"I think you should concern yourself less about her, dear Jack, for your own peace of mind."
"That was shattered long ago, friend. It is gone irrevocably, shivered, smashed, annihilated, like that glass goblet which was once the luck of Eden Hall. O, that Topsparkle is a damned villain! Could I but see him and his accomplice at the Old Bailey, I would answer the dread summons cheerfully. But to die and leave those two behind, and to leave her in their power!"
"God grant that you may outlive those ancient sinners."
"God will not grant it, Herrick. My days are numbered, like the beads upon a rosary—I am telling them off bead by bead—'tis but a short string."
"Dear Jack, if thou would'st consult a physician instead of talking this wild nonsense, and if thou would'st but take care of thyself—"
"I might live to be ninety—on ass's milk—like Hervey. Open another bottle of Burgundy, Herrick, we are too much in the dismals."
"You shall have no more to-night."
"Shall I not, Mentor? Then I will go to bed and dream I am in Mahomet's paradise, where lovely woman intoxicates instead of wine."
The house in Poland Street was scarce alive with the sound of footsteps on the stairs, or the opening and shutting of doors, until the day was well on towards noon. The cry of the sweep and the small coal man, the baker with his rolls, and Irish Molly with her clattering milk-pails, passed over the sleeping household, and was scarce heard dimly in a dream by any member of that strangely compacted family. The lodgers were for the most part such gentlemen as only began to think of their morning tea or chocolate when it was afternoon by the sundial. The landlord and his wife, being always among the last to retire, rose late in the morning with a struggle, lamenting the brevity of the night. Your bad sleeper is ever the most reluctant to rise, for his one chance of slumber comes generally in that fatal hour when business or duty compels him to leave his bed. Fétis, who passed most of his nights in feverish unrest, was apt after sunrise to sink into the deep sleep of mental and bodily exhaustion; but he must needs rise at ten in order to wait upon his master in Soho Square, whose toilet generally began at eleven. Madame Fétis coiled herself round like a dormouse, and would have slept twelve hours at a stretch if permitted; but as she rarely went to bed before three o'clock in the morning, so much indulgence was impossible. The house must be in order soon after noon, and delicate dainty little breakfasts must be served up for any distinguished patrons who might have spent the night upon the premises. And neither cook nor underlings could be trusted unless Madame was there with her keen bright eyes overlooking everything. It was Madame who made my lord Duke's chocolate, and buttered my lord Marquis's toast. She was the moving principle of grace and order in the household.
At one o'clock on the day after Lord Lavendale's supper-party, at an hour when the sober jog-trot citizens of London had dined or were in the act of dining, Madame sat sipping her chocolate, in a morningnégligéof dove-coloured tabinet—a material which Dr. Swift had done his best to make popular, through the Queen and Princesses, for the benefit of the Irish weavers. Her lace ruffles at neck and wrist were of the finest Buckinghamshire, and she wore a little mob-cap upon her piled-up tresses of unpowdered hair, which was vastly becoming. At her side lay an open ledger, and a brace of bills, which were to be delivered to his Grace and the Marquis later in the afternoon. As she sipped and munched, the lady compared the items in the bills with the figures in the ledger, and with this reading solaced her morning meal. She stopped occasionally to make a calculation with the aid of her roseate finger-tips, laboriously counted, for she resembled the great Duchess Sarah alike in being an excellent woman of business, and completely ignorant of the simplest rules of arithmetic.
For the first time for at least a year Mr. Fétis had failed in his morning duties at Mr. Topsparkle's toilet. He had come home from his evening entertainment very ill, and he was no better this morning; so Madame had been obliged to send a little note of apology to Soho Square, a missive composed in equal parts of French and English, with an impartial measure of bad spelling in both languages.
Madame's apartment was a small front parlour, close to the street door. From her window she could survey an approaching visitor, while from her door she could overhear any conversation that was carried on in the passage, and keep herself informed as to every one who went out or came in. It was the spider's little parlour into which many a giddy buzzing fly had fluttered unwarily, to emerge with clipped wings. It was Circe's cave; and the bones of innumerable victims lay bleaching there, from a metaphorical point of view.
To-day Madame Fétis was so deeply absorbed in the addition of that long column of figures that she was less on the alert than usual for external sounds, and she was surprised by the setting down of a sedan in front of her door, and within three feet of her window. It was a private sedan, painted and fitted with that studied simplicity which indicated distinction in the owner. The panels were a dark brown, the armorial bearings were unobtrusive—all was dark, plain, sober in style. Madame Fétis had not time to wonder, for the orange and brown liveries of the footmen who preceded the vehicle informed her that the chair could belong to no less important a person than her husband's patron and quasi-master, the rich Mr. Topsparkle; and the little Frenchwoman's heart fluttered with gratified vanity at the idea that her fascinations had brought Mr. Topsparkle to her husband's house, which he had never visited before.
"The powdered pert proficient in the art" of disturbing a whole street by his performance on the knocker now proceeded to startle the midday quiet by a most prodigious fantasia in iron. Madame flew to open the door, and stood smiling and curtseying as Mr. Topsparkle descended from his chair, treading delicately, like the ladies of ancient Jerusalem.
"Dear Madam, you do me too much honour," he protested, as he entered the panneled passage, bringing a cloud of perfumed powder and an overpowering odour of attar of roses into the semi-darkness of the narrow entry. "It is not often that Cerberus is replaced by Hebe."
"My servants are so lazy, your honour," apologised Madame; "our Cerberus is cleaning the shoes in his morning sleep, and myfemme de chambrehas scarce made up her mind whether the broom she is using is a dream or a reality. If your honour will be so condescending as to step into the parlour—"
"One moment, madam," said Topsparkle, and then turning to the open door he waved his hand to the footmen. "You can take my chair home, you fellows. I shall walk."
The chairmen took up their lightened load, and the footmen trudged off in front of the sedan, as Madame Fétis shut the door, and followed her visitor into the little parlour, where she drew forward a large armchair, in which she was wont to take her afternoon sleep, and which was naturally the most luxurious seat in the room, or it would not have been so favoured.
"So my good Fétis has broken down at last," said Mr. Topsparkle, as he seated himself.
"Yes, sir; he is very ill."
