On Thursday morning, our verger rose in unusually good spirits, congratulating himself upon the eminent service he had done to the city of Hereford, by his sagacity in discovering the foreign plot to blow up the cathedral, and by his dexterity in having the enemy held in custody, at the very hour when the dreadful deed was to have been perpetrated. Mr. Hill’s knowing friends farther agreed it would be necessary to have a guard that should sit up every night in the churchyard; and that as soon as they could, by constantly watching the enemy’s motions, procure any information which the attorney should deem sufficient grounds for a legal proceeding, they should lay the whole business before the mayor.
After arranging all this most judiciously and mysteriously with friends who were exactly of his own opinion, Mr. Hill laid aside his dignity of verger; and assuming his other character of a tanner proceeded to his tan-yard. What was his surprise and consternation, when he beheld his great rick of oak bark levelled to the ground; the pieces of bark were scattered far and wide, some over the close, some over the fields, and some were seen swimming upon the water! No tongue, no pen, no muse can describe the feelings of our tanner at this spectacle! feelings which became the more violent from the absolute silence which he imposed on himself upon this occasion. He instantly decided in his own mind, that this injury was perpetrated by O’Neill, in revenge for his arrest; and went privately to the attorney to inquire what was to be done, on his part, to secure legal vengeance.
The attorney unluckily, or at least as Mr. Hill thought, unluckily, had been sent for, half an hour before, by a gentleman at some distance from Hereford, to draw up a will; so that our tanner was obliged to postpone his legal operations.
We forbear to recount his return, and how many times he walked up and down the close to view his scattered bark, and to estimate the damage that had been done to him. At length that hour came which usually suspends all passions by the more imperious power of appetite—the hour of dinner; an hour of which it was never needful to remind Mr. Hill by watch, clock, or dial; for he was blessed with a punctual appetite, and powerful as punctual: so powerful, indeed, that it often excited the spleen of his more genteel, or less hungry wife.—“Bless my stars, Mr. Hill,” she would oftentimes say, “I am really downright ashamed to see you eat so much; and when company is to dine with us, I do wish you would take a snack by way of a damper before dinner, that you may not look so prodigious famishing and ungenteel.”
Upon this hint, Mr. Hill commenced a practice, to which he ever afterwards religiously adhered, of going, whether there was to be company or no company, into the kitchen regularly every day, half an hour before dinner, to take a slice from the roast or the boiled before it went up to table. As he was this day, according to his custom, in the kitchen, taking his snack by way of a damper, he heard the housemaid and the cook talking about some wonderful fortune-teller, whom the housemaid had been consulting. This fortune-teller was no less a personage than the successor to Bampfylde Moore Carew, king of the gipsies, whose life and adventures are probably in many, too many, of our readers’ hands. Bampfylde, the second king of the gipsies, assumed this title, in hopes of becoming as famous, or as infamous, as his predecessor: he was now holding his court in a wood near the town of Hereford, and numbers of servant-maids and ‘prentices went to consult him—nay, it was whispered that he was resorted to, secretly, by some whose education might have taught them better sense.
Numberless were the instances which our verger heard in his kitchen of the supernatural skill of this cunning man; and whilst Mr. Hill ate his snack with his wonted gravity, he revolved great designs in his secret soul. Mrs. Hill was surprised, several times during dinner, to see her consort put down his knife and fork, and meditate. “Gracious me, Mr. Hill, what can have happened to you this day? What can you be thinking of, Mr. Hill, that can make you forget what you have upon your plate?”
“Mrs. Hill,” replied the thoughtful verger, “our grand-mother Eve had too much curiosity; and we all know it did not lead to good. What I am thinking of will be known to you in due time, but not now, Mrs. Hill; therefore, pray, no questions, or teasing, or pumping. What I think, I think; what I say, I say; what I know, I know; and that is enough for you to know at present: only this, Phoebe, you did very well not to put on the Limerick gloves, child. What I know, I know. Things will turn out just as I said from the first. What I say, I say; and what I think, I think; and this is enough for you to know at present.”
Having finished dinner with this solemn speech, Mr. Hill settled himself in his arm-chair, to take his after-dinner’s nap; and he dreamed of blowing up cathedrals, and of oak bark floating upon the waters; and the cathedral was, he thought, blown up by a man dressed in a pair of woman’s Limerick gloves, and the oak bark turned into mutton steaks, after which his great dog Jowler was swimming; when, all on a sudden, as he was going to beat Jowler for eating the bark transformed into mutton steaks, Jowler became Bampfylde the second, king of the gipsies; and putting a horsewhip with a silver handle into Hill’s hand, commanded him three times, in a voice as loud as the town crier’s, to have O’Neill whipped through the market-place of Hereford: but, just as he was going to the window to see this whipping, his wig fell off, and he awoke.
It was difficult, even for Mr. Hill’s sagacity, to make sense of this dream: but he had the wise art of always finding in his dreams something that confirmed his waking determinations. Before he went to sleep, he had half resolved to consult the king of the gipsies, in the absence of the attorney; and his dream made him now wholly determined upon this prudent step. From Bampfylde the second, thought he, I shall learn for certain who made the hole under the cathedral, who pulled down my rick of bark, and who made away with my dog Jowler; and then I shall swear examinations against O’Neill without waiting for attorneys. I will follow my own way in this business: I have always found my own way best.
So, when the dusk of the evening increased, our wise man set out towards the wood to consult the cunning man. Bampfylde the second, king of the gipsies, resided in a sort of hut made of the branches of trees: the verger stooped, but did not stoop low enough, as he entered this temporary palace; and, whilst his body was almost bent double, his peruke was caught upon a twig. From this awkward situation he was relieved by the consort of the king; and he now beheld, by the light of some embers, the person of his gipsy majesty, to whose sublime appearance this dim light was so favourable that it struck a secret awe into our wise man’s soul; and, forgetting Hereford cathedral, and oak bark, and Limerick gloves, he stood for some seconds speechless. During this time, the queen very dexterously disencumbered his pocket of all superfluous articles. When he recovered his recollection, he put with great solemnity the following queries to the king of the gipsies, and received the following answers:
“Do you know a dangerous Irishman, of the name of O’Neill, who has come, for purposes best known to himself, to settle at Hereford?”
“Yes, we know him well.”
“Indeed! And what do you know of him?”
“That he is a dangerous Irishman.”
“Right! And it was he, was it not, that pulled down, or caused to be pulled down, my rick of oak bark?”
“It was.”
“And who was it that made away with my dog Jowler, that used to guard the tan-yard?”
“It was the person that you suspect.”
“And was it the person whom I suspect that made the hole under the foundation of our cathedral?”
“The same, and no other.”
