“The limit to your expectations was only in your own modesty; the less you had a right—in the common parlance—to expect, the more you wanted, and the more you ought to have looked for. Say that Miss Wyndham’s fortune clears a thousand a year of your property, you would never be able to get along on what you’d have. No; I’ll tell you what you’ll do. You’ll shut up Kelly’s Court, raise the rents, take a moderate house in London; and Lord Cashel, when his party are in, will get you made a court stick of, and you’ll lead just such a life as your grandfather. If it’s not very glorious, at any rate it’s a useful kind of life. I hope Miss Wyndham will like it. You’ll have to christen your children Ernest and Albert, and that sort of thing; that’s the worst of it; and you’ll never be let to sit down, and that’s a bore. But you’ve strong legs. It would never do for me. I could never stand out a long tragedy in Drury Lane, with my neck in a stiff white choker, and my toes screwed into tight dress boots. I’d sooner be a porter myself, for he can go to bed when the day’s over.” “You’re very witty, Dot; but you know I’m the last man in Ireland, not excepting yourself, to put up with that kind of thing. Whatever I may have to live on, I shall live in my own country, and on my own property.” “Very well; if you won’t be a gold stick, there’s the other alternative: fortify Kelly’s Court, and prepare for the sheriff’s officers. Of the two, there’s certainly more fun in it; and you can go out with the harriers on a Sunday afternoon, and live like a ‘ra’al O’Kelly of the ould times’;—only the punch’ll kill you in about ten years.” “Go on, Dot, go on. You want to provoke me, but you won’t. I wonder whether you’d bear it as well, if I told you you’d die a broken-down black-leg, without a friend or a shilling to bless you.” “I don’t think I should, because I should know that you were threatening me with a fate which my conduct and line of life would not warrant any one in expecting.” “Upon my word, then, I think there’s quite as much chance of that as there is of my getting shut up by bailiffs in Kelly’s Court, and dying drunk. I’ll bet you fifty pounds I’ve a better account at my bankers than you have in ten years.” “Faith, I’ll not take it. It’ll be hard work getting fifty pounds out of you, then! In the meantime, come and play a game of billiards before dinner.” To this Lord Ballindine consented, and they adjourned to the billiard-room; but, before they commenced playing, Blake declared that if the names of Lord Cashel or Miss Wyndham were mentioned again that evening, he should retreat to his own room, and spend the hours by himself; so, for the rest of that day, Lord Ballindine was again driven back upon Brien Boru and the Derby for conversation, as Dot was too close about his own stable to talk much of his own horses and their performances, except when he was doing so with an eye to business. CHAPTER XI. THE EARL OF CASHEL