'We are getting a bad name, whether we deserve it or not,' said Mr. Oldeschole. 'That fellow Hardlines has put us into his blue- book, and now there's an article in the Times!'

Just at this moment, a messenger brought in to Mr. Snape the unfortunate letter of which we have given a copy.

'What's that?' said Mr. Oldeschole.

'A note from Mr. Corkscrew, sir,' said Snape.

'He's the worst of the whole lot,' said Mr. Oldeschole.

'He is very bad,' said Snape; 'but I rather think that perhaps, sir, Mr. Tudor is the worst of all.'

'Well, I don't know,' said the Secretary, muttering sotto voce to the Under-Secretary, while Mr. Snape read the letter —'Tudor, at any rate, is a gentleman.'

Mr. Snape read the letter, and his face grew very long. There was a sort of sneaking civility about Corkscrew, not prevalent indeed at all times, but which chiefly showed itself when he and Mr. Snape were alone together, which somewhat endeared him to the elder clerk. He would have screened the sinner had he had either the necessary presence of mind or the necessary pluck. But he had neither. He did not know how to account for the letter but by the truth, and he feared to conceal so flagrant a breach of discipline at the moment of the present discussion.

Things at any rate so turned out that Mr. Corkscrew's letter was read in full conclave in the board-room of the office, just as he was describing the excellence of his manoeuvre with great glee to four or five other jolly souls at the 'Magpie and Stump.'

At first it was impossible to prevent a fit of laughter, in which even Mr. Snape joined; but very shortly the laughter gave way to the serious considerations to which such an epistle was sure to give rise at such a moment. What if Sir Gregory Hardlines should get hold of it and put it into his blue-book! What if the Times should print it and send it over the whole world, accompanied by a few of its most venomous touches, to the eternal disgrace of the Internal Navigation, and probably utter annihilation of Mr. Oldeschole's official career! An example must be made!

Yes, an example must be made. Messengers were sent off scouring the town for Mr. Corkscrew, and about midnight he was found, still true to the 'Magpie and Stump,' but hardly in condition to understand the misfortune which had befallen him. So much as this, however, did make itself manifest to him, that he must by no means join his jolly-souled brethren at the Eel-pie Island, and that he must be at his office punctually at ten o'clock the next morning if he had any intention of saving himself from dismissal. When Charley arrived at his office, Mr. Corkscrew was still with the authorities, and Charley's turn was to come next.

Charley was rather a favourite with Mr. Oldeschole, having been appointed by himself at the instance of Mr. Oldeschole's great friend, Sir Gilbert de Salop; and he was, moreover, the best- looking of the whole lot of navvies; but he was no favourite with Mr. Snape.

'Poor Screwy—it will be all up with him,' said Charley. 'He might just as well have gone on with his party and had his fun out.'

'It will, I imagine, be necessary to make more than one example, Mr. Tudor,' said Mr. Snape, with a voice of utmost severity.

'A-a-a-men,' said Charley. 'If everything else fails, I think I'll go into the green line. You couldn't give me a helping hand, could you, Mr. Snape?' There was a rumour afloat in the office that Mr. Snape's wife held some little interest in a small greengrocer's establishment.

'Mr. Tudor to attend in the board-room, immediately,' said a fat messenger, who opened the door wide with a start, and then stood with it in his hand while he delivered the message.

'All right,' said Charley; 'I'll tumble up and be with them in ten seconds;' and then collecting together a large bundle of the arrears of the Kennett and Avon lock entries, being just as much as he could carry, he took the disordered papers and placed them on Mr. Snape's desk, exactly over the paper on which he was writing, and immediately under his nose.

'Mr. Tudor—Mr. Tudor!' said Snape.

'As I am to tear myself away from you, Mr. Snape, it is better that I should hand over these valuable documents to your safe keeping. There they are, Mr. Snape; pray see that you have got them all;' and so saying, he left the room to attend to the high behests of Mr. Oldeschole.

As he went along the passages he met Verax Corkscrew returning from his interview. 'Well, Screwy,' said he, 'and how fares it with you? Pork chops are bad things in summer, ain't they?'

'It's all U-P,' said Corkscrew, almost crying. 'I'm to go down to the bottom, and I'm to stay at the office till seven o'clock every day for a month; and old Foolscap says he'll ship me the next time I'm absent half-an-hour without leave.'

'Oh! is that all?' said Charley. 'If that's all you get for pork chops and senna, I'm all right. I shouldn't wonder if I did not get promoted;' and so he went in to his interview.

What was the nature of the advice given him, what amount of caution he was called on to endure, need not here be exactly specified. We all know with how light a rod a father chastises the son he loves, let Solomon have given what counsel he may to the contrary. Charley, in spite of his manifold sins, was a favourite, and he came forth from the board-room an unscathed man. In fact, he had been promoted as he had surmised, seeing that Corkscrew who had been his senior was now his junior. He came forth unscathed, and walking with an easy air into his room, put his hat on his head and told his brother clerks that he should be there to-morrow morning at ten, or at any rate soon after.

'And where are you going now, Mr. Tudor?' said Snape.

'To meet my grandmother at Islington, if you please, sir,' said Charley. 'I have permission from Mr. Oldeschole to attend upon her for the rest of the day—perhaps you would like to ask him.' And so saying he went off to his appointment with Mr. M'Ruen at the 'Banks of Jordan.'



CHAPTER XIX

A DAY WITH ONE OF THE NAVVIES.—AFTERNOON

The 'Banks of Jordan' was a public-house in the city, which from its appearance did not seem to do a very thriving trade; but as it was carried on from year to year in the same dull, monotonous, dead-alive sort of fashion, it must be surmised that some one found an interest in keeping it open.

Charley, when he entered the door punctually at two o'clock, saw that it was as usual nearly deserted. One long, lanky, middle- aged man, seedy as to his outward vestments, and melancholy in countenance, sat at one of the tables. But he was doing very little good for the establishment: he had no refreshment of any kind before him, and was intent only on a dingy pocket-book in which he was making entries with a pencil.

You enter the 'Banks of Jordan' by two folding doors in a corner of a very narrow alley behind the Exchange. As you go in, you observe on your left a little glass partition, something like a large cage, inside which, in a bar, are four or five untempting- looking bottles; and also inside the cage, on a chair, is to be seen a quiet-looking female, who is invariably engaged in the manufacture of some white article of inward clothing. Anything less like the flashy-dressed bar-maidens of the western gin palaces it would be difficult to imagine. To this encaged sempstress no one ever speaks unless it be to give a rare order for a mutton chop or pint of stout. And even for this she hardly stays her sewing for a moment, but touches a small bell, and the ancient waiter, who never shows himself but when called for, and who is the only other inhabitant of the place ever visible, receives the order from her through an open pane in the cage as quietly as she received it from her customer.

The floor of the single square room of the establishment is sanded, and the tables are ranged round the walls, each table being fixed to the floor, and placed within wooden partitions, by which the occupier is screened from any inquiring eyes on either side.

Such was Mr. Jabesh M'Ruen's house-of-call in the city, and of many a mutton chop and many a pint of stout had Charley partaken there while waiting for the man of money. To him it seemed to be inexcusable to sit down in a public inn and call for nothing; he perceived, however, that the large majority of the frequenters of the 'Banks of Jordan' so conducted themselves.

He was sufficiently accustomed to the place to know how to give his orders without troubling that diligent barmaid, and had done so about ten minutes when Jabesh, more punctual than usual, entered the place. This Charley regarded as a promising sign of forthcoming cash. It very frequently happened that he waited there an hour, and that after all Jabesh would not come; and then the morning visit to Mecklenburg Square had to be made again; and so poor Charley's time, or rather the time of his poor office, was cut up, wasted, and destroyed.

'A mutton chop!' said Mr. M'Ruen, looking at Charley's banquet. 'A very nice thing indeed in the middle of the day. I don't mind if I have one myself,' and so Charley had to order another chop and more stout.

'They have very nice sherry here, excellent sherry,' said M'Ruen. 'The best, I think, in the city—that's why I come here.'

'Upon my honour, Mr. M'Ruen, I shan't have money to pay for it until I get some from you,' said Charley, as he called for a pint of sherry.

'Never mind, John, never mind the sherry to-day,' said M'Ruen. 'Mr. Tudor is very kind, but I'll take beer;' and the little man gave a laugh and twisted his head, and ate his chop and drank his stout, as though he found that both were very good indeed. When he had finished, Charley paid the bill and discovered that he was left with ninepence in his pocket.

And then he produced the bill stamp. 'Waiter,' said he, 'pen and ink,' and the waiter brought pen and ink.

'Not to-day,' said Jabesh, wiping his mouth with the table-cloth. 'Not to-day, Mr. Tudor—I really haven't time to go into it to- day—and I haven't brought the other bills with me; I quite forgot to bring the other bills with me, and I can do nothing without them,' and Mr. M'Ruen got up to go.

But this was too much for Charley. He had often before bought bill stamps in vain, and in vain had paid for mutton chops and beer for Mr. M'Ruen's dinner; but he had never before, when doing so, been so hard pushed for money as he was now. He was determined to make a great attempt to gain his object.

'Nonsense,' said he, getting up and standing so as to prevent M'Ruen from leaving the box; 'that's d—- nonsense.'

'Oh! don't swear,' said M'Ruen—'pray don't take God's name in vain; I don't like it.'

'I shall swear, and to some purpose too, if that's your game. Now look here——'

'Let me get up, and we'll talk of it as we go to the bank—you are so unpunctual, you know.'

'D—- your punctuality.'

'Oh! don't swear, Mr. Tudor.'

'Look here—if you don't let me have this money to-day, by all that is holy I will never pay you a farthing again—not one farthing; I'll go into the court, and you may get your money as you can.'

'But, Mr. Tudor, let me get up, and we'll talk about it in the street, as we go along.'

'There's the stamp,' said Charley. 'Fill it up, and then I'll go with you to the bank.'