“And for what purpose did he make that hole?”
“For a purpose that must not be named,” replied the king of the gipsies; nodding his head in a mysterious manner.
“But it may be named to me,” cried the verger, “for I have found it out, and I am one of the vergers; and is it not fit that a plot to blow up the Hereford cathedral should be known to me, and through me?”
These oracular verses, pronounced by Bampfylde with all the enthusiasm of one who was inspired, had the desired effect upon our wise man; and he left the presence of the king of the gipsies with a prodigiously high opinion of his majesty’s judgment and of his own, fully resolved to impart, the next morning, to the mayor of Hereford, his important discoveries.
Now it happened that, during the time Mr. Hill was putting the foregoing queries to Bampfylde the second, there came to the door or entrance of the audience chamber, an Irish haymaker, who wanted to consult the cunning man about a little leathern purse which he had lost, whilst he was making hay, in a field near Hereford. This haymaker was the same person who, as we have related, spoke so advantageously of our hero, O’Neill, to the widow Smith. As this man, whose name was Paddy M’Cormack, stood at the entrance of the gipsies’ hut, his attention was caught by the name of O’Neill; and he lost not a word of all that passed. He had reason to be somewhat surprised at hearing Bampfylde assert it was O’Neill who had pulled down the rick of bark. “By the holy poker,” said he to himself, “the old fellow now is out there. I know more o’ that matter than he does—no offence to his majesty: he knows no more of my purse, I’ll engage now, than he does of this man’s rick of bark and his dog: so I’ll keep my tester in my pocket, and not be giving it to this king o’ the gipsies, as they call him; who, as near as I can guess, is no better than a cheat. But there is one secret which I can be telling this conjuror himself; he shall not find it such an easy matter to do all what he thinks; he shall not be after ruining an innocent countryman of my own, whilst Paddy M’Cormack has a tongue and brains.”
Now Paddy M’Cormack had the best reason possible for knowing that Mr. O’Neill did not pull down Mr. Hill’s rick of bark; it was M’Cormack himself, who, in the heat of his resentment for the insulting arrest of his countryman in the streets of Hereford, had instigated his fellow haymakers to this mischief; he headed them, and thought he was doing a clever, spirited action.
There is a strange mixture of virtue and vice in the minds of the lower class of Irish; or rather a strange confusion in their ideas of right and wrong, from want of proper education. As soon as poor Paddy found out that his spirited action of pulling down the rick of bark was likely to be the ruin of his countryman, he resolved to make all the amends in his power for his folly: he went to collect his fellow haymakers and persuaded them to assist him this night in rebuilding what they had pulled down.
They went to this work when every body except themselves, as they thought, was asleep in Hereford. They had just completed the stack, and were all going away except Paddy, who was seated at the very top, finishing the pile, when they heard a loud voice cry out, “Here they are, Watch! Watch!”
Immediately, all the haymakers, who could, ran off as fast as possible. It was the watch who had been sitting up at the cathedral who gave the alarm. Paddy was taken from the top of the rick, and lodged in the watchhouse till morning. “Since I’m to be rewarded this way for doing a good action, sorrow take me,” said he, “if they catch me doing another the longest day ever I live.”
Happy they who have in their neighbourhood such a magistrate as Mr. Marshal! He was a man who, to an exact knowledge of the duties of his office, joined the power of discovering truth from the midst of contradictory evidence; and the happy art of soothing, or laughing, the angry passions into good-humour. It was a common saying in Hereford—that no one ever came out of Justice Marshal’s house as angry as he went into it.
Mr. Marshal had scarcely breakfasted when he was informed that Mr. Hill, the verger, wanted to speak to him on business of the utmost importance. Mr. Hill, the verger, was ushered in; and, with gloomy solemnity, took a seat opposite to Mr. Marshal.
“Sad doings in Hereford, Mr. Marshal! Sad doings, sir.”
“Sad doings? Why, I was told we had merry doings in Hereford. A ball the night before last, as I heard.”
“So much the worse, Mr. Marshal; so much the worse; as those think with reason that see as far into things as I do.”
“So much the better, Mr. Hill,” said Mr. Marshal, laughing; “so much the better; as those think with reason that see no farther into things than I do.”
“But, sir,” said the verger, still more solemnly, “this is no laughing matter, nor time for laughing; begging your pardon. Why, sir, the night of that there diabolical ball, our Hereford cathedral, sir, would have been blown up—blown up from the foundation, if it had not been for me, sir!”
“Indeed, Mr. Verger! And pray how, and by whom, was the cathedral to be blown up? and what was there diabolical in this ball?”
Here Mr. Hill let Mr. Marshal into the whole history of his early dislike to O’Neill, and his shrewd suspicions of him the first moment he saw him in Hereford; related in the most prolix manner all that the reader knows already, and concluded by saying that, as he was now certain of his facts, he was come to swear examinations against this villanous Irishman, who, he hoped, would be speedily brought to justice, as he deserved.
“To justice he shall be brought, as he deserves,” said Mr. Marshal; “but, before I write, and before you swear, will you have the goodness to inform me how you have made yourself as certain, as you evidently are, of what you call your facts?”
“Sir, that is a secret,” replied our wise man, “which I shall trust to you alone;” and he whispered into Mr. Marshal’s ear that his information came from Bampfylde the second, king of the gipsies.
Mr. Marshal instantly burst into laughter; then composing himself said, “My good sir, I am really glad that you have proceeded no farther in this business; and that no one in Hereford, beside myself, knows that you were on the point of swearing examinations against a man on the evidence of Bampfylde the second, king of the gipsies{1}. My dear sir, it would be a standing joke against you to the end of your days. A grave man, like Mr. Hill; and a verger too! Why, you would be the laughing-stock of Hereford!”
Now Mr. Marshal well knew the character of the man to whom he was talking, who, above all things on earth, dreaded to be laughed at. Mr. Hill coloured all over his face, and, pushing back his wig by way of settling it, showed that he blushed not only all over his face but all over his head.
{Footnote 1: The following passage is an extract from Colquhoun, On the Police of the Metropolis, page 69:—“An instance of mischievous credulity, occasioned by consulting this impostor” (a man calling himself an astrologer, who practised long in the Curtain-road, Shoreditch, London; and who is said, in conjunction with his associates, to have made near 300£. a year by practising on the credulity of the lower order of the people), “fell lately under the review of a police magistrate. A person, having property stolen from him, went to consult the conjuror respecting the thief; who having described something like the person of a man whom he suspected, his credulity and folly so far got the better of his reason and reflection, as to induce him, upon the authority of this impostor, actually to charge his neighbour with a felony, and to cause him to be apprehended. The magistrate settled the matter by discharging the prisoner, reprimanding the accuser severely, and ordering the conjuror to be taken into custody, according to law, as a rogue and a vagabond.”}
“Why, Mr. Marshal, sir,” said he, “as to my being laughed at, it is what I did not look for, being as there are some men in Hereford to whom I have mentioned that hole in the cathedral, who have thought it no laughing matter, and who have been precisely of my own opinion thereupon.”
