Mrs. Rudd, however, was mightily shocked when she beheld the condition in which the reverend gentleman presented himself at her own parlour-door; and she could indeed scarcely believe her eyes. But when, after hiccupping out some unintelligible words, that self-same reverend gentleman—the pastor of an admiring flock, and whose sermons were so refreshing and so savoury,—when he,—the individual whom she had looked upon as the essence of human perfection,—when he, we say, cast his arms around her neck and administered to her somewhat wrinkled cheeks a hearty smack,—then, what did she do? Why—she put up with the affront—doubtless to save the reputation of the minister;—and, perhaps with the same charitable desire to avoid the scandal of an exposure, she permitted him to repeat his caresses as often as he chose during the half-hour that he remained in her company. She even made him some tea, which materially tended to sober him; and, when he had at length taken his departure, she muttered several times to herself, “Well—after all, this saint of a man is mere flesh and blood like any other!”
But when Mrs. Rudd’s more pleasurable reflections had ceased,—for pleasurable they certainly were, both during the reverend gentleman’s presence and for a short time after the door had closed behind him,—she remembered that her disagreeable lodgers were, still in the house, notwithstanding the remonstrances which, according to his statement to the widow, the pious minister had most eloquently addressed to them. And that they were still in the dwelling, she was very soon made to understand;—for the obstreperous behaviour of those “dreadful men,” to use Mrs. Rudd’s own words, recommenced in the form of the most hearty peals of laughter—and the clashing of the fire-irons—and the stamping of feet, as if the two gentlemen were mad.
“They have begun their booze,” said Mrs. Rudd to herself, looking up in despair at the ceiling, as if she thought the captain and his friend must inevitably come through upon her devoted head. “But never mind!” she suddenly exclaimed aloud, as a thought—a very bright thought struck her: “I will put up with it for this once—and to-morrow—to-morrow——”
Here Mrs. Rudd stopped short; for she would not even trust the empty air with the lucid idea which had struck her.
We may however inform our readers that this said idea was nothing more nor less than to lock out the two gentlemen when they went for their usual walk on the morrow.
Tranquillized by the excellence of the scheme, Mrs. Rudd refreshed herself with a small drop of brandy, and then spread her huge Bible open on the table before her—not to read it, but merely because “it looked pious-like,” as she thought, if any of her neighbours should happen to drop in. For Mrs. Rudd delighted in the reputation for sanctity which she enjoyed amongst her acquaintances in general, and the frequenters of the reverend gentleman’s chapel in particular.
Let us now return to Mr. Frank Curtis and Captain O’Blunderbuss, who, as the landlady rightly concluded, were enjoying themselves in their own peculiar fashion up-stairs.
Having partaken of a cold joint, and the slip-shod girl of the house having provided them with a jug of hot water, the two gentlemen commenced the evening’s orgie. The whiskey-punch which they brewed was of that kind which is libellously alleged to be peculiarly affected by ladies—namely, “hot, strong, and plenty of it;”—and, under its influence, they soon manifested their wonted exuberance of spirits. First, Captain O’Blunderbuss would insist upon giving Frank a lesson with the broad-sword—the one using the poker, and the other the shovel;—and every time the gallant officer thrust his friend in the ribs, a hearty shout of laughter burst from their lips—for they considered it prime fun.
When they were tired of this amusement, they resumed their seats—replenished their glasses—and chatted on divers matters interesting to themselves. Presently Frank started up, and leapt over a chair in order to show his agility, although he had grown somewhat stout of late years;—and as he acquitted himself in a clumsy manner, the captain volunteered to teach him how to do it. But the gallant officer only tumbled over the chair, causing a tremendous split in his trousers—an accident at which they nevertheless both laughed more heartily than ever.
“Be Jasus!” cried the captain, “and it’s the only pair of unmintionables that I possess! But niver mind: I’ll be afther telling the gal to take them round to the tailor’s the first thing in the morning; and so I’ll take my breakfast in bed, Frank. They’ll soon be sent home again.”
“Let’s see? we’ve got to meet Styles to-morrow at three in the afternoon,” said Curtis; “and, by Jove! we must make him come down with the dust.”
“Be the power-rs! and you’re right, my frind!” exclaimed the captain. “It’s eighteen-pince that’s left in my pocket at this prisint spaking——”
“And nothing at all in mine,” interrupted Frank, both his hands diving at the same time down into the depths of the empty conveniences alluded to. “Deuce take this railway affair! It gets on precious slow. I remember when I was in Paris two or three-and-twenty years ago, they were making a new path-way through my friend the Archbishop’s estate at Fontainbleau; and if his Grace didn’t go and swear at the men all day long, they never would have got on with it.”
“Be the power-rs! if it’s a thrifle of swearing that would make Misther Styles push a-head,” said the gallant officer, “I’m the boy to help him on with that same.”
“You see there’s been what they call a tightness in the Money-Market lately,” observed Frank: “at least, that’s what Styles told me the other day——”
“And it’s an infer-r-rnal tightness that’s got hould of our Money-Market, my frind,” interrupted the captain. “Be Jasus! there’s the potheen bottle empty—and no tick at the public!”
“You’ve got eighteen-pence in your pocket, captain,” suggested Curtis.
“Right, me boy!”—and he rang the bell furiously.
