The History of Pendennis
Page 3
CHAPTER I. Shows how First Love may interrupt Breakfast
One fine morning in the full London season, Major Arthur Pendenniscame over from his lodgings, according to his custom, to breakfast at acertain Club in Pall Mall, of which he was a chief ornament. As hewas one of the finest judges of wine in England, and a man of active,dominating, and inquiring spirit, he had been very properly chosen tobe a member of the Committee of this Club, and indeed was almost themanager of the institution; and the stewards and waiters bowed beforehim as reverentially as to a Duke or a Field-Marshal.
At a quarter past ten the Major invariably made his appearance in thebest blacked boots in all London, with a checked morning cravat thatnever was rumpled until dinner time, a buff waistcoat which bore thecrown of his sovereign on the buttons, and linen so spotless that Mr.Brummel himself asked the name of his laundress, and would probably haveemployed her had not misfortunes compelled that great man to fly thecountry. Pendennis's coat, his white gloves, his whiskers, his verycane, were perfect of their kind as specimens of the costume of amilitary man en retraite. At a distance, or seeing his back merely, youwould have taken him to be not more than thirty years old: it was onlyby a nearer inspection that you saw the factitious nature of his richbrown hair, and that there were a few crow's-feet round about thesomewhat faded eyes of his handsome mottled face. His nose was of theWellington pattern. His hands and wristbands were beautifully long andwhite. On the latter he wore handsome gold buttons given to him by hisRoyal Highness the Duke of York, and on the others more than one elegantring, the chief and largest of them being emblazoned with the famousarms of Pendennis.
He always took possession of the same table in the same corner of theroom, from which nobody ever now thought of ousting him. One or twomad wags and wild fellows had in former days, and in freak or bravado,endeavoured twice or thrice to deprive him of this place; but there wasa quiet dignity in the Major's manner as he took his seat at the nexttable, and surveyed the interlopers, which rendered it impossible forany man to sit and breakfast under his eye; and that table--by the fire,and yet near the window--became his own. His letters were laid out therein expectation of his arrival, and many was the young fellow about townwho looked with wonder at the number of those notes, and at the sealsand franks which they bore. If there was any question about etiquette,society, who was married to whom, of what age such and such a duke was,Pendennis was the man to whom every one appealed. Marchionesses used todrive up to the Club, and leave notes for him, or fetch him out. He wasperfectly affable. The young men liked to walk with him in the Park ordown Pall Mall; for he touched his hat to everybody, and every other manhe met was a lord.
The Major sate down at his accustomed table then, and while the waiterswent to bring him his toast and his hot newspaper, he surveyed hisletters through his gold double eye-glass. He carried it so gaily, youwould hardly have known it was spectacles in disguise, and examined onepretty note after another, and laid them by in order. There were largesolemn dinner cards, suggestive of three courses and heavy conversation;there were neat little confidential notes, conveying female entreaties;there was a note on thick official paper from the Marquis of Steyne,telling him to come to Richmond to a little party at the Star andGarter, and speak French, which language the Major possessed veryperfectly; and another from the Bishop of Ealing and Mrs. Trail,requesting the honour of Major Pendennis's company at Ealing House,all of which letters Pendennis read gracefully, and with the moresatisfaction, because Glowry, the Scotch surgeon, breakfasting oppositeto him, was looking on, and hating him for having so many invitations,which nobody ever sent to Glowry.
These perused, the Major took out his pocket-book to see on what days hewas disengaged, and which of these many hospitable calls he could affordto accept or decline.
He threw over Cutler, the East India Director, in Baker Street, in orderto dine with Lord Steyne and the little French party at the Star andGarter--the Bishop he accepted, because, though the dinner was slow, heliked to dine with bishops--and so went through his list and disposed ofthem according to his fancy or interest. Then he took his breakfastand looked over the paper, the gazette, the births and deaths, and thefashionable intelligence, to see that his name was down among the guestsat my Lord So-and-so's fete, and in the intervals of these occupationscarried on cheerful conversation with his acquaintances about the room.
Among the letters which formed Major Pendennis's budget for that morningthere was only one unread, and which lay solitary and apart from all thefashionable London letters, with a country postmark and a homely seal.The superscription was in a pretty delicate female hand, and thoughmarked 'Immediate' by the fair writer, with a strong dash of anxietyunder the word, yet the Major had, for reasons of his own, neglected upto the present moment his humble rural petitioner, who to be sure couldhardly hope to get a hearing among so many grand folks who attendedhis levee. The fact was, this was a letter from a female relative ofPendennis, and while the grandees of her brother's acquaintance werereceived and got their interview, and drove off, as it were, the patientcountry letter remained for a long time waiting for an audience in theante-chamber under the slop-bason.
At last it came to be this letter's turn, and the Major broke a sealwith 'Fairoaks' engraved upon it, and 'Clavering St. Mary's' for apostmark. It was a double letter, and the Major commenced perusing theenvelope before he attacked the inner epistle.
"Is it a letter from another Jook," growled Mr. Glowry, inwardly,"Pendennis would not be leaving that to the last, I'm thinking."
