Osborne was quite savage. The little governess patronized him and per siflé ‘dey him until this young British Lion felt quite uneasy; nor could he muster sufficient presence of mind to find a pretext for backing out of this most delectable conversation.
‘I thought you liked the City families pretty well,‘ he said, haughtily.
‘Last year you mean, when I was fresh from that horrid vulgar school? Of course I did. Doesn‘t every girl like to come home for the holidays? And how was I to know any better? But oh, Mr. Osborne, what a difference eighteen months‘ experience makes!—eighteen months spent, pardon me for saying so, with gentlemen. As for dear Amelia, she, I grant you, is a pearl, and would be charming anywhere. There now, I see you are beginning to be in a good humour; but oh, these queer odd City people ! And Mr. Jos—how is that wonderful Mr. Joseph?‘
‘It seems to me you didn‘t dislike that wonderful Mr. Joseph last year,‘ Osborne said, kindly.
‘How severe of you! Well, entre nous,ez I didn‘t break my heart about him; yet if he had asked me to do what you mean by your looks (and very expressive and kind they are, too), I wouldn‘t have said no.‘
Mr. Osborne gave a look as much as to say, ‘Indeed, how very obliging!‘
‘What an honour to have had you for a brother-in-law, you are thinking? To be sister-in-law to George Osborne, Esquire, son of John Osborne, Esquire, son of—what was your grandpapa, Mr. Osborne? Well, don‘t be angry. You can‘t help your pedigree, and I quite agree with you that I would have married Mr. Joe Sedley; for could a poor penniless girl do better? Now you know the whole secret. I‘m frank and open; and, considering all things, it was very kind of you to allude to the circumstance—very kind and polite. Amelia dear, Mr. Osborne and I were talking about your poor brother Joseph. How is he?‘
Thus was George utterly routed. Not that Rebecca was in the right; but she had managed most successfully to put him in the wrong. And he now shamefully fled, feeling, if he stayed another minute, that he would have been made to look foolish in the presence of Amelia.
Though Rebecca had had the better of him, George was above the meanness of tale-bearing or revenge upon a lady,—only he could not help cleverly confiding to Captain Crawley, next day, some notions of his regarding Miss Rebecca—that she was a sharp one, a dangerous one, a desperate flirt, &c.; in all of which opinions Crawley agreed laughingly, and with every one of which Miss Rebecca was made acquainted before twenty-four hours were over. They added to her original regard for Mr. Osborne. Her woman‘s instinct had told her that it was George who had interrupted the success of her first love-passage, and she esteemed him accordingly.
‘I only just warn you,‘ he said to Rawdon Crawley, with a knowing look—he had bought the horse, and lost some score of guineas after dinner, ‘I just warn you—I know women, and counsel you to be on the look-out.‘
‘Thank you, my boy,‘ said Crawley, with a look of peculiar gratitude. ‘You‘re wide awake, I see.‘ And George went off, thinking Crawley was quite right.
He told Amelia of what he had done, and how he had counselled Rawdon Crawley—a devilish good, straightforward fellow—to be on his guard against that little sly, scheming Rebecca.
‘Against whom?‘ Amelia cried.
‘Your friend the governess.—Don‘t look so astonished.‘
‘Oh, George, what have you done?‘ Amelia said. For her woman‘s eyes, which Love had made sharp-sighted, had in one instant discovered a secret which was invisible to Miss Crawley, to poor virgin Briggs, and, above all, to the stupid peepers of that young whiskered prig, Lieutenant Osborne.
For as Rebecca was shawling her in an upper apartment, where these two friends had an opportunity for a little of that secret talking and conspiring which forms the delight of female life, Amelia, coming up to Rebecca, and taking her two little hands in hers, said, ‘Rebecca, I see it all.‘
Rebecca kissed her.
And regarding this delightful secret, not one syllable more was said by either of the young women. But it was destined to come out before long.
Some short period after the above events, and Miss Rebecca Sharp still remaining at her patroness‘s house in Park Lane, one more hatchment might have been seen in Great Gaunt Street, figuring amongst the many which usually ornament that dismal quarter. It was over Sir Pitt Crawley‘s house; but it did not indicate the worthy baronet‘s demise. It was a feminine hatchment, and indeed a few years back had served as a funeral compliment to Sir Pitt‘s old mother, the late dowager Lady Crawley. Its period of service over, the hatchment had come down from the front of the house, and lived in retirement somewhere in the back premises of Sir Pitt‘s mansion. It reappeared now for poor Rose Dawson. Sir Pitt was a widower again. The arms quartered on the shield along with his own were not, to be sure, poor Rose‘s. She had no arms. But the cherubs painted on the scutcheon answered as well for her as for Sir Pitt‘s mother, and Resurgamfa was written under the coat, flanked by the Crawley Dove and Serpent. Arms and Hatchments, Resurgam.—Here is an opportunity for moralizing!
