Masters of the Novella

by Delphi Classics

  “When I was last at home, I remember you consulted me as to the best mode of laying out a sum of money which was lying useless in your banker’s hands. I have since lost no opportunity of gaining what information I could: and situated here as I am, in the very midst of affairs, I believe, although very young, I am as good a person to apply to as many others of greater age and standing.

  “I frequently thought of mentioning to you our Association, but feelings of delicacy prevented me from doing so. I did not wish that anyone should suppose that a shadow of self-interest could move me in any way.

  “But I believe, without any sort of doubt, that the West Diddlesex Association offers the best security that you can expect for your capital, and, at the same time, the highest interest you can anywhere procure.

  “The situation of the Company, as I have it from the very best authority (underline that), is as follows: —

  “The subscribed and bonâ fide capital is five millions sterling.

  “The body of directors you know. Suffice it to say that the managing director is John Brough, Esq., of the firm of Brough and Hoff, a Member of Parliament, and a man as well known as Mr. Rothschild in the City of London. His private fortune, I know for a fact, amounts to half a million; and the last dividends paid to the shareholders of the I. W. D. Association amounted to 6.125 per cent. per annum.”

  [That I know was the dividend declared by us.]

  “Although the shares in the market are at a very great premium, it is the privilege of the four first clerks to dispose of a certain number, 5,000l. each at par; and if you, my dearest aunt, would wish for 2,500l. worth, I hope you will allow me to oblige you by offering you so much of my new privileges.

  “Let me hear from you immediately upon the subject, as I have already an offer for the whole amount of my shares at market price.”

  “But I haven’t, sir,” says I.

  “You have, sir. I will take the shares; but I want you. I want as many respectable persons in the Company as I can bring. I want you because I like you, and I don’t mind telling you that I have views of my own as well; for I am an honest man and say openly what I mean, and I’ll tell you why I want you. I can’t, by the regulations of the Company, have more than a certain number of votes, but if your aunt takes shares, I expect — I don’t mind owning it — that she will vote with me. Now do you understand me? My object is to be all in all with the Company; and if I be, I will make it the most glorious enterprise that ever was conducted in the City of London.”

  So I signed the letter and left it with Mr. B. to frank.

  The next day I went and took my place at the third clerk’s desk, being led to it by Mr. B., who made a speech to the gents, much to the annoyance of the other chaps, who grumbled about their services: though, as for the matter of that, our services were very much alike: the Company was only three years old, and the oldest clerk in it had not six months’ more standing in it than I. “Look out,” said that envious M’Whirter to me. “Have you got money, or have any of your relations money? or are any of them going to put it into the concern?”

  I did not think fit to answer him, but took a pinch out of his mull, and was always kind to him; and he, to say the truth, was always most civil to me. As for Gus Hoskins, he began to think I was a superior being; and I must say that the rest of the chaps behaved very kindly in the matter, and said that if one man were to be put over their heads before another, they would have pitched upon me, for I had never harmed any of them, and done little kindnesses to several.

  “I know,” says Abednego, “how you got the place. It was I who got it you. I told Brough you were a cousin of Preston’s, the Lord of the Treasury, had venison from him and all that; and depend upon it he expects that you will be able to do him some good in that quarter.”

  I think there was some likelihood in what Abednego said, because our governor, as we called him, frequently spoke to me about my cousin; told me to push the concern in the West End of the town, get as many noblemen as we could to insure with us, and so on. It was in vain I said I could do nothing with Mr. Preston. “Bah! bah!” says Mr. Brough, “don’t tell me. People don’t send haunches of venison to you for nothing;” and I’m convinced he thought I was a very cautious prudent fellow, for not bragging about my great family, and keeping my connection with them a secret. To be sure he might have learned the truth from Gus, who lived with me; but Gus would insist that I was hand in glove with all the nobility, and boasted about me ten times as much as I did myself.

  The chaps used to call me the “West Ender.”

  “See,” thought I, “what I have gained by Aunt Hoggarty giving me a diamond-pin! What a lucky thing it is that she did not give me the money, as I hoped she would! Had I not had the pin — had I even taken it to any other person but Mr. Polonius, Lady Drum would never have noticed me; had Lady Drum never noticed me, Mr. Brough never would, and I never should have been third clerk of the West Diddlesex.”

  I took heart at all this, and wrote off on the very evening of my appointment to my dearest Mary Smith, giving her warning that a “certain event,” for which one of us was longing very earnestly, might come off sooner than we had expected. And why not? Miss S.’s own fortune was 70l. a year, mine was 150l., and when we had 300l., we always vowed we would marry. “Ah!” thought I, “if I could but go to Somersetshire now, I might boldly walk up to old Smith’s door” (he was her grandfather, and a half-pay lieutenant of the navy), “I might knock at the knocker and see my beloved Mary in the parlour, and not be obliged to sneak behind hayricks on the look-out for her, or pelt stones at midnight at her window.”