"I was hardly surprised at receiving your amiable billet. I have been meditating on our little chat t'other day, my good Madame Fétis," pursued Topsparkle, lolling negligently forward in the commodious chair, with his elbow on his knee, and drawing figures upon the dusty carpet with the amber tip of his cane, "and as I am deeply concerned in the health—above all in the mental health—of your excellent husband, I felt an anxiety to hear more from the same source; so instead of sending a footman to make inquiries, I have come myself. I know the uneasiness of a wife's affection, and that her tenderness may exaggerate the signs of evil—"
"Indeed, sir, I don't exaggerate my husband's condition," exclaimed the lady, with a fretful air; "it grows worse and worse; and I dread the day when I shall see him carried off to Bedlam in a strait waistcoat. 'Twas only last night that he had a worse outbreak than ever, and the night before that—"
"The night before that you had Jack Spencer, and Lord Lavendale, and a party to supper and cards," interrupted Topsparkle, tapping Madame's plump arm with the tips of his skinny fingers. "Oh, I have heard of your banquetings and revelries,ma belle, and the money that is lost and won under this modest roof of yours."
"Indeed, sir, it was a very sober party. There were no ladies, and there was no broken glass, nor an item of furniture damaged. I protest we should never make both ends meet by such parties as that, though I own Mr. Spencer flings a guinea where any other gentleman would give a shilling. But 'tis the mad-cap evenings—when the ladies and gentlemen take to romping over their supper, or when there are swords drawn at cards, and the furniture damaged—that bring grist to the mill."
"And so there was not much diversion at Mr. Spencer's party—'twas a grave and sedate assembly," said Topsparkle, with a trivial gossiping air, as of one who talked from sheer idleness; "but those quiet evenings are more dangerous than your romping revelries. I'll warrant the play was high."
Madame shook her head gloomily.
"Ay, I'll warrant it was, your honour, for that silly husband of mine tossed about in a wakeful fever till daylight, and raved like a lunatic towards nine o'clock, when he fell asleep—raved about Venice and one Borromeo. Does your honour remember any friend of my husband's by that name?"
"Borromeo?" repeated Topsparkle meditatively. "No, the name is strange to me. And so your husband talked in his sleep, and about Venice? Do his thoughts often turn that way?"
"'Tis the first time I have heard him. His ravings have been mostly about your honour's house in Soho Square. What can there be in that splendid mansion which should give Louis such a horror of it? He is always prating of ghosts. Do you really think 'tis haunted, sir?"
"Not one whit more than this cosy little parlour of yours, my fair friend; but servants are superstitious, and have a way of inventing a ghost for every fine old house. Mine was once occupied by Lord Grey, who was beheaded after Monmouth's rebellion; and those fools of mine have concocted a story that his headless figure stalks in the corridors between midnight and cock-crow. There are no ghosts in Soho Square, madam, save such childish inventions as I tell you of; but I fear your husband is in a very bad way, and that these ravings of his are but too sure an indication of the brandy-drinker's disease. You must be careful of him, my good Madame Fétis, if you would not see him expire in a madhouse."
"Alas, sir, how can I take care of a man who refuses to take care of himself? 'Twas only last night I implored him not to go to a supper at Lord Lavendale's house in Bloomsbury Square, to which his lordship had invited him."
"So his lordship invited your husband to sup, did he? Vastly condescending, I protest."
"Your honour would hardly believe how much notice the highest gentlemen in the land have taken of Fétis. 'Tis that has been his ruin. Lord Lavendale was monstrously taken with him. In his sleep that night it was Lavendale at every turn—Venice—Borromeo—Lavendale—mixed in all his ravings; and then yesterday evening, after the opera, he calls for a chair and is carried to his lordship's house, in spite of my protesting that the company he was going into would lead him into high play and hasten our ruin. He would not listen to me, but off he goes, in a sage-green ribbed velvet suit which your honour had made for the last birthday, and never wore but once—"
"I remember the suit," said Topsparkle, "it made me look as sickly as a lady of fashion in her morning cap before she puts on her rouge. It cost me ninety-five guineas for the birthday, and I gave it to Fétis next morning. 'Tis my rule never to wear a suit a second time if I don't like myself in it on the first wearing. 'Tis against good sense that a man should disgust himself with his own person for the sake of a few paltry guineas. I dare swear Fétis looks admirable in the suit. 'Tis just the colour of his own complexion."
"He looked more of a fine gentleman than 'tis well a man of his position should," replied Madame severely. "If he would take more pains to save money for his old age, and less to pass for a man of fashion, 'twould be better for both of us."
"But with so charming a wife, and with such advantages of education, a man of romantic temper might be pardoned for forgetting that he was not born in the purple," pleaded Topsparkle. "But I distract you from your narrative. You were about to say—"
"Oh, sir, could you but have seen my husband at four o'clock this morning, when he came back from his orgy."
"The word is severe, madam. Was he intoxicated?"
"Worse than that, sir. He was white as death, and trembling in every limb. He had tried to walk home, but had well nigh fallen in the street, when the chance of an empty coach saved him. He seemed as if he were struck speechless, would answer none of my questions, and let me help him to bed like a baby. Yet it was not losing his money which had overcome his senses, for the guineas fell out of his pockets and strewed the carpet as if it had been raining gold. He lay moaning half the night, till he fell into a kind of stupor."
"Did he rave as on the previous night?"
"Not one intelligible word has he uttered since he came home."
"Strange. It looks like some kind of seizure. Have you sent for a doctor?"
"No, sir; I was afraid for any one to see him in such a condition, lest it should get about the neighbourhood that he is a lunatic, and spoil our business."
"You are a vastly sensible woman, an excellent prudent creature," exclaimed Topsparkle, with enthusiasm. "Let not a mortal see him till he has got his reason again. Should it once be rumoured that he is out of his mind, you would be undone."
"I have spoken to your honour with perfect candour, as my poor husband's patron and friend," returned Madame meekly.
"You have done wisely, my good soul. I am your husband's best friend, and your only safe adviser. It is evident that he has got himself into a condition that is but one step from madness, and madness in this country is a terrible thing. It means the loss of all a man's rights as a citizen, it means the confiscation of his property, upon which the iron clutch of the High Court of Chancery swoops down like the claw of a vulture. It means that from comfortable circumstances a maniac's family may be reduced to paupers."
"O, sir, protect me from such a calamity."
"Do not fear, sweet soul. You shall be protected. Should the worst come, and your husband must needs be removed, it shall be my sacred care to provide for you. Two hundred a year in Paris, where you might, perhaps, return to the profession which you so much adorned."
"O, sir, you have, indeed, the soul of a great nobleman. It was the dream of my girlhood to live in Paris."
"The nest shall be found for you, poor bird, if the tempest of calamity should ever blow you hence," murmured Topsparkle, patting her plump hand.