“But did you tell these gentlemen that you had been consulting the king of the gipsies?”
“No, sir, no: I can’t say that I did.”
“Then I advise you, keep your own counsel, as I will.”
Mr. Hill, whose imagination wavered between the hole in the cathedral and his rick of bark on one side, and between his rick of bark and his dog Jowler on the other, now began to talk of the dog, and now of the rick of bark; and when he had exhausted all he had to say upon these subjects, Mr. Marshal gently pulled him towards the window, and putting a spy-glass into his hand, bid him look towards his own tan-yard, and tell him what he saw. To his great surprise, Mr. Hill saw his rick of bark rebuilt.
“Why, it was not there last night,” exclaimed he, rubbing his eyes. “Why, some conjuror must have done this.”
“No,” replied Mr. Marshal, “no conjuror did it: but your friend Bampfylde the second, king of the gipsies, was the cause of its being rebuilt; and here is the man who actually pulled it down, and who actually rebuilt it.”
As he said these words, Mr. Marshal opened the door of an adjoining room, and beckoned to the Irish haymaker, who had been taken into custody about an hour before this time. The watch who took Paddy had called at Mr. Hill’s house to tell him what had happened, but Mr. Hill was not then at home.
It was with much surprise that the verger heard the simple truth from this poor fellow; but no sooner was he convinced that O’Neill was innocent as to this affair, than he recurred to his other ground of suspicion, the loss of his dog.
The Irish haymaker now stepped forward, and, with a peculiar twist of the hips and shoulders, which those only who have seen it can picture to themselves, said, “Plase your honour’s honour, I have a little word to say too about the dog.” “Say it then,” said Mr. Marshal.
“Plase your honour, if I might expect to be forgiven, and let off for pulling down the jontleman’s stack, I might be able to tell him what I know about the dog.”
“If you can tell me any thing about my dog,” said the tanner, “I will freely forgive you for pulling down the rick: especially as you have built it up again. Speak the truth now: did not O’Neill make away with the dog?”
“Not at all at all, plase your honour,” replied the haymaker: “and the truth of the matter is, I know nothing of the dog, good or bad; but I know something of his collar, if your name, plase your honour, is Hill, as I take it to be?”
“My name is Hill: proceed,” said the tanner, with great eagerness. “You know something about the collar of my dog Jowler?”
“Plase your honour, this much I know any way, that it is now or was the night before last, at the pawnbroker’s there, below in town; for, plase your honour, I was sent late at night (that night that Mr. O’Neill, long life to him! was arrested) to the pawnbroker’s for a Jew, by Mrs. O’Neill, poor creature! she was in great trouble that same time.”
“Very likely,” interrupted Mr. Hill: “but go on to the collar; what of the collar?”
“She sent me,—I’ll tell you the story, plase your honour, out of the face—she sent me to the pawnbroker’s for the Jew; and, it being so late at night, the shop was shut, and it was with all the trouble in life that I got into the house any way: and, when I got in, there was none but a slip of a boy up; and he set down the light that he had in his hand, and ran up the stairs to waken his master: and, whilst he was gone, I just made bold to look round at what sort of a place I was in, and at the old clothes and rags and scraps; there was a sort of a frieze trusty.”
“A trusty!” said Mr. Hill; “what is that pray?”
“A big coat, sure, plase your honour: there was a frieze big coat lying in a corner, which I had my eye upon, to trate myself to; I having, as I then thought, money in my little purse enough for it. Well, I won’t trouble your honour’s honour with telling of you now how I lost my purse in the field, as I found after; but about the big coat, as I was saying, I just lifted it off the ground, to see would it fit me; and, as I swung it round, something, plase your honour, hit me a great knock on the shins: it was in the pocket of the coat, whatever it was, I knew; so I looks into the pocket, to see what was it, plase your honour, and out I pulls a hammer and a dog-collar; it was a wonder, both together, they did not break my shins entirely: but it’s no matter for my shins now: so, before the boy came down, I just out of idleness spelt out to myself the name that was upon the collar: there were two names, plase your honour; and out of the first there were so many letters hammered out I could make nothing of it, at all at all; but the other name was plain enough to read any way, and it was Hill, plase your honour’s honour, as sure as life: Hill, now.”
This story was related in tones and gestures which were so new and strange to English ears and eyes, that even the solemnity of our verger gave way to laughter.—Mr. Marshal sent a summons for the pawnbroker, that he might learn from him how he came by the dog-collar. The pawnbroker, when he found from Mr. Marshal that he could by no other means save himself from being committed to prison, confessed that the collar had been sold to him by Bampfylde the second, king of the gipsies.
A warrant was immediately despatched for his majesty: and Mr. Hill was a good deal alarmed, by the fear of its being known in Hereford that he was on the point of swearing examinations against an innocent man, upon the evidence of a dog-stealer and a gipsy.
Bampfylde the second made no sublime appearance, when he was brought before Mr. Marshal; nor could all his astrology avail upon this occasion: the evidence of the pawnbroker was so positive, as to the fact of his having sold to him the dog-collar, that there was no resource left for Bampfylde but an appeal to Mr. Hill’s mercy. He fell on his knees, and confessed that it was he who stole the dog; which used to bark at him at night so furiously that he could not commit certain petty depredations, by which, as much as by telling fortunes, he made his livelihood.
“And so,” said Mr. Marshal, with a sternness of manner which till now he had never shown, “to screen yourself, you accused an innocent man; and by your vile arts would have driven him from Hereford, and have set two families for ever at variance, to conceal that you had stolen a dog.”
The king of the gipsies was, without farther ceremony, committed to the house of correction. We should not omit to mention, that, on searching his hut, the Irish haymaker’s purse was found, which some of his majesty’s train had emptied. The whole set of gipsies decamped, upon the news of the apprehension of their monarch.
Mr. Hill stood in profound silence, leaning upon his walking-stick, whilst the committal was making out for Bampfylde the second. The fear of ridicule was struggling with the natural positiveness of his temper: he was dreadfully afraid that the story of his being taken in by the king of the gipsies would get abroad; and, at the same time, he was unwilling to give up his prejudice against the Irish glover.
“But, Mr. Marshal,” cried he, after a long silence, “the hole under the foundation of the cathedral has never been accounted for: that is, was, and ever will be, an ugly mystery to me; and I never can have a good opinion of this Irishman, till it is cleared up; nor can I think the cathedral in safety.”
