by R S Surtees
Mrs. Brantinghame marked his countenance with satisfaction, and felt encouraged to go on; indeed, she had never known Sir Archy’s information fail, though she had not always been able to realise it. “Of course (hem)” continued she, smoothing out the corner of her kerchief, “Of course I need not (hem) say that my (hem) daughter is very much (cough — hem) flattered and (cough) gratified by the (hem) partiality you have (cough) shown her, and I’m sure (cough — hem — cough)” simpered she, “I have every reason to show you (cough) confidence and esteem, as well on my brother Sir Archy’s account as on that of my poor dear child, but, considering the difficulty (hem) and the delicacy (hem) of my (hem) situation, I feel assured you will excuse a mother’s (hem) and (hem)” — the old lady checking herself, in the hope that the Captain would now take up the running.
In this, however, she was disappointed; for the Captain, having taken a careful survey of the ceiling during the earlier part of the discourse, and seen what he was almost sure was a spider’s web in the cornice above the door, now took to studying the roses, lilies, and convolvuluses of which the light-grounded carpet was composed.
In the course of his floricultural pursuit, the following ideas came to his assistance: —
First, that he was a very great man.
Secondly, that the old lady was in too great a hurry.
Thirdly, that he wouldn’t be bullied.
As he seemed likely to increase his stock of ideas, Mrs. Brantinghame resumed the appeal, ad misericordiam.
“People,” whimpered she, pretending to brush away a rising tear, “People may blame (hem) me for allowing my (hem) daughter’s (cough) affections to be (hem) engaged before the (cough — hem — cough) preliminaries are all arranged, but really, my dear (cough — hem) Captain, I have been placed in a very trying and difficult situation, and my great regard for my brother, Sir Archy, prompting (hem) me to show you every (cough) attention, without p’r’aps thinking or (cough — hem — cough) considering the great (cough) risk and (hem) danger I was exposing my poor dear child to.” Whereupon she went off full cry, burying her sobs in her kerchief.
During this second performance, the Captain’s thoughts had time to take another turn, and they served him thus: —
First, he recollected his ignominious expulsion from Great Coram Street.
Secondly, he thought he would like to show Belinda how soon he could suit himself, and that, too, with a great heiress.
Thirdly, he considered that the not having a brother was always as good as a thousand pounds to a girl, as sooner or later the brother would be sure to do him out of that sum.
Fourthly, that the old lady could not live for ever, and, in addition to a very lady-like wife, he would come in for no end of property — plate, and china.
Accordingly, by the time Mrs. Brantinghame was done heaving and sobbing, the Captain was gifted with the following powers of speech: —
“I’m sure, marm, (hem) — I’m sure, marm, (cough) — I’m sure, marm, (sneeze)—” now looking up to the cornice for the spider’s web, “I am certainly — I may say undoubtedly — deeply — that is to say sincerely — sincerely, that is to say deeply — attached — to your very elegant and amiable, that is to say, amiable and elegant daughter, and,” looking at his rather ragged nails, “I flatter myself — that is to say — I have reason to believe — that your lovely and beautiful — that is to say amiable — and (cough) accomplished daughter is equally attached to me,” now looking down at his Molières.
“That I have no doubt of, my dear Captain,” interrupted Mrs. Brantinghame, glad to have got that admission from himself; “that I have no doubt of, my dear Captain,” repeated she. “If I had not been satisfied on that point, I should not have thought of troubling you to day; but, standing almost alone in the world, and knowing the danger of allowing these sort of (cough) intimacies to ripen into (hem) friendships, without a little (hem) understanding, I felt it my duty as a mother to satisfy myself that your (cough) feelings are reciprocal, so that my (cough) child’s (hem) affections might not be (sneeze) sacrificed.”
The Captain grinned assent, whereupon a game at cross-purposes ensued between Mamma and himself, each wanting to find out what the other had; but, Mrs. Brantinghame having determined to make her daughter Mrs. Doleful at all hazards, she did not go so close to the wind as she would otherwise have done. They were both in a good deal of debt, and Mamma was determined to saddle the Captain with her daughter’s share.
