It has been notified in a previous chapter that Mr. Pringle was in some mental anxiety touching the acquisition of a certain twenty pounds which he required for immediate disbursement. This position he held in common with many of his colleagues at the Tin-Tax Office, and indeed with most junior clerks in the Civil Service. "The truth is," says Captain Smoke, in Douglas Jerrold's comedy,The Bubbles of the Day, "I want a thousand pounds." "My dear Smoke," says his friend, "there never was a man yet that didnotwant a thousand pounds." The truth of the axiom is undeniable; only in the Civil Service the amount is much diminished. Twenty pounds, familiarly known as a "twentyer," is generally the much-desiderated sum among the junior slaves of the Crown; and it was for a "twentyer" that Mr. Pringle now pined. A hosier who some two years before had sued for Mr. Pringle's custom, nor sued in vain,--who had supplied him with under-linen of fine texture and high price, with shirts of brilliant and variegated patterns, with boating jerseys and socks so vivid in stripe that his legs resembled those of the functionary in the opening of the pantomime who by the boys in the gallery is prematurely recognised as the future clown, owing to the resplendent beauty of his ankles,--at length, after repeated transmissions of his "little account," and after mystic hints that he had not yet seen the colour of Mr. Pringle's money, brought into action the terrible engines of the law, and summoned his debtor to the County Court.
It was at the very latter end of the quarter when this legal ukase was placed in Mr. Pringle's hands, and that gentleman, examining his capital, found it consist of thirty-seven shillings, a silver threepence, and a penny,--which sums were to provide his dinners, cigars, and general pleasures for a fortnight. Clearly, then, out of this no compromise could be effected; he could not even go through that performance so dear to the hard-pressed debtor, which is temporarily so soothing and in the end so futile, known as paying "something on account." A five-pound note has the same effect on a tradesman to whom twenty pounds are owing as a wet brush on a very bad hat,--it creates a temporary gleam of comfort,but nothing more. Mr. Pringle had not even this resource: if he were summoned to the County Court, and if the investigation were reported, as it was sure to be, inThe Dalston Dreadnought and De Beauvoir Town Looker-on, he should get horribly chaffed by his comrades, perhaps pitched into by the Board, and it would bring all his other creditors down on him. So something must be done, and cash must be raised at once. Mr. Pringle did not know where to turn: he had never been a borrower, and hated the idea of asking money favours from his friends; moreover, in real truth, he would not have known whom to turn to, had he been so minded. Prescott, his Pylades, was by no means overburdened with money--indeed, Kinchenton's income only sufficed for the keeping up of his modest establishment and for the schooling of Percy; while Dibb, Crump, Boppy, or any of the other office men, were utterly impracticable in such a case. Finally, he determined that he must "do a bill;" an act of which he had hitherto been innocent, and towards the proper accomplishment of which he thought it best to take the advice of Mr. Rittman.
In nearly every Government office there is one impecunious black sheep,--one clerk who is always hovering on the edge of the precipice of insolvency, over which he finally tumbles, to creep out with life indeed, but with scars and bruises which last him during the remainder of his official existence. This character was in the Tin-Tax Office played by Mr. Rittman, who for years had been "in difficulties," and was thoroughly versed in every species of money-borrowing, were it the loan-simple from a friend, the loan-complex on a bill with a friend's name, the life-insurance facile, the loan-office ruinous, the bill of sale advertised, or the pawnbroker low. As yet no learned Commissioner had sat in judgment on Mr. Rittman's pecuniary transactions, but he had been in sponging-houses, in Whitecross Street, and in the Queen's Bench; and though his end was rapidly approaching (for he had a couple of sons verging on manhood, and apparently inheriting all their father's frailties), he was never despondent, but maintained a creditable appearance and a cheerful manner. To him Mr. Pringle had gone, on the day before that on which we first made his acquaintance; and Mr. Rittman, from the young man's manner on entering the room, at once guessed the object of his visit.
"How do, Rittman?" commenced Mr. Pringle.
"Good morning, my dear sir--good morning!" said the gentleman addressed, laying down his pen and bowing pleasantly. He had on a voluminous white waistcoat, a great show of shirt-wristband, and before him, in a tumbler, stood some choice flowers. "Seldom you come down to this part of the building; keep to the more aristocratic end--eh?" and Mr. Rittman smiled, and showed a good set of teeth.
"No! I don't know--the truth is--I want some advice, and I think you're the man to give it to me."
"My dear sir, I shall be delighted. What is it?" (this thrown off at a tangent to a messenger who appeared in the doorway, saying, "Ere's Brown's man agen, Mr. Rittman"). "Ah! Brown's man; well, you'd better say I've not yet returned from Jersey, but you expect me on Tuesday.--And now, my dear sir; you were saying--some advice?"
"Well, the fact is, Rittman, I'm hard up, and I want to borrow some money; and I thought you could--"
"Not lend you any? that would be almost too delicious, my dear sir. You didn't think I could lend you any?" and Mr. Rittman screamed with laughter at the absurdity of the idea.
"No, no, of course not; but I thought you might tell me where I could get it."
"Oh, that's a totally different thing; of course I can. I rather pique myself upon knowing more about such matters than most men. Of course I can. Now, let me see--what security can you give?"
"Eh?" asked Mr. Pringle.
"Security for the repayment? If you borrow from the Rainy. Day or Amicable Nest-Eggs Insurance Office, you must give two sureties, householders, and insure for double the amount of the loan. If you go to the Helping Hand or the Leg-up Loan Office, you must give three sureties, householders, and pay a lot for office-fees and inquiries, which are made by a dirty-faced man at a pound a week. If you give a bill of sale on your furniture--"
"My good sir," said Pringle testily, "I've got no furniture. And surely all this bother can't be necessary for the sum I want--only twenty pounds."
"Twenty pounds! twenty pounds! a fleabite, a mere fleabite!" said Mr. Rittman (he had three and sevenpence in his pocket at the moment, and did not know in the least where to turn for more). "I hoped you were going to call my generalship into play; for I may say, without boasting, that when it's not for myself, I am fertile in resources. But--twenty pounds--I'll give you the address of a man who'll let you have it at once."
"There won't be any names wanted, or any thing of that sort, will there?" asked Pringle, rather doubtful of this promptitude.
