The Charles Dickens Christmas Megapack

by Charles Dickens

  “I ain’t ’appy, Magsman.”

  “What’s on your mind, Mr. Chops?”

  “They don’t use me well. They an’t grateful to me. They puts me on the mantel-piece when I won’t have in more Champagne-wine, and they locks me in the sideboard when I won’t give up my property.”

  “Get rid of ’em, Mr. Chops.”

  “I can’t. We’re in Society together, and what would Society say?”

  “Come out of Society!” says I.

  “I can’t. You don’t know what you’re talking about. When you have once gone into Society, you mustn’t come out of it.”

  “Then if you’ll excuse the freedom, Mr. Chops,” were my remark, shaking my head grave, “I think it’s a pity you ever went in.”

  Mr. Chops shook that deep Ed of his, to a surprisin extent, and slapped it half a dozen times with his hand, and with more Wice than I thought were in him. Then, he says, “You’re a good fellow, but you don’t understand. Good-night, go along. Magsman, the little man will now walk three times round the Cairawan, and retire behind the curtain.” The last I see of him on that occasion was his tryin, on the extremest werge of insensibility, to climb up the stairs, one by one, with his hands and knees. They’d have been much too steep for him, if he had been sober; but he wouldn’t be helped.

  It warn’t long after that, that I read in the newspaper of Mr. Chops’s being presented at court. It was printed, “It will be recollected”—and I’ve noticed in my life, that it is sure to be printed that it will be recollected, whenever it won’t—“that Mr. Chops is the individual of small stature, whose brilliant success in the last State Lottery attracted so much attention.” Well, I says to myself, Such is Life! He has been and done it in earnest at last. He has astonished George the Fourth!

  (On account of which, I had that canvass new-painted, him with a bag of money in his hand, a presentin it to George the Fourth, and a lady in Ostrich Feathers fallin in love with him in a bag-wig, sword, and buckles correct.)

  I took the House as is the subject of present inquiries—though not the honour of bein acquainted—and I run Magsman’s Amusements in it thirteen months—sometimes one thing, sometimes another, sometimes nothin particular, but always all the canvasses outside. One night, when we had played the last company out, which was a shy company, through its raining Heavens hard, I was takin a pipe in the one pair back along with the young man with the toes, which I had taken on for a month (though he never drawed—except on paper), and I heard a kickin at the street door. “Halloa!” I says to the young man, “what’s up!” He rubs his eyebrows with his toes, and he says, “I can’t imagine, Mr. Magsman”—which he never could imagine nothin, and was monotonous company.

  The noise not leavin off, I laid down my pipe, and I took up a candle, and I went down and opened the door. I looked out into the street; but nothin could I see, and nothin was I aware of, until I turned round quick, because some creetur run between my legs into the passage. There was Mr. Chops!

  “Magsman,” he says, “take me, on the old terms, and you’ve got me; if it’s done, say done!”

  I was all of a maze, but I said, “Done, sir.”

  “Done to your done, and double done!” says he. “Have you got a bit of supper in the house?”

  Bearin in mind them sparklin warieties of foreign drains as we’d guzzled away at in Pall Mall, I was ashamed to offer him cold sassages and gin-and-water; but he took ’em both and took ’em free; havin a chair for his table, and sittin down at it on a stool, like hold times. I, all of a maze all the while.

  It was arter he had made a clean sweep of the sassages (beef, and to the best of my calculations two pound and a quarter), that the wisdom as was in that little man began to come out of him like prespiration.

  “Magsman,” he says, “look upon me! You see afore you, One as has both gone into Society and come out.”

  “O! You are out of it, Mr. Chops? How did you get out, sir?”

  “SOLD OUT!” says he. You never saw the like of the wisdom as his Ed expressed, when he made use of them two words.

  “My friend Magsman, I’ll impart to you a discovery I’ve made. It’s wallable; it’s cost twelve thousand five hundred pound; it may do you good in life—The secret of this matter is, that it ain’t so much that a person goes into Society, as that Society goes into a person.”

  Not exactly keepin up with his meanin, I shook my head, put on a deep look, and said, “You’re right there, Mr. Chops.”

  “Magsman,” he says, twitchin me by the leg, “Society has gone into me, to the tune of every penny of my property.”

  I felt that I went pale, and though nat’rally a bold speaker, I couldn’t hardly say, “Where’s Normandy?”

  “Bolted. With the plate,” said Mr. Chops.

  “And t’other one?” meaning him as formerly wore the bishop’s mitre.