“What,” said Mr. Marshal, with an arch smile, “I suppose the verses of the oracle still work upon your imagination, Mr. Hill. They are excellent in their kind. I must have them by heart that, when I am asked the reason why Mr. Hill has taken an aversion to an Irish glover, I may be able to repeat them:
“You’ll oblige me, sir,” said the verger, “if you would never repeat those verses, sir; nor mention, in any company, the affair of the king of the gipsies.”
“I will oblige you,” replied Mr. Marshal, “if you will oblige me. Will you tell me honestly whether now that you find this Mr. O’Neill is neither a dog-killer nor a puller down of bark ricks, you feel that you could forgive him for being an Irishman, if the mystery, as you call it, of the hole under the cathedral was cleared up?” “But that is not cleared up, I say, sir,” cried Mr. Hill, striking his walking-stick forcibly upon the ground, with both his hands. “As to the matter of his being an Irishman, I have nothing to say to it: I am not saying any thing about that, for I know we all are born where it pleases God; and an Irishman may be as good as another. I know that much, Mr. Marshal; and I am not one of those illiberal-minded ignorant people that cannot abide a man that was not born in England. Ireland is now in his majesty’s dominions, I know very well, Mr. Marshal; and I have no manner of doubt, as I said before, that an Irishman born may be as good, almost, as an Englishman born.”
“I am glad,” said Mr. Marshal, “to hear you speak, almost, as reasonably as an Englishman born and every man ought to speak; and I am convinced that you have too much English hospitality to persecute an inoffensive stranger, who comes amongst us trusting to our justice and good nature.”
“I would not persecute a stranger, God forbid!” replied the verger, “if he was, as you say, inoffensive.”
“And if he was not only inoffensive, but ready to do every service in his power to those who are in want of his assistance, we should not return evil for good, should we?”
“That would be uncharitable, to be sure; and moreover a scandal,” said the verger.
“Then,” said Mr. Marshal, “will you walk with me as far as the widow Smith’s, the poor woman whose house was burnt last winter! This haymaker, who lodged near her, can show us the way to her present abode.”
During his examination of Paddy M’Cormack, who would tell his whole history, as he called it, out of the face, Mr. Marshal heard several instances of the humanity and goodness of O’Neill, which Paddy related to excuse himself for that warmth of attachment to his cause, that had been manifested so injudiciously by pulling down the rick of bark in revenge for the arrest. Amongst other things, Paddy mentioned his countryman’s goodness to the widow Smith: Mr. Marshal was determined, therefore, to see whether he had, in this instance, spoken the truth; and he took Mr. Hill with him, in hopes of being able to show him the favourable side of O’Neill’s character. Things turned out just as Mr. Marshal expected. The poor widow and her family, in the most simple and affecting manner, described the distress from which they had been relieved by the good gentleman and lady, the lady was Phoebe Hill; and the praises that were bestowed upon Phoebe were delightful to her father’s ear, whose angry passions had now all subsided.
The benevolent Mr. Marshal seized the moment when he saw Mr. Hill’s heart was touched, and exclaimed, “I must be acquainted with this Mr. O’Neill. I am sure we people of Hereford ought to show some hospitality to a stranger, who has so much humanity. Mr. Hill, will you dine with him to-morrow at my house?”
Mr. Hill was just going to accept of this invitation, when the recollection of all he had said to his club about the hole under the cathedral came across him; and, drawing Mr. Marshal aside, he whispered, “But sir, sir, that affair of the hole under the cathedral has not been cleared up yet.”
At this instant, the widow Smith exclaimed, “Oh! here comes my little Mary” (one of her children, who came running in): “this is the little girl, sir, to whom the lady has been so good. Make your curtsy, child. Where have you been all this while?”
“Mammy,” said the child, “I’ve been showing the lady my rat.”
“Lord bless her! Gentlemen, the child has been wanting me this many a day to go to see this tame rat of hers; but I could never get time, never: and I wondered too at the child’s liking such a creature. Tell the gentlemen, dear, about your rat. All I know is, that, let her have but never such a tiny bit of bread, for breakfast or supper, she saves a little of that little for this rat of hers: she and her brothers have found it out somewhere by the cathedral.”
“It comes out of a hole under the wall of the cathedral,” said one of the elder boys; “and we have diverted ourselves watching it, and sometimes we have put victuals for it, so it has grown, in a manner, tame like.”
Mr. Hill and Mr. Marshal looked at one another during this speech; and the dread of ridicule again seized on Mr. Hill, when he apprehended that, after all he had said, the mountain might, at last, bring forth—a rat. Mr. Marshal, who instantly saw what passed in the verger’s mind, relieved him from this fear, by refraining even from a smile on this occasion. He only said to the child, in a grave manner, “I am afraid, my dear, we shall be obliged to spoil your diversion. Mr. Verger, here, cannot suffer rat-holes in the cathedral: but, to make you amends for the loss of your favourite, I will give you a very pretty little dog, if you have a mind.”
The child was well pleased with this promise; and, at Mr. Marshal’s desire, she then went along with him and Mr. Hill to the cathedral, and they placed themselves at a little distance from that hole which had created so much disturbance. The child soon brought the dreadful enemy to light; and Mr. Hill, with a faint laugh, said, “I’m glad it’s no worse: but there were many in our club who were of my opinion; and, if they had not suspected O’Neill too, I am sure I should never have given you so much trouble, sir, as I have done this morning. But, I hope, as the club know nothing about that vagabond, that king of the gipsies, you will not let any one know any thing about the prophecy, and all that? I am sure, I am very sorry to have given you so much trouble, Mr. Marshal.”
Mr. Marshal assured him that he did not regret the time which he had spent in endeavouring to clear up all these mysteries and suspicions; and Mr. Hill gladly accepted his invitation to meet O’Neill at his house the next day. No sooner had Mr. Marshal brought one of the parties to reason and good-humour, than he went to prepare the other for a reconciliation. O’Neill and his mother were both people of warm but forgiving tempers: the arrest was fresh in their minds; but when Mr. Marshal represented to them the whole affair, and the verger’s prejudices, in a humorous light, they joined in the good-natured laugh, and O’Neill declared that, for his part, he was ready to forgive and to forget every thing, if he could but see Miss Phoebe in the Limerick gloves.
Phosbe appeared the next day, at Mr. Marshal’s, in the Limerick gloves; and no perfume ever was so delightful to her lover as the smell of the rose leaves, in which they had been kept. Mr. Marshal had the benevolent pleasure of reconciling the two families. The tanner and the glover of Hereford became, from bitter enemies, useful friends to each other; and they were convinced, by experience, that nothing could be more for their mutual advantage than to live in union.