"Nothing of the kind; merely your acknowledgment. Here's the address--Scadgers, Newman Street. You'll find Mr. Scadgers a curious man, but very pleasant; and when you say you come from me, he'll be very polite. And, Mr. Pringle, let me give you one word of advice--Be firm in the matter of Madeira."
"In the matter of Madeira?"
"Yes, awful; you can't stand it. Ostades are bad enough, or a Stradivarius fiddle; and perhaps, as you're a single man in apartments, a key-bugle mightn't do, as likely to be objected to by the other lodgers--but any of them rather than the Madeira."
In the middle of Newman Street stands a paintless door, in the centre of which gleams a brass-plate, bearing the word "Scadgers," in fat Roman capitals. Nothing else. No "Mr.;" no description of Scadgers' profession; nothing to break the charm. "Scadgers" stands an oasis of shining brass in a desert of lustreless deal, and winks knowingly at the double-faced portrait, one half dirty, the other half clean, at the picture-restorer's over the way. Scadgers' door differed from its fellows in having but one bell-handle; for Scadgers had quite enough business to occupy the whole house, and to demand ramifications in the neighbourhood. All we have to do, in the course of this story, is to deal with Scadgers as Scadgers; but my private belief is that Scadgers was the Universal Philanthropic Man's a Man for a' that Loan Office, held at the Blue Pig and Toothache in Wells Street; that he was "Cash promptly advanced on furniture without removal, freehold and leasehold property, legacies, reversions, warrants, and all other securities. Sheriffs' executions and rent-distraint immediately paid out" (videadvertisement);--that he was "Methuselah's Muffin-Powder, or Never say Die" patent medicine, and proprietor-in-chief of "The Hob," a domestic Miscellany, which commenced with weak romance, and failed, but has since achieved an enormous success for itself, and a fortune for its spirited proprietor, by the publication of "Baby Clarence; or, My Life at Brompton." Certainly you could not have guessed Scadgers' occupation from the outside of his residence, which looked like a dirty lodging-house, like a third-rate boarding-house, like those melancholy houses occupied by those most melancholy people on earth, third-rate piano-sellers; like a house let in rooms to people who lithograph fashion-plates; like any thing but what it was--a house where more money was made than in nine-tenths of the houses in London.
When Mr. Pringle arrived on the Scadgerian steps, he looked for a knocker, and finding none, he pulled the Scadgerian bell. A responsive click and the partial unlatching of the door invited him to push; the door yielded, and he found himself in a large and empty hall, on one side of which was a glass door, with the word "Office" in faded gilt letters on a white ground. This glass-door being open, Mr. Pringle walked straight through, and found himself in the "office." He had seen a good many offices in his time, but never one like this. He had never seen an office with musical instruments in it before; and here were four or five pianos standing ranged against the wall, to say nothing of harps in leather cases leaning drunkenly in corners, and a few cornets-à-piston in green boxes, and a guitar or two with blue ribbons to hang them round your neck by, just as if they had come fresh from the necks of Spanishdonnas. And there were slack-baked-looking old pictures in heavy Dutch-metal frames--fine specimens of old masters--saints with skulls and Bibles in front of them, and very ascetic cheek-bones and great phrenological development of talent and courage; Dutch boors standing on one leg and drinking glasses of ale, and yawning youths with an effect of shaded candlelight on their faces. There were modern pictures, too, of lakes and Thames scenery, and girls with fair hair, which, when compared with the old ones, looked as if they had been painted in milk-and-water; and there were three driving-whips in one corner, a set of harness across a chair, and the leather cushions of a brougham under it. There was a bronze umbrella-stand, formed by a dog holding a whip in his mouth, a big French clock, and a couple of chemist's bottles, red and green; and in the midst of all this confusion stood a little shrivelled old man, with very white hair and a very red face--a dirty little old man dressed in a rusty suit of black, who addressed Mr. Pringle in a rusty creaking voice, and wanted to know "his pleasure."
"I--I wish to speak to Mr. Scadgers," said Mr. Pringle, with a modesty and hesitation altogether strange to him.
"Ah!" said the little old man; "deary me! yes!" and then he seated himself on the edge of a wine-hamper, and began to count his fingers with great interest, as though not quite sure of the number he really possessed.
"Mr. Scadgers!" said Pringle, after a minute or two.
"Ah, yes! I'll call him," said the little old man, and rang a bell which lurked in the corner of the chimney-piece.
A great creaking of uncarpeted stairs under heavy boots followed this bell-ringing, and presently Mr. Scadgers entered the room. Mr. Scadgers' appearance partook of the charming amenities of the prize-fighter and the undertaker: his hair was black and close-cropped, his face white, his nose red, one eye was considerably larger than the other, and one corner of his mouth had a peculiar upward twist. He was dressed in black, with a pair of dull leather boots reaching half-way up his thighs; and as he came through the door, he took a red silk pocket-handkerchief from the crown of his hat, and mopped his head.
"Servant, sir!" said Mr. Scadgers, surveying Mr. Pringle with his gleaming black eyes, and reckoning him up in a moment. "What may you want?"
"Well," said Mr. Pringle, "I wanted a few minutes' conversation; but private, if you please--"
"Oh!" interrupted Mr. Scadgers, "don't mind Jinks; he's safe enough--knows all my affairs--thoroughly to be trusted."
"Well, then," said Mr. Pringle, hesitating; then, with a desperate rush, "look here!--fact is--want money!"
"Ah!" said Mr. Scadgers, with something like admiration in his tone, "got it out with a rush, didn't you? That's the only way! Who told you to come to me?"
"Mr. Rittman, of the--"
"I know--Tin-tax Office. Do you belong to it? Thought so. Wretched office; lost a mint of money in that office. What salary do you get?"
Mr. Pringle mentioned that he was in the receipt of ninety pounds a-year.
"Ah! twenty-one eighteen and nine on the 5th of every third month--I know all about it! Now" mopping his head, "how much do you want?"
"Twenty pounds."
"Lor' bless me! and when do you want it?"
"At once!"
"Can't be done, sir! can't be done!" Violent mopping. "Haven't got any money in the house. Can't you look in next week, and I might let you have ten?"
Mr. Pringle roundly asserted that this would not do at all, and turned round towards the door.
"Stop, sir!" shouted Mr. Scadgers, making tremendous play with the red-silk handkerchief. "What a hasty young man you are! Look here,"--taking out his purse,--"here's a ten-pound note that I promised to young Stephens of the Wafer Office; he was to have been here by two; now its getting on for three, and he's not come. I might let you have that!"