M'Ruen took the bit of paper, and twisted it over and over again in his hand, considering the while whether he had yet squeezed out of the young man all that could be squeezed with safety, or whether by an additional turn, by giving him another small advancement, he might yet get something more. He knew that Tudor was in a very bad state, that he was tottering on the outside edge of the precipice; but he also knew that he had friends. Would his friends when they came forward to assist their young Pickle out of the mire, would they pay such bills as these or would they leave poor Jabesh to get his remedy at law? That was the question which Mr. M'Ruen had to ask and to answer. He was not one of those noble vultures who fly at large game, and who are willing to run considerable risk in pursuit of their prey. Mr. M'Ruen avoided courts of law as much as he could, and preferred a small safe trade; one in which the fall of a single customer could never be ruinous to him; in which he need run no risk of being transported for forgery, incarcerated for perjury, or even, if possibly it might be avoided, gibbeted by some lawyer or judge for his malpractices.

'But you are so unpunctual,' he said, having at last made up his mind that he had made a very good thing of Charley, and that probably he might go a little further without much danger. 'I wish to oblige you, Mr. Tudor; but pray do be punctual;' and so saying he slowly spread the little document before him, across which Scatterall had already scrawled his name, and slowly began to write in the date. Slowly, with his head low down over the table, and continually twisting it inside his cravat, he filled up the paper, and then looking at it with the air of a connoisseur in such matters, he gave it to Charley to sign.

'But you haven't put in the amount,' said Charley.

Mr. M'Ruen twisted his head and laughed. He delighted in playing with his game as a fisherman does with a salmon. 'Well—no—I haven't put in the amount yet. Do you sign it, and I'll do that at once.'

'I'll do it,' said Charley; 'I'll say L15, and you'll give me L10 on that.'

'No, no, no!' said Jabesh, covering the paper over with his hands; 'you young men know nothing of filling bills; just sign it, Mr. Tudor, and I'll do the rest.' And so Charley signed it, and then M'Ruen, again taking the pen, wrote in 'fifteen pounds' as the recognized amount of the value of the document. He also took out his pocket-book and filled a cheque, but he was very careful that Charley should not see the amount there written. 'And now,' said he, 'we will go to the bank.'

As they made their way to the house in Lombard Street which Mr. M'Ruen honoured by his account, Charley insisted on knowing how much he was to have for the bill. Jabesh suggested L3 10s.; Charley swore he would take nothing less than L8; but by the time they had arrived at the bank, it had been settled that L5 was to be paid in cash, and that Charley was to have the three Seasons for the balance whenever he chose to send for them. When Charley, as he did at first, positively refused to accede to these terms, Mr. M'Ruen tendered him back the bill, and reminded him with a plaintive voice that he was so unpunctual, so extremely unpunctual.

Having reached the bank, which the money-lender insisted on Charley entering with him, Mr. M'Ruen gave the cheque across the counter, and wrote on the back of it the form in which he would take the money, whereupon a note and five sovereigns were handed to him. The cheque was for L15, and was payable to C. Tudor, Esq., so that proof might be forthcoming at a future time, if necessary, that he had given to his customer full value for the bill. Then in the outer hall of the bank, unseen by the clerks, he put, one after another, slowly and unwillingly, four sovereigns into Charley's hand.

'The other—where's the other?' said Charley.

Jabesh smiled sweetly and twisted his head.

'Come, give me the other,' said Charley roughly.

'Four is quite enough, quite enough for what you want; and remember my time, Mr. Tudor; you should remember my time.'

'Give me the other sovereign,' said Charley, taking hold of the front of his coat.

'Well, well, you shall have ten shillings; but I want the rest for a purpose.'

'Give me the sovereign,' said Charley, 'or I'll drag you in before them all in the bank and expose you; give me the other sovereign, I say.'

'Ha, ha, ha!' laughed Mr. M'Ruen; 'I thought you liked a joke, Mr. Tudor. Well, here it is. And now do be punctual, pray do be punctual, and I'll do anything I can for you.'

And then they parted, Charley going westward towards his own haunts, and M'Ruen following his daily pursuits in the city.

Charley had engaged to pull up to Avis's at Putney with Harry Norman, to dine there, take a country walk, and row back in the cool of the evening; and he had promised to call at the Weights and Measures with that object punctually at five.

'You can get away in time for that, I suppose,' said Harry.

'Well, I'll try and manage it,' said Charley, laughing.

Nothing could be kinder, nay, more affectionate, than Norman had been to his fellow-lodger during the last year and a half. It seemed as though he had transferred to Alaric's cousin all the friendship which he had once felt for Alaric; and the deeper were Charley's sins of idleness and extravagance, the wider grew Norman's forgiveness, and the more sincere his efforts to befriend him. As one result of this, Charley was already deep in his debt. Not that Norman had lent him money, or even paid bills for him; but the lodgings in which they lived had been taken by Norman, and when the end of the quarter came he punctually paid his landlady.

Charley had once, a few weeks before the period of which we are now writing, told Norman that he had no money to pay his long arrear, and that he would leave the lodgings and shift for himself as best he could. He had said the same thing to Mrs. Richards, the landlady, and had gone so far as to pack up all his clothes; but his back was no sooner turned than Mrs. Richards, under Norman's orders, unpacked them all, and hid away the portmanteau. It was well for him that this was done. He had bespoken for himself a bedroom at the public-house in Norfolk Street, and had he once taken up his residence there he would have been ruined for ever.

He was still living with Norman, and ever increasing his debt. In his misery at this state of affairs, he had talked over with Harry all manner of schemes for increasing his income, but he had never told him a word about Mr. M'Ruen. Why his salary, which was now L150 per annum, should not be able to support him, Norman never asked. Charley the while was very miserable, and the more miserable he was, the less he found himself able to rescue himself from his dissipation. What moments of ease he had were nearly all spent in Norfolk Street; and such being the case how could he abstain from going there?

'Well, Charley, and how do 'Crinoline and Macassar' go on?' said Norman, as they sauntered away together up the towing-path above Putney. Now there were those who had found out that Charley Tudor, in spite of his wretched, idle, vagabond mode of life, was no fool; indeed, that there was that talent within him which, if turned to good account, might perhaps redeem him from ruin and set him on his legs again; at least so thought some of his friends, among whom Mrs. Woodward was the most prominent. She insisted that if he would make use of his genius he might employ his spare time to great profit by writing for magazines or periodicals; and, inspirited by so flattering a proposition, Charley had got himself introduced to the editor of a newly- projected publication. At his instance he was to write a tale for approval, and 'Crinoline and Macassar' was the name selected for his first attempt.

The affair had been fully talked over at Hampton, and it had been arranged that the young author should submit his story, when completed, to the friendly criticism of the party assembled at Surbiton Cottage, before he sent it to the editor. He had undertaken to have 'Crinoline and Macassar' ready for perusal on the next Saturday, and in spite of Mr. M'Ruen and Norah Geraghty, he had really been at work.

'Will it be finished by Saturday, Charley?' said Norman.

'Yes—at least I hope so; but if that's not done, I have another all complete.'

'Another! and what is that called?'

'Oh, that's a very short one,' said Charley, modestly.

'But, short as it is, it must have a name, I suppose. What's the name of the short one?'

'Why, the name is long enough; it's the longest part about it. The editor gave me the name, you know, and then I had to write the story. It's to be called "Sir Anthony Allan-a-dale and the Baron of Ballyporeen."'

'Oh! two rival knights in love with the same lady, of course,' and Harry gave a gentle sigh as he thought of his own still unhealed grief. 'The scene is laid in Ireland, I presume?'

'No, not in Ireland; at least not exactly. I don't think the scene is laid anywhere in particular; it's up in a mountain, near a castle. There isn't any lady in it—at least, not alive.'

'Heavens, Charley! I hope you are not dealing with dead women.'

'No—that is, I have to bring them to life again. I'll tell you how it is. In the first paragraph, Sir Anthony Allan-a-dale is lying dead, and the Baron of Ballyporeen is standing over him with a bloody sword. You must always begin with an incident now, and then hark back for your explanation and description; that's what the editor says is the great secret of the present day, and where we beat all the old fellows that wrote twenty years ago.'

'Oh!—yes—I see. They used to begin at the beginning; that was very humdrum.'

'A devilish bore, you know, for a fellow who takes up a novel because he's dull. Of course he wants his fun at once. If you begin with a long history of who's who and all that, why he won't read three pages; but if you touch him up with a startling incident or two at the first go off, then give him a chapter of horrors, then another of fun, then a little love or a little slang, or something of that sort, why, you know, about the end of the first volume, you may describe as much as you like, and tell everything about everybody's father and mother for just as many pages as you want to fill. At least that's what the editor says.'

'Meleager ab ovo may be introduced with safety when you get as far as that,' suggested Norman.

'Yes, you may bring him in too, if you like,' said Charley, who was somewhat oblivious of his classicalities. 'Well, Sir Anthony is lying dead and the Baron is standing over him, when out come Sir Anthony's retainers——'

'Out—out of what?'

'Out of the castle: that's all explained afterwards. Out come the retainers, and pitch into the Baron till they make mincemeat of him.'

'They don't kill him, too?'

'Don't they though? I rather think they do, and no mistake.'

'And so both your heroes are dead in the first chapter.'

'First chapter! why that's only the second paragraph. I'm only to be allowed ten paragraphs for each number, and I am expected to have an incident for every other paragraph for the first four days.'

'That's twenty incidents.'

'Yes—it's a great bother finding so many.—I'm obliged to make the retainers come by all manner of accidents; and I should never have finished the job if I hadn't thought of setting the castle on fire. 'And now forked tongues of liquid fire, and greedy lambent flames burst forth from every window of the devoted edifice. The devouring element——.' That's the best passage in the whole affair.'

'This is for the Daily Delight, isn't it?'

'Yes, for the Daily Delight. It is to begin on the 1st of September with the partridges. We expect a most tremendous sale. It will be the first halfpenny publication in the market, and as the retailers will get them for sixpence a score—twenty-four to the score—they'll go off like wildfire.'