Mr. Crawley had tended that otherwise friendless bedside. She went out of the world strengthened by such words and comfort as he could give her. For many years his was the only kindness she ever knew; the only friendship that solaced in any way that feeble, lonely soul. Her heart was dead long before her body. She had sold it to become Sir Pitt Crawley‘s wife. Mothers and daughters are making the same bargain every day in Vanity Fair.
When the demise took place, her husband was in London attending to some of his innumerable schemes, and busy with his endless lawyers. He had found time, nevertheless, to call often in Park Lane, and to dispatch many notes to Rebecca, entreating her, enjoining her, commanding her to return to her young pupils in the country, who were now utterly without companionship during their mother‘s illness. But Miss Crawley would not hear of her departure; for though there was no lady of fashion in London who would desert her friends more complacently as soon as she was tired of their society, and though few tired of them sooner, yet as long as her engouement fb lasted her attachment was prodigious, and she clung still with the greatest energy to Rebecca.
The news of Lady Crawley‘s death provoked no more grief or comment than might have been expected in Miss Crawley‘s family circle. ‘I suppose I must put off my party for the 3rd,‘ Miss Crawley said; and added, after a pause, ‘I hope my brother will have the decency not to marry again.‘ ‘What a confounded rage Pitt will be in if he does,‘ Rawdon remarked, with his usual regard for his elder brother. Rebecca said nothing. She seemed by far the gravest and most impressed of the family. She left the room before Rawdon went away that day; but they met by chance below, as he was going away after taking leave, and had a parley together.
On the morrow, as Rebecca was gazing from the window, she startled Miss Crawley, who was placidly occupied with a French novel, by crying out in an alarmed tone, ‘Here‘s Sir Pitt, ma‘am!‘ and the baronet‘s knock followed this announcement.
‘My dear, I can‘t see him. I won‘t see him. Tell Bowls not at home, or go downstairs and say I‘m too ill to receive any one. My nerves really won‘t bear my brother at this moment;‘ cried out Miss Crawley, and resumed the novel.
‘She‘s too ill to see you, sir,‘ Rebecca said, tripping down to Sir Pitt, who was preparing to ascend.
‘So much the better,‘ Sir Pitt answered. ‘I want to see you, Miss Becky. Come along a me into the parlour,‘ and they entered that apartment together.
‘I wawnt you back at Queen‘s Crawley, miss,‘ the baronet said, fixing his eyes upon her, and taking off his black gloves and his hat with its great crape hatband. His eyes had such a strange look, and fixed upon her so steadfastly, that Rebecca Sharp began almost to tremble.
‘I hope to come soon,‘ she said in a low voice, ‘as soon as Miss Crawley is better—and return to—to the dear children.‘
‘You‘ve said so these three months, Becky,‘ replied Sir Pitt, ‘and still you go hanging on to my
sister, who‘ll fling you off like an old shoe, when she‘s wore you out. I tell you I want you. I‘m going back to the Vuneral. Will you come back? Yes or no.‘
‘I daren‘t—I don‘t think—it would be right—to be alone—with you, sir,‘ Becky said, seemingly in great agitation.
‘I say agin, I want you,‘ Sir Pitt said, thumping the table. ‘I can‘t git on without you. I didn‘t see what it was till you went away. The house all goes wrong. It‘s not the same place. All my accounts has got muddled agin. You must come back. Do come back. Dear Becky, do come.‘
‘Come—as what, sir?‘ Rebecca gasped out.
‘Come as Lady Crawley, if you like,‘ the baronet said, grasping his crape hat. ‘There! will that zatusfy you? Come back and be my wife. Your vit vor‘t. Birth be hanged. Your as good a lady as ever I see. You‘ve got more brains in your little vinger than any baronet‘s wife in the county. Will you come? Yes or no?‘
‘Oh, Sir Pitt!‘ Rebecca said, very much moved.