Nov. 1799.
Leonard Ludgate was the only son and heir of a London haberdasher, who had made some money by constant attendance to his shop. “Out of debt out of danger,” was the father’s old-fashioned saying. The son’s more liberal maxim was, “Spend to-day, and spare to-morrow.” Whilst he was under his father’s eye, it was not in his power to live up to his principles; and he longed for the time when he should be relieved from his post behind the counter: a situation which he deemed highly unworthy a youth of his parts and spirit. To imprison his elegant person behind a counter in Cranbourne-alley was, to be sure, in a cruel father’s power; but his tyranny could not extend to his mind; and, whilst he was weighing minikin pins, or measuring out penny ribbon, his soul, leaving all these meaner things, was expatiating in Bond-street or Hyde-park. Whilst his fingers mechanically adjusted the scales, or carelessly slipped the yard, his imagination was galloping a fine bay with Tom Lewis, or driving Miss Belle Perkins in a gig.
Now Tom Lewis was a dashing young citizen, whom old Ludgate could not endure; and Miss Belle Perkins a would-be fine lady, whom he advised his son never to think of for a wife. But the happy moment at length arrived, when our hero could safely show how much he despised both the advice and the character of his father; when he could quit his nook behind the counter, throw aside the yard, assume the whip, and affect the fine gentleman. In short, the happy moment came when his father died.
Leonard now shone forth in all the glory which the united powers of tailor, hatter, and hosier, could spread around lug person. Miss Belle Perkins, who had hitherto looked down upon our hero as a reptile of Cranbourne-alley, beheld his metamorphosis with surprise and admiration. And she, who had formerly been heard to say, “she would not touch him with a pair of tongs,” now unreluctantly gave him her envied hand at a ball at Bagnigge Wells. Report farther adds that, at tea, Miss Belle whispered loud enough to be heard, that since his queer father’s death, Leonard Ludgate had turned out quite a genteeler sort of person than could have been expected.
“Upon this hint he spake.” His fair one, after assuming all proper and becoming airs upon the occasion, suffered herself to be prevailed upon to call, with her mother and a friend, at Mr. Ludgate’s house in Cranbourne-alley, to see whether it could be possibly inhabited by a lady of her taste and consequence.
As Leonard handed her out of her hackney-coach, she exclaimed, “Bless us, and be we to go up this paved lane, and through the shop, before we can get to the more creditabler apartments?”
“I’m going to cut a passage off the shop, which I’ve long had in contemplation,” replied our hero; “only I can’t get light into it cleverly.”
“Oh! a lamp in the style of a chandaleer will do vastly well by night, which is the time one wants one’s house to put the best foot foremost, for company; and by day we can make a shift, somehow or other, I dare say. Any thing’s better than trapesing through a shop; which is a thing I’ve never been used to, and cannot reconcile myself to by any means.”
Leonard immediately acceded to this scheme of the dark passage by day, and the chandaleer by night; and he hurried his fair one through the odious shop to the more creditabler apartments. She was handed above, about, and underneath. She found every particle of the house wanted modernizing immensely, and was altogether smaller than she could ever have conceived beforehand. Our hero, ambitious at once to show his gallantry, spirit, and taste, incessantly protested he would adopt every improvement Miss Belle Perkins could suggest; and he declared that the identical same ideas had occurred to him a hundred and a hundred times, during his poor father’s lifetime: but he could never make the old gentleman enter into any thing of the sort, his notions of life being utterly limited, to say no worse. “He had one old saw, for ever grating in my ears, as an answer to everything that bore the stamp of gentility, or carried with it an air of spirit: hey, Allen!” continued our hero, looking over his shoulder at a young man who was casting up accounts; “hey, Allen—you remember the old saw?”
“Yes, sir,” replied the young man, “if you mean, ‘Out of debt out of danger:’ I hope I shall never forget it.”
“I hope so too; as you have your fortune to make, it is very proper for you: but for one that has a fortune ready made to spend, I am free to confess I think my principle worth a million of it: and my maxim is, ‘Spend to-day, and spare to-morrow:’ hey, ladies?” concluded Leonard, appealing with an air secure of approbation to his fair mistress and her young companion.
“Why that suits my notions, I must own candidly,” said Belle; “but here’s one beside me, or behind me—Where are you, Lucy?” pursued the young lady, addressing herself to her humble companion: “here’s one, who is more of your shop-man’s way of thinking than yours, I fancy. ‘Out of debt out of danger’ is just a sober saying to your mind, an’t it, Lucy?”
Lucy did not deny the charge. “Well, child,” said Miss Perkins, “it’s very proper, for you have no fortune of your own to spend.”
“It is, indeed,” said Lucy, with modest firmness; “for as I have none of my own, if it were my maxim to spend to-day and spare to-morrow, I should be obliged to spend other people’s money, which I never will do as long as I can maintain myself independently.”
“How proud we are!” cried Miss Perkins, sarcastically. Leonard assented to the sarcasm by his looks; but Allen declared he liked proper pride, and seemed to think that Lucy’s was of this species.
An argument might have ensued, if a collation, as Mr. Ludgate called it, had not appeared at this critical moment. Of what it consisted, and how genteelly and gallantly our hero did the honours of his collation, we forbear to relate; but one material circumstance we must not omit, as on this, perhaps more than even on his gentility and gallantry, depended the fortune of the day. In rummaging over a desk to find a corkscrew, young Ludgate took occasion to open and shake a pocket-book, from which fell a shower of bank notes. What effect they produced upon his fair one, and on her mother, can be best judged of by the event. Miss Belle Perkins, after this domiciliary visit, consented to go with our hero on Sunday to Kensington Gardens, Monday to Sadler’s Wells, Tuesday on the water, Wednesday to the play, Thursday the Lord knows to what ball, Friday to Vauxhall, and on Saturday to—the altar!
Some people thought the young lady and gentleman rather precipitate; but these were persons who, as the bride justly observed, did not understand any thing in nature of a love match. Those who have more liberal notions, and a more extensive knowledge of the human heart, can readily comprehend how a lady may think a man so odious at one minute, that she could not touch him with a pair of tongs, and so charming the next, that she would die a thousand deaths for him, and him alone. Immediately after the ceremony was performed, Mr. and Mrs. Ludgate went down in the hoy to Margate, to spend their honeymoon in style. Their honeymoon, alas! could not be prolonged beyond the usual bounds. Even the joys of Margate could not be eternal, and the day came too soon when our happy pair were obliged to think of returning home. Home! With what different sensations different people pronounce and hear that word pronounced! Mrs. Leonard Ludgate’s home in Cranbourne-alley appeared to her, as she scrupled not to declare, an intolerable low place, after Margate. The stipulated alterations, her husband observed, had been made in the house, but none of them had been executed to her satisfaction. The expedient of the dark passage was not found to succeed: a thorough wind, from the front and back doors, ran along it when either or both were left open to admit light; and this wicked wind, not content with running along the passage, forced its way up and down stairs, made the kitchen chimney smoke, and rendered even the more creditabler apartments scarcely habitable. Chimney doctors were in vain consulted: the favourite dark passage was at length abandoned, and the lady, to her utter discomfiture, was obliged to pass through the shop.