"But indeed, sir, we will hope my poor husband will recover his reason, and learn better sense," resumed Madame, after a few moments' reflection. "I am very fond of Poland Street, and this business would be a fortune for us if Fétis would leave off play."
"My dear soul, he has gone too far. He will never be cured. When a man of his age gambles or drinks, the chances of cure are nil."
"Would you like to see him, sir?"
Topsparkle suppressed a shudder.
"Better not, madam. I should but agitate him by my presence. I will call on you to-morrow, when he may be in a better condition to converse with me."
He kissed Madame's fair hand, and bowed himself out of her presence. He walked along Poland Street, across Golden Square, westward to St. James's Street, with that light and easy motion which had become natural to him, the bearing of an elderly man who never meant to be old, who defied age to wither him, and who conquered the insidious foe called Time, by being in all things younger than youth itself. Yonder gallant guardsman of five-and-twenty on the opposite pavement moved heavily compared with the airy grace with which Topsparkle skimmed the street. He had trained every muscle, schooled every sinew in the long fight against senility. By his temperance and his activity he had contrived so far to have the best of the battle. The day of defeat must come sooner or later, he knew, and he had steeled himself to contemplate the end with a cynical courage. "May it be sharp and swift," he said; "may I crumble to pieces in an hour, like an embalmed corpse which is suddenly exposed to the air after two thousand years in an Egyptian sepulchre."
To-day, though his mind was full of perplexity, his movements and the carriage of his head were as jaunty as ever. No one who saw those dainty red-heeled shoes tripping along, and the careless swing of that slender rapier, would have supposed that Mr. Topsparkle was meditating anything more serious than the last quarrel between the Cuzzoni faction and the Faustina faction at the opera house, or the last wild exploit of mad-cap Peterborough at Bevis Mount.
What was to be done with this worn-out tool of his, which was getting dangerous? That was the question. It had never occurred to Vyvyan Topsparkle that his accomplice would not last as long as himself; that this slave of his, who had done his bidding with an unscrupulous obedience which indicated a mind utterly callous to the distinction between right and wrong, should at the eleventh hour develop a guilty conscience and all its attendant inconveniences.
"It is not conscience," thought Topsparkle savagely. "The man cares no more for that false feeble creature who lies in St. Anne's churchyard than he cares for St. Anne herself. It is brandy and not conscience that moves him. He has destroyed his nerves by intemperance, and must needs call up the dead to torment himself and endanger me. A madhouse—yes, that is the safest abode for a gentleman in this disposition. I have only to find out a safe asylum, and then, presto, my friend Fétis shall be bestowed where a strait waistcoat will tame his antics, and the free use of the gag will put a stop to his invocations of the dead. A mad-doctor and a private madhouse—that is what I have to find without loss of time."
Then, after walking a little further, cudgelling his brain in the effort to remember all he had ever heard about the incarceration of madmen in England, he reverted to a question which was more perplexing to him than the ravings of Fétis.
"Lavendale,que diable allait il faire dans cette galère? what the deuce can impel Lavendale to patronise my valet? and why should his lordship's society revive old associations with Venice, and reduce the man from semi-lunacy to dumb melancholic madness, as I doubt his state must be to-day, if his wife speaks truth? There is mystery and mischief here, and I cannot too soon protect myself from the chances of awkward revelations. There must be some private way of dealing with madmen, without shutting them up in that great hospital by London Wall, where all the world may see them at a penny a head, easier and cheaper than the lions in the Tower. I remember how Lavendale and his friend were struck by that marvellous likeness between Miss Bosworth and Margharita; yet what should come of that, an accidental resemblance, curious, but of no significance? I almost hated that girl for the shock her face gave me every time we met. It was a constant oppression to my spirits to have her in my house. And now they say Durnford has run away with her, and married her at Keith's Chapel, and that her father has thrown her off in consequence, so that my gentleman has but a penniless beauty for his partner in life, and no doubt will soon repent his bargain. Why should Lavendale invite my valet? O, a whim, no doubt, a trick, a practical joke, such as Wharton and his Schemers used to hatch t'other day—some conspiracy against a woman's peace or reputation. Something modish, witty, and iniquitous, no doubt. Why should I fancy there is mischief to me amidst such random follies? But the fact remains that Fétis has taken to blabbing, and must be gagged. Yes, my poor, good, faithful, self-serving servant, you were a very convenient and useful person so long as you knew how to hold your tongue, but now you have turned babbler you must be provided for accordingly. The wife can be easily dealt with. She is vain, silly, and selfish, and can be bought cheap."
Mr. Topsparkle was now in St. James's Street, in front of White's chocolate house, which was one of his chief resorts when he wanted to kill time between the morning undress saunter in the Mall and the afternoon parade in the Ring. 'Twas here he heard the latest news of the town, such floating scandals as had not yet been transfixed by theFlying Postor theSt. James's Journal; and it was here he met the innumerable gentlemen who were pleased to be bosom friends with one of the richest men in London.
"Why, Top," exclaimed one of these gentry—an easy-going young gentleman, who had spent a brace of fortunes, his own and his wife's, and so deemed he had earned the right to live upon his friends and the general public—"thou art younger by ten years than thou wert last week. Thou look'st like Hyperion new lighted on a heaven-kissing hill."
"And thou, Chambers, wast at the playhouse last night, I take it; and supped on champagne afterwards, and art not yet sober," answered Mr. Topsparkle somewhat coolly, as he seated himself at his favourite table.
"Thou hast hit the mark, Top. Invite me to a dish of tea, and sober me; I have not the price of one in my pocket."
"Sit down then, and behave decently while the Bohea is brewing."
"Pekoe, friend, Pekoe; nothing like Pekoe to clear the fumes of last night's wine. Do you hear, waiter; Mr. Topsparkle's chocolateà la vanille, and a dish of your strongest Pekoe for Mr. Topsparkle's friend, with cream, scoundrel, with plenty of cream."
White's was full at this leisure hour before dinner, and there were many greetings for Mr. Topsparkle, of a less exuberant but no less friendly tone than that of Captain Chambers. He sipped his chocolate in a leisurely manner, looked about him, and listened, returned every salutation, kissed his hand to acquaintances at the further end of the room, and said very little. He was wondering which of all these men was most likely to be of use to him in the matter he had in hand. He wanted to obtain information of a peculiar character without appearing too curious on the subject. He wanted to be advised without asking for anybody's advice.