‘Say yes, Becky,‘ Sir Pitt continued. ‘I‘m an old man, but a good‘n. I‘m good for twenty years. I‘ll make you happy, zee if I don‘t. You shall do what you like; spend what you like; and ‘av it all your own way. I‘ll make you a zettlement. I‘ll do everything reglar. Look year!‘ and the old man fell down on his knees and leered at her like a satyr.
Rebecca started back a picture of consternation. In the course of this history we have never seen her lose her presence of mind; but she did now, and wept some of the most genuine tears that ever fell from her eyes.
‘Oh, Sir Pitt!‘ she said. ‘Oh, sir—I—I‘m married already.‘
CHAPTER XV
In Which Rebecca‘s Husband Appears for a Short Time
Every reader of a sentimental turn (and we desire no other) must have been pleased with the tableau with which the last act of our little drama concluded; for what can be prettier than an image of Love on his knees before Beauty?
But when Love heard that awful confession from Beauty that she was married already, he bounced up from his attitude of humility on the carpet, uttering exclamations which caused poor little Beauty to be more frightened than she was when she made her avowal. ‘Married; you‘re joking,‘ the baronet cried, after the first explosion of rage and wonder. ‘You‘re making vun of me, Becky. Who‘d ever go to marry you without a shilling to your vortune?‘
‘Married! married!‘ Rebecca said, in an agony of tears—her voice choking with emotion, her handkerchief up to her ready eyes, fainting against the mantelpiece—a figure of woe fit to melt the most obdurate heart. ‘Oh, Sir Pitt, dear Sir Pitt, do not think me ungrateful for all your goodness to me. It is only your generosity that has extorted my secret.‘
‘Generosity be hanged!‘ Sir Pitt roared out. ‘Who is it tu, then, you‘re married? Where was it?‘
‘Let me come back with you to the country, sir! Let me watch over you as faithfully as ever! Don‘t, don‘t separate me from dear Queen‘s Crawley!‘
‘The feller has left you, has he?‘ the baronet said, beginning, as he fancied, to comprehend. ‘Well, Becky—come back if you like. You can‘t eat your cake and have it. Any ways I made you a vair offer. Coom back as governess—you shall have it all your own way.‘ She held out one hand. She cried fit to break her heart; her ringlets fell over her face, and over the marble mantel-piece where she laid it.
‘So the rasca ran off, eh?‘ Sir Pitt said, with a hideous attempt at consolation. ‘Never mind, Becky, I‘ll take care of ‘ee.‘
‘Oh, sir! it would be the pride of my life to go back to Queen‘s Crawley, and take care of the children, and of you as formerly, when you said
you were pleased with the services of your little Rebecca. When I think of what you have just offered me, my heart fills with gratitude—indeed it does. I can‘t be your wife, sir; let me—let me be your daughter.‘
Saying which, Rebecca went down on her knees in a most tragical way, and taking Sir Pitt‘s horny black hand between her own two (which were very pretty and white, and as soft as satin), looked up in his face with an expression of exquisite pathos and confidence, when—when the door opened, and Miss Crawley sailed in.
Mrs. Firkin and Miss Briggs, who happened by chance to be at the parlour-door soon after the baronet and Rebecca entered the apartment, had also seen accidentally through the keyhole the old gentleman prostrate before the governess, and had heard the generous proposal which he made her. It was scarcely out of his mouth, when Mrs. Firkin and Miss Briggs had streamed up the stairs, had rushed into the drawing-room where Miss Crawley was reading the French novel, and had given that old lady the astounding intelligence that Sir Pitt was on his knees, proposing to Miss Sharp. And if you calculate the time for the above dialogue to take place—the time for Briggs and Firkin to fly to the drawing-room-the time for Miss Crawley to be astonished, and to drop her volume of Pigault le Brunfc—and the time for her to come downstairs—you will see how exactly accurate this history is, and how Miss Crawley must have appeared at the very instant when Rebecca had assumed the attitude of humility.
‘It is the lady on the ground, and not the gentleman,‘ Miss Crawley said, with a look and voice of great scorn. ‘They told me that you were on your knees, Sir Pitt: do kneel once more, and let me see this pretty couple!‘
‘I have thanked Sir Pitt Crawley, ma‘am,‘ Rebecca said, rising, ‘and have told him that—that I never can become Lady Crawley.‘
‘Refused him!‘ Miss Crawley said, more bewildered than ever. Briggs and Firkin at the door opened the eyes of astonishment and the lips of wonder.