"But that's only ten!" said Mr. Pringle.
"Onlyten! what a way to speak of money! Wait, sir, wait; let us see what we can do. Any one likely to look in this afternoon to pay any interest, Jinks?"
"Too late now!" said Jinks, with brevity.
"Ah! too late--I dessay! Just look in the cash-box, Jinks, and see what's there; though I'm afraid it's not much. I should say there wasn't more than three pounds, Jinks!"
Mr. Jinks peered into a little cash-box on the desk before him, and answered, "Just three pound!"
"Ah! bring 'em out, Jinks; give 'em here. Let's see--ten and three's thirteen; and that only leaves me seven-and-six to go on with till Monday! Never mind: you could have thirteen, Mr.--"
"But I want twenty!"
"Ah, so you do! Pity you don't want some wine! I've got some Madeiry as would--but wine ain't money, is it? There's a splendid picture, now--a Murillo: you might take that."
"Pictures are not more money than wine; are they?"
"Ain't they? That Murillo's worth ten pound, and any one would give you that for it. Ain't there no one you could sell it to? You see you're in such a hurry for the money, or you might offer it to the National Gallery, or some swell collecting of pictures might buy it, but you're so pressed. Tell you what you might do, though," said Mr. Scadgers, as though struck by a sudden inspiration: "you might pawn it."
"How the deuce could I go lugging that picture about the streets to pawn it?" said Pringle testily.
"No, to be sure! Stay, look here! I dare say Jinks wouldn't mind pawning it for you. Jinks, look here; just run with this round the corner, will you? Get as much as you can, you know." And without more ado, Mr. Jinks put on a reddish-black napless hat, tucked the picture under his arm, and started off.
While he was gone, Mr. Scadgers asked Mr. Pringle what his name was, how long he had been in the office, where he lodged, and other home-thrusting questions; and presently Mr. Jinks returned without the picture, but with three sovereigns and a printed ticket, which he delivered to his master, saying, "Wouldn't do no more than three."
"Three!" said Mr. Scadgers. "Well, that's nearer to twenty than we was, isn't it? Now, Mr. Pringle,"--taking a slip of stamped paper from his pocketbook--"just you sign your name at the bottom here. All correct, you see. Fifth of next month,--promise to pay,--value received,--and all the rest of it; and I'll hand you over sixteen pounds and the ticket; and when you get that picture out, you'll have a treasure."
"Oh, curse the picture!" said Pringle ruefully.
"Ah," said Mr. Scadgers, grinning, "that's what they all says. Cuss the picture! Well, if that ticket ain't any use to you, I don't mind giving you half a pound for it."
"I thought you had only seven-and-sixpence left?"
"No more I have, myself; but I might borrow half a pound from Jinks. What do you say? Ah, I thought so. Here, Jinks, put this little dockyment along with your other valuables. Here's the half pound, sir. Now let's look at your signature. George Townshend Pringle! Very nice. No relation to Mr. Townshend, of Austin Friars--the great Townshend?"
"He's my uncle," said Pringle. "I'm named after him."
"Indeed! named after him A very capital connexion. Good morning, sir! good morning! I'll look in upon you on the fifth."
But after Mr. Pringle had gone, Mr. Scadgers still stood with the bill fluttering between his fingers, muttering to himself: "Sing'ler that! very sing'ler! For years I hadn't seen the Runner until yesterday, when I came across him in Cheapside; and now to-day I hear of him again. I wonder," added Mr. Scadgers, with a very sinister smile, "whether that little account between me and the Runner will ever be wound up? I've owed him one this many a year."
The Hansom cab conveying Mr. Prescott went at a rapid pace along the Strand, through the Pall-Mall district, and by divers short cuts into Piccadilly. There was nothing to stop it; there were no blocks or stoppages; and as it was the dead season of the year, and every one was out of town, the Commissioners of Sewers were good enough to leave the roads alone; reserving until the traffic was in full play their right to erect gigantic, hideous hoardings in the most crowded thoroughfares. The streets were deserted, the public buildings shut up, dust and straw and dirty paper whirled about in the eddying gusts of the autumnal wind, and the entire appearance of London was dull and wretched. People had evidently been in doubt what to do about dress; and while some were in the faded gaiety of the just-departed summer, others were putting on an even shadier appearance in the creased and awkward garments of the previous winter. The doctors' carriages and the hack-cabs had the thoroughfares to themselves; the occupants of the former, always on the watch for the recognition of some favoured patient, sat back in their vehicles, engaged either in the perusal of some medical work, or in happy day-dreams of increased practice, studs of wearied horses, noble introductions, enormous fees,--all culminating, perhaps, in baronetcies and appointments at Court.
Of the hack-cabs seen about, but few were Hansoms; for at that season men who want to go quickly, and don't mind paying a shilling a mile, are at a discount. Now and then a sun-tanned swell, whose portmanteau atop nearly obstructed the driver's sight, and who himself was but dimly visible among gun-cases, hat-boxes, and railway-rugs, might have been encountered, passing from one terminus to another; but the "reg'lar riders,"--the lawyer's clerk, with the tape-tied bundle of papers, who charges his cab to "the office;" the lounging swell; the M.P. dashing down to the House; the smug-faced capitalist, whose brain is full of calculation, and who sits the whole way to the City smiling at all and seeing none; the impecunious speculator, who rides in a cab because he cannot afford to be seen in an omnibus,--all these were away from London. And the four-wheelers, though laden, had but dreary burdens: the fortnight at Margate is over; no more morning dips, no more afternoon rambles on the sands, no donkey-backs, no pleasure-boats, no Pegwell Bay now! Paterfamilias is once more Hobbs and Motchkin's out-door at thirty shillings a week; the eight-roomed house in Navarino Terrace, Camden Town, resumes its wonted appearance; the children return to the "curriculum" of education at Miss Gimp's in the Crescent; and save the sand-covered little wooden spades which hang from the hat-pegs in the passage, naught remains of their maritime excursion.
