CHAPTER III.
MINEWVRING.
Master rose the nex morning with a dismal countinants--he seamed tothink that his pa's visit boded him no good. I heard him muttering athis brexfast, and fumbling among his hundred pound notes; once he hadlaid a parsle of them aside (I knew what he meant), to send 'em to hisfather. "But no," says he at last, clutching them all up together again,and throwing them into his escritaw, "what harm can he do me? If he isa knave, I know another who's full as sharp. Let's see if we cannot beathim at his own weapons." With that Mr. Deuceace drest himself in hisbest clothes, and marched off to the Plas Vandom, to pay his cort to thefair widdo and the intresting orfn.
It was abowt ten o'clock, and he propoased to the ladies, on seeingthem, a number of planns for the day's rackryation. Riding in the BodyBalong, going to the Twillaries to see King Looy Disweet (who was thenthe raining sufferin of the French crownd) go to chapple, and, finely,a dinner at 5 o'clock at the Caffy de Parry; whents they were all toadjourn, to see a new peace at the theatre of the Pot St. Martin, calledSussannar and the Elders.
The gals agread to everythink, exsep the two last prepositiums. "We havean engagement, my dear Mr. Algernon," said my lady. "Look--a very kindletter from Lady Bobtail." And she handed over a pafewmd noat from thatexolted lady. It ran thus:--
"FBG. ST. HONORE, Thursday, Feb. 15, 1817.
"MY DEAR LADY GRIFFIN,--It is an age since we met. Harassing publicduties occupy so much myself and Lord Bobtail, that we have scarce timeto see our private friends; among whom, I hope, my dear Lady Griffinwill allow me to rank her. Will you excuse so unceremonious aninvitation, and dine with us at the embassy to-day? We shall be enpetite comite, and shall have the pleasure of hearing, I hope, some ofyour charming daughter's singing in the evening. I ought, perhaps, tohave addressed a separate, note to dear Miss Griffin; but I hope shewill pardon a poor diplomate, who has so many letters to write, youknow.
"Farewell till seven, when I POSITIVELY MUST see you both. Ever, dearestLady Griffin, your affectionate
"ELIZA BOBTAIL."
Such a letter from the ambassdriss, brot by the ambasdor's Shassure, andsealed with his seal of arms, would affect anybody in the middling ranxof life. It droav Lady Griffin mad with delight; and, long before mymaster's arrivle, she'd sent Mortimer and Fitzclarence, her two footmin,along with a polite reply in the affummatiff.
Master read the noat with no such fealinx of joy. He felt that therewas somethink a-going on behind the seans, and, though he could not tellhow, was sure that some danger was near him. That old fox of a father ofhis had begun his M'Inations pretty early!
Deuceace handed back the letter; sneared, and poohd, and hinted thatsuch an invitation was an insult at best (what he called a pees ally);and, the ladies might depend upon it, was only sent because Lady Bobtailwanted to fill up two spare places at her table. But Lady Griffin andMiss would not have his insinwations; they knew too fu lords ever torefuse an invitatium from any one of them. Go they would; and poorDeuceace must dine alone. After they had been on their ride, and had hadtheir other amusemince, master came back with them, chatted, and laft;he was mighty sarkastix with my lady; tender and sentrymentle with Miss;and left them both in high sperrits to perform their twollet, beforedinner.
As I came to the door (for I was as famillyer as a servnt of the house),as I came into the drawing-room to announts his cab, I saw master veryquietly taking his pocket-book (or pot fool, as the French call it) andthrusting it under one of the cushinx of the sofa. What game is this?thinx I.
Why, this was the game. In abowt two hours, when he knew the ladies weregon, he pretends to be vastly anxious abowt the loss of his potfolio;and back he goes to Lady Griffinses to seek for it there.
"Pray," says he, on going in, "ask Miss Kicksey if I may see her for asingle moment." And down comes Miss Kicksey, quite smiling, and happy tosee him.
"Law, Mr. Deuceace!" says she, trying to blush as hard as ever shecould, "you quite surprise me! I don't know whether I ought, really,being alone, to admit a gentleman."
"Nay, don't say so, dear Miss Kicksey! for do you know, I came here fora double purpose--to ask about a pocket-book which I have lost, and may,perhaps, have left here; and then, to ask you if you will have the greatgoodness to pity a solitary bachelor, and give him a cup of your nicetea?"
NICE TEA! I thot I should have split; for I'm blest if master had eatena morsle of dinner!
Never mind: down to tea they sat. "Do you take cream and sugar, dearsir?" says poar Kicksey, with a voice as tender as a tuttle-duff.