  My aunt, in a few days, wrote a pretty gracious reply to my letter. She had not determined, she said, as to the manner in which she should employ her three thousand pounds, but should take my offer into consideration; begging me to keep my shares open for a little while, until her mind was made up.

  What, then, does Mr. Brough do? I learned afterwards, in the year 1830, when he and the West Diddlesex Association had disappeared altogether, how he had proceeded.

  “Who are the attorneys at Slopperton?” says he to me in a careless way.

  “Mr. Ruck, sir,” says I, “is the Tory solicitor, and Messrs. Hodge and Smithers the Liberals.” I knew them very well, for the fact is, before Mary Smith came to live in our parts, I was rather partial to Miss Hodge, and her great gold-coloured ringlets; but Mary came and soon put her nose out of joint, as the saying is.

  “And you are of what politics?”

  “Why, sir, we are Liberals.” I was rather ashamed of this, for Mr. Brough was an out-and-out Tory; but Hodge and Smithers is a most respectable firm. I brought up a packet from them to Hickson, Dixon, Paxton, and Jackson, our solicitors, who are their London correspondents.

  Mr. Brough only said, “Oh, indeed!” and did not talk any further on the subject, but began admiring my diamond-pin very much.

  “Titmarsh, my dear boy,” says he, “I have a young lady at Fulham who is worth seeing, I assure you, and who has heard so much about you from her father (for I like you, my boy, I don’t care to own it), that she is rather anxious to see you too. Suppose you come down to us for a week? Abednego will do your work.”

  “Law, sir! you are very kind,” says I.

  “Well, you shall come down; and I hope you will like my claret. But hark ye! I don’t think, my dear fellow, you are quite smart enough — quite well enough dressed. Do you understand me?”

  “I’ve my blue coat and brass buttons at home, sir.”

  “What! that thing with the waist between your shoulders that you wore at Mrs. Brough’s party?” (It was rather high-waisted, being made in the country two years before.) “No — no, that will never do. Get some new clothes, sir, — two new suits of clothes.”

  “Sir!” says I, “I’m already, if the truth must be told, very short of money for this quarter, and can’t afford myself a new suit for a long time to come.”

  “Pooh, pooh! don’t let that annoy you
. Here’s a ten-pound note — but no, on second thoughts, you may as well go to my tailor’s. I’ll drive you down there: and never mind the bill, my good lad!” And drive me down he actually did, in his grand coach-and-four, to Mr. Von Stiltz, in Clifford Street, who took my measure, and sent me home two of the finest coats ever seen, a dress-coat and a frock, a velvet waist-coat, a silk ditto, and three pairs of pantaloons, of the most beautiful make. Brough told me to get some boots and pumps, and silk stockings for evenings; so that when the time came for me to go down to Fulham, I appeared as handsome as any young nobleman, and Gus said that “I looked, by Jingo, like a regular tip-top swell.”

  In the meantime the following letter had been sent down to Hodge and Smithers: —

  “Ram Alley, Cornhill, London: July 1822.

  “Dear Sirs,

  * * * * *

  [This part being on private affairs relative to the cases of Dixon v. Haggerstony, Snodgrass v. Rubbidge and another, I am not permitted to extract.]

  * * * * *

  “Likewise we beg to hand you a few more prospectuses of the Independent West Diddlesex Fire and Life Insurance Company, of which we have the honour to be the solicitors in London. We wrote to you last year, requesting you to accept the Slopperton and Somerset agency for the same, and have been expecting for some time back that either shares or assurances should be effected by you.

  “The capital of the Company, as you know, is five millions sterling (say 5,000,000l.), and we are in a situation to offer more than the usual commission to our agents of the legal profession. We shall be happy to give a premium of 6 per cent. for shares to the amount of 1,000l., 6.5 per cent. above a thousand, to be paid immediately upon the taking of the shares.

  “I am, dear Sirs, for self and partners,

  Yours most faithfully,

  Samuel Jackson.”

  This letter, as I have said, came into my hands some time afterwards. I knew nothing of it in the year 1822, when, in my new suit of clothes, I went down to pass a week at the Rookery, Fulham, residence of John Brough, Esquire, M.P.

  CHAPTER VII

  HOW SAMUEL TITMARSH REACHED THE HIGHEST POINT OF PROSPERITY

  If I had the pen of a George Robins, I might describe the Rookery properly: suffice it, however, to say it is a very handsome country place; with handsome lawns sloping down to the river, handsome shrubberies and conservatories, fine stables, outhouses, kitchen-gardens, and everything belonging to a first-rate rus in urbe, as the great auctioneer called it when he hammered it down some years after.

  I arrived on a Saturday at half-an-hour before dinner: a grave gentleman out of livery showed me to my room; a man in a chocolate coat and gold lace, with Brough’s crest on the buttons, brought me a silver shaving-pot of hot water on a silver tray; and a grand dinner was ready at six, at which I had the honour of appearing in Von Stiltz’s dress-coat and my new silk stockings and pumps.