Dreary, dreary, every where! Dreary down in old country mansions, where, while the men are pheasant-shooting in the woods, the ladies look dismally on what was lately the croquet-ground, where the gardeners are now busy sweeping up the leaves, and pressing them into huge barrows, and wheeling them away; where the trees stand out gaunt and brown, and where the evergreens bordering the pleasant walks rustle with the autumnal winds; where the cracks, and flaws, and dampnesses of old country mansions begin to make themselves unpleasantly conspicuous; and where the servants, town-bred, commence to be colded, sniffy, to have shivers and "creeps." Dreary at the seaside, where the storm-soaked, worm-eaten jetty, lately echoing to the pattering feet of children, or the sturdy tread of the visitor taking his constitutional, is now given over to its normal frequenters--tarry-trousered men in blue jerseys and oilskin sou'-wester hats, who are always looking out for some boat that never arrives, or some storm which always comes when they do not expect it; bills are stuck on the pleasant plate-glass bow windows so lately filled with pretty girls, rosy children, and parents who dined at two o'clock, and enjoyed their nuts and port-wine "looking over the sea;" and the proprietors of the lodging-houses, who have lived in damp back-kitchens since June, are once more seen above-ground. Dreary in Continental towns, where home-returning English are finding out that they have spent too much money on their trip, and bewailing the Napoleons left as a tribute to the managers of the Homburgh Bank; where the discomforts of the return sea-passage first assert themselves, and where couriers and innkeepers are going in for their last grand turn of robbery and swindle. Dreary, dreary, every where! but specially dreary in Hyde Park, at the Piccadilly gates, at which Mr. Prescott leaves his Hansom, and strolls into Rotten Row.
A blank desert of posts and rails and dry dusty gravel; a long strip of iron-enclosed sand and grit, with half a dozen figures in the three-quarter mile range to break the dull monotony. As Prescott mooned drearily along, at five-minute intervals he would hear the sound of a horse's hoofs, and turning rapidly, would find some easy-going steed doing its quiet sanitary business for its owner, a man who, either from circumstances or disposition, never quitted London, but was to be seen at some time or other of the day in the Row, no matter what might be the time of year. Interspersed with these were grooms, riding in that groomy undress of wide-awake hat, short, stiff shirt-collar, and tight-fitting, yellow-clay-coloured trousers, trying the wind and bottom of some that were meant to be flyers in the approaching hunting-season; beasts with heavy, strong quarters, long backs, short, sharp heads, and rolling eyes, with a preponderance of white always showing. Country-bred Mr. Prescott, and cannot therefore divest himself of a certain canniness in the matter of horseflesh: now and then he leans over the rail to follow the progress of a horseman flying past, with his hands well down, and every muscle of his steed brought into splendid play; or the healthy gymnastics of a valetudinarian, who had learned exactly the utmost amount of exercise to be derived from his horse as compared with the least amount of discomfort to be endured by himself. But these do not rivet his attention; and he passes on until he is nearly abreast of the Serpentine, when, looking back, he sees a blue skirt fluttering in the wind, and in an instant recognising its wearer, pulls up by the rails and waits her advent.
It does not take long for that chestnut mare to cover the distance, albeit she is being ridden from side to side, and is evidently receiving her "finishing" in the elegancies of themanègeIn less than two minutes she is pulled up short by the rails where Prescott is standing, and her rider, Kate Mellon, with the colour flushing in her cheeks, with her eyes aglow, with her hair a trifle dishevelled from the exercise, is sitting bolt upright, and with the handle of her riding-whip giving the young gentleman a mock salute.
"Servant, colonel!" says she.
"How do you do, Kate?" says Prescott, leaning forward and touching the neat little white cuff on her wrist; "I thought I should find you here."
"More than I thought of you!" says the lady. "Why ain't you counting up those figures, and adding and subtracting, and all the rest of it you do in your office, eh?"
"To-day's a half-holiday, Kitty--Saturday, you know," says Prescott, with rather a grim smile; for he does not like that rough description of his official duties.
"Oh, ah!" says the lady, with great simplicity; "Saturday, ah! Confounded nuisance sometimes! Lost my net veil one Saturday afternoon here in the Row; went to Marshall and Snelgrove's on my way home; all shut up tight as wax!"
"You're better than you were yesterday, at the station?"
"Oh, yes; I'm all right; I shall do well enough! Wo-ho! steady, old lady!" (this to the mare). "I'm always better in town. Don't let's stand here; I can't hold this mare quiet, and that's the truth; she frets on the curb most awful."
"Most awfully, Kitty, not most awful. I've told you of that a hundred times."
"Well, most awfully, if you like it better. Steady, Poll! Walk along by my side. Who are you, I should like to know, to pull me up about my talking? What right have you to lecture me about my grammar and that?"
"What right?" asks Prescott, suddenly turning white; "none, save the fact of my loving you, Kitty. You know it well enough, though I've never told you in so many words. You know that Idolove you! You can't have seen me hanging about you during the last season, making excuses to come to your place, first there and last to go, hating every man who had more chances of talking to you than I had,--you can't have seen all this without knowing that I loved you, Kitty!"
The mare is pulled suddenly up; there is no one near them in the blank desert of the Row; and her rider says, "And suppose Ididknow it,--what then?"
Prescott shrugs his shoulders and looks upon the ground, but does not reply.
"Have you ever had one word of encouragement from me? Have you ever seen a look of mine which has led you on? Can you say that, suppose I tell you to let me hear no more of this,--as I do tell you at once and for ever,--I have deceived or thrown you over in any one way?"
"Never!"
"Thank God for that!" says the girl, with some bitterness; "for that's a chalk in my favour, at least. Now look here! I know you, James Prescott; and I know that you're too good a man--too well brought up and fond of home and that sort of thing--to hint any thing but what's right towards me."
"Kitty!"
"There--I know it. Don't break a blood-vessel with your emotion," she added, gently tapping him on the shoulder with her riding-whip. "All right. Well, suppose we were married, you'd feel very jolly, wouldn't you, while you were down at your office doing your sums and things, which you got so riled when I spoke of just now, to think that Tom Orme, and Claverhouse, and De Bonnet, and a whole lot of fellows, were mooning about this place with me?"
"I'd wring all their necks!" says honest Jim Prescott, looking excessively wobegone.
"Exactly. But you see, if you wrung their necks, they would not send their wives and sisters and daughters to be taught riding at The Den; they would not commission me to look out for ladies' hacks, to break them, and bring them into order; and my trade would be gone. And we couldn't live on the twopence-halfpenny a-year you get from your office, Jim, old fellow."