The slip-shod girl answered the summons, and was forthwith despatched for a supply of whiskey at the wine-vaults which the lodgers honoured with their custom.
“Now we’re altogether aground,” said Curtis, after a pause which had followed the departure of the servant. “But we’ve every thing necessary in the house for to-morrow morning’s breakfast, except the milk——”
“And bar-r-ring my breeches, ye spalpeen!” cried the captain. “They must be immediately menthed, any how.”
“Oh! the tailor won’t think of asking for the money when he brings them home,” said Curtis: then, beholding the comical expression of his friend’s countenance, which was elongated with sore misgivings respecting the amount of confidence the snip might choose to put in his honour, Frank burst out into a tremendous fit of laughter.
“Arrah! and be Jasus! and it’s all mighty fine for you, Misther Curtis, to make a damned fool of yourself in that fashion,” exclaimed Captain O’Blunderbuss, becoming as red as a turkey-cock: “but I can assure ye that it’s no joking matther for me to contimplate the prospict of lying in bed for a week or two till I get my breeches back again. And now, if you’re not afther houlding your tongue, Frank, I’ll tip ye a small rap on the head with the poker—by the howly poker-r, I will!”
“Don’t get into a rage, captain,” said Curtis, putting a bridle upon his mirth in consequence of the threat just held out—a threat which he knew his amiable friend was perfectly capable of putting into force. “I will go out the first thing in the morning and see Styles—and I have no doubt he will give me some money. I shall be back again by the time the tailor comes home with—with——”
“The unmintionables!” vociferated the captain, his wrath reviving as he saw that his friend was once more on the point of giving vent to a hearty cachinnation. “But here’s the gal coming up stairs with the potheen; and so we’ll be afther enjoying ourselves for the prisint, and think of the tightness of the Money-Mar-r-rket in the morning.”
“Well, what the deuce has made you so long?” demanded Frank Curtis, as the slip-shod domestic entered the room.
“Long, sir!” echoed the girl, as if in surprise. “Lor, sir—I ain’t been a minit!”
“Not a minute!” cried Frank, who always bullied servants—when they weren’t footmen who could knock him down for his impudence: “I tell you, you’ve been more than a quarter of an hour.”
“Well, sir—and if so be I have,” said the girl, suddenly recollecting something which had occurred to hinder her on her errand, “it was because as I went out of the street-door a man come up and asked me if so be as Mr. Smith lived here. ‘No,’ says I: ‘he don’t.’—‘Well, then,’ says the man, ‘Mr. Brown does.’—‘No, he don’t, though,’ I says, says I; ‘nor yet Mr. Jones, nor Mr. Noakes neether.’—‘Well, who does live here, then?’ says the man; and as I thought it would teach him not to be so precious knowing another time, I out and told him slap as how two gentlemen lived here as was named Blunderbuss—leastways, O’Blunderbuss, and Curtis.”
“The devil you did!” ejaculated the two lodgers as it were in the same breath, and exchanging significant glances which expressed the same apprehension.
“To be sure I did, sir,” responded the girl, not perceiving the alarm which she had created in the minds of the gentlemen, but rather attributing their excited ejaculations to an approval of her conduct: “for I thinks to myself, thinks I, ‘Now, my fine feller, you’ll believe that there’s no Smiths or Browns here; and you won’t be quite so positive another time.’”
“Well—and what did the man say?” demanded Frank Curtis, darting another uneasy glance at his friend.
“He only said ‘Oh!’ and went away,” returned the girl; “and that’s what kept me a little in going——”
“What sort of a looking fellow was he?” asked Curtis.
“He warn’t a gentleman, sir—and he smelt horrible of drink,” said the domestic.
“But what should you take him for?” demanded Frank, impatiently.
“A thief, sir,” was the ingenuous response.
“Be Jasus! and thin it’s a shiriff’s——” ejaculated Captain O’Blunderbuss, starting in his chair: but, instantly stopping short ere he completed the sentence, he added in a few moments and in a less excited tone, “You may go down stairs, my dear; and if any one comes and asks for Misther Frank Cur-r-tis or Captain O’Bluntherbuss, ye must deny us, mind—or I’ll be afther skinning ye alive!”
“Lor, sir!” cried the girl; and, horrified by the dreadful threat, she hastened from the room as if the individual who had uttered the menace were preparing to carry it into execution.
For some few minutes after she had taken her departure, Captain O’Blunderbuss and Mr. Curtis sate eyeing each other in silence,—the same idea evidently occupying both—and both fearful to express it; as if to give utterance to the thought were positively to meet the dreaded misfortune half-way.
“Well,” exclaimed Curtis, at length, “and what do you think of that?”
“Be Jasus! and it’s what do you think of it?” cried the captain.
“For my part I think it’s Rumrigg and Kaysay the lawyers, who’ve found out where we are, and mean to take us on that cursed cognovit we gave them last Christmas for the discounter’s affair,” said Mr. Curtis, who, having now fully expressed his fears, no longer hesitated to look particularly blank upon the matter.
“Faith! and that same’s my opinion also,” exclaimed the gallant officer; then, grasping the poker very tight in his hand, he said, “But if the thunthering villains of shiriff’s-officers crape into this house, it’s myself that’ll sind ’em out again with a flay in their ear. So don’t make yourself unhappy at all, at all, my frind; but let’s dhrink bad luck to the bastes of the airth!”