'Well, Charley, and what do you do with the dead bodies of your two heroes?'

'Of course I needn't tell you that it was not the Baron who killed Sir Anthony at all.'

'Oh! wasn't it? O dear—that was a dreadful mistake on the part of the retainers.'

'But as natural as life. You see these two grandees were next- door neighbours, and there had been a feud between the families for seven centuries—a sort of Capulet and Montague affair. One Adelgitha, the daughter of the Thane of Allan-a-dale—there were Thanes in those days, you know—was betrothed to the eldest son of Sir Waldemar de Ballyporeen. This gives me an opportunity of bringing in a succinct little account of the Conquest, which will be beneficial to the lower classes. The editor peremptorily insists upon that kind of thing.'

'Omne tulit punctum,' said Norman.

'Yes, I dare say,' said Charley, who was now too intent on his own new profession to attend much to his friend's quotation. 'Well, where was I?—Oh! the eldest son of Sir Waldemar went off with another lady and so the feud began. There is a very pretty scene between Adelgitha and her lady's-maid.'

'What, seven centuries before the story begins?'

'Why not? The editor says that the unities are altogether thrown over now, and that they are regular bosh—our game is to stick in a good bit whenever we can get it—I got to be so fond of Adelgitha that I rather think she's the heroine.'

'But doesn't that take off the interest from your dead grandees?'

'Not a bit; I take it chapter and chapter about. Well, you see, the retainers had no sooner made mincemeat of the Baron—a very elegant young man was the Baron, just returned from the Continent, where he had learnt to throw aside all prejudices about family feuds and everything eke, and he had just come over in a friendly way, to say as much to Sir Anthony, when, as he crossed the drawbridge, he stumbled over the corpse of his ancient enemy—well, the retainers had no sooner made mincemeat of him, than they perceived that Sir Anthony was lying with an open bottle in his hand, and that he had taken poison.'

'Having committed suicide?' asked Norman.

'No, not at all. The editor says that we must always have a slap at some of the iniquities of the times. He gave me three or four to choose from; there was the adulteration of food, and the want of education for the poor, and street music, and the miscellaneous sale of poisons.'

'And so you chose poisons and killed the knight?'

'Exactly; at least I didn't kill him, for he comes all right again after a bit. He had gone out to get something to do him good after a hard night, a Seidlitz powder, or something of that sort, and an apothecary's apprentice had given him prussic acid in mistake.'

'And how is it possible he should have come to life after taking prussic acid?'

'Why, there I have a double rap at the trade. The prussic acid is so bad of its kind, that it only puts him into a kind of torpor for a week. Then we have the trial of the apothecary's boy; that is an excellent episode, and gives me a grand hit at the absurdity of our criminal code.'

'Why, Charley, it seems to me that you are hitting at everything.'

'Oh! ah! right and left, that's the game for us authors. The press is the only censor morum going now—and who so fit? Set a thief to catch a thief, you know. Well, I have my hit at the criminal code, and then Sir Anthony comes out of his torpor.'

'But how did it come to pass that the Baron's sword was all bloody?'

'Ah, there was the difficulty; I saw that at once. It was necessary to bring in something to be killed, you know. I thought of a stray tiger out of Wombwell's menagerie; but the editor says that we must not trespass against the probabilities; so I have introduced a big dog. The Baron had come across a big dog, and seeing that the brute had a wooden log tied to his throat, thought he must be mad, and so he killed him.'

'And what's the end of it, Charley?'

'Why, the end is rather melancholy. Sir Anthony reforms, leaves off drinking, and takes to going to church everyday. He becomes a Puseyite, puts up a memorial window to the Baron, and reads the Tracts. At last he goes over to the Pope, walks about in nasty dirty clothes all full of vermin, and gives over his estate to Cardinal Wiseman. Then there are the retainers; they all come to grief, some one way and some another. I do that for the sake of the Nemesis.'

'I would not have condescended to notice them, I think,' said Norman.

'Oh! I must; there must be a Nemesis. The editor specially insists on a Nemesis.'

The conclusion of Charley's novel brought them back to the boat. Norman, when he started, had intended to employ the evening in giving good counsel to his friend, and in endeavouring to arrange some scheme by which he might rescue the brand from the burning; but he had not the heart to be severe and sententious while Charley was full of his fun. It was so much pleasanter to talk to him on the easy terms of equal friendship than turn Mentor and preach a sermon.

'Well, Charley,' said he, as they were walking up from the boat wharf—Norman to his club, and Charley towards his lodgings—from which route, however, he meant to deviate as soon as ever he might be left alone—'well, Charley, I wish you success with all my heart; I wish you could do something—I won't say to keep you out of mischief.'

'I wish I could, Harry,' said Charley, thoroughly abashed; 'I wish I could—indeed I wish I could—but it is so hard to go right when one has begun to go wrong.'

'It is hard; I know it is.'

'But you never can know how hard, Harry, for you have never tried,' and then they went on walking for a while in silence, side by side.

'You don't know the sort of place that office of mine is,' continued Charley. 'You don't know the sort of fellows the men are. I hate the place; I hate the men I live with. It is all so dirty, so disreputable, so false. I cannot conceive that any fellow put in there as young as I was should ever do well afterwards.'

'But at any rate you might try your best, Charley.'

'Yes, I might do that still; and I know I don't; and where should I have been now, if it hadn't been for you?'

'Never mind about that; I sometimes think we might have done more for each other if we had been more together. But remember the motto you said you'd choose, Charley—Excelsior! We can none of us mount the hill without hard labour. Remember that word, Charley—Excelsior! Remember it now—now, to-night; remember how you dream of higher things, and begin to think of them in your waking moments also;' and so they parted.



CHAPTER XX

A DAY WITH ONE OF THE NAVVIES.—EVENING

'Excelsior!' said Charley to himself, as he walked on a few steps towards his lodgings, having left Norman at the door of his club. 'Remember it now—now, to-night.'

Yes—now is the time to remember it, if it is ever to be remembered to any advantage. He went on with stoic resolution to the end of the street, determined to press home and put the last touch to 'Crinoline and Macassar;' but as he went he thought of his interview with Mr. M'Ruen and of the five sovereigns still in his pocket, and altered his course.

Charley had not been so resolute with the usurer, so determined to get L5 from him on this special day, without a special object in view. His credit was at stake in a more than ordinary manner; he had about a week since borrowed money from the woman who kept the public-house in Norfolk Street, and having borrowed it for a week only, felt that this was a debt of honour which it was incumbent on him to pay. Therefore, when he had walked the length of one street on his road towards his lodgings, he retraced his steps and made his way back to his old haunts.

The house which he frequented was hardly more like a modern London gin-palace than was that other house in the city which Mr. M'Ruen honoured with his custom. It was one of those small tranquil shrines of Bacchus in which the god is worshipped perhaps with as constant a devotion, though with less noisy demonstrations of zeal than in his larger and more public temples. None absolutely of the lower orders were encouraged to come thither for oblivion. It had about it nothing inviting to the general eye. No gas illuminations proclaimed its midnight grandeur. No huge folding doors, one set here and another there, gave ingress and egress to a wretched crowd of poverty-stricken midnight revellers. No reiterated assertions in gaudy letters, each a foot long, as to the peculiar merits of the old tom or Hodge's cream of the valley, seduced the thirsty traveller. The panelling over the window bore the simple announcement, in modest letters, of the name of the landlady, Mrs. Davis; and the same name appeared with equal modesty on the one gas lamp opposite the door.

Mrs. Davis was a widow, and her customers were chiefly people who knew her and frequented her house regularly. Lawyers' clerks, who were either unmarried, or whose married homes were perhaps not so comfortable as the widow's front parlour; tradesmen, not of the best sort, glad to get away from the noise of their children; young men who had begun the cares of life in ambiguous positions, just on the confines of respectability, and who, finding themselves too weak in flesh to cling on to the round of the ladder above them, were sinking from year to year to lower steps, and depths even below the level of Mrs. Davis's public-house. To these might be added some few of a somewhat higher rank in life, though perhaps of a lower rank of respectability; young men who, like Charley Tudor and his comrades, liked their ease and self- indulgence, and were too indifferent as to the class of companions against whom they might rub their shoulders while seeking it.

The 'Cat and Whistle,' for such was the name of Mrs. Davis's establishment, had been a house of call for the young men of the Internal Navigation long before Charley's time. What first gave rise to the connexion it is not now easy to say; but Charley had found it, and had fostered it into a close alliance, which greatly exceeded any amount of intimacy which existed previously to his day.

It must not be presumed that he, in an ordinary way, took his place among the lawyers' clerks, and general run of customers in the front parlour; occasionally he condescended to preside there over the quiet revels, to sing a song for the guests, which was sure to be applauded to the echo, and to engage in a little skirmish of politics with a retired lamp-maker and a silversmith's foreman from the Strand, who always called him 'Sir,' and received what he said with the greatest respect; but, as a rule, he quaffed his Falernian in a little secluded parlour behind the bar, in which sat the widow Davis, auditing her accounts in the morning, and giving out orders in the evening to Norah Geraghty, her barmaid, and to an attendant sylph, who ministered to the front parlour, taking in goes of gin and screws of tobacco, and bringing out the price thereof with praiseworthy punctuality.

Latterly, indeed, Charley had utterly deserted the front parlour; for there had come there a pestilent fellow, highly connected with the Press, as the lamp-maker declared, but employed as an assistant shorthand-writer somewhere about the Houses of Parliament, according to the silversmith, who greatly interfered with our navvy's authority. He would not at all allow that what Charley said was law, entertained fearfully democratic principles of his own, and was not at all the gentleman. So Charley drew himself up, declined to converse any further on politics with a man who seemed to know more about them than himself, and confined himself exclusively to the inner room.

On arriving at this elysium, on the night in question, he found Mrs. Davis usefully engaged in darning a stocking, while Scatterall sat opposite with a cigar in his mouth, his hat over his nose, and a glass of gin and water before him.