To make herself amends for this mortification, she insisted upon throwing down the partition between the dining-room and her own bedchamber, that she might have one decent apartment at least fit for a rout. It was to no purpose that her friend Lucy, who was called in to assist in making up furniture, represented that this scheme of throwing bedchamber and dining-room into one would be attended with some inconveniences; for instance, that Mr. and Mrs. Ludgate would be obliged, in consequence of this improvement, to sleep in half of the maid’s garret, or to sit up all night. This objection was overruled by Mrs. Ludgate, whose genius, fertile in expedients, made every thing easy, by the introduction of a bed in the dining-room, in the shape of a sofa. The newly-enlarged apartment, she observed, would thus answer the double purposes of show and utility; and, as soon as the supper and card tables should be removed, the sofa-bed might be let down. She asserted that the first people in London manage in this way. Leonard could not contradict his lady, because she had a ready method of silencing him, by asking how he could possibly know any thing of life who had lived all his days, except Sundays, in Cranbourne-alley? Then, if any one of his father’s old notions of economy by chance twinged his conscience, Belle very judiciously asked how he ever came to think of her for a wife? “Since you have got a genteel wife,” said she, “it becomes you to live up to her notions, and to treat her as she and her friends have a right to expect. Before I married you, sir, none of the Perkins’s were in trade themselves, either directly or indirectly; and many’s the slights and reproaches I’ve met with from my own relations and former acquaintances, since my marriage, on account of the Ludgates being all tradesfolks; to which I always answer, that my Leonard is going to wash his hands of trade himself, and to make over all concern in the haberdashery line and shop to the young man below stairs, who is much better suited to such things.”
By such speeches as these, alternately piquing and soothing the vanity of her Leonard, our accomplished wife worked him to her purposes. She had a rout once a week; and her room was so crowded, that there was scarcely a possibility of breathing. Yet, notwithstanding all this, she one morning declared, with a burst of tears, she was the most miserable woman in the world. And why? Because her friend, Mrs. Pimlico, Miss Coxeater that was, had a house in Weymouth-street; whilst she was forced to keep on being buried in Cranbourne-alley. Mr. Ludgate was moved by his wife’s tears, and by his own ambition, and took a house in Weymouth-street. But before they had been there six weeks, the fair one was again found bathed in tears. And why? “Because,” said Belle, “because, Mr. Ludgate, the furniture of this house is as old as Methusalem’s; and my friend, Mrs. Pimlico, said yesterday that it was a shame to be seen: and so to be sure it is, compared with her own, which is spick and span new. Yet why should she pretend to look down upon me in point of furniture, or any thing? Who was she, before she was married? Little Kitty Coxeater, as we always called her at the dancing school; and nobody ever thought of comparing her, in point of gentility, with Belle Perkins! Why, she is as ugly as sin! though she is my friend, I must acknowledge that; and, if she had all the clothes in the world, she would never know how to put any of them on; that’s one comfort. And, as every body says, to be sure she never would have got a husband but for her money. And, after all, what sort of a husband has she got? A perfumer, indeed! a man with a face like one of his own wash-balls, all manner of colours. I declare, I would rather have gone without to the end of my days than have married Mr. Pimlico.”
“I cannot blame you there, my dear,” said Mr. Ludgate; “for to be sure Mr. Pimlico, much as he thinks of himself and his country house, has as little the air of—the air of fashion as can be well conceived.”
Leonard Ludgate made an emphatic pause in this speech; and surveyed himself in a looking-glass with much complacency, whilst he pronounced the word fashion. He, indeed, approved so much of his wife’s taste and discernment, in preferring him to Mr. Pimlico, that he could not at this moment help inclining to follow her judgment respecting the furniture. He acceded to her position, that the Ludgates ought to appear at least no shabbier than the Pimlicos. The conclusion was inevitable: Leonard, according to his favourite maxim of “Spend to-day, and spare to-morrow,” agreed that they might new furnish the house this year, and pay for it the next. This was immediately done; and the same principle was extended through all their household affairs, as far as the tradesmen concerned would admit of its being carried into practice.
By this means, Mr. and Mrs. Ludgate were not for some time sensible of the difficulties they were preparing for themselves. They went on vying with the Pimlicos, and with all their new acquaintance, who were many of them much richer than themselves; and of this vain competition there was no end. Those who estimate happiness not by the real comforts or luxuries which they enjoy, but by comparison between themselves and their neighbours, must be subject to continual mortification and discontent. Far from being happier than they were formerly, Mr. and Mrs. Ludgate were much more miserable after their removal to Weymouth-street. Was it not better to be the first person in Cranbourne-alley than the last in Weymouth-street? New wants and wishes continually arose in their new situation. They must live like other people. Everybody, that is, everybody in Weymouth-street, did so and so; and, therefore, they must do the same. They must go to such a place, or they must have such a thing, not because it was in itself necessary or desirable, but because everybody, that is, everybody of their acquaintance, did or had the same. Even to be upon a footing with their new neighbours was a matter of some difficulty; and then merely to be upon an equality, merely to be admitted and suffered at parties, is awkward and humiliating. Noble ambition prompted them continually to aim at distinction. The desire to attain il poco piu—the little more, stimulates to excellence, or betrays to ruin, according to the objects of our ambition. No artist ever took more pains to surpass Raphael or Correggio than was taken by Mr. and Mrs. Ludgate to outshine Mr. and Mrs. Pimlico. And still what they had done seemed nothing: what they were to do occupied all their thoughts. No timid economical fears could stop or even startle them in the road to ruin. Faithful to his maxim, our hero denied himself nothing. If, for a moment, the idea that any thing was too expensive suggested itself, his wife banished care by observing, “We need not pay for it now. What signifies it, since we need not think of paying for it till next year?” She had abundance of arguments of similar solidity, adapted to all occasions. Sometimes the thing in question was such a trifle it could not ruin anybody. “‘Tis but a guinea! ‘Tis but a few shillings!” Sometimes it was a sort of thing that could not ruin anybody, because “‘Tis but for once and away!” ‘Tis but is a most dangerous thing! How many guineas may be spent upon ‘tis but, in the course of one year, in such a city as London!