“With all my heart,” cried Frank, brewing for himself a strong glass of toddy. “The only thing is——”
“Is what?” demanded the captain, suddenly desisting from his occupation of mixing a tumbler of grog for himself, and fixing his eyes sternly upon his friend.
“The breeches,” was the laconic answer.
“Ah! now—and can’t ye be asy about those same unmintionables?” cried the gallant officer. “I suspicted it was afther them ye was harping again and again. It’ll become a sore subject in time, Frank. So dhrink—and bad luck to the inexprissibles.”
And the two gentlemen did drink, until the bottle was empty, when they retired to rest—the captain having previously informed the servant-girl that he should leave his trousers outside his chamber door, and that she must take them round to the tailor the very first thing in the morning, with instructions for him to mend and return them as speedily as possible.
Mr. Curtis arose at a very early hour—at least for him,—it being only eight o’clock when he sallied forth with the intention of seeking Mr. Bubbleton Styles, on whose purse he contemplated as deep an inroad as that gentleman’s circumstances would permit.
But before he quitted the house, he partook of breakfast, and likewise carried in some tea and toast to his friend the captain, who was compelled, “under painful circumstances,” as Frank observed, to keep his bed for an hour or two. The gallant officer charged his companion and ally to return without delay—the prudence of shifting their quarters as soon as convenient, being strongly suggested by the enquiries instituted regarding them on the preceding evening.
Having disposed of his breakfast. Captain O’Blunderbuss turned himself round in his bed and took a nap—in which luxurious state of light and dreamy repose he remained for upwards of an hour, when he was suddenly awakened by a low, sneaking, suspicious kind of double knock at the street-door.
He started up in bed; and, as he hastily collected his scattered ideas, the affair of Rumrigg and Kaysay flashed to his mind.
Leaping from his couch as a chesnut bounces from a shovel on the fire, Captain O’Blunderbuss pulled on his stockings, thrust his feet into his slippers, and stole out upon the landing, where he held his breath and listened attentively.
At that very instant the servant-girl, who invariably kept people waiting at the door as long as possible, answered the summons; and the captain overheard the following colloquy.
“Is the genelmen at home, my dear?” asked a rough, harsh, grating voice.
“Oh! you’re the one that stopped and spoke to me last evening,” responded the girl.
“Just so: but it was o’ny to make a few civil enquiries consarning your missus’s lodgers. I ’spose they’re at home; and so me and my friend will just walk up, my dear—‘cause our business is partickler.”
“Well, then, it ain’t of no use to go up now,” said the servant-girl: “for Mr. Curtis has gone out, and the captain isn’t out of bed—leastways, he hasn’t left his room yet; and he brekfusted there.”
“Never mind, my dear,” persisted the man with the hoarse voice: “we’ll just walk up and pay our respeks to the captain, who is a wery nice genelman no doubt.”
From this conversation the gallant officer learnt that there were two persons enquiring for him, although one only appeared to speak in the matter. His worst suspicions were confirmed: they were bailiffs, come to arrest him on the cognovit given jointly by himself and his inseparable friend Mr. Francis Curtis to those astute gentlemen, Messrs. Rumrigg and Kaysay.
What was to be done? He must dress himself in all possible haste, and fight his way desperately out of the house!
This was his first idea.
But it was so easy to think of dressing—and so difficult to carry the scheme into execution: for, alas! the gallant officer’s unmentionables were at the tailor’s; and he knew that Frank possessed not a second pair!
What, then, was to be done?
Should he surrender himself into the hands of the officers, and be borne ignominiously to Whitecross Street? The thought was ridiculous with such a man as Captain O’Blunderbuss!
Locking his own door, and taking the key with him, he scud up to the top storey, and sought refuge in the bed-chamber of Mrs. Rudd, who, he felt assured, had gone out to market as usual—otherwise she would have been certain to emerge from her parlour below and join in the conversation which had taken place between the bailiffs and the servant-girl.
The captain’s first thought, in thus flying to his landlady’s bed-chamber, was merely to seek refuge there, and leave the officers to suppose that he had gone out. It struck him that they would knock at his door—would force open that door on not receiving any answer—and would then conclude that he really was not at home. In the meantime he should have leisure to decide upon the best means of ultimately avoiding the bailiffs altogether.
But scarcely had he entered Mrs. Rudd’s room when a new and truly magnificent idea suggested itself—or rather, was suggested by the fact that an open cupboard revealed the worthy landlady’s best silk gown, while upon a chest of drawers stood the good woman’s Sunday bonnet, to which she had been putting a new ribband that very morning before she went out. The bonnet, which was of fine straw and of a large shape, was provided with an ample blue gauze veil; for Mrs. Rudd liked to be smart on the Sabbath—if it were only to compete with her female neighbours who attended the “ministry” of the Reverend Emanuel Flummery.
The appearance of the two articles of dress just specified, determined the gallant officer how to act; and his arrangements were made with almost lightning speed.