'I began to think you weren't coming,' said Scatterall, 'and I was getting so deuced dull that I was positively thinking of going home.'

'That's very civil of you, Mr. Scatterall,' said the widow.

'Well, you've been sitting there for the last half-hour without saying a word to me; and it is dull. Looking at a woman mending stockings is dull, ain't it, Charley?'

'That depends,' said Charley, 'partly on whom the woman may be, and partly on whom the man may be. Where's Norah, Mrs. Davis?'

'She's not very well to-night; she has got a headache; there ain't many of them here to-night, so she's lying down.'

'A little seedy, I suppose,' said Scatterall.

Charley felt rather angry with his friend for applying such an epithet to his lady-love; however, he did not resent it, but sitting down, lighted his pipe and sipped his gin and water.

And so they sat for the next quarter of an hour, saying very little to each other. What was the nature of the attraction which induced two such men as Charley Tudor and Dick Scatterall to give Mrs. Davis the benefit of their society, while she was mending her stockings, it might be difficult to explain. They could have smoked in their own rooms as well, and have drunk gin and water there, if they had any real predilection for that mixture. Mrs. Davis was neither young nor beautiful, nor more than ordinarily witty. Charley, it is true, had an allurement to entice him thither, but this could not be said of Scatterall, to whom the lovely Norah was never more than decently civil. Had they been desired, in their own paternal halls, to sit and see their mother's housekeeper darn the family stockings, they would, probably, both of them have rebelled, even though the supply of tobacco and gin and water should be gratuitous and unlimited.

It must be presumed that the only charm of the pursuit was in its acknowledged impropriety. They both understood that there was something fast in frequenting Mrs. Davis's inner parlour, something slow in remaining at home; and so they both sat there, and Mrs. Davis went on with her darning-needle, nothing abashed.

'Well, I think I shall go,' said Scatterall, shaking off the last ash from the end of his third cigar.

'Do,' said Charley; 'you should be careful, you know; late hours will hurt your complexion.'

'It's so deuced dull,' said Scatterall.

'Why don't you go into the parlour, and have a chat with the gentlemen?' suggested Mrs. Davis; 'there's Mr. Peppermint there now, lecturing about the war; upon my word he talks very well.'

'He's so deuced low,' said Scatterall.

'He's a bumptious noisy blackguard too,' said Charley; 'he doesn't know how to speak to a gentleman, when he meets one.'

Scatterall gave a great yawn. 'I suppose you're not going, Charley?' said he.

'Oh yes, I am,' said Charley, 'in about two hours.'

'Two hours! well, good night, old fellow, for I'm off. Three cigars, Mrs. Davis, and two goes of gin and water, the last cold.' Then, having made this little commercial communication to the landlady, he gave another yawn, and took himself away. Mrs. Davis opened her little book, jotted down the items, and then, having folded up her stockings, and put them into a basket, prepared herself for conversation.

But, though Mrs. Davis prepared herself for conversation, she did not immediately commence it. Having something special to say, she probably thought that she might improve her opportunity of saying it by allowing Charley to begin. She got up and pottered about the room, went to a cupboard, and wiped a couple of glasses, and then out into the bar and arranged the jugs and pots. This done, she returned to the little room, and again sat herself down in her chair.

'Here's your five pounds, Mrs. Davis,' said Charley; 'I wish you knew the trouble I have had to get it for you.'

To give Mrs. Davis her due, this was not the subject on which she was anxious to speak. She would have been at present well inclined that Charley should remain her debtor. 'Indeed, Mr. Tudor, I am very sorry you should have taken any trouble on such a trifle. If you're short of money, it will do for me just as well in October.'

Charley looked at the sovereigns, and bethought himself how very short of cash he was. Then he thought of the fight he had had to get them, in order that he might pay the money which he had felt so ashamed of having borrowed, and he determined to resist the temptation.

'Did you ever know me flush of cash? You had better take them while you can get them,' and as he pushed them across the table with his stick, he remembered that all he had left was ninepence.

'I don't want the money at present, Mr. Tudor,' said the widow. 'We're such old friends that there ought not to be a word between us about such a trifle—now don't leave yourself bare; take what you want and settle with me at quarter-day.'

'Well, I'll take a sovereign,' said he, 'for to tell you the truth, I have only the ghost of a shilling in my pocket.' And so it was settled; Mrs. Davis reluctantly pocketed four of Mr. M'Ruen's sovereigns, and Charley kept in his own possession the fifth, as to which he had had so hard a combat in the lobby of the bank.

He then sat silent for a while and smoked, and Mrs. Davis again waited for him to begin the subject on which she wished to speak. 'And what's the matter with Norah all this time?' he said at last.

'What's the matter with her?' repeated Mrs. Davis. 'Well, I think you might know what's the matter with her. You don't suppose she's made of stone, do you?'

Charley saw that he was in for it. It was in vain that Norman's last word was still ringing in his ears. 'Excelsior!' What had he to do with 'Excelsior?' What miserable reptile on God's earth was more prone to crawl downwards than he had shown himself to be? And then again a vision floated across his mind's eye of a young sweet angel face with large bright eyes, with soft delicate skin, and all the exquisite charms of gentle birth and gentle nurture. A single soft touch seemed to press his arm, a touch that he had so often felt, and had never felt without acknowledging to himself that there was something in it almost divine. All this passed rapidly through his mind, as he was preparing to answer Mrs. Davis's question touching Norah Geraghty.

'You don't think she's made of stone, do you?' said the widow, repeating her words.

'Indeed I don't think she's made of anything but what's suitable to a very nice young woman,' said Charley.

'A nice young woman! Is that all you can say for her? I call her a very fine girl.' Miss Golightly's friends could not say anything more, even for that young lady. 'I don't know where you'll pick up a handsomer, or a better-conducted one either, for the matter of that.'

'Indeed she is,' said Charley.

'Oh! for the matter of that, no one knows it better than yourself, Mr. Tudor; and she's as well able to keep a man's house over his head as some others that take a deal of pride in themselves.'

'I'm quite sure of it,' said Charley.

'Well, the long and the short of it is this, Mr. Tudor.' And as she spoke the widow got a little red in the face: she had, as Charley thought, an unpleasant look of resolution about her—a roundness about her mouth, and a sort of fierceness in her eyes. 'The long and the short of it is this, Mr. Tudor, what do you mean to do about the girl?'

'Do about her?' said Charley, almost bewildered in his misery.

'Yes, do about her. Do you mean to make her your wife? That's plain English. Because I'll tell you what: I'll not see her put upon any longer. It must be one thing or the other; and that at once. And if you've a grain of honour in you, Mr. Tudor—and I think you are honourable—you won't back from your word with the girl now.'

'Back from my word?' said Charley.

'Yes, back from your word,' said Mrs. Davis, the flood-gates of whose eloquence were now fairly opened. 'I'm sure you're too much of the gentleman to deny your own words, and them repeated more than once in my presence—Cheroots—yes, are there none there, child?—Oh, they are in the cupboard.' These last words were not part of her address to Charley, but were given in reply to a requisition from the attendant nymph outside. 'You're too much of a gentleman to do that, I know. And so, as I'm her natural friend—and indeed she's my cousin, not that far off—I think it's right that we should all understand one another.'

'Oh, quite right,' said Charley.

'You can't expect that she should go and sacrifice herself for you, you know,' said Mrs. Davis, who now that she had begun hardly knew how to stop herself. 'A girl's time is her money. She's at her best now, and a girl like her must make her hay while the sun shines. She can't go on fal-lalling with you, and then nothing to come of it. You mustn't suppose she's to lose her market that way.'

'God knows I should be sorry to injure her, Mrs. Davis.'

'I believe you would, because I take you for an honourable gentleman as will be as good as your word. Now, there's Peppermint there.'

'What! that fellow in the parlour?'

'And an honourable gentleman he is. Not that I mean to compare him to you, Mr. Tudor, nor yet doesn't Norah; not by no means. But there he is. Well, he comes with the most honourablest proposals, and will make her Mrs. Peppermint to-morrow, if so be that she'll have it.'

'You don't mean to say that there has been anything between them?' said Charley, who in spite of the intense desire which he had felt a few minutes since to get the lovely Norah altogether off his hands, now felt an acute pang of jealousy.' You don't mean to say that there has been anything between them?'

'Nothing as you have any right to object to, Mr. Tudor. You may be sure I wouldn't allow of that, nor yet wouldn't Norah demean herself to it.'

'Then how did she get talking to him?'

'She didn't get talking to him. But he has eyes in his head, and you don't suppose but what he can see with them. If a girl is in the public line, of course any man is free to speak to her. If you don't like it, it is for you to take her out of it. Not but what, for a girl that is in the public line, Norah Geraghty keeps herself to herself as much as any girl you ever set eyes on.'

'What the d—- has she to do with this fellow then?'

'Why, he's a widower, and has three young children; and he's looking out for a mother for them; and he thinks Norah will suit. There, now you have the truth, and the whole truth.'

'D—- his impudence!' said Charley.

'Well, I don't see that there's any impudence. He has a house of his own and the means to keep it. Now I'll tell you what it is. Norah can't abide him—'

Charley looked a little better satisfied when he heard this declaration.

'Norah can't abide the sight of him; nor won't of any man as long as you are hanging after her. She's as true as steel, and proud you ought to be of her.' Proud, thought Charley, as he again muttered to himself, 'Excelsior!'—'But, Mr. Tudor, I won't see her put upon; that's the long and the short of it. If you like to take her, there she is. I don't say she's just your equal as to breeding, though she's come of decent people too; but she's good as gold. She'll make a shilling go as far as any young woman I know; and if L100 or L150 are wanting for furniture or the like of that, why, I've that regard for her, that that shan't stand in the way. Now, Mr. Tudor, I've spoke honest; and if you're the gentleman as I takes you to be, you'll do the same.'