Bargains! excellent bargains! were also with our heroine admirable pleas for expense. “We positively must buy this, my dear; for it would be a sin to let such a bargain slip through one’s fingers. Mrs. Pimlico paid twice as much for what is not half as good. ‘Twould be quite a shame to one’s good sense to miss such a bargain!” Mrs. Ludgate was one of those ladies who think it is more reasonable to buy a thing because it is a bargain than because they want it: she farther argued, “If we don’t want it, we may want it:” and this was a satisfactory plea.
Under the head bargains we must not forget cheap days. Messrs. Run and Raffle advertised a sale of old shop goods, with the catching words—cheap days! Everybody crowded to throw away their money on cheap days; and, amongst the rest, Mrs. Ludgate.
One circumstance was rather disagreeable in these cheap days: ready money was required; and this did not suit those who lived by the favourite maxim of the family. Yet there was a reason that counterbalanced their objection in Mrs. Ludgate’s mind: “Mrs. Pimlico was going to Messrs. Run and Raffle’s and what would she think, if I wasn’t to be there? She’d think, to be sure, that we were as poor as Job.” So, to demonstrate that she had ready money to throw away, Mrs. Ludgate must go on the cheap days.
“Belle,” said her husband, “ready money’s a serious thing.”
“Yes, Leonard, but, when nothing else will be taken, you know, one can’t do without it.”
“But, if one has not it, I tell you, one must do without it,” said Leonard peevishly.
“Lord, Mr. Ludgate, if you have not it about you, can’t you send to Cranbourne-alley, to Mr. Allen, for some for me? ‘Tis but a few guineas I want; and ‘twould be a shame to miss such bargains as are to be had for nothing, at Run and Raffle’s. And these cheap days are extraordinary things. It can’t ruin any body to spend a guinea or two, once and away, like other people.”
At the conclusion of her eloquent speech, Mrs. Ludgate rang the bell; and, without waiting for any assent from her husband but silence, bade the footman run to the shop, and desire Allen to send her ten guineas immediately.
Mr. Ludgate looked sullen, whistled, and then posted himself at the parlour window to watch for the ambassador’s return. “I wonder,” continued Mrs. Ludgate, “I wonder, Leonard, that you let Allen leave you so bare of cash of late! It is very disagreeable to be always sending out of the house, this way, for odd guineas. Allen, I think, uses you very ill; but I am sure I would not let him cheat me, if I was you. Pray, when you gave up the business of the shop to him, was not you to have half the profits for your good-will, and name, and all that!”
“Yes.”
“And little enough! But why don’t you look after Allen, then, and make him pay us what he owes us?”
“I’ll see about it to-morrow, child.”
“About how much do you think is owing to us?” pursued Mrs. Ludgate.
“I can’t tell, ma’am.”
“I wish then you’d settle accounts to-morrow, that I might have some ready money.”
The lady seemed to take it for granted that her having ready money would be the necessary and immediate consequence of settling accounts with Allen; her husband could have set her right in this particular, and could have informed her that not a farthing was due to him; that, on the contrary, he had taken up money in advance, on the next half year’s expected profits; but Mr. Ludgate was ashamed to let his wife know the real state of his affairs: indeed, he was afraid to look them in the face himself. “Here’s the boy coming back!” cried he, after watching for some time in silence at the window.
Leonard went to the street-door to meet him; and Belle followed close, crying, “Well! I hope Allen has sent me the money?”
“I don’t know,” said the breathless boy. “I have a letter for my master, here, that was written ready, by good luck, afore I got there.”
Leonard snatched the letter; and his wife waited to see whether the money was enclosed.
“The rascal has sent me no money, I see, but a letter, and an account as long as my arm.”
“No money!” cried Belle; “that’s using us very oddly and ill, indeed; and I wonder you submit to such conduct! I declare I won’t bear it! Go back, I say, Jack; go, run this minute, and tell Allen he must come up himself; for I, Mrs. Ludgate, wants to speak with him.”
“No, my dear, no; nonsense! don’t go, Jack. What signifies your sending to speak with Allen? What can you do? How can you settle accounts with him? What should women know of business? I wish women would never meddle with things they don’t understand.”
“Women can understand well enough when they want money,” cried the sharp lady; “and the short and the long of it is, Mr. Ludgate, that I will see and settle accounts with Allen myself; and bring him to reason, if you won’t; and this minute, too.”
“Bless me! upon my faith, Allen’s better than we thought: here’s bank-notes within the account,” said Mr. Ludgate.
“Ay, I thought he could not be so very impertinent as to refuse when I sent to him myself. But this is only one five pound note: I sent for ten. Where is the other?”
“I want the other myself,” said her husband.
The tone was so peremptory, that she dared not tempt him further; and away she went to Messrs. Run and Raffle’s, where she had the pleasure of buying a bargain of things that were of no manner of use to her, and for which she paid twice as much as they were worth. These cheap days proved dear days to many.
Whilst Mrs. Ludgate spent the morning at Messrs. Run and Raffle’s, her husband was with Tom Lewis, lounging up and down Bond-street. Tom Lewis being just one step above him in gentility, was invited to parties where Ludgate could not gain admittance, was bowed to by people who never bowed to Leonard Ludgate, could tell to whom this livery or that carriage belonged, knew who everybody was, and could point out my lord this, and my lady that, in the park or at the play. All these things made him a personage of prodigious consequence in the eyes of our hero, who looked upon him as the mirror of fashion. Tom knew how to take advantage of this admiration, and borrowed many a guinea from him in their morning walks: in return, he introduced Mr. Ludgate to some of his friends, and to his club.
New occasions, or rather new necessities, for expense occurred every day, in consequence of his connexion with Lewis. Whilst he aimed at being thought a young man of spirit, he could not avoid doing as other people did. He could not think of economy! That would be shabby! On his fortune rested his claims to respect from his present associates; and, therefore, it was his constant aim to raise their opinion of his riches. For some time, extravagance was not immediately checked by the want of money, because he put off the evil day of payment. At last, when bills poured in upon him, and the frequent calls of tradesmen began to be troublesome, he got rid of the present difficulty by referring them to Allen. “Go to Allen; he must settle with you: he does all my business.”
Allen sent him account after account, stating the sums he paid by his order. Ludgate thrust the unread accounts into his escritoire, and thought no more of the matter. Allen called upon him, to beg he would come to some settlement, as he was getting more and more, every day, into his debt. Leonard desired to have an account, stated in full, and promised to look over it on Monday: but Monday came, and then it was put off till Tuesday; and so on, day after day.