The reader will recollect that he had no clothes at the moment to put off before he put others on—he having sought the landlady’s room in his shirt, stockings, and slippers. To slip into the silk dress was therefore the work of an instant: to assume the Leghorn bonnet was an affair accomplished with equal speed;—and to ransack the widow’s drawers for a shawl was a matter scarcely occupying ten seconds. Then, drawing the veil in thick folds over his moustachioed and whiskered countenance with one hand, and grasping Mrs. Rudd’s parasol in the other, Captain O’Blunderbuss took a hasty survey of himself in the glass, and was perfectly satisfied with the result.
We have before stated that Mrs. Rudd was very tall, starch, and prim; and the reader is aware that Captain O’Blunderbuss was no dwarf—neither was he particularly stout. Thus, although he certainly appeared a very colossal woman, he might still pass as one at a pinch—and surely need was never more pinching than on the present occasion. At all events he was resolved to make the attempt; and the exciting nature of the incident was just of the kind which he particularly relished—though, perhaps, he would rather have had the fun without the danger of the thing.
In the meantime he had not been in a state of ignorance of what was passing on the landing of the floor below; for the bailiffs, having ascended to that height, stopped at his own chamber door, at which they knocked. But receiving no answer, the one with the hoarse voice exclaimed, “Captain O’Blunderbuss, I’ve got a message for you wery particklar from a friend of your’n.”
Still there was no response; and the man, addressing himself to the servant-girl, asked her if she were sure that the captain was at home.
“I’m certain he is,” was the reply; “because he’s sent out his—his—trousers to be mended, and is lying a-bed till they come back.”
“But mayn’t he have another pair?” demanded the bailiff.
“I don’t b’lieve he have,” said the girl: “leastways, I never see more than one either on or off him.”
“Then the captain is at home,” growled the sheriff’s-officer; “and we must do our dooty, Tom.”
These last words were evidently addressed by the speaker to his companion; and the captain comprehended that the forcing of the door would be the next step. Nor was he wrong in his conjecture;—for, before the servant girl could divine the intention of the two men, they had effected an entrance into the chamber which the gallant officer had only quitted three minutes previously.
The captain, who had been listening at the door of Mrs. Rudd’s own bed-room, now partly descended the stairs, and again stood still to listen—his proceedings being conducted as noiselessly and cautiously as possible.
“Well—I’m blowed if he’s here!” exclaimed the bailiff with the hoarse voice.
“No more than a cat,” returned his companion.
“How’s this, my dear?” continued the first speaker: “have you been a-making fools on us?”
“No,” answered the girl sharply: “I thought the captain was here—but he ain’t. So I s’pose he’s gone out without my hearing or seeing him. But now you’ve broke the lock of the door and must pay for it—or else missus will blow me up finely when she comes home from market.”
“Then she is at market,” said Captain O’Blunderbuss to himself, his hopes becoming more elated by the assurance thus conveyed to him through the servant-girl’s remark to the bailiffs.
“Pay for it, indeed!” growled the one with the hoarse voice. “That won’t suit our books neither. S’pose we fix the lock on agin in such a way that it won’t be knowed as how we ever busted the door open at all?”
“Well—do what you like; but make haste about it, ’cause missus is sure to come home in a minit or two—leastways if she’s raly out; for I didn’t see her go. But I s’pose she is—or else she’d have been down afore this to know what all the row’s about.”
“We’ll see to it, my dear,” observed the hoarse-speaking bailiff. “But I say, Tom—here’s the captain’s cap, and coat, and veskitt. Bless’d if I believe he’s gone out arter all! Let’s search t’other rooms: this gal is a-playing tricks with us.”
“Come into Mr. Curtis’s chamber and see,” exclaimed the juvenile servant; and the captain heard the party pursuing their domiciliary visit in the quarter alluded to. “Well, now?” said the girl, with a derisive laugh: “is he there? Oh! ah! you may look under the bed! Why don’t you search the drawers—or get up the chimley and look out on the tiles?”
“Don’t be sarsy, my dear,” growled the bailiff. “Come—here’s a shillin’ for you. Now tell us the truth—ain’t the captain somewhere in the house?”
“Yes—I’m sure he be,” returned the girl; “’cause his breeches is gone to be mended, and his coat and wescutt and cap is in his own room—and I know he ain’t got two suits of clothes. Besides,” she added, sinking her voice to a tone of mysterious confidence—though not so low as to be inaudible to the gallant officer on the stairs above, “his bluchers is down stairs to be blacked—and I’ll swear he ain’t got two pair of them.”
“Then he is in the house,” said the bailiff. “Now, Tom, I tell’ee what we must do. You stay here, and me and the gal will just toddle down stairs and look in the kitchen, and scullery, and sich-like places.”
“Oh! but you must put the lock right first,” exclaimed the girl; “for if missus—Lor! here she is!” added the affrighted servant, in a hurried whisper.
The fact was that the captain, by some awkward and unintentional movement, at that very instant rustled the silk gown loud enough for the sound to catch the ears of the girl and the bailiffs; and he was about to curse his folly, when, finding that all had suddenly become still on the floor below, it instantly struck him that the juvenile servant had imposed silence on the officers for fear her mistress should stop to enquire the cause of their presence and thereby notice the damaged lock.
He was perfectly correct in his conjecture: and, perceiving that the sudden stillness remained unbroken, he boldly descended the stairs—imitating as well as he could the measured walk of the sanctimonious landlady, and treading with feminine lightness in his slippers.