At any other time he would have received Captain Chambers's familiar advances with an icy reserve; but to-day he was inclined to be indulgent; for he told himself that Chambers was just the kind of scamp who might be useful in an emergency; a man who, with his last guinea, had parted with his last scruple, a perfect specimen of the relentless gentlemanly villain, without heart, conscience, or honour, a scourge to confiding tradesmen, a traitor to trusting women, a bad son, a bad husband, a worse father, and a very pleasant fellow to fill a gap at a dinner-party.
"How's your wife, Bob?" asked a man at the next table. "I saw her in the Ring a week ago in the old dowager's carriage, looking as ill as if she was going to die and give you the chance of an heiress."
"Egad, I shall have to commit bigamy if she doesn't; so for conscience' sake she ought to give up the ghost," answered Chambers. "I have been seriously meditating running off with an Irish heiress, under a false name, and settling in some corner of her barbarous country, where I could live upon her fortune, and escape all the vexations of this accursed town."
"I don't think you should anathematise a town, Bob, which has allowed you to cut a very pretty figure and to spend twice your fortune," said his friend.
"O, your damned shopkeepers have been civil enough," answered Chambers, lolling back in his chair and picking his teeth languidly. "I had a bevy of them in my dressing-room every morning teasing me for orders long after I was absolutely insolvent. But 'twas my tailor finished me."
"Indeed! How was that? Surely he never caught you in so soft a mood as to pay him?"
"O, it was a bite of the most diabolical nature. 'Twas soon after I married that the fellow began to get importunate. I had run up a pretty long bill with him—birthday-suits, hunting clothes, an occasional hundred on my I O U—when I was hard up for card-money. Your West End snip is generally a money-lender in disguise. I suppose the total must have been close upon four figures; but I had never bothered myself about the matter. One morning the insolent rascal congratulated me upon having married an heiress. No doubt he knew Belle's poor little fortune to a guinea. I thanked him for his compliments in a manner which was as good as telling him to mind his own business, and next week he asked me for five or six hundred on account. 'Shillings, d'ye mean, sirrah?' says I. 'No, Captain, guineas,' says he; 'your bill, including money lent, is over twelve hundred.' This staggered me for I had not a sixpence of my own, and my wife's modest dowry of seven thousand pounds was tightly settled upon herself. I have always thought with Dick Steele that our new fashion of marriage-settlements is the most detestable form of bargaining that was ever invented. Mr. Snip looked black as thunder when I frankly confessed my inability to pay him till I dropped into an expected legacy from my East Indian godfather, who had long been ailing. Need I say that I invented the godfather and the legacy on the spot?"
"And was Snip satisfied to accept your Oriental security?"
"Alas, no. He told me that unless my wife would guarantee the payment of his bill he should be under the painful necessity of consigning me to the Fleet Prison and the tender mercies of that notorious friend of humanity, Governor Bambridge. The fellow was evidently in earnest, so to make a long story short, poor Belle consented to be responsible for the scoundrel's account, and all went merrily for the next three years, when, after worrying damnably with lawyers' letters, of which I naturally took no notice, he put in an execution, and had to be paid off in a lump sum of 6859l.7s.11-1/2d., and poor Belle found her fortune was altogether swamped by this one liability."
"How did she take it?" asked his friend.
"Like an angel; and I believe she would have been a loving wife to the end, in spite of all my peccadilloes, debts, cards, and women included; but the old Dowager came swooping down like Medea in her chariot, and carried her lost lamb back to the family fold in Golden Square, where they all pig together upon shoulders of mutton and cow-heel, but contrive to keep up a show of gentility in the way of a worn-out coach and a leash of hungry footmen."
"Very wonderful are the struggles of polite poverty," said the other; "but it is still more wonderful to me, Bob, how you contrive to keep out of the sponging-house,criblé de dettesthough you are."
"Ah, that is indeed a miracle," replied Chambers. "I sometimes catch myself wondering at the long-suffering of my creditors. Yet their patience is not altogether unrewarded. I have introduced some very pretty fellows to my old purveyors. There are innocent young gentlemen from the country who would never know where to go for their finery if there wasn't an experienced man of fashion to put them in the right path."
"Ay, Bob, we all understand your pleasant ways. When a man loses the ability to spend on his own account, he may still flourish as the source of spending in others. Tradesmen are always civil to Captain Rook if he visits them in company with Squire Pigeon."
"'Sdeath, Middleton, d'ye mean to insult me?" cried Chambers, with his hand on his sword.
"Nay, Captain, I did but respond in tune with your own ethics, which were never of the strictest."
"Faith, you're right, friend! I was never given to riding the high horse of morality. I spent my money like a gentleman, and any wife's money after it, and have earned the right to take things easily."
"Till you find yourself in the sponging-house, Bob. That evil day must come. All your creditors will not be equally placable."
"Whenever I get into the sponging-house, the odds are I shall be kicked out again for want of funds to make me worth keeping. Your sponging-house, kept by some dirty Jew, and waited on by a drab, is the most expensive hotel in London."
"Then they'll put you among the poor prisoners, and let you fetch and carry for those that are better off. 'Twill be a sorry end for Buck Chambers, the man who used to keep two servants to attend to his jackboots."
"Hang it! 'twas no superfluity of service. No man can be expected to do more than look after three horses or six pairs of boots."
"If they do nab you, Bob," said another friend, who had been attracted from a neighbouring table as the conversation grew louder, Mr. Topsparkle sipping his chocolate silently all the while, and listening in a half-abstracted mood, only reflecting within himself much as Romeo did about the apothecary, that here was a fellow who would do anything for gold; "if the limbs of the law do get you in their clutches, let us hope, for the sake of a world that could scarce exist pleasurably without you, that they won't put you into Marjory's."
"Marjory's! What, the sponging-house in Shoe Lane!" cried Chambers; "'tis an execrable den, but not a whit worse than their other holes. I have hobbed and nobbed with my friends in most of their rat-traps, and know the geography of them. I'd as lief be at Marjory's as anywhere else, if I must needs have the key turned upon me."
"Not just now, Bob; for there was an honest fellow—an Exeter tradesman up in London for a holiday, and arrested by mistake for another—who died of smallpox at Marjory's only yesterday morning; and they say the disease rages in the house, and has done for the last ten days."
The Captain sprang to his feet in a fury.
"And yet they go on taking prisoners there," he cried; "poor innocent wretches, whose only crime is to have lived like gentlemen! What a vile world we live in!"