To do Mrs. Davis justice, it must be acknowledged that in her way she had spoken honestly. Of course she knew that such a marriage would be a dreadful misalliance for young Tudor; of course she knew that all his friends would be heart-broken when they heard of it. But what had she to do with his friends? Her sympathies, her good wishes, were for her friend. Had Norah fallen a victim to Charley's admiration, and then been cast off to eat the bitterest bread to which any human being is ever doomed, what then would Charley's friends have cared for her? There was a fair fight between them. If Norah Geraghty, as a reward for her prudence, could get a husband in a rank of life above her, instead of falling into utter destruction as might so easily have been the case, who could do other than praise her—praise her and her clever friend who had so assisted her in her struggle?

Dolus an virtus—

Had Mrs. Davis ever studied the classics she would have thus expressed herself.

Poor Charley was altogether thrown on his beam-ends. He had altogether played Mrs. Davis's game in evincing jealousy at Mr. Peppermint's attentions. He knew this, and yet for the life of him he could not help being jealous. He wanted to get rid of Miss Geraghty, and yet he could not endure that anyone else should lay claim to her favour. He was very weak. He knew how much depended on the way in which he might answer this woman at the present moment; he knew that he ought now to make it plain to her, that however foolish he might have been, however false he might have been, it was quite out of the question that he should marry her barmaid. But he did not do so. He was worse than weak. It was not only the disinclination to give pain, or even the dread of the storm that would ensue, which deterred him; but an absurd dislike to think that Mr. Peppermint should be graciously received there as the barmaid's acknowledged admirer.

'Is she really ill now?' said he.

'She's not so ill but what she shall make herself well enough to welcome you, if you'll say the word that you ought to say. The most that ails her is fretting at the long delay.—Bolt the door, child, and go to bed; there will be no one else here now. Go up, and tell Miss Geraghty to come down; she hasn't got her clothes off yet, I know.'

Mrs. Davis was too good a general to press Charley for an absolute, immediate, fixed answer to her question. She knew that she had already gained much, by talking thus of the proposed marriage, by setting it thus plainly before Charley, without rebuke or denial from him. He had not objected to receiving a visit from Norah, on the implied understanding that she was to come down to him as his affianced bride. He had not agreed to this in words; but silence gives consent, and Mrs. Davis felt that should it ever hereafter become necessary to prove anything, what had passed would enable her to prove a good deal.

Charley puffed at his cigar and sipped his gin and water. It was now twelve o'clock, and he thoroughly wished himself at home and in bed. The longer he thought of it the more impossible it appeared that he should get out of the house without the scene which he dreaded. The girl had bolted the door, put away her cups and mugs, and her step upstairs had struck heavily on his ears. The house was not large or high, and he fancied that he heard mutterings on the landing-place. Indeed he did not doubt but that Miss Geraghty had listened to most of the conversation which had taken place.

'Excuse me a minute, Mr. Tudor,' said Mrs. Davis, who was now smiling and civil enough; 'I will go upstairs myself; the silly girl is shamefaced, and does not like to come down'; and up went Mrs. Davis to see that her barmaid's curls and dress were nice and jaunty. It would not do now, at this moment, for Norah to offend her lover by any untidiness. Charley for a moment thought of the front door. The enemy had allowed him an opportunity for retreating. He might slip out before either of the women came down, and then never more be heard of in Norfolk Street again. He had his hand in his waistcoat pocket, with the intent of leaving the sovereign on the table; but when the moment came he felt ashamed of the pusillanimity of such an escape, and therefore stood, or rather sat his ground, with a courage worthy of a better purpose.

Down the two women came, and Charley felt his heart beating against his ribs. As the steps came nearer the door, he began to wish that Mr. Peppermint had been successful. The widow entered the room first, and at her heels the expectant beauty. We can hardly say that she was blushing; but she did look rather shamefaced, and hung back a little at the door, as though she still had half a mind to think better of it, and go off to her bed.

'Come in, you little fool,' said Mrs. Davis. 'You needn't be ashamed of coming down to see him; you have done that often enough before now.'

Norah simpered and sidled. 'Well, I'm sure now!' said she. 'Here's a start, Mr. Tudor; to be brought downstairs at this time of night; and I'm sure I don't know what it's about'; and then she shook her curls, and twitched her dress, and made as though she were going to pass through the room to her accustomed place at the bar.

Norah Geraghty was a fine girl. Putting her in comparison with Miss Golightly, we are inclined to say that she was the finer girl of the two; and that, barring position, money, and fashion, she was qualified to make the better wife. In point of education, that is, the effects of education, there was not perhaps much to choose between them. Norah could make an excellent pudding, and was willing enough to exercise her industry and art in doing so; Miss Golightly could copy music, but she did not like the trouble; and could play a waltz badly. Neither of them had ever read anything beyond a few novels. In this respect, as to the amount of labour done, Miss Golightly had certainly far surpassed her rival competitor for Charley's affections.

Charley got up and took her hand; and as he did so, he saw that her nails were dirty. He put his arms round her waist and kissed her; and as he caressed her, his olfactory nerves perceived that the pomatum in her hair was none of the best. He thought of those young lustrous eyes that would look up so wondrously into his face; he thought of the gentle touch, which would send a thrill through all his nerves; and then he felt very sick.

'Well, upon my word, Mr. Tudor,' said Miss Geraghty, 'you're making very free to-night.' She did not, however, refuse to sit down on his knee, though while sitting there she struggled and tossed herself, and shook her long ringlets in Charley's face, till he wished her—safe at home in Mr. Peppermint's nursery.

'And is that what you brought me down for, Mrs. Davis?' said Norah. 'Well, upon my word, I hope the door's locked; we shall have all the world in here else.'

'If you hadn't come down to him, he'd have come up to you,' said Mrs. Davis.

'Would he though?' said Norah; 'I think he knows a trick worth two of that;' and she looked as though she knew well how to defend herself, if any over-zeal on the part of her lover should ever induce him to violate the sanctum of her feminine retirement.

There was no over-zeal now about Charley. He ought to have been happy enough, for he had his charmer in his arms; but he showed very little of the ecstatic joy of a favoured lover. There he sat with Norah in his arms, and as we have said, Norah was a handsome girl; but he would much sooner have been copying the Kennett and Avon canal lock entries in Mr. Snape's room at the Internal Navigation.

'Lawks, Mr. Tudor, you needn't hold me so tight,' said Norah.

'He means to hold you tight enough now,' said Mrs. Davis. 'He's very angry because I mentioned another gentleman's name.'

'Well, now you didn't?' said Norah, pretending to look very angry.

'Well, I just did; and if you'd only seen him! You must be very careful what you say to that gentleman, or there'll be a row in the house.'

'I!' said Norah. 'What I say to him! It's very little I have to say to the man. But I shall tell him this; he'd better take himself somewhere else, if he's going to make himself troublesome.'

All this time Charley had said nothing, but was sitting with his hat on his head, and his cigar in his mouth. The latter appendage he had laid down for a moment when he saluted Miss Geraghty; but he had resumed it, having at the moment no intention of repeating the compliment.

'And so you were jealous, were you?' said she, turning round and looking at him. 'Well now, some people might have more respect for other people than to mix up their names that way, with the names of any men that choose to put themselves forward. What would you say if I was to talk to you about Miss——'

Charley stopped her mouth. It was not to be borne that she should be allowed to pronounce the name that was about to fall from her lips.

'So you were jealous, were you?' said she, when she was again able to speak. 'Well, my!'

'Mrs. Davis told me flatly that you were going to marry the man,' said Charley; 'so what was I to think?'

'It doesn't matter what you think now,' said Mrs. Davis; 'for you must be off from this. Do you know what o'clock it is? Do you want the house to get a bad name? Come, you two understand each other now, so you may as well give over billing and cooing for this time. It's all settled now, isn't it, Mr. Tudor?'

'Oh yes, I suppose so,' said Charley.

'Well, and what do you say, Norah?'

'Oh, I'm sure I'm agreeable if he is. Ha! ha! ha! I only hope he won't think me too forward—he! he! he!'

And then with another kiss, and very few more words of any sort, Charley took himself off.

'I'll have nothing more to do with him,' said Norah, bursting into tears, as soon as the door was well bolted after Charley's exit. 'I'm only losing myself with him. He don't mean anything, and I said he didn't all along. He'd have pitched me to Old Scratch, while I was sitting there on his knee, if he'd have had his own way—so he would;' and poor Norah cried heartily, as she went to her work in her usual way among the bottles and taps.

'Why, you fool you, what do you expect? You don't think he's to jump down your throat, do you? You can but try it on; and then if it don't do, why there's the other one to fall back on; only, if I had the choice, I'd rather have young Tudor, too.'

'So would I,' said Norah; 'I can't abide that other fellow.'

'Well, there, that's how it is, you know—beggars can't be choosers. But come, make us a drop of something hot; a little drop will do yourself good; but it's better not to take it before him, unless when he presses you.'

So the two ladies sat down to console themselves, as best they might, for the reverses which trade and love so often bring with them.

Charley walked off a miserable man. He was thoroughly ashamed of himself, thoroughly acknowledged his own weakness; and yet as he went out from the 'Cat and Whistle,' he felt sure that he should return there again to renew the degradation from which he had suffered this night. Indeed, what else could he do now? He had, as it were, solemnly plighted his troth to the girl before a third person who had brought them together, with the acknowledged purpose of witnessing that ceremony. He had, before Mrs. Davis, and before the girl herself, heard her spoken of as his wife, and had agreed to the understanding that such an arrangement was a settled thing. What else had he to do now but to return and complete his part of the bargain? What else but that, and be a wretched, miserable, degraded man for the rest of his days; lower, viler, more contemptible, infinitely lower, even than his brother clerics at the office, whom in his pride he had so much despised?