"I know that, Kitty," said poor Prescott; "I know all that; but--"
"Hold on half a second!" interrupted Kate; "let us look the thing straight in the face, and have it out, Jim, now and for ever. I know you--know you're a thoroughgoing good fellow, straight as an arrow, and know that if you married me, you'd stick to me till you dropped. But you'd have a hard time, Jim--an awful hard time!"
"I should not mind that, Kitty. I'd work for you--"
"Oh, it isn't in that way I mean. But how would you stand having to break off with your own people for your wife's sake? How could you take me down to your governor's parsonage, and introduce me there? How would my manners and my talk please your mother and sisters? It's madness, Jim,--it's worse than madness,--to talk of such a scheme. Shake hands, and let's be always good friends--the best of friends. If you ever want a good turn that I can do, you know where I'm to be found. God bless you, old boy; but never mention this subject again!"
James Prescott gave a great gulp at a lump which was rising in his throat, and warmly grasped Kate Mellon's proffered hand. As she raised her eyes he noticed her colour fade, and saw a troubled expression in her face.
"Good by, Jim," the said hurriedly. "Just strike down that path, will you? Get away quickly; here's some one coming; and--and I don't want to be seen talking to you. Quick! there's a good fellow. Good by."
She touched her horse with her slight whip, and cantered off at once. Prescott looked in the direction she had indicated, and saw Mr. Simnel, mounted on a handsome thoroughbred, calmly curveting up the Row.
What could there be between Kate Mellon and Robert Simnel?
After that episode at the stile, which, as it happened, formed such a crisis in their destinies, Barbara Lexden and Frank Churchill did not move towards the house, but quietly turned into that fir plantation through which they had strolled some days previously on their return from the shooting party. At first neither spoke; Barbara walked with her eyes downcast, and Churchill strolled idly by her side; then, after a few paces, he took her unresisting hand and placed it in his arm. She looked, up into his face with calm, earnest, trustful eyes, and he bowed his head until, for the first time in his life, his lips touched hers, and as he withdrew them he murmured, "My darling! my own darling! thank God for this!" His arm stole round her waist, and for an instant he held her tightly clasped; then gently releasing her, he again passed her hand through his arm, covered it with his other hand, and walked on quietly by her side. There was no need of speech; it was all known, all settled, all arranged; that restored glove, that one fervent sentence, that one look in which each seemed to read the secrets of the other's soul, had done it all. This was first love, undisturbed by the fact that on either side there had probably been some half-dozen attacks of that spurious article, that saccharine bliss, that state of pleasant torture which reveals itself in sheep-like glances and deep-drawn sighs, in a tendency to wear tight boots and to increase the already over-swollen tailor's bill, to groan and be poetical, and to shrink from butchers' meat. Although the existent state of Barbara and Churchill had none of these characteristics, it was still first love.
Marvellous, marvellous time! so short in its duration, but leaving such an indelible impress on the memory! A charming period, ahasheesh-dream impossible ever to be renewed, a prolonged intoxication scarcely capable of realisation in one's sober moments. A thing of once, which gone never comes again, but leaves behind it remembrances which, while they cause the lips to curl at their past folly, yet give the heart a twinge in the reflection that the earnestness which outbalanced the folly, the power of entering into and being swayed by them, the youth--that is it, after all; confess it!--the youth is vanished for ever and aye. What and where was the glamour, the power of which you dimly remember but cannot recall? Put aside the claret-jug, and, with your feet on the fender, as you sit alone, try and analyse that bygone time. The form comes clearly out of the mist: the dark-brown banded hair, the quiet earnest eyes the slight lissome figure and delicate hands; and with them a floating reminiscence of a violet perfume, a subtle, delicate essence, which made your heart beat with extra vigour even before your eyes rested on what they longed for. Kisses and hand-clasps and ardent glances were the current coin of those days; one of either of the former missed, say at parting for the night, for instance, made you wretched; one of the latter shot in a different direction sent you to toss sleepless all night on your bed, and to rise with the face of a murderer, and with something not very different from the mind of one. There were heartaches in those days, real, dead, dull pains, sickening longings, spasms of hope and fear; dim dread of missing the prize on the attainment of which the whole of life was set, a psychical state which would be as impossible to your mind now as would the early infantile freshness to your lined cheek, or the curling locks of boyhood to your grizzled pate. It is gone, clean gone. Perhaps it snapped off short with a wrench, leaving its victim with a gaping wound which the searing-iron of time has completely cicatrised; perhaps it mellowed down into calm, peaceful, conjugal, and subsequently paternal affection. But tell me not, O hard-hearted and worldly-minded bachelor, intent on the sublimation of self, and cynically enough disposed to all that is innocent and tender,--tell me not, O husband, however devoted to your wife, however proud of your offspring,--tell me not that a regret for that vanished time does not sometimes cross your mind, that the sense of having lost the power of enjoying such twopenny happiness, ay, and such petty misery, does not cost you an occasional pang. It still goes on, that tragi-comedy, the same as ever, though the actors be different, though our places are now in the cushioned gallery among the spectators instead of on the stage, and we witness the performance, not with envy, not with admiration, but with a strange feeling of bewilderment that such things once were with us,--that the dalliance of the puppets, and the liquid jargon which they speak, once were our delight, and that we once had the pass-key to that blissful world whose pleasures and whose sorrows now alike fail to interest us.
So in the thorough enjoyment of this new-found happiness, in all tranquillity and repose, as in a calm haven after tempest, three or four days passed over Barbara and Churchill. Their secret was their own, and was doubly dear for being known but to themselves. No one suspected it. Churchill joined the shooting-party on two occasions; but as he had previously been in the habit of detaching himself after luncheon, no one remarked his doing so now, and no one knew that the remainder of the day until dinner-time was spent with Barbara alone. After dinner Barbara would sometimes sing, and then Churchill would hover round the piano, perhaps with moreempressementthan he had previously shown (because, though fond, as every man of any sensitiveness must be, of music, he was by no means an enthusiast, and was racked wofully with smothered yawns during the performance of any elaborate piece), yet by no means noticeably. And during all the time each had the inward satisfaction of knowing that their words and actions were appreciated by the other, and that the "little look across the crowd," as Owen Meredith says, was full of meaning to and thoroughly understood by the person it was intended to reach. At length, about the fourth day after the proceedings at the stile, their conversation took a more practical turn. They had been wandering slowly along, and had at length stopped to rest on a grass-covered bank which was screened from the sight of the distant house by a thick belt of evergreens, while far away in front of them stretched a glorious prospect of field and woodland. As sometimes happens in October, the sun seemed to have recovered his old July force, and blazed so fiercely that they were glad to sit under the friendly shade. Barbara had removed the glove from her right hand, and sat looking down at her lover, who lay by her side, idly tracing the course of one of the violet veins in the little hand which rested in his own broad palm. Suddenly he looked up and said:
"Darling, this lotus-eating is rapidly coming to an end. It would be sweet enough, thus 'propped on beds of amaranth and moly,' to remain and dream away the time together; but there's the big world before us, and my holiday is nearly finished."