"A vile world with a vengeance. Marjory's is a gold-mine for Bambridge. He claps all his prisoners into that hell, and makes them pay heavily before he allows them to be removed to the purgatory of another house, or the paradise of prison and chummage. This poor wretch from Exeter had not a stiver about him, so they refused to shift him. He was put in a room with three other men, one of whom was just recovering from the disease. The Exeter man took it badly, and died off-hand."
The Captain put on his hat.
"Farewell, friends," he said; "I'm off by to-night's fast coach to Bristol, and from thence to the wilds of Connemara. I was not born to be carrion for the vulture Bambridge."
He pulled himself together with a debonair movement, and staggered gaily out of the house, amidst the laughter of his friends.
"Was there ever such a good-humoured hardened villain?" exclaimed Middleton; "'tis a perpetual conundrum to me how he keeps out of gaol."
"He will get there some day," said a gentleman of clerical aspect; "our friend will have his pennyworth of prison, with a noose to follow."
Mr. Topsparkle paid his score, and sauntered away.
Not a word had he heard, nor had he made any inquiry, about madhouses, public or private; yet it seemed to him that he was wiser than when he entered the chocolate house, and that he knew all he wanted to know.
Mr. Fétis slept until late in the afternoon, and awoke restored to his senses and so far recovered in his health as to be able to dress himself and go down-stairs. He was taking a cup of coffee strengthened with cognac in his wife's parlour when the Topsparkle orange and brown livery again enlivened the doorstep, and a note was handed in at the door.
It was a somewhat urgent summons from Fétis's patron and master.
"If you are well enough to come to me this afternoon, I should like to see you," wrote Mr. Topsparkle; "my messenger will get you a chair."
Fétis told the footman that he was able to walk, and would wait upon Mr. Topsparkle almost immediately. He followed the footman in about five minutes, and was at once admitted to his master's dressing-room, where he found Mr. Topsparkle sitting before the fire, in slippers and a crimson brocadenégligé.
"My good Fétis, pray think me not inhuman in sending for you," he exclaimed, in his airiest manner, "but if you have vital power enough to put my head and complexion in order for the evening, it will be a real benevolence on your part. I am to go to an assembly at Henrietta's, and I don't want to look older than poor Mr. Congreve, who has the aspect of a sickly Methuselah."
"I do not believe her Grace thinks so, sir," said Fétis, going over to the toilet-table and beginning to arrange his arsenal of little china pots and crystal bottles, brushes and sponges, and hare's-feet.
"O, for her he is always Adonis. But he grows daily more wrinkled and mummified, and he paints as badly as Kneller at his worst, which is saying much," replied Topsparkle, seating himself in front of the glass, a Venetian mirror, framed in filagree silver, which ought to have reflected beauty as young and fresh as Belinda's. "And so, my poor friend," he continued with a sympathetic air, "you have been very ill. May I ask the nature of your malady?"
"I was as near death as I could be, I believe, sir," answered Fétis gloomily, still occupied with cosmetics and paint-brushes, and going on with his work as he spoke. "You will laugh at me doubtless when I tell you the cause of my indisposition, for you have a lighter nature than mine, or you could scarce live contentedly in this house."
"I have less education, and more philosophy, Fétis. That is the secret of my easier temper."
"I saw a ghost last night, sir," said Fétis, beginning his operations on his master's complexion.
"Indeed, my dear Fétis, I am told they swarm in the neighbourhood of Bloomsbury, where I hear you spent last midnight in most patrician society."
"How did you know where I spent my evening?" gasped Fétis.
"A little bird, my dear friend, a sweet little singing bird. Our London groves are vocal with such airy songsters. Pray keep your hand steady. God's curse, fellow, that wash of yours is revolting when 'tis not laid on smoothly. You are too thick over the right temple."
There was a pause, during which Fétis finished his ground-colour and outlined an eyebrow with a miniature-painter's pencil.
"And so you saw a ghost last night. Was it in Denmark Street, St. Giles's, as you reeled homewards after your orgy?"
"No, sir, 'twas before I left Lord Lavendale's house. I had supped with his lordship and Mr. Durnford—"
"A fellow I hate!" interrupted Topsparkle; "a sinister, prying knave!"
"We had played cards for an hour or so, and I had been sole winner. I was in excellent spirits, elated, rejuvenated by my good luck. I had to pass through a suite of cold and empty rooms, dark except for the candle carried by my companion, Durnford, and a gleam of light from a lamp on the staircase beyond. It was in this semi-darkness I saw the shape of her whose death we compassed, in that room yonder, forty years ago!"
He pointed to the door opening into Topsparkle's bedchamber.
"My good Fétis, you were drunk," said his master, without moving a muscle. "His lordship had plied you with wine till your highly imaginative mind was on the alert for phantoms. An effect of light and shade in a dusky room, a white curtain perchance, an optical delusion of some kind. I should have given you credit for more sense and less superstition."
"I tell you 'twas she, Margharita Vincenti. It was her face, sad, reproachful, as it has looked upon me many a time in this house. It was her figure, her attitude, standing there before me in the light of Mr. Durnford's uplifted candle, with all the reality of life."
"And yet in a trice the vision vanished, melted before your eyes?"
"Indeed I know not, sir, for terror overcame my senses, and I swooned."
"My good Fétis, you are in a very bad state of health. You need to be monstrously careful of yourself. These signs and wonders of yours presage lunacy. Give me the hand-mirror. No, your eyebrows are not so successful as usual. There is a gouty line in the arch of the left, and you have given me a scintilla too much rouge. Pray tone down that rosy-apple appearance to a more delicate peach bloom. I think you are falling off in the composition of your red. There is a purple tinge that is too conspicuously artificial. You are a chemist, and should know more of the amalgamation of colours. You should try to imitate nature, my good Fétis. And you tell me you saw my poor Margharita's ghost, and that 'twas Mr. Durnford who held the candle that lighted the vision?"
"It was just as I have told you."
"To be sure. And pray do you happen to remember a certain young lady, an heiress, who came to the Abbey last winter, and who was the living image of my poor Margharita—whom you must remember I indulged and treated with all possible kindness so long as she was faithful to me—and on whose account you might therefore spare me your reproaches."
"I cannot forget my crime, nor who prompted it."