The more reason he had to know that his affairs were deranged, the more carefully he concealed all knowledge of them from his wife. Her ignorance of the truth not only led her daily into fresh extravagance, but was, at last, the cause of bringing things to a premature explanation. After spending the morning at Messrs. Run and Raffle’s, she returned home with a hackney-coach full of bargains. As she came into the parlour, loaded with things that she did not want, she was surprised by the sight of an old friend, whom she had lately treated entirely as a stranger. It was Lucy, who had in former days been her favourite companion. But Lucy had chosen to work, to support herself independently, rather than to be a burden to her friends; and Mrs. Ludgate could not take notice of a person who had degraded herself so far as to become a workwoman at an upholsterer’s. She had consequently never seen Lucy since this event took place, except when she went to Mr. Beech the upholsterer’s, to order her new furniture. She then was in company with Mrs. Pimlico: and, when she saw Lucy at work in a back parlour with two or three other young women, she pretended not to know her. Lucy could scarcely believe that this was done on purpose; and, at all events, she was not mortified by the insult. She was now come to speak to Mrs. Ludgate about the upholsterer’s bill.
“Ha! Lucy, is it you?” said Mrs. Ludgate, as soon as she entered. “I’ve never seen you in Weymouth-street before! How comes it you never called, if it was only to see our new house? I’m sure I should always be very happy to have you here—when we’ve nobody with us; and I’m quite sorry as I can’t ask you to stay and take a bit of mutton with us to-day, because I’m engaged to dine in Bond-street, with Mrs. Pimlico’s cousin, pretty Mrs. Paget, the bride whom you’ve heard talk of, no doubt. So you’ll excuse me if I run away from you, to make myself a little decent; for it’s horrid late!”
After running off this speech, with an air and a volubility worthy of her betters, she set before Lucy some of her bargains, and was then retreating to make herself decent; but Lucy stopped her, by saying, “My dear Mrs. Ludgate, I am sorry to detain you, but Mr. Beech, the upholsterer, knowing I have been acquainted with you, has sent me to speak to you about his bill. He is in immediate want of money, because he is fitting out one of his sons for the East Indies.”
“Well! but his son’s nothing to me! I sha’n’t think of paying the bill yet, I can assure him; and you may take it back, and tell him so.”
“But,” said Lucy, “if I take back such an answer, I am afraid Mr. Beech will send the bill to Mr. Ludgate; and that was what you particularly desired should not be done.”
“Why, no; that’s what I can’t say I should particularly wish, just at present,” said Mrs. Ludgate, lowering her tone “because, to tell you a bit of a secret, Lucy, I’ve run up rather an unconsciable bill, this year, with my milliner and mantua-maker; and I would not have all them bills come upon him all in a lump, and on a sudden, as it were; especially as I laid out more on the furniture than he counts. So, my dear Lucy, I’ll tell you what you must do: you must use your influence with Beech to make him wait a little longer. I’m sure he may wait well enough; and he shall be paid next month.”
Lucy declared that her influence, on the present occasion, would be of no avail; but she had the good-nature to add, “If you are sure the bill can be paid next month, I will leave my two years’ salary in Mr. Beech’s hands till then; and this will perhaps satisfy him, if he can get bills from other people paid, to make up the money for his son. He said thirty guineas from you on account would do, for the present; and that sum is due to me.”
“Then, my dearest Lucy, for Heaven’s sake, do leave it in his hands! You were a good creature to think of it; but you always were a good creature.”
“Your mother used to be kind to me, when I was a child; and I am sure I ought not to forget it,” said Lucy, the tears starting into her eyes: “and you were once kind to me; I do not forget that,” continued Lucy, wiping the tears from her cheeks.—“But do not let me detain you; you are in a hurry to dress to go to Mrs. Pimlico’s.”
“No—pray—I am not in a hurry now,” said Mrs. Ludgate, who had the grace to blush at this instant. “But, if you must go, do take this hat along with you. I assure you it’s quite the rage: I got it this morning at Run and Raffle’s, and Mrs. Pimlico and Mrs. Paget have got the same.”
Lucy declined accepting the hat, notwithstanding this strong and, as Mrs. Ludgate would have thought it, irresistible recommendation. “Now you must have it: it will become you a thousand times better than that you have on,” cried Mrs. Ludgate, insisting the more the more Lucy withdrew; “and, besides, you must wear it for my sake. You won’t? Then I take it very ill of you that you are so positive; for I assure you, whatever you may think, I wish to be as kind to you now as ever. Only, you know, one can’t always, when one lives in another style, be at home as often as one wishes.”
Lucy relieved her ci-devant friend from the necessity of making any more awkward apologies, by moving quickly towards the door. “Then you won’t forget,” continued Mrs. Ludgate, following her into the passage, “you won’t forget the job you are to do for me with Beech?”
“Certainly I shall not. I will do what I have promised: but I hope you will be punctual about the payment next month,” said Lucy, “because I believe I shall be in want of my money at that time. It is best to tell you exactly the truth.”
“Certainly! certainly! you shall have your money before you want it, long and long; and my only reason for borrowing it from you at all is, that I don’t like to trouble Mr. Ludgate, till he has settled accounts with Allen, who keeps all our money from us in a strange way; and, in my opinion, uses Leonard exceedingly ill and unfairly.”
“Allen!” cried Lucy, stopping short. “Oh, Belle! how can you say so? How can you think so? But you know nothing of him, else you could not suspect him of using any one ill, or unfairly; much less your husband, the son of his old friend.”
“Bless me! how she runs on! and how she colours! I am sure I didn’t know I was upon such tender ground! I did not know Allen was such a prodigious favourite!”
“I only do him justice in saying that I am certain he could not do an unfair or unhandsome action.”
“I know nothing of the matter, I protest; only this—that short accounts, they say, make long friends; and I hope I sha’n’t affront any body by saying, it would be very convenient if he could be got to settle with Mr. Ludgate, who, I am sure, is too much the gentleman to ask any thing from him but his own; which, indeed, if it was not for me, he’d be too genteel to mention. But, as I said before, short accounts make long friends; and, as you are so much Allen’s friend, you can hint that to him.”
“I shall not hint, but say it to him as plainly as possible,” replied Lucy; “and you may be certain that he will come to settle accounts with Mr. Ludgate before night.” “I am sure I shall be mighty glad of it; and so will Mr. Ludgate,” said Belle; and thus they parted.
Mrs. Ludgate with triumph announced to her husband, upon his return home, that she had brought affairs to a crisis with Allen; and that he would come to settle his accounts this evening. The surprise and consternation which appeared in Mr. Ludgate’s countenance, convinced the lady that her interference was highly disagreeable.