"And you must go back to town?" and the little fingers tightened round his, and the shapely head was bent towards his face.
"Yes, pet; must. But what of that? When I go, it is but to prepare for thee, my heart's darling; but to set things straight for your reception. You're determined, child, to share my lot at once? You've reflected on what I said the other night, about waiting a year to see whether--"
"No, Frank, no! those long engagements are utterly hateful. There will you be, I suppose" (and she glanced slyly at him), "moping by yourself, and there shall I be with another round of that horrible season before me, thinking of you, longing for you, and yet having to undergo all the detestable nonsense of balls and parties andfêtes, which I so thoroughly despise--for what? At the end to find ourselves a year older, and you perhaps a few pounds richer. As though riches made happiness!" said poor Barbara, who, since she had come to what are called years of discretion, had never known what it was to have a whim unindulged.
Churchill raised himself on his elbow, and smiled as he smoothed her glossy hair.
"My child," said he, "have you never heard of the philosopher who, when told that poverty was no crime, rejoined, 'No; no crime; but it's deuced inconvenient'? Recollect, furnished lodgings in Mesopotamia, hack cabs to ride in, no Parker to dress your hair, no Rotten Row--by Jove, when I think of it, I feel almost inclined to rush off and never see you again, so horrible is the change to which holding to me must lead you!" and a dark shadow passed across his face.
"Do you?" asked Barbara, bending so closely over him that he felt her warm breath on his cheek; "do you?" she repeated with such a dash of earnest in her jesting tone that Churchill thought it necessary to slip his arm round her, and press his lips to her forehead in reassurance. "Why, you silly boy, you forget that when I was a child at home with papa, I knew what poverty was; such poverty as would make what you speak of wealth by comparison. Besides, shall we not be together to share it? And you'll buy me a--what do they call it?--a cookery book, and I'll learn all kinds of housekeeping ways. I can do some things already; Guérin, the Morrisons'chef--who was a little struck with me, I think, sir--showed Clara Morrison and me how to make an omelette; and Maurice Gladstone--my cousin Maurice, you know; when we were staying at Sandgate, he was quartered at Shorncliffe--taught me to do bashawed lobster, and he says my bashawed lobster is as good as Sergeant Pheeny's. And you know all the Guards are mad to get asked to sup with Sergeant Pheeny, who's a lawyer, you know, and not a soldier-sergeant."
And she stopped quite out of breath.
"'You know' and 'you know,'" said Churchill, mocking her; "I do know Sergeant Pheeny, as it happens, and his bashawed lobster, and that dish and omelettes will doubtless be our staple food; and you shall cook it, and clean the saucepans afterwards, you little goose. However, I tell you candidly, darling, though it sounds selfish, Idare notrun the risk of losing you, even with all these difficulties before us. As you say, we shall share them together, and--"
"Now, not another word!" said Barbara, placing her hand upon his lips; "there are to be no difficulties, and all is to be arranged at once. And I think the first thing to be done is for me to speak to my aunt."
"Ay," said Churchill, with rather a dolorous expression of face; "I am afraid that will be what your friend Captain Lyster would call a 'teaser.' Talking about no difficulties--we shall find one there!"
"I do not think so. I am sure, Frank, my aunt has shown special politeness toyou."
"Yes, darling, politeness of a certain kind to people in my position. Don't frown; I have long since dropped that distinction as between ourselves. But I mean so far as the outer world is concerned, to people in my position--authors, artists, and 'professional people' of all kinds--mixing in society, there are always two distinct varieties of politeness. One, which seems to say, 'You are not belonging tonous autres; you are not a man of family and position; but you bring something which is a distinction in its way, and which, so far as this kind of acquaintance goes, entitles you to a proper reception at our hands.' The other, which says as plainly, 'You don't eat peas with your knife, or wipe your lips with the back of your hand; you're decently dressed, and will pass muster; while at the same time you're odd, quaint, amusing, out of the common run, and you present at my house a sort of appanage to my position.' I think Miss Lexden belongs to the latter class, Barbara."
"I am afraid that old feeling of class-prejudice is a monomania with you," said Barbara, a little coldly: "however, I will see my aunt, and bring matters to an issue there at once."
"All luck go with you, child! There is one chance for us. The old proverb says, 'Femme savante est toujours galante.' Miss Lexden is a clever woman; perhaps has had her own love-affairs, and will feel pity for ours. But, Barbara, in case she should be antagonistic--violently, I mean--you will not--"
"Monsieur," said Barbara, with a little inflatedmoue, "la garde meurt, mais ne se rend pas, as Cambronne didnotsay. No, no; trust in me. And now give me your arm, and let us go home."
It was a point of honour with old Miss Lexden to have the best room in every house where she visited; and so good was her system of tactics, that she generally succeeded. Far away in northern castles, where accommodation was by no means on a par with the rank of their owners, duchesses had been worse lodged and infinitely worse attended to than this old commoner, whose bitter tongue and incapacity for reticence did her yeoman's service on all possible occasions; not that she was ever rude, or even impolite, or said any thing approaching to actual savagery; but she had a knack of dropping hints, of firing from behind a masked battery of complacency, and of roughly rubbing "raws," which was more effective than the most studied attacks. As spent balls, when rolling calmly along, as innocuous, apparently, as those "twisters" of Hillyer's, which evade the dexterous "dip" of the longstop on the smooth short sward of the Oval, have been known, when attempted to be stopped, to take off a foot, so did old Miss Lexden's apparently casual remarks, after to all appearance missing their aim, tear and wound and send limping to the rear any one who rashly chanced to answer or gainsay her. Women, with that strange blundering upon the right so often seen among them, seemed to guess the diabolical power of the old lady's missiles, and avoided them with graceful ease, making gentledétours, which led them out of harm's way, or cowering for shelter in elegant attitudes under projecting platitudes; but men, in their conscious self-strength, would often stand up to bear the brunt of an argument, and always came away worsted from the fight. So that old Miss Lexden generally had her own way amongst her acquaintance, and one important part of her own way was the acquisition of the greatest comfort wherever she stayed.