  “Bolted. With the jewels,” said Mr. Chops.

  I sat down and looked at him, and he stood up and looked at me.

  “Magsman,” he says, and he seemed to myself to get wiser as he got hoarser; “Society, taken in the lump, is all dwarfs. At the court of St. James’s, they was all a doing my old business—all a goin three times round the Cairawan, in the hold court-suits and properties. Elsewheres, they was most of ’em ringin their little bells out of make-believes. Everywheres, the sarser was a goin round. Magsman, the sarser is the uniwersal Institution!”

  I perceived, you understand, that he was soured by his misfortunes, and I felt for Mr. Chops.

  “As to Fat Ladies,” he says, giving his head a tremendious one agin the wall, “there’s lots of them in Society, and worse than the original. Hers was a outrage upon Taste—simply a outrage upon Taste—awakenin contempt—carryin its own punishment in the form of a Indian.” Here he giv himself another tremendious one. “But theirs, Magsman, theirs is mercenary outrages. Lay in Cashmeer shawls, buy bracelets, strew ’em and a lot of ’andsome fans and things about your rooms, let it be known that you give away like water to all as come to admire, and the Fat Ladies that don’t exhibit for so much down upon the drum, will come from all the pints of the compass to flock about you, whatever you are. They’ll drill holes in your ’art, Magsman, like a Cullender. And when you’ve no more left to give, they’ll laugh at you to your face, and leave you to have your bones picked dry by Wulturs, like the dead Wild Ass of the Prairies that you deserve to be!” Here he giv himself the most tremendious one of all, and dropped.

  I thought he was gone. His Ed was so heavy, and he knocked it so hard, and he fell so stoney, and the sassagerial disturbance in him must have been so immense, that I thought he was gone. But, he soon come round with care, and he sat up on the floor, and he said to me, with wisdom comin out of his eyes, if ever it come:

  “Magsman! The most material difference between the two states of existence through which your unhappy friend has passed;” he reached out his poor little hand, and his tears dropped down on the moustachio which it was a credit to him to have done his best to grow, but it is not in mortals to command success—“the difference this. When I was out of Society, I was paid light for being seen. When I went into Society, I paid heavy for being seen. I prefer the former, even if I wasn’t forced upon it. Give me out through the trumpet, in the hold way, to-morrow.”

  Arter that, he slid into the line again as easy as if he had been iled all over. But the organ was kep from him, and no allusions was ever made, when a company was in, to his property. He got wiser every day; his views of Society and the Public was luminous, bewilderin, awful; and his Ed got bigger and bigger as his Wisdom expanded it.

  He took well, and pulled ’em in most excellent for nine weeks. At the expiration of that period, when his Ed was a sight, he expressed one evenin, the last Company havin been turned out, and the door shut, a wish to have a little music.

  “Mr. Chops,” I said (I never dropped the “Mr.” with him; the world might do it, but not me); “Mr. Chops, are you sure as you are in a st
ate of mind and body to sit upon the organ?”

  His answer was this: “Toby, when next met with on the tramp, I forgive her and the Indian. And I am.”

  It was with fear and trembling that I began to turn the handle; but he sat like a lamb. I will be my belief to my dying day, that I see his Ed expand as he sat; you may therefore judge how great his thoughts was. He sat out all the changes, and then he come off.

  “Toby,” he says, with a quiet smile, “the little man will now walk three times round the Cairawan, and retire behind the curtain.”

  When we called him in the morning, we found him gone into a much better Society than mine or Pall Mall’s. I giv Mr. Chops as comfortable a funeral as lay in my power, followed myself as Chief, and had the George the Fourth canvass carried first, in the form of a banner. But, the House was so dismal arterwards, that I giv it up, and took to the Wan again.

  * * * *

  “I don’t triumph,” said Jarber, folding up the second manuscript, and looking hard at Trottle. “I don’t triumph over this worthy creature. I merely ask him if he is satisfied now?”

  “How can he be anything else?” I said, answering for Trottle, who sat obstinately silent. “This time, Jarber, you have not only read us a delightfully amusing story, but you have also answered the question about the House. Of course it stands empty now. Who would think of taking it after it had been turned into a caravan?” I looked at Trottle, as I said those last words, and Jarber waved his hand indulgently in the same direction.

  “Let this excellent person speak,” said Jarber. “You were about to say, my good man?”—

  “I only wished to ask, sir,” said Trottle doggedly, “if you could kindly oblige me with a date or two in connection with that last story?”