"Plague take you, Fétis, why use hard words? 'Twas but a sleeping draught made a thought too powerful, so that the sleep became eternal. 'Twas euthanasia. Had that girl lived her fate would have been an evil one. She was on the downward slope when death stopped her. She had ceased to care for me, and was passionately in love with Churchill. Do you suppose he would have remained true to her when the vanity of conquest was over and her monotony of sweetness began to pall? Deserted by him, she would have fallen a prey to some coarser profligate, and then the side boxes, and the hospital or Bridewell. Faithless to me, there was nothing but death that could save her."
"You might have made her your wife."
"Because I found her false and fickle as a mistress! A pretty reason, quotha."
"To be made an honest woman would have steadied her; you might have given her the company of her child; that is ever a mother's safeguard."
"Pollute my house with the presence of a squalling baby! No, Fétis, endurance has limits. Pshaw! let us not harp upon this folly. Do you remember Mrs. Bosworth?"
"Yes; I saw her only at a distance. The likeness was certainly startling."
"And you did not know that the lady is now Mr. Durnford's wife? He stole her from her father's house t'other day, and Parson Keith married them."
"No; I had not heard that."
"And therefore could not guess that the ghost you saw in the dark room was no less a personage than Durnford's young wife, who by a freak of nature happens to be the living image of my dead mistress?"
"By heaven, it might have been so! I never guessed—I never thought—" faltered Fétis.
"Of course not. You have lost your head, my friend, since you took to cards and strong waters. Had you been content to drink like a gentleman, these fancies would never have addled your brains. I hope you betrayed yourself no more than by your swooning fit in Lavendale's presence. You held your tongue, I trust, when your senses returned?"
"I know not," answered Fétis, with an embarrassed air. "I left the house like a sleepwalker, scarce conscious of my own actions; nor do I know how I reached my own chamber."
"You are a sad fool, my dear Fétis, and, what is more, you are a dangerous fool," said Topsparkle, in his gentlest voice, and with a faint sigh. "The hand-glass again, please. Yes, that is better: the eyebrows have more delicacy than your first attempt. I want to appear at my best to-night. A man who has a beautiful wife should not look a scarecrow. You have a remarkable talent for touching up a face; a gift, Fétis, a gift. 'Tis an art that can be no more learnt than oratory or poetry. A man must be born with it. I am very sorry for you, my good Louis, sorry that tongue of yours is no more to be trusted. There, that will do. My valet can help me on with my wig. You are looking ill and tired. Get home as fast as you can."
"Indeed, sir, I am far from well."
"I can see it, my poor friend. Good-day to you. Tell my servant to bring me a dish of tea as you go out."
Fétis bowed and retired, gave his master's message to the footman sitting half asleep in the ante-room, and went out of the house.
He had not left the Square before he was stopped by two shabbily-clad men, one of whom tapped him on the shoulder.
"You are my prisoner, Mr. Fétis."
"Prisoner, fellow! you are joking."
"No, sir; this will show you there is no joke in the matter;" and the man produced a paper which Mr. Fétis read with a troubled brow.
"This can be very easily settled," he said after a pause; "'tis but a bagatelle. I had forgotten that Mr. Bevis had sued me. The account is such a paltry one, and I have put thousands into Bevis's pockets. It is but fifty pounds. If you will accompany me to yonder house on the other side of the Square, Mr. Topsparkle will oblige me with the cash."
"Can't do no such thing, your honour," growled the bailiff, in a voice thickened by hard living and strong drink. "My orders are to take you straight to the sponging-house. You can communicate with your friends when you're there."
"But the house is within a few paces, and I tell you I can get the money!"
"The law's the law, and it mustn't be tampered with," said the man, "and duty's duty, and it's mine to see you safe inside the lock. Call a coach, Jerry; there's a stand in Greek Street," and so, with his arm held in the dirty grasp of a bailiff, Mr. Fétis was marched off to a coach.
In that trouble of mind which had been growing on him of late he had indeed almost forgotten that judgment had been pronounced against him at the suit of Messrs. Bevis, wine merchants, of the Strand, whose account, though he made so light of it, was one of long standing. Messrs. Bevis had filled and refilled Mr. Topsparkle's cellars since his re-establishment in London, and Fétis had been the agent and intermediary in all purchases of wine, choosing, tasting, approving, and had been courted and fawned upon by the Messrs. Bevis and their clerks. And now on account of a trumpery fifty-odd pounds for goods supplied to himself, he was to be locked up in gaol! He was astounded at the ingratitude of these wretches.
It was on the second day after Fétis had been deprived of his liberty, that the post brought a thick packet to Mr. Durnford in Bloomsbury Square, as he sat with Lavendale over a bottle of claret after the four o'clock dinner. The writing of the address was unfamiliar to him, and the characters had a blurred and irregular look, as if the hand that had traced them had scarce been steady enough to hold a pen.
He broke the seals hurriedly, eager to see the contents, for the post-mark was that of the next post town to Flamestead and Fairmile.
The letter contained an enclosure consisting of three other letters, the ink faded, and the paper yellowed by age. These were written in French, in a niggling mean little hand which Mr. Herrick had never seen before.
On the inside of the cover were these lines in the same illegible and tremulous scrawl as the outer inscription.
"Sir,——the hand of death is on me. Your wife never injured me, and I should like to do her a good turn before I die. The enclosed letters, which Squire Bosworth found on the person of your wife's father, were discovered by me in his bureau some years ago. They may help you to a fortune, and induce you to think more kindly of your humble servant,——Barbara Layburne."
"Sir,——the hand of death is on me. Your wife never injured me, and I should like to do her a good turn before I die. The enclosed letters, which Squire Bosworth found on the person of your wife's father, were discovered by me in his bureau some years ago. They may help you to a fortune, and induce you to think more kindly of your humble servant,——Barbara Layburne."
Herrick hastily unfolded one of the three letters, and looked at the signature.
"By heaven, Lavendale, 'tis a strange world!" he exclaimed. "This letter is signed by the man who was here the other night, and his signature in this conjuncture, before I read a line of this correspondence, assures me that my suspicion is well founded."
"What suspicion?"
"One which I have hitherto hesitated to confide to you lest you should deem me a lunatic. I have for some time suspected that the likeness between Irene and the portrait you and I unearthed at Ringwood Abbey was something more than an accident—that there was a link between the story of Topsparkle's past life and my dear one's birth—and here in Philip Chumleigh's possession are letters bearing the signature of Topsparkle's tool and accomplice. Before I read them I am convinced they will confirm all my suspicions."
"Read, Herrick, read. Thou knowest I am more interested in thy fortunes than in my own—for thine are the more hopeful. Read, Herrick, I burn with impatience."