Of course, in an easy, regulated household like that of Sir Marmaduke Wentworth, there was no need of special strategy. Years ago, on her first visit, she had selected her apartments, and had had them reserved for her ever since. Pleasant apartments they were, large, airy, and with a glorious look-out across the garden over the surrounding downs. When the windows were open, as they always were when practicable during Miss Lexden's tenancy,--for the old lady was a great lover of fresh air,--the rooms were filled with the perfume of the flowers, occasionally mixed with fresh, healthy sea-smell. These had been the state-rooms in the Grange, in bygone times; and when Miss Lexden first came there, there was a huge bed, with nodding plumes at the foot, and a great canopy, and high-backed solemn chairs, and a big wardrobe like a family mausoleum but the old lady had all these cleared away, and persuaded Sir Marmaduke to refurnish the rooms with a suite of light maple and moss-rosebud chintz, with looking-glass let into the panels of the wardrobe, and snug little low chairs scattered about; and then with a chintz paper, and water-colour drawings in light frames, the place was so changed that the old housekeeper, who had been in the family for years, scarcely knew it again, and was loud in her lamentations over the desecration.
Miss Lexden was a lazy old lady, who always breakfasted in bed, and when staying on a visit at a country house generally remained the greater portion of the day in her room. She was accustomed to say with great freedom that she did not amuse the young people and they certainly did not amuse her, and that she hated all old people except herself. She was a great correspondent of all kinds of people, wrote lengthy epistles in very excellent French to all kinds of refugees, who were perpetually turning up in different parts of Europe, and working the oracle for their own purposes; wrote lengthy epistles to American statesmen on the slavery question, to English lecturers on subjects of political economy, and to her special friends on all points of domestic scandal. I fear that, with the exception of the last, her correspondence was not much regarded, as she never sent to refugees any thing but her blessing and her prayers; and these, even though coming from an Englishmiladi, were not discountable at anyGeld-wechsel Comptoiron the Continent. But herChronique Scandaleusewas delicious; it was bold in invention, full in detail, and always written in the most pointed and epigrammatic style. There were people who obtained autumn invitations, on the sheer strength of their being recipients of Miss Lexden's correspondence. Extracts from her letters were read publicly at the breakfast-table, and created the greatest delight. "Good as a book, by Jove!" was a frequent comment on them; "full of humour, and that kind of thing; sort of thing that fellow writes and people pay money for, by Jove! ought to send it toPunch, that she ought." (For it is a thing to be noted, that if the aristocracy of this great country ever permit themselves to be amused, they invariably think that the thing which amused them, no matter of what kind it be, ought to be sent toPunch.) Miss Lexden also was a great reader of French novels; she subscribed regularly to Rolandi's, and devoured all that sound sense, morality, philosophy, and extensive knowledge of the world, which yearly issued from the Parisian publishers. In bygone times she had laughed heartily over the farcical humour of M. Paul de Kock; now that her palate had somewhat dulled. Fortune had sent her the titillating works of M. Gustave Flaubert, M. Xavier de Montepin, M. Ernest Feydeau, and others of that modern school which delights in calling a spade a spade, with the broad theories of M. Proudhon to be her political guide, and the casuistries of M. Renan for her Sunday reading. She read all, but liked the novels best; and had been seen to weep over a yellow-covered volume in which an elegant marquis, all soul and black eyes, amembre du Jockei-Club, and altogether an adorable person, had to give satisfaction to a brute of a husband who objected to being dishonoured.
With one of these yellow-covered volumes on her lap, Miss Lexden was sitting placidly in the easiest of chairs at the open window on the afternoon when Barbara and Churchill held the conversation just narrated. She was a pleasant-looking old lady, with a fat, wrinkleless, full face, like an old child, with a shiny pink-and-white complexion, and with hair which defied you to tell whether it had been wonderfully well preserved, or admirably dyed, arranged under a becoming cap. She was dressed in a rich brown moiré-antique silk, and with a black-lace shawl thrown over her ample shoulders; her fat, pudgy little hands, covered with valuable rings, were crossed over the book on her lap; and she was just on the point of dropping off into a placid slumber, when there came a knock at the door, immediately upon which Barbara entered the room.
"Well, Barbara," said the old lady, stifling a yawn; "is it time to dress? I've done nothing since luncheon but read this ridiculous book, and I was very nearly dropping asleep, and I've no notion of the time; and Withers is always gadding about in this house with that steward, and never comes near me till the last moment."
"It is quite early, aunt; scarcely six o'clock yet; and I came up to you on purpose to have a quietcausewith you before you dressed. I think I have news which will keep you awake. You've not asked me of my flirtations lately."
"My dear child, why should I ask? I interested myself about Lord Hinchenbrook because he was thepartiof the season, and because to have carried him off from that odious doll, that Miss Musters, as you could easily, would have been a triumph to us both; but you refused. I interested myself about young Chaldecott because our families had long been intimate, and the largest property in Yorkshire is worth interesting oneself about; but you refused. You know your own mind best, Barbara, andIknow that you have too much good sense and real notion of what is right to do a foolish thing; so I leave you to yourself, and don't worry you with any questions."
"Thanks, aunt, for your good opinion," said Barbara, playing with a sprig of scarlet geranium which she had taken from a vase on the table; "but I shall give you no further trouble. I am going to be married."
"Sir Charles Chaldecott has written?" said the old lady, putting aside the book, and sitting upright in her chair; "has written; and you--?" and in her anxiety Miss Lexden smiled so unguardedly that, for the first time in her life, the gold-settings of her false teeth were seen by a looker-on.
"I--we shall not hear any more of Sir Charles Chaldecott, aunt," said Barbara hesitatingly; "no; I am going to be married to a gentleman now staying in this house."
Miss Lexden's face fell; the gold teeth-settings disappeared from view entirely; and she shrugged her shoulders as she said, "Very well, my dear; I feared something of the sort. If you like to settle on three thousand a year, and to take a man whose constitution is ruined by the Indian climate, I can only say--it is your affair."
Barbara bit her lips to avoid betraying a smile as she replied, "You are wrong again, aunt. Captain Lyster has never done me the honour of an offer." Then seriously, "I am going to be married to Mr. Churchill."
