Jezebel's Daughter

by Wilkie Collins

  IX

  The night is getting on; and the lamp I am writing by grows dim.

  My mind wanders away from Frankfort, and from all that once happened

  there. The picture now in my memory presents an English scene.

  I am at the house of business in London. Two friends are waiting for me.

  One of them is Fritz. The other is the most popular person in the

  neighborhood; a happy, harmless creature, known to everyone by the

  undignified nickname of Jack Straw. Thanks to my aunt's influence, and to

  the change of scene, no return of the relapse at Frankfort has shown

  itself. We are easy about the future of our little friend.

  As to the past, we have made no romantic discoveries, relating to the

  earlier years of Jack's life. Who were his parents; whether they died or

  whether they deserted him; how he lived, and what he suffered, before he

  drifted into the service of the chemistry-professor at Wurzburg--these,

  and other questions like them, remain unanswered. Jack himself feels no

  sort of interest in our inquiries. He either will not or cannot rouse his

  feeble memory to help us. "What does it matter now?" he says. "I began to

  live when Mistress first came to see me. I don't remember, and won't

  remember, anything before that."

  So the memoirs of Jack remain unwritten, for want of materials--like the

  memoirs of many another foundling, in real life.

  While I am speaking of Jack, I am keeping my two friends waiting in the

  reception-room. I dress myself in my best clothes and join them. Fritz is

  silent and nervous; unreasonably impatient for the arrival of the

  carriage at the door. Jack promenades the room, with a superb nosegay in

  the button-hole of a glorious blue coat. He has a watch; he carries a

  cane; he wears white gloves, and tight nankeen pantaloons. He struts out

  before us, when the carriage comes at last. "I don't deny that Fritz is a

  figure in the festival," he says, when we drive away; "but I positively

  assert that the thing is not complete without Me. If my dress fails in

  any respect to do me justice, for Heaven's sake mention it, one of you,

  before we pass the tailor's door!" I answer Jack, by telling him that he

  is in all respects perfect. And Jack answers me, "David, you have your

  faults; but your taste is invariably correct. Give me a little more room;

  I can't face Mistress with crumpled coat-tails."

  We reach a little village in the neighborhood of London, and stop at the

  gate of the old church.

  We walk up to the altar-rails, and wait there. All the women in the place

  are waiting also. They merely glance at Fritz and at me--their whole

  attention is concentrated on Jack. They take him for the bridegroom. Jack

  discovers it; and is better pleased with himself than ever.

  The organist plays a wedding-march. The bride, simply and unpretendingly

  dressed, just fluttered enough to make her eyes irresistible, and her

  complexion lovely, enters the church, leaning on Mr. Keller's arm.

  Our good partner looks younger than usual. At his own earnest request,

  the business in Frankfort has been sold; the head-partner first

  stipulating for the employment of a given number of reputable young women

  in the office. Removed from associations which are inexpressibly

  repellent to him, Mr. Keller is building a house, near Mrs. Wagner's

  pretty cottage, on the hill above the village. Here he proposes to pass

  the rest of his days peacefully, with his two married children.

  On their way to the altar, Mr. Keller and Minna are followed by Doctor

  Dormann (taking his annual holiday, this year, in England). The doctor

  gives his arm to the woman of all women whom Jack worships and loves. My

  kind and dear aunt--with the old bright charm in her face; the firm

  friend of all friendless creatures--why does my calmness desert me, when

  I try to draw my little portrait of her; Minna's second mother, standing

  by Minna's side, on the greatest day of her life?

  I can't even see the paper. Nearly fifty years have passed, since that

  wedding-day. Oh, my coevals, who have outlived your dearest friends, like

  me, _you_ know what is the matter with my eyes! I must take out my

  handkerchief, and put down my pen--and leave some of you younger ones to

  finish the story of the marriage for yourself.