Durnford obeyed, and after a careful comparison of dates read the first letter, which was dated Florence, July 20th, 1705.
"Mademoiselle,—It is with the utmost regret that I am constrained to remonstrate with you upon the contents of your last letter addressed to your father, under cover to me, and forwarded at your urgent desire by the Rev. Mother, who, when she so far complied with your wish, was aware that she transgressed the rules laid down for her guidance by my honoured master, your guardian and benefactor, who desired that no communication should ever be addressed to him by you."Your address to a father who has long ceased to exist, can but be answered by the assurance that the noble Englishman who is generous enough to pay for your maintenance at the convent recognises no claim upon him of a nature such as you put forward in your vehement letter. He has provided for you from your infancy, and will continue to provide for you so long as you deserve his bounty; but he cannot submit to be persecuted by appeals to his affection, or by your foolish desire to know the secret of your birth, a knowledge which you may be assured could not add to your satisfaction or peace of mind."Be advised, therefore, my dear young lady, by one who is cordially your friend. Pursue the even tenor of your way, and ask no indiscreet questions of any one. It would be well for you, perhaps, if the piety of your surroundings should lead you to renounce the vanities of a troublesome world, and to devote your life to the peaceful seclusion of the cloister. Should you make this election, your noble friend will doubtless contribute handsomely to the wealth of the convent in which your childhood and girlhood have been spent so happily.—Accept the assurance of my sincere respect,Fétis."
"Mademoiselle,—It is with the utmost regret that I am constrained to remonstrate with you upon the contents of your last letter addressed to your father, under cover to me, and forwarded at your urgent desire by the Rev. Mother, who, when she so far complied with your wish, was aware that she transgressed the rules laid down for her guidance by my honoured master, your guardian and benefactor, who desired that no communication should ever be addressed to him by you.
"Your address to a father who has long ceased to exist, can but be answered by the assurance that the noble Englishman who is generous enough to pay for your maintenance at the convent recognises no claim upon him of a nature such as you put forward in your vehement letter. He has provided for you from your infancy, and will continue to provide for you so long as you deserve his bounty; but he cannot submit to be persecuted by appeals to his affection, or by your foolish desire to know the secret of your birth, a knowledge which you may be assured could not add to your satisfaction or peace of mind.
"Be advised, therefore, my dear young lady, by one who is cordially your friend. Pursue the even tenor of your way, and ask no indiscreet questions of any one. It would be well for you, perhaps, if the piety of your surroundings should lead you to renounce the vanities of a troublesome world, and to devote your life to the peaceful seclusion of the cloister. Should you make this election, your noble friend will doubtless contribute handsomely to the wealth of the convent in which your childhood and girlhood have been spent so happily.—Accept the assurance of my sincere respect,Fétis."
The second was a year later.
"Mademoiselle,—Your noble friend has been informed of a disgraceful intrigue in which you have engaged with an Englishman, who gained admission to the convent grounds under peculiar circumstances, and from whom you have received letters, conveyed to you by means which, although suspected, have not been as yet fully discovered by your custodians."I warn you that the pursuance of this intrigue must inevitably lead to your ruin, as your benefactor will consider himself absolved by your misconduct from all future claims upon him. But I hope to be able to assure him that you have renounced this folly and are in a fair way to renounce all other follies, and to devote your life to the service of God. You have before your eyes daily so many touching examples of the beauty of such a life, that it would be only natural your heart should yearn towards the cloister.—With heartfelt respect,Fétis."
"Mademoiselle,—Your noble friend has been informed of a disgraceful intrigue in which you have engaged with an Englishman, who gained admission to the convent grounds under peculiar circumstances, and from whom you have received letters, conveyed to you by means which, although suspected, have not been as yet fully discovered by your custodians.
"I warn you that the pursuance of this intrigue must inevitably lead to your ruin, as your benefactor will consider himself absolved by your misconduct from all future claims upon him. But I hope to be able to assure him that you have renounced this folly and are in a fair way to renounce all other follies, and to devote your life to the service of God. You have before your eyes daily so many touching examples of the beauty of such a life, that it would be only natural your heart should yearn towards the cloister.—With heartfelt respect,Fétis."
The third letter was dated Florence, December, 1707.
"Madame,—My noble master commands me to inform you that he can recognise no further claim upon him, and that he can respond to no appeal from you or your husband, either in the present or in the future."He requests that he may be troubled by no further communications from you,Fétis."
"Madame,—My noble master commands me to inform you that he can recognise no further claim upon him, and that he can respond to no appeal from you or your husband, either in the present or in the future.
"He requests that he may be troubled by no further communications from you,Fétis."
"Devil!" exclaimed Lavendale, when he had heard the last of the letters, "nay, Satan himself, as I have read of him, has an amiable air as compared with this fish-blooded profligate—this worn-outroué, whose heart must be of the consistence of a sliced cucumber. I have no doubt that Irene's mother was Topsparkle's daughter, the infant whom he sent to Buckinghamshire to be nursed, and doubtless carried off to the Continent with the rest of his goods and chattels when he left the country. And to think that he had not even one touch of tenderness for the child of the woman he murdered! There was no compunction—no remorse—not one sting of conscience to urge him to generosity. He could have seen the daughter starve with as unrelenting eyes as he saw the mother die."
"He is indeed a heartless dastard," said Herrick, "and I have no desire that my wife should profit by her kindred with him."
"O, but she shall profit, or at any rate he shall wince," cried Lavendale; "let me be your emissary, Herrick. 'Twill be easier for me to give him his jobation. I will make those old veins of his tingle; I will conjure up the vermilion of shame under that vizard of white lead. I will let him know what an English gentleman thinks of such conduct as his. God's death, but he shall feel again, as he felt forty years ago on the hustings at Brentford, when the mob rated him. If Hamlet spoke daggers to his mother, I will speak rotten eggs and dead puppy-dogs to this Topsparkle. And he isherhusband.Herhusband! O, shame! O, agony! Herrick, I was an ass, a poltroon, not to run away with her!"
That was an old argument which Durnford did not care to reopen. He gave Lavendale the letters, urged him to be temperate in his interview with Topsparkle. But little good could come of raking up the unholy past. There was no evidence strong enough to bring the millionaire's crimes home to him in any court of justice. Fétis might blab his own and his master's guilt in a moment of excitement and terror, but face to face with the law, would doubtless recant. The lapse of forty years gave Vyvyan Topsparkle the best possible security against the consequences of his guilt. The history of his crime might be guessed at, but could never be proved.