"Both, dearest Miss Kicksey!" answers master; who stowed in a power ofsashong and muffinx which would have done honor to a washawoman.
I shan't describe the conversation that took place betwigst master andthis young lady. The reader, praps, knows y Deuceace took the trouble totalk to her for an hour, and to swallow all her tea. He wanted to findout from her all she knew about the famly money matters, and settle atonce which of the two Griffinses he should marry.
The poar thing, of cors, was no match for such a man as my master. Ina quarter of an hour, he had, if I may use the igspression, "turned herinside out." He knew everything that she knew; and that, poar creature,was very little. There was nine thousand a year, she had heard say,in money, in houses, in banks in Injar, and what not. Boath the ladiessigned papers for selling or buying, and the money seemed equillydivided betwigst them.
NINE THOUSAND A YEAR! Deuceace went away, his cheex tingling, his heartbeating. He, without a penny, could nex morning, if he liked, be masterof five thousand per hannum!
Yes. But how? Which had the money, the mother or the daughter? All thetea-drinking had not taught him this piece of nollidge; and Deuceacethought it a pity that he could not marry both.
. . . . . .
The ladies came back at night, mightaly pleased with their reception atthe ambasdor's; and, stepping out of their carridge, bid coachmin driveon with a gentlemin who had handed them out--a stout old gentlemin, whoshook hands most tenderly at parting, and promised to call often upon myLady Griffin. He was so polite, that he wanted to mount the stairs withher ladyship; but no, she would not suffer it. "Edward," says she tothe coachmin, quite loud, and pleased that all the people in the hotelshould hear her, "you will take the carriage, and drive HIS LORDSHIPhome." Now, can you guess who his lordship was? The Right Hon. theEarl of Crabs, to be sure; the very old genlmn whom I had seen on suchcharming terms with his son the day before. Master knew this the nexday, and began to think he had been a fool to deny his pa the thousandpound.
Now, though the suckmstansies of the dinner at the ambasdor's only cameto my years some time after, I may as well relate 'em here, word forword, as they was told me by the very genlmn who waited behind LordCrabseses chair.
There was only a "petty comity" at dinner, as Lady Bobtail said; and myLord Crabs was placed betwigst the two Griffinses, being mighty ellygantand palite to both. "Allow me," says he to Lady G. (between the soop andthe fish), "my dear madam, to thank you--fervently thank you for yourgoodness to my poor boy. Your ladyship is too young to experience, but,I am sure, far too tender not to understand the gratitude which mustfill a fond parent's heart for kindness shown to his child. Believeme," says my lord, looking her full and tenderly in the face, "that thefavors you have done to another have been done equally to myself, andawaken in my bosom the same grateful and affectionate feelings withwhich you have already inspired my son Algernon."
Lady Griffin blusht, and droopt her head till her ringlets fell into herfish-plate: and she swallowed Lord Crabs's flumry just as she would somany musharuins. My lord (whose powers of slack-jaw was notoarious) nexaddrast another spitch to Miss Griffin. He said he'd heard how Deuceacewas SITUATED. Miss blusht--what a happy dog he was--Miss blusht crimson,and then he sighed deeply, and began eating his turbat and lobstersos. Master was a good un at flumry, but, law bless you! he was no moarequill to the old man than a mole-hill is to a mounting. Before thenight was ov
er, he had made as much progress as another man would in aear. One almost forgot his red nose and his big stomick, and his wickedleering i's, in his gentle insiniwating woice, his fund of annygoats,and, above all, the bewtific, morl, religious, and honrabble toan of hisgenral conservation. Praps you will say that these ladies were, for suchrich pipple, mightaly esaly captivated; but recklect, my dear sir, thatthey were fresh from Injar,--that they'd not sean many lords,--thatthey adoared the peeridge, as every honest woman does in England who hasproper feelinx, and has read the fashnabble novvles,--and that here atParis was their fust step into fashnabble sosiaty.
Well, after dinner, while Miss Matilda was singing "Die tantie," or "Dipyour chair," or some of them sellabrated Italyian hairs (when she beganthis squall, hang me if she'd ever stop), my lord gets hold of LadyGriffin again, and gradgaly begins to talk to her in a very differentstrane.
"What a blessing it is for us all," says he, "that Algernon has found afriend so respectable as your ladyship."
"Indeed, my lord; and why? I suppose I am not the only respectablefriend that Mr. Deuceace has?"
"No, surely; not the only one he HAS HAD: his birth, and, permit me tosay, his relationship to myself, have procured him many. But--" (here mylord heaved a very affecting and large sigh).
"But what?" says my lady, laffing at the igspression of his dismal face."You don't mean that Mr. Deuceace has lost them or is unworthy of them?"