This exciting discussion was at length interrupted by Frederick (who had been listening at the door for some time) entering the room, to announce that luncheon was ready, whereupon, Mrs. Brantinghame having gathered herself together, tendered Doleful her hand, saying emphatically, as she eyed his slightly flushed face, “Then we understand each other.” And the gallant officer having answered “Yes;” she replied, as she took his arm to go down stairs, “Then you shall have an opportunity after luncheon.”
CHAPTER LXXIX. THE CAPTAIN IN DISTRESS.
THE LUNCHEON THAT day was rather better than usual. In addition to a nice piece of cold sirloin of beef, Saveloy sent in a dish of hot sausage-rolls, and some pork-pies, on “sale or return,” as the booksellers say, and Martha had tried her hand, not altogether unsuccessfully, at a sweet omelette. The decanters, too, were replenished, though we are sorry to add that Partridge was so exasperated at Mrs. Brantinghame’s meanness in locking away the wine, that he had infused a very strong dose of jalap into the Tent. He had just had time to shake it well up, as Captain Doleful and Mrs. Brantinghame descended.
Ere they had got settled in their seats, Miss entered the room, looking, the very essence of innocence, though most carefully got up, and rustling in a new drab and pink shot watered silk. Doleful was up on the instant to receive his intended, whose smiling features had just been regulated at the looking-glass. Notwithstanding the wigging our old friend had just had, he played a pretty good knife and fork, and though he thought the first glass of Tent tasted rather queer, he did not hesitate to take a second, in which Mrs. Brantinghame joined him. So they beefed, and sausaged, and Tented, as if there was nothing particularly astir.
Mrs. Brantinghame, however, retired earlier than usual, giving a significant hem and look at her daughter, and no sooner did the door close than Doleful, instead of finding himself in the delightful elysium young gentlemen anticipate on such occasions, began to experience all sorts of queer qualms and disagreeable sensations. Miss, who was under orders to bring the affair to a termination, one way or the other, seeing his perturbation, thought to assist his courage by Marsala, which proving more like liquid fire than wine, he again had recourse to the jalaped Tent. He still thought it queer, and sipped and tasted, and turned it over on his palate, wondering if it could be the sweet omelette that made it taste so.
Miss, knowing Mamma’s sanguine temperament, and that she would not rest long, now that she was fairly raised, tried to get him into conversation as soon as she could. She first broached that convenient autumnal subject, the court-martial on Lieutenant Perry, and censured the naughty officers who tried him. Doleful, who was still lost in meditation on the wine, merely replied between sips, that soldiers generally made as great a mess when they played at lawyers, as lawyers would if they played at soldiers. He then sip, sip, sipped, till he finished the glass, and set it down, thoroughly satisfied there was something wrong about it. He wondered where they had got it. Miss noted his abstraction, and also her Mamma’s hurried footsteps pacing over head. She tried to get him into the warlike line — the Crimea — then into the Baltic — to Helsingfors, Bomarsund, Revel, saying she thought it was almost better to be as she was, without a brother, than have him exposed to such terrible dangers. This observation, with the falling of a worsted-work weight above, drew Doleful’s attention from certain inward qualms he was feeling, to the subject on which Mamma had been sounding him. It was a great nuisance the old woman being so pressing. What could make her change her tactics so suddenly? She,
who had been all ease and confidence before. Could another suitor have turned up? Oh dear! what a twinge that was — wish he mightn’t have got the cholera. And he incontinently took another pull at the Tent. It was decidedly nasty; and he set his glass down, determined to be done with it. He would give his ears for a little brandy. — There again! — Wished he was at home. — Believed he would have to take a cab. — Would cost him a shilling. — Could have dined at home for ninepence.
Miss, little thinking what was going on internally, but dreading her Mamma’s impetuosity, who, not over comfortable herself, was fretting and fidgetting about in the drawing-room, counting the minutes as hours, venting her spleen on Doleful and all dilatory sweethearters, and wondering how much he had cost her in the way of victuals and drink. Miss, we say, little thinking of what Doleful was suffering, and anxious to give him a lift, tried him personally, by asking what he thought of her new dress, getting up to show it, and just as he was paying the old compliment to her fair hand, after admiring the dress, Mamma, who had stolen noiselessly into the room, exclaimed, “Well, I’m glad you’ve got it all settled. I’m glad you’ve got it all settled,” seizing Doleful’s hand as it dropped from her daughter’s; “for really I was getting very nervous and uncomfortable. And, oh, my dear child!” continued she, giving her a strong hug, “I hope you’ll be happy!” adding, as she turned again to the now teeth-grinding Captain, “I’m sure if she’s not, it will be her own fault, for I never saw a sweeter disposition than yours. And now,” inquired she, in the same breath, “will you take any more luncheon,” pointing to the still well-stored table, and thinking the servants would be wanting their dinners.