On reaching the landing—the dreaded landing whence opened the room where the officers were concealed with the servant girl—Captain O’Blunderbuss felt a violent inclination to make a precipitate rush down the remainder of the stairs to the bottom: but, fearing that such a proceeding would only lead to his capture, as it was certain to excite an instantaneous suspicion of the truth and a vigorous pursuit in consequence, he pursued his way with measured tread, taking good care to rustle the silk dress as much as possible.
The landing of the first floor was gained in safety: he was descending the last flight—and his escape appeared certain,—when a loud double knock at the front-door echoed through the dwelling.
For an instant the gallant officer was staggered: but a second thought convinced him that it was not his landlady’s knock—and he sped boldly on.
Drawing his veil as closely as possible over his countenance, and tucking the parasol under his arm for the moment, he opened the front-door.
The visitor was the Rev. Mr. Emanuel Flummery.
“Ah! my dear madam,” said that pious man, stepping into the passage with all the unceremonious ease of a familiar friend, and not at the instant noticing the extraordinary height of the person whom he thus addressed; “I looked in just to ask you how you were—and—and,” he added, sinking his voice to a low whisper, “for the purpose of tasting in your arms a renewal of those favours which you yesterday——”
But to the ineffable wonderment of the reverend gentleman, the fictitious Mrs. Rudd dealt him such a sudden and violent blow with a heavy clenched fist, just between his two eyes, that he was floored on the spot; and the captain seizing the front-door key, darted out of the house.
Banging the door behind him, the gallant officer locked it, and marched away with a haste and a manliness of step which, had any one been passing at the time, would have betrayed his real sex in a moment.
Suddenly, however, it struck him that he was playing a female character; and, instantly relaxing his speed, he assumed a gait so mincing, affected, and fantastic, that his appearance was most comical and ludicrous.
He put up the parasol, and held it so as to screen his countenance, over which he likewise kept the blue gauze veil in many folds; and, in this manner, the gallant gentleman pursued his way half round the Square—not daring to take precipitately to his heels, yet fearful every instant of hearing a hue and cry raised behind him.
“Lauk-a-daisy me!” cried a female voice, suddenly breaking upon the captain’s ears, and speaking close by.
“Be Jasus! mim—and is it yourself?” ejaculated the gallant gentleman, stopping short: “because it’s me that’s afther being Misthress Rudd just at the prisint spaking!”
“You Mrs. Rudd!” exclaimed the infuriated landlady. “Here—murder—thieves——”
“Hould, mim!” said the captain, in a tone so ferocious that it silenced the woman in an instant: “if ye’re afther raising an alarm, mim, I’ll bethray ye to all the wor-r-ld for having bestowed your favours yesterday on that spalpeen of a methodist parson—that will I, Misthress Rudd, and bad luck to ye!”
The landlady was thunderstruck—astounded.
“So now, mim, just walk on quietly to your own house, of which I hereby prisint ye with the kay,” continued the captain; “and mind ye don’t look once behind ye until ye reach your own door—and I’ll sind your toggery back again this evening—and you’ll be sure to give mine to the missinger that brings yours, paying likewise for my throusers, mim. And bewar-r-r, mim,” added the gallant gentleman, with a terrific rattling of the r’s, “how ye bethray me in any way—if ye valley the sacret of your indecent proceedings with the methodist parson.”
Thus speaking, the captain handed the bewildered Mrs. Rudd the key of her house, and hurried on.
From the moment that he had quitted the dwelling until the termination of this scene, scarcely three minutes had elapsed: but the captain was well aware that the bailiffs would not be much longer before they discovered his flight, as the Rev. Mr. Flummery, whom he had so unceremoniously knocked down in the passage, would speedily and inevitably give them such information as would open their eyes to the real truth of all the recent proceedings.
Accordingly, the gallant gentleman’s object was to get away from Charterhouse Square within the shortest space of time possible; and the moment he parted from Mrs. Rudd he struck into the Charter House itself, under the impression that there was a thoroughfare in this direction.
But before he turned under the gloomy archway of that monastic establishment, he looked round and beheld the landlady still standing on the spot where he had left her—motionless, and apparently petrified with horror and astonishment at the threats which he had held out. Her back was, however, turned towards him,—and he therefore felt more at ease in his mind as he entered the Charter House.
“Who do you want, mem?” said the porter, as he emanated from his crib.
But Captain O’Blunderbuss affected not to hear the challenge, and passed on—adopting that mincing affectation of gait which we have before noticed, and which made him appear such a comical figure.
“Well, I’m blowed if I ever see sich a o’oman!” mattered the porter to himself, as he returned to his lodge. “Vonderful giantesses ain’t nothink to her. And her petticuts—my eye! ain’t ’em short too? But she hasn’t a wery bad leg neither—though her stockins might be a trifle or so cleaner.”
The captain continued his way,—still shading his head with the parasol—still keeping the veil closely folded over his countenance,—but not the less able to reconnoitre the place in which he now found himself for the first time in his life.
He beheld a wide, open space, laid out in grass plats, bordered and intersected by gravel walks, and surrounded by low continuous buildings, of uniform architecture and cloistral appearance.