"I will talk to the wretch to-night," said Lavendale; "yes, this very night. It is Lady Judith's assembly, by the bye, and all the world will be in Soho Square."
"You can scarcely enter upon such a discussion at a party," said Herrick.
"O, but I will make an opportunity; Topsparkle shall take me to his private rooms. I am on fire till I tell that ancient reprobate my mind about him."
"And if he should challenge you?"
"As he challenged Churchill? Why, in that case I shall refuse like Churchill, and tell him that I only fight with gentlemen. But he will not challenge me. He will be too much afraid of my revelations when I tell him how Fétis has confessed to a murder committed at his master's instigation."
Each side in politics and all shades of opinions were to be found at Mr. Topsparkle's town house, as they were at Ringwood Abbey. Statecraft was represented by Walpole, who dropped in for a quarter of an hour, and who looked daggers at his sometime friend and ally, Mr. Pulteney; by Carteret and Bolingbroke; while literature had its representatives in Voltaire, whose epic poem,La Henriade, had been already tasted in private readings by theéliteamong his subscribers, although not to be published till next March; in Congreve and Gay; in the Scotch parson's son, Thomson, whose poemWinterwas being read and admired by everybody; and in that scapegrace Savage, whom Queen Caroline protected and whom Lady Judith courted out of aggravation to respectable people. All the modish beauties were there, from the fair daughters and granddaughters of the house of Marlborough to Mrs. Pulteney, secure in unbounded influence over her husband and several other slaves, reckless of his reputation and of her own, and insolent in the consciousness of superior charms. It was a strange medley gathering; but Lady Judith never seemed more in her element than in a social pot-pourri of this kind. She looked gorgeous in amber and gold brocade and the famous Topsparkle diamonds, the necklace which Caroline had worn at her coronation, a string of single brilliants as large as small hazel nuts, of perfect shape and purest water. A cloud of ostrich feathers about her head and neck softened the glare of her gems and the gaudy colouring of her gown. She looked like a portrait by Velasquez, fresh from the painter's easel, in all the brilliancy of colour newly laid on.
Lord Lavendale she received with her easiest air. He found her surrounded by a circle of beaux and politicians, ambassadors and poets, keeping them all in conversation, alert and ready with answer and repartee at every turn of their talk.
The latest ridiculous anecdote about the King had put everybody into a good humour.
"You must take your fill of laughter and have done with it," said Lady Judith, "for I expect to hear my trumpeters strike up Handel's march at any moment, to do honour to our conquering hero's arrival. Their Majesties promised they would look in upon me after the opera."
"Then I hope you have ordered double your usual supper—plentiful as your banquets ever are," said Lord Carteret, "for it is a distinguishing mark of royalty to eat three times as much as the commonalty. The old Dowager of Orleans was always lamenting her son's excesses at the table—she has told me of his incautious gluttony with tears of affectionate concern, which his fatal apoplexy showed to be but too prophetic—and she assured me also that when the late king's body was opened it was found he was constructed on a different principle from his subjects, and had twice their capacity for digestion. It was hereditary with the Bourbon race to gorge: and our Hanoverians seem of the same kidney."
Lady Judith turned from his lordship to welcome Mrs. Robinson, who came fluttering in after her triumphs at the opera, with Lord Peterborough in attendance upon her steps, proud to be considered her slave, yet ashamed to confess himself her husband, so strong were the prejudices of that great world which worshipped Senesino and Farinelli, and squabbled acrimoniously about the rival merits of Cuzzoni and Faustina.
"My dearest Anastasia, I hear you surpassed yourself in Rinaldo," exclaimed Lady Judith. "Topsparkle was there till nearly the end of the third act, and came away hysterical with rapture." Then turning to Peterborough, with the fair Anastasia's hand in hers, "Is your lordship still in love with Bevis Mount and solitude?"
"Could I but tempt your ladyship to visit the wild romantic cottage where I pass my time, 'twould be no longer a hermit's cell, but the temple of Cytherea," answered Mordanto gaily, "the mere fact that you had been there, like a queen on her royal progress, would for ever idealise that humble dwelling."
"Have a care, my lord, lest I take you at your word some day, and put up at Bevis Mount for a night on my way from Ringwood to London. 'Twould be but to take the Winchester road instead of travelling by Salisbury, and it would be a prodigious joke to descend upon you as unexpectedly as if I were indeed the goddess and conveyed through the air by a team of doves."
"You should be received with adoration and rapture; yet I warn you thatmyBlenheim would scarce afford shelter for a fine lady's attendants, although it might be made into a not-unfitting bower for beauty unattended."
"O, my people should go to an inn, I would bring only Topsparkle to play propriety. How doyoulike his lordship's new toy, Anastasia?"
"You mean his cottage near Southampton? I have not seen it," answered the singer, with a cold proud air.
"Indeed, and can he like a dwelling you have not approved?"
"His lordship is eccentric in many things, my dear Lady Judith," replied Mrs. Robinson, and then she and her swain moved on and mingled with the crowd, making way for Lavendale.
"Your ladyship is in unusual spirits to-night," he said, after a few words of greeting.
"Yes, I am full of contentment. I met some friends of yours at the playhouse last night, that pretty Mrs. Bosworth and yourfidus Achates, Mr. Durnford, and I was told all about their runaway marriage. 'Tis the prettiest thing I have heard of for ages, an heiress to renounce all her expectations for the lover of her choice. I saw how the land lay when they were together at Ringwood. But I am forgetting to congratulate you upon your success as an orator. Lord Carteret told me just now that you have astonished your own party and scared the Opposition, that you spoke better than Lord Scarborough, and that you are reckoned as a new element of strength in Walpole's forces."
"I shall be proud to be the ally of so great a man."
"What, you admire him as heartily as ever? You are not afraid of his overweening ambition? Lord Townshend has been moaning about the palace this modern Sejanus has built at Houghton, and which almost dwarfs the splendour of poor Townshend's own place, which he had hitherto considered the metropolis of Norfolk. Every stone that augments the grandeur of Houghton is a stone of offence to Townshend."
"He will have to swallow them, as Saturn swallowed the substitutes for his children," retorted Lavendale lightly; "Walpole's power has not yet attained its zenith."
"Do you play?" asked Lady Judith with a wave of her fan towards the crowded card-room.
Lavendale accepted the gesture as his dismissal.
At this moment the trumpets began to blare the stirring march fromJudas Maccabeus, and the hero of Oudenarde came strutting up the steps, between the flare and flash of torches held by two rows of powdered footmen.