"What?" shrieked the old lady, surprised out of all decorum; "what?" Then, after an instant's pause, "I beg your pardon, Barbara; did I not understand you to say that you were going to be married to Mr. Churchill, the--the gentleman now staying in this house?"
"You did so understand me, aunt, and it is the fact."
"Then," said Miss Lexden, in rather a low, flat key, "I'll trouble you to ring the bell for Withers. It must be time for me to dress for dinner."
Barbara looked astonished, and would have spoken; but her aunt had risen from her chair and turned her back on her, moving towards the dressing-table. So she mechanically rang the bell, and left the room.
With the result of this conversation Churchill was made acquainted as he and Barbara bent together over a large stereoscope in the drawing-room before dinner. In a few hurried words, interspersed with ejaculations of admiration at the views, uttered in a much louder tone, Barbara conveyed to her lover that their project would meet with no assistance from her aunt, even if that old lady did not actively and violently oppose it. Churchill shrugged his shoulders on hearing this, and looked somewhat serious and annoyed; but as she rose to go in to dinner, Barbara pressed his hand, and looking into her face, he saw her eyes brighten and her lip curl with an expression of triumph, and he recognised in an instant that her energy had risen at the prospect of opposition, and that her determination to have her own way had strengthened rather than lessened from her aunt's treatment.
There was an accession to the dinner-table that day in the person of Mr. Schröder, a German long resident in England, and partner in the great house of Schröder, Stutterheim, Hinterhaus, and Company, bankers and brokers, which had branches and ramifications in all the principal cities of the world. No one would have judged Gustav Schröder to have been a keen financier and a consummate master of his business from his personal appearance. He was between fifty-five and sixty years old, heavy and dull-looking, with short, stubbly, iron-gray hair, dull boiled eyes, and thin dry lips, which he was constantly sucking. He was clumsy in his movements, and very taciturn; but though he spoke little, even to Miss Townshend, by whom he was seated, he seemed to derive intense satisfaction in gazing at her with a proprietorial kind of air, which nearly goaded Lyster, sitting directly opposite to them, to desperation. Upon his evidently uncomfortable state Captain Lyster was rallied with great humour by old Miss Lexden, who, however much she may have been inwardly annoyed, showed no signs of trouble. She opined that Captain Lyster must be in love; that some shepherdess on the neighbouring downs, some Brightonpoissarde, must have captivated him, and she was delighted at it, and it would do him good; and in spite of Lyster's protestations--which, however, he soon gave up when he found he had the trouble of repeating them--the old lady launched out into a very unusual tirade on her part in favour of early marriages, of love-matches made for love's sake alone, which frequently turned out the happiest, "didn't they, Mr. Churchill?" At which question, Churchill, who was dreamily looking across the table, and thinking how artistically Barbara's head was posed on her neck, and what a lovely ear she had, stammered an inarticulate and inappropriate reply.
But when dinner was over, and the post-prandial drink finished, and the coffee consumed in the drawing-room, and the "little music" played, and the ladies had retired to rest (Barbara, in her good night to Churchill, giving one reassuring hand-pressure, and looking as saucily triumphant as before), and the men had exchanged their dress coats for comfortable velvet lounging-jackets, and had, in most cases, dispensed with their white cravats; when Sir Marmaduke had nodded his farewell for the night, Churchill, instead of joining the party in the smoke-room, made his way to the old gentleman's quarters, and knocked at the dressing-room door. Bidden to come in, he found Sir Marmaduke in his dressing-gown and slippers, seated before a fire (for the evenings were beginning to be chilly), with a glass of cold brandy-and-water on a little table at his right hand, and the evening paper on his knee.
"Holloa!" was the old gentleman's salutation; "what's in the wind now? There must be something the matter when a young fellow like you, instead of joining in the nonsense downstairs, comes to hunt out an old fogey like me. What is it?"
"Business, Sir Marmaduke," commenced Churchill; "I want five minutes' business talk with you."
"God bless my soul!" growled Sir Marmaduke; "business at this time of night, and withme!You can't talk without something to drink, you know. Here, Gumble; another tumbler and the brandy for Mr. Churchill. Why don't you talk to Stone, my dear fellow? he manages all my business, you know."
"Yes, yes, Sir Marmaduke; but this is for you, and you alone. I came to tell you that I am going to be married."
"Ay, ay! no news to me, though you think it is. What's his name, Beresford, told us all about it. Well, well, deuced risky business; wish you well through it, and all that kind of thing. Don't congratulate you, because that's all humbug. But why specially announce it tome?"
"Simply because it is your due. I met the lady in this house, and the first introduction was through you. I don't know what nonsense Mr. Beresford may have been spreading, but the real fact is that I am going to be married to Barbara Lexden. Now you see my motive."
"I'm obliged to you, sir," said the old man, rising from his chair, and extending his hand; "you've acted like a gentleman, by Jove! like a gentleman and a man of honour. God bless my soul! how I recollect your father, Frank, and how like you are to him! And so you're going to marry little Barbara! not little Barbara now, though. How time flies! A good girl, sir; and a deuced fine girl, too, for the matter of that. What does her aunt say to that? She meant her for much higher game than you, young fellow. What does her aunt say? Does she know of it?--Does Miss Lexden know of it? I'll wager there'll be 'wigs upon the green,' as poor Dick Burke used to say, when she hears of it."
"Miss Lexden has heard of it, sir," said Churchill, smiling; "and I'm afraid she did not receive the news very auspiciously; but we shall endeavour to gain her consent, and if we fail--well, we must do without it. And now I won't keep you from your paper any longer. I thought it my duty to tell you, and having done so, I'll say good night."
"One minute, Frank Churchill; wait one minute. I'm a queer, useless old fellow--an old brute, I often think, for I'm not unconscious of the strange life I lead, and the odd--but, however, that's neither here nor there. Your father and I were boon companions--a wild, harum-scarum chap he was--andsuchcompany--and I've a regard for you, which is strengthened by your conduct to-night. My old cousin, Miss Lexden--well, she's an old lady, you know, and she meant Barbara for a marquis, at least; and then old women hate to be disappointed, you know, and she'll be savage, I've no doubt. But when you're once married, she won't be difficult to deal with, and so far as I can help you, I will. And now, God bless you, and good night; and--give Barbara a kiss for me in the morning."