He walked from Norfolk Street into the Strand, and there the world was still alive, though it was now nearly one o'clock. The debauched misery, the wretched outdoor midnight revelry of the world was there, streaming in and out from gin-palaces, and bawling itself hoarse with horrid, discordant, screech-owl slang. But he went his way unheeding and uncontaminated. Now, now that it was useless, he was thinking of the better things of the world; nothing now seemed worth his grasp, nothing now seemed pleasurable, nothing capable of giving joy, but what was decent, good, reputable, cleanly, and polished. How he hated now that lower world with which he had for the last three years condescended to pass so much of his time! how he hated himself for his own vileness! He thought of what Alaric was, of what Norman was, of what he himself might have been—he that was praised by Mrs. Woodward for his talent, he that was encouraged to place himself among the authors of the day! He thought of all this, and then he thought of what he was—the affianced husband of Norah Geraghty!

He went along the Strand, over the crossing under the statue of Charles on horseback, and up Pall Mall East till he came to the opening into the park under the Duke of York's column. The London night world was all alive as he made his way. From the Opera Colonnade shrill voices shrieked out at him as he passed, and drunken men coming down from the night supper-houses in the Haymarket saluted him with affectionate cordiality. The hoarse waterman from the cabstand, whose voice had perished in the night air, croaked out at him the offer of a vehicle; and one of the night beggar-women who cling like burrs to those who roam the street a these unhallowed hours still stuck to him, as she had done ever since he had entered the Strand.

'Get away with you,' said Charley, turning at the wretched creature in his fierce anger; 'get away, or I'll give you in charge.'

'That you may never know what it is to be in misery yourself!' said the miserable Irishwoman.

'If you follow me a step farther I'll have you locked up,' said Charley.

'Oh, then, it's you that have the hard heart,' said she; 'and it's you that will suffer yet.'

Charley looked round, threw her the odd halfpence which he had in his pocket, and then turned down towards the column. The woman picked up her prize, and, with a speedy blessing, took herself off in search of other prey.

His way home would have taken him up Waterloo Place, but the space round the column was now deserted and quiet, and sauntering there, without thinking of what he did, he paced up and down between the Clubs and the steps leading into the park. There, walking to and fro slowly, he thought of his past career, of all the circumstances of his life since his life had been left to his own control, and of the absence of all hope for the future.

What was he to do? He was deeply, inextricably in debt. That wretch, M'Ruen, had his name on bills which it was impossible that he should ever pay. Tradesmen held other bills of his which were either now over-due, or would very shortly become so. He was threatened with numerous writs, any one of which would suffice to put him into gaol. From his poor father, burdened as he was with other children, he knew that he had no right to expect further assistance. He was in debt to Norman, his best, he would have said his only friend, had it not been that in all his misery he could not help still thinking of Mrs. Woodward as his friend.

And yet how could his venture to think longer of her, contaminated as he now was with the horrid degradation of his acknowledged love at the 'Cat and Whistle!' No; he must think no more of the Woodwards; he must dream no more of those angel eyes which in his waking moments had so often peered at him out of heaven, teaching him to think of higher things, giving him higher hopes than those which had come to him from the working of his own unaided spirit. Ah! lessons taught in vain! vain hopes! lessons that had come all too late! hopes that had been cherished only to be deceived! It was all over now! He had made his bed, and he must lie on it; he had sown his seed, and he must reap his produce; there was now no 'Excelsior' left for him within the bounds of human probability.

He had promised to go to Hampton with Harry Norman on Saturday, and he would go there for the last time. He would go there and tell Mrs. Woodward so much of the truth as he could bring himself to utter; he would say farewell to that blest abode; he would take Linda's soft hand in his for the last time; for the last time he would hear the young, silver-ringing, happy voice of his darling Katie; for the last time look into her bright face; for the last time play with her as with a child of heaven—and then he would return to the 'Cat and Whistle.'

And having made this resolve he went home to his lodgings. It was singular that in all his misery the idea hardly once occurred to him of setting himself right in the world by accepting his cousin's offer of Miss Golightly's hand and fortune.



CHAPTER XXI

HAMPTON COURT BRIDGE

Before the following Saturday afternoon Charley's spirits had somewhat recovered their natural tone. Not that he was in a happy frame of mind; the united energies of Mr. M'Ruen and Mrs. Davis had been too powerful to allow of that; not that he had given over his projected plan of saying a long farewell to Mrs. Woodward, or at any rate of telling her something of his position; he still felt that he could not continue to live on terms of close intimacy both with her daughters and with Norah Geraghty. But the spirits of youth are ever buoyant, and the spirits of no one could be endowed, with more natural buoyancy than those of the young navvy. Charley, therefore, in spite of his misfortunes, was ready with his manuscript when Saturday afternoon arrived, and, according to agreement, met Norman at the railway station.

Only one evening had intervened since the night in which he had ratified his matrimonial engagement, and in spite of the delicate nature of his position he had for that evening allowed Mr. Peppermint to exercise his eloquence on the heart of the fair Norah without interruption. He the while had been engaged in completing the memoirs of 'Crinoline and Macassar.'

'Well, Charley,' they asked, one and all, as soon as he reached the Cottage, 'have you got the story? Have you brought the manuscript? Is it all finished and ready for that dreadful editor?'

Charley produced a roll, and Linda and Katie instantly pounced upon it.

'Oh! it begins with poetry,' said Linda.

'I am so glad,' said Katie. 'Is there much poetry in it, Charley? I do so hope there is.'

'Not a word of it,' said Charley; 'that which Linda sees is a song that the heroine is singing, and it isn't supposed to be written by the author at all.'

'I'm so sorry that there's no poetry,' said Katie. 'Can't you write poetry, Charley?'

'At any rate there's lots of love in it,' said Linda, who was turning over the pages.

'Is there?' said Katie. 'Well, that's next best; but they should go together. You should have put all your love into verse, Charley, and then your prose would have done for the funny parts.'

'Perhaps it's all fun,' said Mrs. Woodward. 'But come, girls, this is not fair; I won't let you look at the story till it's read in full committee.' And so saying, Mrs. Woodward took the papers from her daughters, and tying them up, deposited them safe in custody. 'We'll have it out when the tea-things are gone.'

But before the tea-things had come, an accident happened, which had been like to dismiss 'Crinoline and Macassar' altogether from the minds of the whole of the Woodward family. The young men had, as usual, dined in town, and therefore they were all able to spend the long summer evening out of doors. Norman's boat was down at Hampton, and it was therefore determined that they should row down as far as Hampton Court Park and back. Charley and Norman were to row; and Mrs. Woodward agreed to accompany her daughters. Uncle Bat was left at home, to his nap and rum and water.

Norman was so expert a Thames waterman, that he was quite able to manage the boat without a steersman, and Charley was nearly his equal. But there is some amusement in steering, and Katie was allowed to sit between the tiller-ropes.

'I can steer very well, mamma: can't I, Harry? I always steer when we go to the island, and we run the boat straight into the little creek, only just broad enough to hold it.' Katie's visits to the island, however, were not so frequent as they had heretofore been, for she was approaching to sixteen years of age, and wet feet and draggled petticoats had lost some of their charms. Mrs. Woodward, trusting more to the experience of her two knights than to the skill of the lady at the helm, took her seat, and they went off merrily down the stream.

All the world knows that it is but a very little distance from Hampton Church to Hampton Court Bridge, especially when one has the stream with one. They were very soon near to the bridge, and as they approached it, they had to pass a huge barge, that was lazily making its way down to Brentford.

'There's lots of tune for the big arch,' said Charley.

'Pull away then,' said Harry.

They both pulled hard, and shot alongside and past the barge. But the stream was strong, and the great ugly mass of black timber moved behind them quicker than it seemed to do.

'It will be safer to take the one to the left,' said Harry.

'Oh! there's lots of tune,' said Charley.

'No,' said Harry,' do as I tell you and go to the left.—Pull your left hand a little, Katie.'

Charley did as he was bid, and Katie intended to do the same; but unfortunately she pulled the wrong hand. They were now very near the bridge, and the barge was so close to them as to show that there might have been danger in attempting to get through the same arch with her.

'Your left hand, Katie, your left,' shouted Norman; 'your left string.' Katie was confused, and gave first a pull with her right, and then a pull with her left, and then a strong pull with her right. The two men backed water as hard as they could, but the effect of Katie's steering was to drive the nose of the boat right into one of the wooden piers of the bridge.

The barge went on its way, and luckily made its entry under the arch before the little craft had swung round into the stream before it; as it was, the boat, still clinging by its nose, came round with its stern against the side of the barge, and as the latter went on, the timbers of Norman's wherry cracked and crumpled in the rude encounter.

The ladies should all have kept their seats. Mrs. Woodward did do so. Linda jumped up, and being next to the barge, was pulled up into it by one of the men. Katie stood bolt upright, with the tiller-ropes still in her hand, awe-struck at the misfortune she had caused; but while she was so standing, the stern of the boat was lifted nearly out of the water by the weight of the barge, and Katie was pitched, behind her mother's back, head foremost into the water.

Norman, at the moment, was endeavouring to steady the boat, and shove it off from the barge, and had also lent a hand to assist Linda in her escape. Charley was on the other side, standing up and holding on by the piers of the bridge, keeping his eyes on the ladies, so as to be of assistance to them when assistance might be needed.

And now assistance was sorely needed, and luckily had not to be long waited for. Charley, with a light and quick step, passed over the thwarts, and, disregarding Mrs. Woodward's scream, let himself down, over the gun-wale behind her seat into the water. Katie can hardly be said to have sunk at all. She had, at least, never been so much under the water as to be out of sight. Her clothes kept up her light body; and when Charley got close to her, she had been carried up to the piers of the bridge, and was panting with her head above water, and beating the stream with her little hands.

She was soon again in comparative safety. Charley had her by one arm as he held on with the other to the boat, and kept himself afloat with his legs. Mrs. Woodward leaned over and caught her daughter's clothes; while Linda, who had seen what had happened, stood shrieking on the barge, as it made its way on, heedless of the ruin it left behind.

Another boat soon came to their assistance from the shore, and Mrs. Woodward and Katie were got safely into it. Charley returned to the battered wherry, and assisted Norman in extricating it from its position; and a third boat went to Linda's rescue, who would otherwise have found herself in rather an uncomfortable position the next morning at Brentford.