  “A date!” repeated Jarber. “What does the man want with dates!”

  “I should be glad to know, with great respect,” persisted Trottle, “if the person named Magsman was the last tenant who lived in the House. It’s my opinion—if I may be excused for giving it—that he most decidedly was not.”

  With those words, Trottle made a low bow, and quietly left the room.

  There is no denying that Jarber, when we were left together, looked sadly discomposed. He had evidently forgotten to inquire about dates; and, in spite of his magnificent talk about his series of discoveries, it was quite as plain that the two stories he had just read, had really and truly exhausted his present stock. I thought myself bound, in common gratitude, to help him out of his embarrassment by a timely suggestion. So I proposed that he should come to tea again, on the next Monday evening, the thirteenth, and should make such inquiries in the meantime, as might enable him to dispose triumphantly of Trottle’s objection.

  He gallantly kissed my hand, made a neat little speech of acknowledgment, and took his leave. For the rest of the week I would not encourage Trottle by allowing him to refer to the House at all. I suspected he was making his own inquiries about dates, but I put no questions to him.

  On Monday evening, the thirteenth, that dear unfortunate Jarber came, punctual to the appointed time. He looked so terribly harassed, that he was really quite a spectacle of feebleness and fatigue. I saw, at a glance, that the question of dates had gone against him, that Mr. Magsman had not been the last tenant of the House, and that the reason of its emptiness was still to seek.

  “What I have gone through,” said Jarber, “words are not eloquent enough to tell. O Sophonisba, I have begun another series of discoveries! Accept the last two as stories laid on your shrine; and wait to blame me for leaving your curiosity unappeased, until you have heard Number Three.”

  Number Three looked like a very short manuscript, and I said as much. Jarber explained to me that we were to have some poetry this time. In the course of his investigations he had stepped into the Circulating Library, to seek for information on the one important subject. All the Library-people knew about the House was, that a female relative of the last tenant, as they believed, had, just after that tenant left, sent a little manuscript poem to them which she described as referring to events that had actually passed in the House; and which she wanted the proprietor of the Library to publish. She had written no address on her letter; and the proprietor had kept the manuscript ready to be given back to her (the publishing of poems not being in his line) when she might call for it. She had never called for it; and the poem had been lent to Jarber, at his express request, to read to me.

  Before he began, I rang the bell for Trottle; being determined to have him present at the new reading, as a wholesome check on his obstinacy. To my surprise Peggy answered the bell, and told me, that Trottle had stepped out without saying where. I instantly felt the strongest possible conviction that he was at his old tricks: and that his stepping out in the evening, without leave, meant—Philandering.

  Controlling myself on my visitor’s account, I dismissed Peggy, stifled my indignation, and prepared, as politely as might be, to listen to Jarber.

  SOMEBODY’S LUGGAGE

  CHAPTER I

  HIS LEAVING IT TILL CALLED FOR

  The writer of these humble lines being a Waiter, and having come of a family of Waiters, and owning at the present time five brothers who are all Waiters, and likewise an only sister who is a Waitress, would wish to offer a few words respecting his calling; first having the pleasure of hereby in a friendly manner offering the Dedication of the same unto Joseph, much respected Head Waiter at the Slamjam Coffee-house, London, E.C., than which a individual more eminently deserving of the name of man, or a more amenable honour to his own head and heart, whether considered in the light of a Waiter or regarded as a human being, do not exist.

  In case confusion should arise in the public mind (which it is open to confusion on many subjects) respecting what is meant or implied by the term Waiter, the present humble lines would wish to offer an explanation. It may not be generally known that the person as goes out to wait is not a Waiter. It may not be generally known that the hand as is called in extra, at the Freemasons’ Tavern, or the London, or the Albion, or otherwise, is not a Waiter. Such hands may be took on for Public Dinners by the bushel (and you may know them by their breathing with difficulty when in attendance, and taking away the bottle ere yet it is half out); but such are not Waiters. For you cannot lay down the tailoring, or the shoemaking, or the brokering, or the green-grocering, or the pictorial-periodicalling, or the second-hand wardrobe, or the small fancy businesses—you cannot lay down those lines of life at your will and pleasure by the half-day or evening, and take up Waitering. You may suppose you can, but you cannot; or you may go so far as to say you do, but you do not. Nor yet can you lay down the gentleman’s-service when stimulated by prolonged incompatibility on the part of Cooks (and here it may be remarked that Cooking and Incompatibility will be mostly found united), and take up Waitering. It has been ascertained that what a gentleman will sit meek under, at home, he will not bear out of doors, at the Slamjam or any similar establishment. Then, what is the inference to be drawn respecting true Waitering? You must be bred to it. You must be born to it.