Here and there were scattered groups of old men—collected in knots of threes and fours, and apparently basking in the summer sun, which warmed their frames so attenuated and chilled by age. They did not appear happy—scarcely comfortable or contented;—and could the captain have overheard the remarks which they mumbled and muttered to each other, he would have found that they loathed and detested—hated and abhorred the monastic gloom, the rigid discipline, and the monotonous course of life to which necessity had consigned them.
When the gallant officer made his appearance in this enclosure, his strange and ludicrous figure instantly attracted the notice of the various groups alluded to; and the old fellows began to wonder whom the tall, stately-looking dame was about to honour with a visit.
But by this time Captain O’Blunderbuss had arrived at the unpleasant conviction that there was no thoroughfare either into Goswell Street or Wilderness Row; and he once more found himself, as he subsequently observed, “in a divil of a pother.”
The reader is, however, well aware that our gallant friend was not precisely the man to turn back and surrender to his enemies, who, he felt assured, must by this time be instituting an active search after him in the vicinity—even if they had not become aware that he had sought refuge in the Charter House.
What was to be done?
Nothing—save to enlist some kind inmate of the establishment in his interests;—and on this proceeding he at once decided.
From an upper window he beheld a good-natured, red, round, jolly face looking forth, the casement being open;—and a rapid glance showed the captain the staircase that led to the particular room in which the proprietor of that face must be.
He accordingly walked on with the steady pace and apparent ease of a person who had the assurance of knowing his—or should we not rather say her—way;—and entering the building, he ascended the stairs, until he reached a door on which was a brass-plate bearing the name of Mr. Scales.
Without any ceremony, the captain walked into the room; and the gentleman with the red face, turning away from the window, began to contemplate his supposed visitress with the most profound amazement.
But how much was this surprise enhanced, when the apparent lady threw down the parasol, exclaiming in a voice of singularly masculine power, “Bad luck to ye! ye damned spalpeen of an umbrilla!”—and then immediately afterwards raised a veil which revealed a face embellished with a fierce pair of moustachios and a very decent pair of whiskers—to say nothing of a certain ferociousness of expression and a weather-beaten complexion, which added to the unfeminine appearance of the whole countenance.
“What the deuce does all this mean?” demanded the Brother of the Charter House, at length recovering the use of his tongue, and with difficulty subduing an inclination to laugh;—for he was a jolly old bird, as his face denoted, and doubtless fancied that some masquerading amusement was in progress.
“What does it mane!” ejaculated the gallant officer; “why, just this, me frind—that I’m no more a woman than ye are yourself—but it’s Capthain O’Bluntherbuss I am, of Bluntherbuss Park, ould Ireland. The shiriff’s people are afther me—and I ’scaped ’em in this toggery. So now it’s your own precious aid and assistance I want—and, be the pow-r-rs! ye’ll not repint of any kindness ye may show to a genthleman in timporary difficulties.”
Mr. Scales—for such was indeed the name of the red-faced Brother whose hospitality and aid the captain thus sought—now burst out laughing in good earnest; and the gallant officer laughed too—for he dared not show any ill-feeling on the score of his new friend’s merriment. Besides, that very merriment seemed to augur a willingness to render the assistance demanded: and therefore the two laughed in concert very heartily and for upwards of a couple of minutes.
At last Mr. Scales’s mirth subsided into a low chuckle, until it became altogether extinct so far as its vocal expression was concerned;—and then he enquired in what manner he could render his aid to Captain O’Blunderbuss.
The gallant gentleman very frankly revealed to him his real position: namely, that he had been compelled to beat a precipitate retreat from his lodgings, where he had left his cap, coat, waistcoat, and boots,—that his breeches were at the tailor’s,—that he had nothing on but his landlady’s garments, barring his own shirt, stockings, and slippers,—that he had not a penny in his pocket, nor indeed any pocket at all as he then stood equipped,—and that he was most anxious to get into the City, where he could obtain funds in a minute.
Mr. Scales indulged in another laugh, and then proceeded to comment on the statement which had been made to him.
“I have got a couple of sovereigns in my pocket,” he began, “and don’t mind advancing them for your service if they will do any good.”
“Faith! and they’ll pay the landlady and the tailor!” ejaculated the captain, quite delighted at the prospect just held out.
“Very well,” said Mr. Scales. “Then we can recover your clothes for you. But how will it be if the officers are in the house, and, seeing your landlady give me the garments, should follow me?”
“Be Jasus! and Misthress Rudd is complately in my power-r!” cried Captain O’Blunderbuss:—“just tell her that if she don’t manage the thing slily for ye, that I’ll split upon her and the Riverind Mr. Eminuel Flummery—and she’ll turn as make and as mild as a lamb. But I must be afther sinding her back her own toggery.”
“I’ve got a large band-box in my little bed-room adjoining,” said Mr. Scales; “and I don’t mind carrying out the gown and the bonnet and shawl in it. Never do things by halves—that’s my motto. In the meantime, you can put on my dressing-gown:—I am sorry my own clothes would be much too small for you—or else——”
“Oh! be Jasus! and I’d sooner get back my own,” cried the captain. “I niver should dar-r to prisint myself in any other toggery to my frind in the City.”
“Well and good: you can step into my bed-room and undress yourself,” said Mr. Scales; “and I’ll be off as soon as you are ready.”