The hugging and kissing to which Katie was subjected when she was carried up to the inn, near the boat-slip on the Surrey side of the river, may be imagined; as may also the faces she made at the wineglassful of stiff brandy and water which she was desired to drink. She was carried home in a fly, and by the time she arrived there, had so completely recovered her life and spirits as to put a vehement negative on her mother's proposition that she should at once go to bed.

'And not hear dear Charley's story?' said she, with tears in her eyes. 'And, mamma, I can't and won't go to bed without seeing Charley. I didn't say one word yet to thank him for jumping into the water after me.'

It was in vain that her mother told her that Charley's story would amuse her twice as much when she should read it printed; it was in vain that Mrs. Woodward assured her that Charley should come up to her room door; and hear her thanks as he stood in the passage, with the door ajar. Katie was determined to hear the story read. It must be read, if read at all, that Saturday night, as it was to be sent to the editor in the course of the week; and reading 'Crinoline and Macassar' out loud on a Sunday was not to be thought of at Surbiton Cottage. Katie was determined to hear the story read, and to sit very near the author too during the reading; to sit near him, and to give him such praise as even in her young mind she felt that an author would like to hear. Charley had pulled her out of the river, and no one, as far as her efforts could prevent it, should be allowed to throw cold water on him.

Norman and Charley, wet as the latter was, contrived to bring the shattered boat back to Hampton. When they reached the lawn at Surbiton Cottage they were both in high spirits. An accident, if it does no material harm, is always an inspiriting thing, unless one feels that it has been attributable to one's own fault. Neither of them could in this instance attach any blame to himself, and each felt that he had done what in him lay to prevent the possible ill effect of the mischance. As for the boat, Harry was too happy to think that none of his friends were hurt to care much about that.

As they walked across the lawn Mrs. Woodward ran out to them. 'My dear, dear Charley,' she said, 'what am I to say to thank you?' It was the first time Mrs. Woodward had ever called him by his Christian name. It had hitherto made him in a certain degree unhappy that she never did so, and now the sound was very pleasant to him.

'Oh, Mrs. Woodward,' said he, laughing, 'you mustn't touch me, for I'm all mud.'

'My dear, dear Charley, what can I say to you? and dear Harry, I fear we've spoilt your beautiful new boat.'

'I fear we've spoilt Katie's beautiful new hat,' said Norman.

Mrs. Woodward had taken and pressed a hand of each of them, in spite of Charley's protestations about the mud.

'Oh! you're in a dreadful state,' said she; 'you had better take something at once; you'll catch your death of cold.'

'I'd better take myself off to the inn,' said Charley, 'and get some clean clothes; that's all I want. But how is Katie—and how is Linda?'

And so, after a multitude of such inquiries on both sides, and of all manner of affectionate greetings, Charley went off to make himself dry, preparatory to the reading of the manuscript.

During his absence, Linda and Katie came down to the drawing- room. Linda was full of fun as to her journey with the bargeman; but Katie was a little paler than usual, and somewhat more serious and quiet than she was wont to be.

Norman was the first in the drawing-room, and received the thanks of the ladies for his prowess in assisting them; and Charley was not slow to follow him, for he was never very long at his toilet. He came in with a jaunty laughing air, as though nothing particular had happened, and as if he had not a care in the world. And yet while he had been dressing he had been thinking almost more than ever of Norah Geraghty. O that she, and Mrs. Davis with her, and Jabesh M'Ruen with both of them, could be buried ten fathom deep out of his sight, and out of his mind!

When he entered the room, Katie felt her heart beat so strongly that she hardly knew how to thank him for saving her life. A year ago she would have got up and kissed him innocently; but a year makes a great difference. She could not do that now, so she gave him her little hand, and held his till he came and sat down at his place at the table.

'Oh, Charley, I don't know what to say to you,' said she; and he could see and feel that her whole body was shaking with emotion.

'Then I'll tell you what to say: 'Charley, here is your tea, and some bread, and some butter, and some jam, and some muffin,' for I'll tell you what, my evening bath has made me as hungry as a hunter. I hope it has done the same to you.'

Katie, still holding his hand, looked up into his face, and he saw that her eyes were suffused with tears. She then left his side, and, running round the room, filled a plate with all the things he had asked for, and, bringing them to him, again took her place beside him. 'I wish I knew how to do more than that,' said she.

'I suppose, Charley, you'll have to make an entry about that barge on Monday morning, won't you?' said Linda. 'Mind you put in it how beautiful I looked sailing through the arch.'

'Yes, and how very gallant the bargeman was,' said Norman.

'Yes, and how much you enjoyed the idea of going down the river with him, while, we came back to the Cottage,' said Charley. 'We'll put it all down at the Navigation, and old Snape shall make a special minute about it.'

Katie drank her tea in silence, and tried to eat, though without much success. When chatting voices and jokes were to be heard at the Cottage, the sound of her voice was usually the foremost; but now she sat demure and quiet. She was realizing the danger from which she had escaped, and, as is so often the case, was beginning to fear it now that it was over.

'Ah, Katie, my bonny bird,' said her mother, seeing that she was not herself, and knowing that the excitement and overpowering feelings of gratitude were too much for her-come here; you should be in bed, my foolish little puss, should you not?'

'Indeed, she should,' said Uncle Bat, who was somewhat hard- hearted about the affair of the accident, and had been cruel enough, after hearing an account of it, to declare that it was all Katie's fault.

'Indeed, she should; and if she had gone to bed a little earlier in the evening it would have been all the better for Master Norman's boat.'

'Oh! mamma, don't send me to bed,' said she, with tears in her eyes. 'Pray don't send me to bed now; I'm quite well, only I can't talk because I'm thinking of what Charley did for me;' and so saying she got up, and, hiding her face on her mother's shoulder, burst into tears.

'My dearest child,' said Mrs. Woodward, 'I'm afraid you'll make yourself ill. We'll put off the reading, won't we, Charley? We have done enough for one evening.'

'Of course we will,' said he. 'Reading a stupid story will be very slow work after all we've gone through today.'

'No, no, no,' said Katie; 'it shan't be put off; there won't be any other time for hearing it. And, mamma it must be read; and I know it won't be stupid. Oh; mamma, dear mamma, do let us hear it read; I'm quite well now.'

Mrs. Woodward found herself obliged to give way. She had not the heart to bid her daughter go away to bed, nor, had she done so, would it have been of any avail. Katie would only have lain and sobbed in her own room, and very probably have gone into hysterics. The best thing for her was to try to turn the current of her thoughts, and thus by degrees tame down her excited feelings.

'Well, darling, then we will have the story, if Charley will let us. Go and fetch it, dearest.' Katie raised herself from her mother's bosom, and, going across the room, fetched the roll of papers to Charley. As he prepared to take it she took his hand in hers, and, bending her head over it, tenderly kissed it. 'You mustn't think,' said she, 'that because I say nothing, I don't know what it is that you've done for me; but I don't know how to say it.'

Charley was at any rate as ignorant what he ought to say as Katie was. He felt the pressure of her warm lips on his hand, and hardly knew where he was. He felt that he blushed and looked abashed, and dreaded, fearfully dreaded, lest Mrs. Woodward should surmise that he estimated at other than its intended worth, her daughter's show of affection for him.

'I shouldn't mind doing it every night,' said he, 'in such weather as this. I think it rather good fun going into the water with my clothes on.' Katie looked up at him through her tears, as though she would say that she well understood what that meant.

Mrs. Woodward saw that if the story was to be read, the sooner they began it the better.

'Come, Charley,' said she, 'now for the romance. Katie, come and sit by me.' But Katie had already taken her seat, a little behind Charley, quite in the shade, and she was not to be moved.

'But I won't read it myself,' said Charley; 'you must read it, Mrs. Woodward.'

'O yes, Mrs. Woodward, you are to read it,' said Norman.

'O yes, do read it, manna,' said Linda.

Katie said nothing, but she would have preferred that Charley should have read it himself.

'Well, if I can,' said Mrs. Woodward.

'Snape says I write the worst hand in all Somerset House,' said Charley; 'but still I think you'll be able to manage it.'

'I hate that Mr. Snape,' said Katie, sotto voce. And then Mrs. Woodward unrolled the manuscript and began her task.



CHAPTER XXII

CRINOLINE AND MACASSAR; OR, MY AUNT'S WILL

'Well, Linda was right,' said Mrs. Woodward, 'it does begin with poetry.'

'It's only a song,' said Charley, apologetically—'and after all there is only one verse of that'—and then Mrs. Woodward began

"CRINOLINE AND MACASSAR."

'Ladies and gentlemen, that is the name of Mr. Charles Tudor's new novel.'

'Crinoline and Macassar!' said Uncle Bat. 'Are they intended for human beings' names?'

'They are the heroine and the hero, as I take it,' said Mrs. Woodward, 'and I presume them to be human, unless they turn out to be celestial.'

'I never heard such names in my life,' said the captain.

'At any rate, uncle, they are as good as Sir Jib Boom and Captain Hardaport,' said Katie, pertly.

'We won't mind about that,' said Mrs. Woodward; 'I'm going to begin, and I beg I may not be interrupted.'

"CRINOLINE AND MACASSAR."

"The lovely Crinoline was sitting alone at a lattice window on a summer morning, and as she sat she sang with melancholy cadence the first part of the now celebrated song which had then lately appeared, from the distinguished pen of Sir G— H—,"

'Who is Sir G— H—, Charley?'

'Oh, it wouldn't do for me to tell that,' said Charley. 'That must be left to the tact and intelligence of my readers.'

'Oh, very well,' said Mrs. Woodward, 'we will abstain from all impertinent questions'—'from the distinguished pen of Sir G— H—. The ditty which she sang ran as follows:—

My heart's at my office, my heart is always there— My heart's at my office, docketing with care; Docketing the papers, and copying all day, My heart's at my office, though I be far away.

"'Ah me!' said the Lady Crinoline—"

'What—is she a peer's daughter?' said Uncle Bat.

