," exclaimed his father, beginning to rasp his fingers to and fro across his great, square, shaven chin, "why argufy? Your uncle Tom was a planter—very well! Why is a man a planter—because he plants things, an' what should a man plant but vegetables? So Barnabas, vegetables I says, an' vegetables I abide by, now an' hereafter. Seven 'undred thousand pound all made in Jamaiky—out o' vegetables—an' there y' are!"
Here John Barty paused and sat with his chin 'twixt finger and thumb in expectation of his son's rejoinder, but finding him silent, he presently continued:
"Now what astonishes an' fetches me a leveller as fair doubles me up is—why should my brother Tom leave all this money to a young hop o' me thumb like you, Barnabas? you, as he never see but once and you then a infant (and large for your age) in your blessed mother's arms, Barnabas, a-kicking an' a-squaring away wi' your little pink fists as proper as ever I seen inside the Ring or out. Ah, Barnabas!" sighed his father shaking his head at him, "you was a promising infant, likewise a promising bye; me an' Natty Bell had great hopes of ye, Barnabas; if you'd been governed by me and Natty Bell you might ha' done us all proud in the Prize Ring. You was cut out for the 'Fancy.' Why, Lord! you might even ha' come to be Champion o' England in time—you 're the very spit o' what I was when I beat the Fighting Quaker at Dartford thirty years ago."
"But you see, father—"
"That was why me an' Natty Bell took you in hand—learned you all we knowed o' the game—an' there aren't a fighting man in all England as knows so much about the Noble Art as me an' Natty Bell."
"But father—"
"If you 'd only followed your nat'ral gifts, Barnabas, I say you might ha' been Champion of England to-day, wi' Markisses an' Lords an' Earls proud to shake your hand—if you'd only been ruled by Natty Bell an' me, I'm disappointed in ye, Barnabas—an' so's Natty Bell."
"I'm sorry, father—but as I told you—"
"Still Barnabas, what ain't to be, ain't—an' what is, is. Some is born wi' a nat'ral love o' the 'Fancy' an' gift for the game, like me an' Natty Bell—an' some wi' a love for reading out o' books an' a-cyphering into books—like you: though a reader an' a writer generally has a hard time on it an' dies poor—which, arter all, is only nat'ral—an' there y' are!"
Here John Barty paused to take up the tankard of ale at his elbow, and pursed up his lips to blow off the foam, but in that moment, observing his son about to speak, he immediately set down the ale untasted and continued:
"Not as I quarrels wi' your reading and writing, Barnabas, no, and because why? Because reading and writing is apt to be useful now an' then, and because it were a promise—as I made—to—your mother. When—your mother were alive, Barnabas, she used to keep all my accounts for me. She likewise larned me to spell my own name wi' a capital G for John, an' a capital B for Barty, an' when she died, Barnabas (being a infant, you don't remember), but when she died, lad! I was that lost—that broke an' helpless, that all the fight were took out o' me, and it's a wonder I didn't throw up the sponge altogether. Ah! an' it's likely I should ha' done but for Natty Bell."
"Yes, father—"
"No man ever 'ad a better friend than Natty Bell—Ah! yes, though I did beat him out o' the Championship which come very nigh breaking his heart at the time, Barnabas; but—as I says to him that day as they carried him out of the ring—it was arter the ninety-seventh round, d' ye see, Barnabas—'what is to be, is, Natty Bell,' I says, 'an' what ain't, ain't. It were ordained,' I says, 'as I should be Champion o' England,' I says—'an' as you an' me should be friends—now an' hereafter,' I says—an' right good friends we have been, as you know, Barnabas."
"Indeed, yes, father," said Barnabas, with another vain attempt to stem his father's volubility.