“And them ould fogeys down stairs in the yard,” observed the captain,—“they’ll be afther quistioning ye, my frind, about the tall lady in the black silk gown that’s a foot and a half too shor-r-t for her.”
“Oh! leave them to me,” said the good-natured Brother of the Charter House: “I’ll tell them it’s my sister. Bless your soul, they’re all purblind, and never will have noticed any thing peculiar in your dress. It’s the nurses that I most fear—the charwomen of the establishment, I mean;—for if any of them saw you——”
“I didn’t observe one of them, my dear frind,” interrupted the captain. “But we’ve niver a ha’porth of time to lose—and so I’ll be afther getting out of this infer-r-nal silk gown and Lighorn bonnet.”
From the moderate-sized, but lofty and airy apartment in which this colloquy took place, the captain passed into a little chamber only just large enough to contain a bed, a chest of drawers, and a toilette-table: and there he speedily extricated himself from the feminine apparel, all of which he thrust pell-mell into the band-box which his friend had pointed out to him for the purpose. He then wrapped himself in Mr. Scales’s dressing-gown; and this being done, he gave the good-natured Brother the necessary instructions how to proceed with regard to the landlady and the tailor.
Having tied a string round the band-box, so as to carry it the more conveniently, and likewise with a better appearance of negligent ease, Mr. Scales now set out on his mission—previously enjoining the captain to keep the door carefully locked until his return, and mentioning a signal by which his knock at the door might be known, so that the gallant officer should not incur the danger of admitting any other person. The moment the martial gentleman was left to himself, he advanced straight up to the cupboard, which he unceremoniously opened; and, to his huge delight, perceived a bottle containing a fluid which was unmistakeably of that alcoholic species so widely known under the denomination of gin. The captain took a long draught of the raw spirit, and, much refreshed, sate down to await his new friend’s return.
A quarter of an hour passed, during which he calculated the chances of eventual escape from the bailiffs.
If they had not discovered the trick which was played them, before the captain had entered the Charter House, there was every prospect in his favour; because he felt assured that Mrs. Rudd, even if she had seen him take refuge there, would not dare to betray him.
But if, on the other hand, they had ascertained the whole truth while he was as yet outside the Charter House gates, then they had most probably rushed to the windows and obtained a glimpse of his person in the Square.
And yet, recurring to the chances that were favourable to him, he reasoned that when the noise attendant upon knocking down the methodist minister had reached the ears of the officers, some time would then be lost in receiving explanations from that reverend gentleman, and in vain attempts to open the door—until Mrs. Rudd’s return with the key; and in the interim his place of concealment would have been gained, and would remain unsuspected by the bailiffs.
On the other hand, once more, what if the officers had not waited for Mrs. Rudd’s return at all, but had leapt out of the ground-floor windows?
“Oh! bad luck to the pro and con!” ejaculated the captain aloud. “I’m safe here—and that’s enough. For if the spalpeens had suspicted that I am here, they’d have been afther me long ago!”
Rising from his seat, he crept cautiously up to the window and took a survey of the enclosures through which he had passed a short time before; and this reconnoitring process was highly satisfactory. The old Brothers were lounging about as he had just now beheld them; and not a shadow of a sheriff’s-officer was to be seen.
Highly delighted by the hopeful assurances which the aspect of things thus conveyed to his mind, Captain O’Blunderbuss paid another visit to the cupboard, and regaled himself with another refreshing draught from the gin-bottle—after which potation, he smacked his lips in approval of the alcoholic beverage, and resumed his seat and his meditations.
The latter continued for another quarter of an hour; at the expiration whereof the gallant gentleman paid his respects a third time to the cupboard; and scarcely had he closed the door of that commodious recess, when the concerted signal was given, announcing his friend’s return.
As Mr. Scales entered the room, a glance showed the captain that his friend had succeeded in his mission; for the red countenance wore a triumphant smile, and the band-box had not come back empty.
“Be Jasus! and you’re a thrump!” exclaimed the gallant Irishman, as he marked these indications of success. “But what news of them bastes of the airth——”
“Oh! you’re all safe, my dear fellow,” interrupted Mr. Scales, wiping the perspiration off his rubicund countenance. “The clothes are in the box—the landlady is intimidated, and therefore in your interests—and the bailiffs have got entirely on a wrong scent. In fact, they had left the house before I got there: but there’s no doubt they’re waiting about in the neighbourhood—and therefore it will be better for you to remain here until dark, if you possibly can. I will give you a bit of dinner—and may be a glass of grog——”
“Potheen—rale potheen!” ejaculated the captain, viewing with supreme satisfaction the present prospect of affairs.
“Well—whiskey, if you prefer it,” said the obliging Mr. Scales. “At all events we’ll have a jolly afternoon of it, and drink to our better acquaintance.”
“Betther acquaintance!” cried the Irishman, who, in spite of his adventurous kind of existence, possessed many of the truly generous qualities of his much maligned and deeply injured fellow-countrymen; “betther acquainted we can’t become, my frind: for when a man has done all he could for another, and that other a tothal stranger to him, I mane to say it makes them inthimate at once. And, be Jasus! Misther Scales, if ye’ve an inimy in the whole wor-r-ld, tell me his name and give me his address, and it’s Capthain O’Bluntherbuss that’ll be afther paying him a morning visit, sinding up his car-r-d, and then skinning him alive!”