Doleful declined any more luncheon.
“Or wine?” asked she.
Doleful would have no more of that either.
“Then let us go up stairs, and communicate the joyful intelligence to your sisters by this post,” continued Mrs. Brantinghame.
“Sisters!” exclaimed Doleful, sickening, “I thought you were an only child!”
“Only child I have left,” replied Mrs. Brantinghame, with the utmost effrontery.
“Only child you have left,” gasped Doleful.
“Yes, only child I have left,” continued Mrs. Brantinghame, volubly. “Only child I have left; but we have a charming family circle to introduce you to, and shall have more as soon as ever this weary war is over.”
“War!” ejaculated Doleful, turning livid.
“Yes; my sons are with their regiments in Turkey, but—”
“Why, I thought you wanted a brother!” interrupted Doleful, appealing imploringly to Miss.
“So I do,” replied Miss, calmly. “So I do. These are only half brothers, as mamma will tell you, and a half-brother is never like a whole one, you know.”
“Yes, their name is Honeyball,” explained Mrs. Brantinghame, accepting her daughter’s invitation; “my first husband’s name was Honeyball. P’r’aps you may have heard of him. My eldest son, Archibald, called after my dear brother, Sir Archy, is in the Hot and Heavy Huzzars, and my second son, Humphrey, is in the Royal West Highland Practical Jokers.”
Doleful thought he saw their nasty naked swords gleaming before him, and was fairly overcome. Rushing out of the room, he seized his hat and left the house, running out of Acacia Crescent, up the back lane, through Short’s Gardens, and Milkington Street, like a man possessed, and took to his bed like a dormouse.
CHAPTER LXXX. WHO-HOOP!
THE SEQUEL IS soon told. Three days after, Sir Archibald Depecarde’s travelling chariot, drawn by four smoking posters, was seen rolling, hurriedly, into Handley Cross, with the pinion-folded Partridge lolling consequentially in the rumble, and to draw up with a dash at Captain Doleful’s door. What took place between them, of course we are unable to state, but an adjournment was presently moved to Acacia Crescent; and almost immediately after, bales of haberdashery, and piles of cap and bonnet-boxes began to arrive, and Martha had a busy time of it, taking in and letting out the counter-skippers, and genteel young people bringing them. In due time, white favours flourished through the town, Sir Archibald Depecarde giving away the lovely bride.
Concerned, however, we are to add, that just as Mrs. Brantinghame and Martha were clearing out of the Crescent for Bath, Mrs. Doleful cast up at her mother’s, looking so wretched and haggard, that no census-taker would have booked her at fifty. She declared she could not live with that “‘orrid man” another day, though for what cause, we, as Sir Thomas Trout would say, are not at liberty to mention. Mamma tried Jorrocks’s famous horse recipe upon her, advised her to be to his faults a little blind, and to his virtues ever kind; but Mrs. Doleful declared, she would rather to anything than return to him, and though, with bitter anguish, of Peter Bullock and Captain Capers, and the other gentlemen she had jilted.
On that very day, James Pigg was seen turning out of the Marquis of Cornwallis’s bottle department into Great Coram Street, with a huge tobacco-stained favour under his nose, holloaing out, as he got staggered into the middle of the street, “Keep the tambourine a rowlin! Whativir ye de, keep the tambourine a rowlin!” Then having got himself steadied, he went lurching along, holloaing out, “B-r-r-a-andy and baccy ‘ill gar a man live for iver! Sink ar say b-r-r-a-andy and baccy ‘ill gar a man live for iver!” So he proceeded down Great Coram Street, tendering his nief to every body he met, declaring he’d been the death of a guinea, and would be the death of another when young Stobbs was born, until losing his head in the open, he finally subsided under the pump in Brunswick square. Then, just as the little boys were preparing to sluice him, the tall lobster merchant with the big calves, who was going his evening rounds of “Buy Lob-ster-r-r! fine LOB-ster-r-r!” came to the rescue, and restored him unhurt to Great Coram Street, where the lobster merchant was speedily made as drunk as his friend.