'Not exactly,' said Charley, 'it's only a sort of semi-poetic way one has of speaking of one's heroine.'

"'Ah me!' said the Lady Crinoline—' his heart! his heart!—I wonder whether he has got a heart;' and then she sang again in low plaintive voice the first line of the song, suiting the cadence to her own case:—

His heart is at his office, his heart is always there.

"'It was evident that the Lady Crinoline did not repeat the words in the feeling of their great author, who when he wrote them had intended to excite to high deeds of exalted merit that portion of the British youth which is employed in the Civil Service of the country.

"Crinoline laid down her lute—it was in fact an accordion—and gazing listlessly over the rails of the balcony, looked out at the green foliage which adorned the enclosure of the square below.

"It was Tavistock Square. The winds of March and the showers of April had been successful in producing the buds of May."

'Ah, Charley, that's taken from the old song,' said Katie, 'only you've put buds instead of flowers.'

'That's quite allowable,' said Mrs. Woodward—"successful in producing the buds of May. The sparrows chirped sweetly on the house-top, and the coming summer gladdened the hearts of all—of all except poor Crinoline.

"'I wonder whether he has a heart, said she; 'and if he has, I wonder whether it is at his office.'

"As she thus soliloquized, the door was opened by a youthful page, on whose well-formed breast, buttons seemed to grow like mushrooms in the meadows in August.

"'Mr. Macassar Jones,' said the page; and having so said, he discreetly disappeared. He was in his line of life a valuable member of society. He had brought from his last place a twelvemonth's character that was creditable alike to his head and heart; he was now found to be a trustworthy assistant in the household of the Lady Crinoline's mother, and was the delight of his aged parents, to whom he regularly remitted no inconsiderable portion of his wages. Let it always be remembered that the life even of a page may be glorious. All honour to the true and brave!"

'Goodness, Charley—how very moral you are!' said Linda.

'Yes,' said he; 'that's indispensable. It's the intention of the Daily Delight always to hold up a career of virtue to the lower orders as the thing that pays. Honesty, high wages, and hot dinners. Those are our principles.'

'You'll have a deal to do before you'll bring the lower orders to agree with you,' said Uncle Bat.

'We have a deal to do,' said Charley, 'and we'll do it. The power of the cheap press is unbounded.'

"As the page closed the door, a light, low, melancholy step was heard to make its way across the drawing-room. Crinoline's heart had given one start when she had heard the announcement of the well-known name. She had once glanced with eager inquiring eye towards the door. But not in vain to her had an excellent mother taught the proprieties of elegant life. Long before Macassar Jones was present in the chamber she had snatched up the tambour- frame that lay beside her, and when he entered she was zealously engaged on the fox's head that was to ornament the toe of a left- foot slipper. Who shall dare to say that those slippers were intended to grace the feet of Macassar Jones?"

'But I suppose they were,' said Katie.

'You must wait and see,' said her mother; 'for my part I am not at all so sure of that.'

'Oh, but I know they must be; for she's in love with him,' said Katie.

"'Oh, Mr. Macassar,' said the Lady Crinoline, when he had drawn nigh to her, 'and how are you to-day?' This mention of his Christian name betrayed no undue familiarity, as the two families were intimate, and Macassar had four elder brothers. 'I am so sorry mamma is not at home; she will regret not seeing you amazingly.'

"Macassar had his hat in his hand, and he stood a while gazing at the fox in the pattern. 'Won't you sit down?' said Crinoline.

"'Is it very dusty in the street to-day?' asked Crinoline; and as she spoke she turned upon him a face wreathed in the sweetest smiles, radiant with elegant courtesy, and altogether expressive of extreme gentility, unsullied propriety, and a very high tone of female education. 'Is it very dusty in the street to-day?'

"Charmed by the involuntary grace of her action, Macassar essayed to turn his head towards her as he replied; he could not turn it much, for he wore an all-rounder; but still he was enabled by a side glance to see more of that finished elegance than was perhaps good for his peace of mind.

"'Yes,' said he, 'it is dusty;—it certainly is dusty, rather;— but not very—and then in most streets they've got the water- carts.'

"'Ah, I love those water-carts!' said Crinoline; 'the dust, you know, is so trying.'

"'To the complexion?' suggested Macassar, again looking round as best he might over the bulwark of his collar.

"Crinoline laughed slightly; it was perhaps hardly more than a simper, and turning her lovely eyes from her work, she said, 'Well, to the complexion, if you will. What would you gentlemen say if we ladies were to be careless of our complexions?'

"Macassar merely sighed gently—perhaps he had no fitting answer; perhaps his heart was too full for him to answer. He sat with his eye fixed on his hat, which still dangled in his hand; but his mind's eye was far away.

"'Is it in his office?' thought Crinoline to herself; 'or is it here? Is it anywhere?'

"'Have you learnt the song I sent you? said he at last, waking, as it were, from a trance.

"'Not yet,' said she—'that is, not quite; that is, I could not sing it before strangers yet.'

"'Strangers!' said Macassar; and he looked at her again with an energy that produced results not beneficial either to his neck or his collar.

"Crinoline was delighted at this expression of feeling. 'At any rate it is somewhere,' said she to herself; 'and it can hardly be all at his office.'

"'Well, I will not say strangers,' she said out loud; 'it sounds —it sounds—I don't know how it sounds. But what I mean is, that as yet I've only sung it before mamma!'"

'I declare I don't know which is the biggest fool of the two,' said Uncle Bat, very rudely.' As for him, if I had him on the forecastle of a man-of-war for a day or two, I'd soon teach him to speak out.'

'You forget, sir,' said Charley,' he's not a sailor, he's only in the Civil Service; we're all very bashful in the Civil Service.'

'I think he is rather spooney, I must say,' said Katie; whereupon Mrs. Woodward went on reading.

"'It's a sweet thing, isn't it?' said Macassar.

"'Oh, very!' said Crinoline, with a rapturous expression which pervaded her whole head and shoulders as well as her face and bust—'very sweet, and so new.'

"'It quite comes home to me,' said Macassar, and he sighed deeply.

"'Then it is at his office,' said Crinoline to herself; and she sighed also.

"They both sat silent for a while, looking into the square— Crinoline was at one window, and Macassar at the other: 'I must go now,' said he: 'I promised to be back at three.'

"'Back where?' said she.

"'At my office,' said he.

"Crinoline sighed. After all, it was at his office; it was too evident that it was there, and nowhere else. Well, and why should it not be there? why should not Macassar Jones be true to his duty and to his country? What had she to do with his heart? Why should she wish it elsewhere? 'Twas thus she tried to console herself, but in vain. Had she had an office of her own it might perhaps have been different; but Crinoline was only a woman; and often she sighed over the degradation of her lot.

"'Good morning, Miss Crinoline,' said he.

"'Good morning, Mr. Macassar,' said she; 'mamma will so regret that she has lost the pleasure of seeing you.'

"And then she rung the bell. Macassar went downstairs perhaps somewhat slower, with perhaps more of melancholy than when he entered. The page opened the hall-door with alacrity, and shut it behind him with a slam.

"All honour to the true and brave!

"Crinoline again took up the note of her sorrow, and with her lute in her hand, she warbled forth the line which stuck like a thorn in her sweet bosom:—

His heart is in his office—his heart IS ALWAYS there."

'There,' said Mrs. Woodward, 'that's the end of the first chapter.'

'Well, I like the page the best,' said Linda, 'because he seems to know what he is about.'

'Oh, so does the lady,' said Charley; 'but it wouldn't at all do if we made the hero and heroine go about their work like humdrum people. You'll see that the Lady Crinoline knows very well what's what.'

'Oh, Charley, pray don't tell us,' said Katie; 'I do so like Mr. Macassar, he is so spooney; pray go on, mamma.'

'I'm ready,' said Mrs. Woodward, again taking up the manuscript.

"CHAPTER II

"The lovely Crinoline was the only daughter of fond parents; and though they were not what might be called extremely wealthy, considering the vast incomes of some residents in the metropolis, and were not perhaps wont to mix in the highest circles of the Belgravian aristocracy, yet she was enabled to dress in all the elegance of fashion, and contrived to see a good deal of that society which moves in the highly respectable neighbourhood of Russell Square and Gower Street.

"Her dresses were made at the distinguished establishment of Madame Mantalini, in Hanover Square; at least she was in the habit of getting one dress there every other season, and this was quite sufficient among her friends to give her a reputation for dealing in the proper quarter. Once she had got a bonnet direct from Paris, which gave her ample opportunity of expressing a frequent opinion not favourable to the fabricators of a British article. She always took care that her shoes had within them the name of a French cordonnier; and her gloves were made to order in the Rue Du Bac, though usually bought and paid for in Tottenham Court Road."

'What a false creature!' said Linda.

'False!' said Charley; 'and how is a girl to get along if she be not false? What girl could live for a moment before the world if she were to tell the whole truth about the get-up of her wardrobe—the patchings and make-believes, the chipped ribbons and turned silks, the little bills here, and the little bills there? How else is an allowance of L20 a year to be made compatible with an appearance of unlimited income? How else are young men to be taught to think that in an affair of dress money is a matter of no moment whatsoever?'

'Oh, Charley, Charley, don't be slanderous,' said Mrs. Woodward.

'I only repeat what the editor says to me—I know nothing about it myself. Only we are requested 'to hold the mirror up to nature,'—and to art too, I believe. We are to set these things right, you know.'

'We—who are we?' said Katie.

'Why, the Daily Delight,' said Charley.

'But I hope there's nothing false in patching and turning,' said Mrs. Woodward; 'for if there be, I'm the falsest woman alive.

To gar the auld claes look amaist as weel's the new

is, I thought, one of the most legitimate objects of a woman's diligence.'

'It all depends on the spirit of the stitches,' said Charley the censor.

'Well, I must say I don't like mending up old clothes a bit better than Charley does,' said Katie; 'but pray go on, mamma;' so Mrs. Woodward continued to read.