"Truly I do not know," said Lydia, puzzled; "unless it be that your
colleagues have failed to recommend themselves to society by their
extra-professional conduct as the others have."
"I grant you that fighting men ar'n't gentlemen, as a rule. No more
were painters, or poets, once upon a time. But what I want to know
is this: Supposing a fighting man has as good manners as your
friends, and is as well born, why shouldn't he mix with them and be
considered their equal?"
"The distinction seems arbitrary, I confess. But perhaps the true
remedy would be to exclude the vivisectors and soldiers, instead of
admitting the prize-fighters. Mr. Cashel Byron," added Lydia,
changing her manner, "I cannot discuss this with you. Society has a
prejudice against you. I share it; and I cannot overcome it. Can you
find no nobler occupation than these fierce and horrible encounters
by which you condescend to gain a living?"
"No," said Cashel, flatly. "I can't. That's just where it is."
Lydia looked grave, and said nothing.
"You don't see it?" said Cashel. "Well, I'll just tell you all about
myself, and then leave you to judge. May I sit down while I talk?"
He had risen in the course of his remarks on Lydia's scientific and
military acquaintances.
She pointed to a chair near her. Something in the action brought
color to his cheeks.
"I believe I was the most unfortunate devil of a boy that ever
walked," he began, when he was seated. "My mother was--and is--an
actress, and a tiptop crack in her profession. One of the first
things I remember is sitting on the floor in the corner of a room
where there was a big glass, and she flaring away before it,
attitudinizing and spouting Shakespeare like mad. I was afraid of
her, because she was very particular about my manners and
appearance, and would never let me go near a theatre. I know very
little about either my people or hers; for she boxed my ears one day
for asking who my father was, and I took good care not to ask her
again. She was quite young when I was a child; at first I thought
her a sort of angel--I should have been fond of her, I think, if
she had let me. But she didn't, somehow; and I had to keep my
affection for the servants. I had plenty of variety in that way; for
she gave her whole establishment the sack about once every two
months, except a maid who used to bully her, and gave me nearly all
the nursing I ever got. I believe it was my crying about some
housemaid or other who went away that first set her abusing me for
having low tastes--a sort of thing that used to cut me to the heart,
and which she kept up till the very day I left her for good. We were
a precious pair: I sulky and obstinate, she changeable and
hot-tempered. She used to begin breakfast sometimes by knocking me
to the other side of the room with a slap, and finish it by calling
me her darling boy and promising me all manner of toys and things. I
soon gave up trying to please her, or like her, and became as
disagreeable a young imp as you'd ask to see. My only thought was to
get all I could out of her when she was in a good-humor, and to be
sullen and stubborn when she was in a tantrum. One day a boy in the
street threw some mud at me, and I ran in crying and complained to
her. She told me I was a little coward. I haven't forgiven her for
that yet--perhaps because it was one of the few true things she ever
said to me. I was in a state of perpetual aggravation; and I often
wonder that I wasn't soured for life at that time. At last I got to
be such a little fiend that when she hit me I used to guard off her
blows, and look so wicked that I think she got afraid of me. Then
she put me to school, telling me that I had no heart, and telling
the master that I was an ungovernable young brute. So I, like a
little fool, cried at leaving her; and she, like a big one, cried
back again over me--just after telling the master what a bad one I
was, mind you--and off she went, leaving her darling boy and blessed
child howling at his good luck in getting rid of her.