On that very day, too, our elegant Bloomer having captured the Conqueror, and found out what day Belinda was to be married, entered into the happy state also, as appears by the following paragraph extracted from the Paul Pry: “On the 29th ult., at St. Mary’s Church, by the Rev. Simon Pure, assisted by the Rev. Arthur Lovejoy, William Heveland, Esq., A.D.C., to Constantia, youngest surviving daughter of the late Michael Mendlove, of Handley Cross Spa. The lovely bride, who was dressed as a Bloomer, was attended by six beautiful bridesmaids similarly attired.”
The Conqueror very handsomely settled himself, not quite so good an investment as Charley Stobbs made with pretty Belinda, Mr. Jorrocks having come down with what old Miss Freezer described as “something v — a — a — ry handsome,” and promised them a thousand every time she has twins. They were now down at old Stobbs’s place in Yorkshire, but purpose being back at Handley Cross by the hunting season. They are accompanied by that eminent sportsman Ben, who has been glad to retire from the agonies of hunting and subside into a buttoney-boy for Belinda. This metamorphosis was somewhat accelerated by the following contretemps.
Pigg having gone out in the gray dawn of morn to meet his friend Whiskey Tim and recruit his stock of mountain dew, saw Joe Haddock and Ben having a trial of speed with two of their horses along the south turnpike, and not all Pigg’s frantic yells and gestures, though he knocked his hat crown out in the effort, could overpower the clatter they made on the road. Pigg therefore made the best of his way home and providing himself with a cutting whip, surprised Ben in the parlour in the act of refreshing himself with some of Mr. Jorrocks’s marmalade, which he was scooping out of the pot with his thumb. Taking him as he would a hound by the ear, Pigg pitched into him, exclaiming at the top of his voice,
“Ar’ll teach ye te gallop mar h’ussus, it will ’e (whack) — it will ’e (crack) — it will ’e (smack).”
Squeak, squeal, writhe, wriggle, roar, went Ben, throwing himself on to the floor.
“Ar’ll teach ye te steal t’ard maister’s marmelade,” continued Pigg, now taking Ben by the cuff of the neck; “Ar’ll teach ye te steal t’ard maister’s marmelade, it will ’e
(crack), it will ’e (smack), it will ’e (whack).”
Writhe, roar, wriggle, murder! shrieked Ben.
“Aye, morder aye,” repeated Pigg, turning him deliberately over and taking him by the other ear. “Aye, morder aye, ar’l morder ye, ye bit brazen bowdekite, whe d’ye think ill stand sic wark as this,” (whack, crack — whack, crack — whack, crack) — and altogether Pigg gave him such an elaborate licking as perfectly disgusted Ben with whips and every thing belonging to the chase.
Mr. Jorrocks therefore being without a whip, and in order as he says that they may all break their eggs at the same end, has allowed Pigg to choose his own, who, kennin as he says, “Jist sic another chap as hissel, what used to whop in to the Tynedale,” he has written to engage him, character being no object with Pigg, and Mr. Jorrocks and Pigg have entered into a compact that master and man are not both to get drunk on the same day.
Moreover, Mr. Jorrocks has offered to increase Pigg’s wages if he will make Batsay, who we are sorry to say has had to get her stays let out again — an honest woman.
And now for our jolly old master himself. He says their people have “be’aved so un’andsome in tryin’ to shop him,” that he’s determined to give a loose to pleasure the rest of his life, and is getting hounds together for four days a week — three and a bye at least, which latter he means to have in Pinch-me-near Forest. This is to be permanently added to his country, and the Right Honourable the Lords Commissioners of her Majesty’s Treasury having very properly dismissed the Honourable the Commissioner in charge of her Majesty’s Woods and Forests, together with his Scotch Sylvan oracle, Mr. Prettyfat is again pretty comfortable and able to turn his attention to his poultry, of which he has appointed Mr. Jorrocks grand protector. Pigg and he are to have their breakfasts and a glass of brandy a piece every time the hounds meet there.