Mr. Scales expressed his gratitude for these demonstrations of friendship, but assured the gallant gentleman that he had no enemy whom he wished to undergo the process of flaying at that particular time.
The captain now entered the little bed-room, and hastily equipped himself in his own clothing—the breeches, which the good-natured Brother had paid for at the tailor’s, being neatly mended: so that the Irishman speedily re-appeared in the semi-military garb which became him rather more suitably than the habiliments of Mrs. Rudd.
Captain O’Blunderbuss, having made himself thus far comfortable, wrote a note to Curtis, which Mr. Scales despatched by a messenger to Mr. Bubbleton Styles’s office in the City;—for the Irishman calculated that if Curtis should return to the lodgings in Charterhouse Square before the said note reached him, he would, on hearing the adventures of the morning, retrace his way to Crosby Hall Chambers—there to await either the presence of the captain, or at least some communication from him. This arrangement appeared to be far more prudent than to trust Mrs. Rudd with either letter or message announcing the place where the captain was concealed.
The note being written, and the messenger despatched with it, Mr. Scales proposed a luncheon of bread and cheese and porter, as it was only eleven o’clock in the forenoon, and he intended to order dinner for half-past two. A “nurse,” as the charwoman was called, making her appearance about this time, the refreshments above mentioned were duly procured; and Mr. Scales intimated to his attendant that he should not dine in the common hall that day, but would entertain his friend with steaks and potatoes in his own apartment.
When the captain and the worthy Brother were again alone together, they fell into a conversation upon the establishment to which the latter belonged and in which the former had found so hospitable a refuge.
“Ye seem to have a comfortable berth of it, my frind,” observed the martial gentleman, after burying his countenance for nearly a minute in a pewter-pot.
“Well, the fact is,” returned Mr. Scales, “I manage to make myself happy, because I am naturally of a gay and lively disposition, and I have a great many friends who come to see me. Moreover, I have a few pounds coming in from a snug little annuity—and therefore I can afford those luxuries which the others have no chance of obtaining. But if it weren’t for these circumstances, captain,” added Mr. Scales, sinking his voice to a mysterious whisper, “I should never be able to endure the place.”
“Not endure the place!” repeated the captain, who manifested unfeigned surprise at the observation. “Be the holy poker-r-r! and it sames a broth of a place, it does!”
“Ah! it’s all very well for people out of doors to be told of the existence of the charity,” resumed the Brother; “and how it gives an asylum to eighty poor men, who are widowers and past fifty years of age: but it’s the discipline, my dear sir—the interior discipline,—and then the manner in which we are treated by the authorities of the establishment!”
“Then there’s abuses in the Charter-r-r House as well as elsewhere?” said the captain, interrogatively. “Blood and thunther! where the divil aren’t there abuses, if this same is the case?”
“No where, when the Church has any influence in the matter,” returned Mr. Scales. “But I will explain myself more fully. This institution, you must know, was founded for the purpose of affording an asylum to poor and deserving men, chiefly of the literary or learned professions. But will you believe it? There’s scarcely a literary man in the place; and the only one of any repute at all is Mr. Valcrieff, the celebrated dramatic author. The patrons put in their old and worn-out butlers or lacqueys;—but this would not matter, so long as worthy, deserving, and respectable characters were nominated—which is not the case——”
“Then you have some quare characters among ye, I’ll be afther guessing?” exclaimed the captain.
“We have indeed, my friend,” responded Mr. Scales; “and that is what I chiefly complain of. For instance, we’ve lately had a certain Colonel Tickner thrust upon us—but who is no more a Colonel than I am. A short time ago he called himself Major Tickner—and a little while before that, he was Captain Tickner. So, you perceive, he rises rapidly—and I have no doubt he will be a General next week.”
“A Ginral, be Jasus!” cried Captain O’Blunderbuss. “It’s thrue I might have been one myself by this time, if I’d only stuck to the service: but I’ll swear by the holy poker-r, that your Colonel Tickner is nothing more nor less than an imposthor—a vile imposthor,—and it’s meself that’ll unmask him.”
The gallant gentleman deemed it necessary to fly into a passion relative to the pretences of the self-styled Colonel Tickner to a high military rank; inasmuch as such a display of indignation on his part at the assumption of another, seemed to justify his own right to the honourable grade of Captain.
“Well, it is shameful for men to pretend to be what they are not,” observed Mr. Scales. “This Colonel Tickner sometimes bores me with his company; and it is not at all improbable that he may look in after dinner. If so, we will have some rare fun with him.”
“If he dar-r-rs to have any of his impudence to me,” cried the captain, looking particularly ferocious at the moment, “I’ll trate him as I trated a French dhragoon at Water-r-r-loo. ‘Come hither, ye spalpeen, and let me cut ye down to the middle!’ says I.—‘Oui, Monsieur,’ says he; and on he comes with a rush.—‘Blood and thunther!’ says I, ‘is it fighting ye mane, when I’ve as good as taken ye prisoner before-hand?’—and griping him by the throat, I throttled him, sir, in less time than ye’d be in tossing off a thimblefull of potheen. But pray go on telling me about the Charter House, my frind—and let’s hear all your little gravances. Ye were spaking of the discipline of the place just now;—and sure it’s meself that knows what discipline ought to be.”