"I trust not, my dear madam, I trust not; but he is wild, thoughtless,extravagant, and embarrassed: and you know a man under thesecircumstances is not very particular as to his associates."
"Embarrassed? Good heavens! He says he has two thousand a year left himby a god-mother; and he does not seem even to spend his income--a veryhandsome independence, too, for a bachelor."
My lord nodded his head sadly, and said,--"Will your ladyship give meyour word of honor to be secret? My son has but a thousand a year, whichI allow him, and is heavily in debt. He has played, madam, I fear;and for this reason I am so glad to hear that he is in a respectabledomestic circle, where he may learn, in the presence of far greater andpurer attractions, to forget the dice-box, and the low company which hasbeen his bane."
My Lady Griffin looked very grave indeed. Was it true? Was Deuceacesincere in his professions of love, or was he only a sharper wooing herfor her money? Could she doubt her informer? his own father, and, what'smore, a real flesh and blood pear of parlyment? She determined she wouldtry him. Praps she did not know she had liked Deuceace so much, untilshe kem to feel how much she should HATE him if she found he'd beenplaying her false.
The evening was over, and back they came, as wee've seen,--my lorddriving home in my lady's carridge, her ladyship and Miss walking upstairs to their own apartmince.
Here, for a wonder, was poar Miss Kicksey quite happy and smiling, andevidently full of a secret,--something mighty pleasant, to judge fromher loox. She did not long keep it. As she was making tea for the ladies(for in that house they took a cup regular before bedtime), "Well, mylady," says she, "who do you think has been to drink tea with me?" Poarthing, a frendly face was a event in her life--a tea-party quite a hera!
"Why, perhaps, Lenoir my maid," says my lady, looking grave. "I wish,Miss Kicksey, you would not demean yourself by mixing with my domestics.Recollect, madam, that you are sister to Lady Griffin."
"No, my lady, it was not Lenoir; it was a gentleman, and a handsomegentleman, too."
"Oh, it was Monsieur de l'Orge, then," says Miss; "he promised to bringme some guitar-strings."
"No, nor yet M. de l'Orge. He came, but was not so polite as to askfor me. What do you think of your own beau, the Honorable Mr. AlgernonDeuceace;" and, so saying, poar Kicksey clapped her hands together, andlooked as joyfle as if she'd come in to a fortin.
"Mr. Deuceace here; and why, pray?" says my lady, who recklected allthat his exlent pa had been saying to her.
"Why, in the first place, he had left his pocket-book, and in thesecond, he wanted, he said, a dish of my nice tea; which he took, andstayed with me an hour, or moar."
"And pray, Miss Kicksey," said Miss Matilda, quite contempshusly, "whatmay have been the subject of your conversation with Mr. Algernon? Didyou talk politics, or music, or fine arts, or metaphysics?" Miss M.being what was called a blue (as most hump-backed women in sosiaty are),always made a pint to speak on these grand subjects.
"No, indeed; he talked of no such awful matters. If he had, you know,Matilda, I should never have understood him. First we talked about theweather, next about muffins and crumpets. Crumpets, he said, he likedbest; and then we talked" (here Miss Kicksey's voice fell) "about poordear Sir George in heaven! what a good husband he was, and--"
"What a good fortune he left, eh, Miss Kicksey?" says my lady, with ahard, snearing voice, and a diabollicle grin.
"Yes, dear Leonora, he spoke so respectfully of your blessed husband,and seemed so anxious about you and Matilda, it was quite charming tohear him, dear man!"
"And pray, Miss Kicksey, what did you tell him?"
"Oh, I told him that you and Leonora had nine thousand a year, and--"
"What then?"
"Why, nothing; that is all I know. I am sure I wish I had ninety," sayspoor Kicksey, her eyes turning to heaven.
"Ninety fiddlesticks! Did not Mr. Deuceace ask how the money was left,and to which of us?"
"Yes; but I could not tell him."
"I knew it!" says my lady, slapping down her tea-cup,--"I knew it!"
"Well!" says Miss Matilda, "and why not, Lady Griffin? There is noreason you should break your tea-cup, because Algernon asks a harmlessquestion. HE is not mercenary; he is all candor, innocence, generosity!He is himself blessed with a sufficient portion of the world's goods tobe content; and often and often has he told me he hoped the woman of hischoice might come to him without a penny, that he might show the purityof his affection."
"I've no doubt," says my lady. "Perhaps the lady of his choice is MissMatilda Griffin!" and she flung out of the room, slamming the door, andleaving Miss Matilda to bust into tears, as was her reglar custom, andpour her loves and woas into the buzzom of Miss Kicksey.