  Would you know how born to it, Fair Reader—if of the adorable female sex? Then learn from the biographical experience of one that is a Waiter in the sixty-first year of his age.

  You were conveyed—ere yet your dawning powers were otherwise developed than to harbour vacancy in your inside—you were conveyed, by surreptitious means, into a pantry adjoining the Admiral Nelson, Civic and General Dining-Rooms, there to receive by stealth that healthful sustenance which is the pride and boast of the British female constitution. Your mother was married to your father (himself a distant Waiter) in the profoundest secrecy; for a Waitress known to be married would ruin the best of businesses—it is the same as on the stage. Hence your being smuggled into the pantry, and that—to add to the infliction—by an unwilling grandmother. Under the combined influence of the smells of roast and boiled, and soup, and gas, and malt liquors, you partook of your earliest nourishment; your unwilli
ng grandmother sitting prepared to catch you when your mother was called and dropped you; your grandmother’s shawl ever ready to stifle your natural complainings; your innocent mind surrounded by uncongenial cruets, dirty plates, dish-covers, and cold gravy; your mother calling down the pipe for veals and porks, instead of soothing you with nursery rhymes. Under these untoward circumstances you were early weaned. Your unwilling grandmother, ever growing more unwilling as your food assimilated less, then contracted habits of shaking you till your system curdled, and your food would not assimilate at all. At length she was no longer spared, and could have been thankfully spared much sooner. When your brothers began to appear in succession, your mother retired, left off her smart dressing (she had previously been a smart dresser), and her dark ringlets (which had previously been flowing), and haunted your father late of nights, lying in wait for him, through all weathers, up the shabby court which led to the back door of the Royal Old Dust-Bin (said to have been so named by George the Fourth), where your father was Head. But the Dust-Bin was going down then, and your father took but little—excepting from a liquid point of view. Your mother’s object in those visits was of a house-keeping character, and you was set on to whistle your father out. Sometimes he came out, but generally not. Come or not come, however, all that part of his existence which was unconnected with open Waitering was kept a close secret, and was acknowledged by your mother to be a close secret, and you and your mother flitted about the court, close secrets both of you, and would scarcely have confessed under torture that you know your father, or that your father had any name than Dick (which wasn’t his name, though he was never known by any other), or that he had kith or kin or chick or child. Perhaps the attraction of this mystery, combined with your father’s having a damp compartment, to himself, behind a leaky cistern, at the Dust-Bin—a sort of a cellar compartment, with a sink in it, and a smell, and a plate-rack, and a bottle-rack, and three windows that didn’t match each other or anything else, and no daylight—caused your young mind to feel convinced that you must grow up to be a Waiter too; but you did feel convinced of it, and so did all your brothers, down to your sister. Every one of you felt convinced that you was born to the Waitering. At this stage of your career, what was your feelings one day when your father came home to your mother in open broad daylight—of itself an act of Madness on the part of a Waiter—and took to his bed (leastwise, your mother and family’s bed), with the statement that his eyes were devilled kidneys. Physicians being in vain, your father expired, after repeating at intervals for a day and a night, when gleams of reason and old business fitfully illuminated his being, “Two and two is five. And three is sixpence.” Interred in the parochial department of the neighbouring churchyard, and accompanied to the grave by as many Waiters of long standing as could spare the morning time from their soiled glasses (namely, one), your bereaved form was attired in a white neckankecher, and you was took on from motives of benevolence at The George and Gridiron, theatrical and supper. Here, supporting nature on what you found in the plates (which was as it happened, and but too often thoughtlessly, immersed in mustard), and on what you found in the glasses (which rarely went beyond driblets and lemon), by night you dropped asleep standing, till you was cuffed awake, and by day was set to polishing every individual article in the coffee-room. Your couch being sawdust; your counterpane being ashes of cigars. Here, frequently hiding a heavy heart under the smart tie of your white neckankecher (or correctly speaking lower down and more to the left), you picked up the rudiments of knowledge from an extra, by the name of Bishops, and by calling plate-washer, and gradually elevating your mind with chalk on the back of the corner-box partition, until such time as you used the inkstand when it was out of hand, attained to manhood, and to be the Waiter that you find yourself.