"My dear Major Pendennis," the letter ran, "I beg and implore you tocome to me immediately "--very likely, thought Pendennis, and Steyne'sdinner to-day--"I am in the very greatest grief and perplexity. Mydearest boy, who has been hitherto everything the fondest mother couldwish, is grieving me dreadfully. He has formed--I can hardly write it--apassion, an infatuation,"--the Major grinned--"for an actress whohas been performing here. She is at least twelve years older thanArthur--who will not be eighteen till next February--and the wretchedboy insists upon marrying her."
"Hay! What's making Pendennis swear now?"--Mr. Glowry asked of himself,for rage and wonder were concentrated in the Major's open mouth, as heread this astounding announcement.
"Do, my dear friend," the grief-stricken lady went on, "come to meinstantly on the receipt of this; and, as Arthur's guardian, entreat,command, the wretched child to give up this most deplorable resolution."And, after more entreaties to the above effect, the writer concludedby signing herself the Major's 'unhappy affectionate sister, HelenPendennis.'
"Fairoaks, Tuesday"--the Major concluded, reading the last words of theletter--"A d---d pretty business at Fairoaks, Tuesday; now let ussee what the boy has to say;" and he took the other letter, which waswritten in a great floundering boy's hand, and sealed with the largesignet of the Pendennises, even larger than the Major's own, and withsupplementary wax sputtered all round the seal, in token of the writer'stremulousness and agitation.
The epistle ran thus:
"Fairoaks, Monday, Midnight.
"My Dear Uncle,--In informing you of my engagement with Miss Costigan,daughter of J. Chesterfield Costigan, Esq., of Costiganstown, but,perhaps, better known to you under her professional name of MissFotheringay, of the Theatres Royal Drury Lane and Crow Street, and ofthe Norwich and Welsh Circuit, I am aware that I make an announcementwhich cannot, according to the present prejudices of society at least,be welcome to my family. My dearest mother, on whom, God knows, I wouldwish to inflict no needless pain, is deeply moved and grieved, I amsorry to say, by the intelligence which I have this night conveyed toher. I beseech you, my dear Sir, to come down and reason with herand console her. Although obliged by poverty to earn an honourablemaintenance by the exercise of her splendid talents, Miss Costigan'sfamily is as ancient and noble as our own. When our ancestor, RalphPendennis, landed with Richard II. in Ireland, my Emily's forefatherswere kings of that country. I have the information from Mr. Costigan,who, like yourself, is a
military man.
"It is in vain I have attempted to argue with my dear mother, andprove to her that a young lady of irreproachable character and lineage,endowed with the most splendid gifts of beauty and genius, who devotesherself to the exercise of one of the noblest professions, for thesacred purpose of maintaining her family, is a being whom we should alllove and reverence, rather than avoid;--my poor mother has prejudiceswhich it is impossible for my logic to overcome, and refuses to welcometo her arms one who is disposed to be her most affectionate daughterthrough life.
"Although Miss Costigan is some years older than myself, thatcircumstance does not operate as a barrier to my affection, and I amsure will not influence its duration. A love like mine, Sir, I feel, iscontracted once and for ever. As I never had dreamed of love until I sawher--I feel now that I shall die without ever knowing another passion.It is the fate of my life. It was Miss C.'s own delicacy which suggestedthat the difference of age, which I never felt, might operate as a barto our union. But having loved once, I should despise myself, andbe unworthy of my name as a gentleman, if I hesitated to abide by mypassion: if I did not give all where I felt all, and endow the woman wholoves me fondly with my whole heart and my whole fortune.
"I press for a speedy marriage with my Emily--for why, in truth,should it be delayed? A delay implies a doubt, which I cast from meas unworthy. It is impossible that my sentiments can change towardsEmily--that at any age she can be anything but the sole object of mylove. Why, then, wait? I entreat you, my dear Uncle, to come down andreconcile my dear mother to our union, and I address you as a man of theworld, qui mores hominum multorum vidit et urbes, who will not feel anyof the weak scruples and fears which agitate a lady who has scarcelyever left her village.
"Pray, come down to us immediately. I am quite confident that--apartfrom considerations of fortune--you will admire and approve of myEmily.--Your affectionate Nephew, Arthur Pendennis, Jr."
When the Major had concluded the perusal of this letter, his countenanceassumed an expression of such rage and horror that Glowry, thesurgeon-official, felt in his pocket for his lancet, which he alwayscarried in his card-case, and thought his respected friend was goinginto a fit. The intelligence was indeed sufficient to agitate Pendennis.The head of the Pendennises going to marry an actress ten years hissenior,--a headstrong boy going to plunge into matrimony. "The motherhas spoiled the young rascal," groaned the Major inwardly, "with hercursed sentimentality and romantic rubbish. My nephew marry a tragedyqueen! Gracious mercy, people will laugh at me so that I shall not dareshow my head!" And he thought with an inexpressible pang that he mustgive up Lord Steyne's dinner at Richmond, and must lose his rest andpass the night in an abominable tight mail-coach, instead of takingpleasure, as he had promised himself, in some of the most agreeable andselect society in England.
And he must not only give up this but all other engagements for sometime to come. Who knows how long the business might detain him. Hequitted his breakfast table for the adjoining writing-room, and thereruefully wrote off refusals to the Marquis, the Earl, the Bishop, andall his entertainers; and he ordered his servant to take places inthe mail-coach for that evening, of course charging the sum whichhe disbursed for the seats to the account of the widow and the youngscapegrace of whom he was guardian.