‘Yes—refused,‘ Rebecca continued, with a sad, tearful voice.
‘And am I to credit my ears that you absolutely proposed to her, Sir Pitt?‘ the old lady asked.
‘Ees,‘ said the baronet, ‘I did.‘
‘And she refused you as she says?‘
‘Ees,‘ Sir Pitt said, his features on a broad grin.
‘It does not seem to break your heart at any rate,‘ Miss Crawley remarked.
‘Nawt a bit,‘ answered Sir Pitt, with a coldness and good humour which set Miss Crawley almost mad with bewilderment. That an old gentleman of station should fall on his knees to a penniless governess, and burst out laughing because she refused to marry him—that a penniless governess should refuse a baronet with four thousand a year,—these were mysteries which Miss Crawley could never comprehend. It surpassed any complications of intrigue in her favourite Pigault le Brun.
‘I‘m glad you think it good sport, brother,‘ she continued, groping wildly through this amazement.
‘Vamous,‘ said Sir Pitt. ‘Who‘d ha‘ thought it! what a sly little devil! what a little fox it waws!‘ he muttered to himself, chuckling with pleasure.
‘Who‘d have thought what?‘ cries Miss Crawley, stamping with her foot. ‘Pray, Miss Sharp, are you waiting for the Prince Regent‘s divorce, that you don‘t think our family good enough for you?‘
‘My attitude,‘ Rebecca said, ‘when you came in, ma‘am, did not look as if I despised such an honour as this good—this noble man has deigned to offer me. Do you think I have no heart? Have you all loved me, and been so kind to the poor orphan—deserted—girl, and am I to feel nothing? O my friends! O my benefactors! may not my love, my life, my duty, try to repay the confidence you have shown me? Do you grudge me even gratitude, Miss Crawley? It is too much—my heart is too full; ‘and she sank down in a chair so pathetically, that most of the audience present were perfectly melted with her sadness.
‘Whether you marry me or not, you‘re a good little girl, Becky, and I‘m your vriend, mind,‘ said Sir Pitt, and putting on his crape-bound hat, he walked away—greatly to Rebecca‘s relief; for it was evident that her secret was unrevealed to Miss Crawley, and she had the advantage of a brief reprieve.
Putting her handkerchief to her eyes, and nodding away honest Briggs, who would have followed her upstairs, she went up to her apartment; while Briggs and Miss Crawley, in a high state of exciteme
nt, remained to discuss the strange event, and Firkin, not less moved, dived down into the kitchen regions, and talked of it with all the male and female company there. And so impressed was Mrs. Firkin with the news, that she thought proper to write off by that very night‘s post, ‘with her humble duty to Mrs. Bute Crawley and the family at the Rectory, and Sir Pitt has been and proposed for to marry Miss Sharp, wherein she has refused him, to the wonder of all.‘
The two ladies in the dining-room (where worthy Miss Briggs was delighted to be admitted once more to a confidential conversation with her patroness) wondered to their hearts‘ content at Sir Pitt‘s offer, and Rebecca‘s refusal; Briggs very acutely suggesting that there must have been some obstacle in the shape of a previous attachment, otherwise no young woman in her senses would ever have refused so advantageous a proposal.
‘You would have accepted it yourself, wouldn‘t you, Briggs?‘ Miss Crawley said, kindly.
‘Would it not be a privilege to be Miss Crawley‘s sister?‘ Briggs replied, with meek evasion.
‘Well, Becky would have made a good Lady Crawley, after all,‘ Miss Crawley remarked (who was mollified by the girl‘s refusal, and very liberal and generous now there was no call for her sacrifices). ‘She has brains in plenty (much more wit in her little finger than you have, my poor dear Briggs, in all your head). Her manners are excellent, now I have formed her. She‘s a Montmorency, Briggs, and blood is something, though I despise it for my part; and she would have held her own amongst those pompous stupid Hampshire people much better than that unfortunate ironmonger‘s daughter.‘
Briggs coincided as usual, and the ‘previous attachment‘ was then discussed in conjectures. ‘You poor friendless creatures are always having some foolish tendre,‘fd Miss Crawley said. ‘You yourself, you know, were in love with a writing-master (don‘t cry, Briggs—you‘re always crying, and it won‘t bring him to life again), and I suppose this unfortunate Becky has been silly and sentimental too—some apothecary, or house-steward, or painter, or young curate, or something of that sort.‘
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