  Brough took me by the hand as I came in, and presented me to his lady, a stout fair-haired woman, in light blue satin; then to his daughter, a tall, thin, dark-eyed girl, with beetle-brows, looking very ill-natured, and about eighteen.

  “Belinda my love,” said her papa, “this young gentleman is one of my clerks, who was at our ball.”

  “Oh, indeed!” says Belinda, tossing up her head.

  “But not a common clerk, Miss Belinda, — so, if you please, we will have none of your aristocratic airs with him. He is a nephew of the Countess of Drum; and I hope he will soon be very high in our establishment, and in the city of London.”

  At the name of Countess (I had a dozen times rectified the error about our relationship), Miss Belinda made a low curtsey, and stared at me very hard, and said she would try and make the Rookery pleasant to any friend of Papa’s. “We have not much monde to-day,” continued Miss Brough, “and are only in petit comité; but I hope before you leave us you will see some société that will make your séjour agreeable.”

  I saw at once that she was a fashionable girl, from her using the French language in this way.

  “Isn’t she a fine girl?” said Brough, whispering to me, and evidently as proud of her as a man could be. “Isn’t she a fine girl — eh, you dog? Do you see breeding like that in Somersetshire?”

  “No, sir, upon my word!” answered I, rather slily; for I was thinking all the while how “Somebody” was a thousand times more beautiful, simple, and ladylike.

  “And what has my dearest love been doing all day?” said her papa.

  “Oh, Pa! I have pincéd the harp a little to Captain Fizgig’s flute. Didn’t I, Captain Fizgig?”

  Captain the Honourable Francis Fizgig said, “Yes, Brough, your fair daughter pincéd the harp, and touchéd the piano, and égratignéd the guitar, and écorchéd a song or two; and we had the pleasure of a promenade à l’eau, — of a walk upon the water.”

  “Law, Captain!” cries Mrs. Brough, “walk on the water?”

  “Hush, Mamma, you don’t understand French!” says Miss Belinda, with a sneer.

  “It’s a sad disadvantage, madam,” says Fizgig, gravely; “and I recommend you and Brough here, who are coming out in the great world, to have some lessons; or at least get up a couple of dozen phrases, and introduce them into your conversation here and there. I suppose, sir, you speak it commonly at the office, Mr. What you call it?” And Mr. Fizgig put his glass into his eye and looked at me.

  “We speak English, sir,” says I, “knowing it better than French.”

  “Everybody has not had your opportunities,” Miss Brough, continued the gentleman. “Everybody has not voyagé like nous autres, hey? Mais que voulez-vous, my good sir? you must stick to your cursed ledgers and things. What’s the French for ledger, Miss Belinda?”

  “How can you ask? Je n’en sçais rien, I’m sure.”

  “You should learn, Miss Brough,” said her father. “The daughter of a British merchant need not be ashamed of the means by which her father gets his bread. I’m not ashamed — I’m not proud. Those who know John Brough, know that ten years ago he was a poor clerk like my friend Titmarsh here, and is now worth half-a-million. Is there any man in the House better listened to than John Brough? Is there any duke in the land that can give a better dinner than John Brough; or a larger fortune to his daughter than John Brough? Why, sir, the humble person now speaking to you could buy out many a German duke! But I’m not proud — no, no, not proud. There’s my daughter — look at her — when I die, she will be mistress of my fortune; but am I proud? No! Let him who can win her, marry her, that’s what I say. Be it you, Mr. Fizgig, son of a peer of the realm; or you, Bill Tidd. Be it a duke or a shoeblack, what do I care, hey? — what do I care?”

  “O-o-oh!” sighed the gent who went by the name of Bill Tidd: a very pale young man, with a black riband round his neck instead of a handkerchief, and his collars turned down like Lord Byron. He was leaning against the mantelpiece, and with a pair of great green eyes ogling Miss Brough with all his might.

  “Oh, John — my dear John!” cried Mrs. Brough, seizing her husband’s hand and kissing it, “you are an angel, that you are!”

  “Isabella, don’t flatter me; I’m a man, — a plain downright citizen of London, without a particle of pride, except in you and my daughter here — my two Bells, as I call them! This is the way that we live, Titmarsh my boy: ours is a happy, humble, Christian home, and that’s all. Isabella, leave go my hand!”

  “Mamma, you mustn’t do so before company; it’s odious!” shrieked Miss B.; and Mamma quietly let the hand fall, and heaved from her ample bosom a great large sigh. I felt a liking for that simple woman, and a respect for Brough too. He couldn’t be a bad man, whose wife loved him so.

  Dinner was soon announced, and I had the honour of leading in Miss B., who looked back rather angrily, I thought, at Captain Fizgig, because that gentleman had offered his arm to Mrs. Brough. He sat on the right of Mrs. Brough, and Miss flounced down on the seat next to him, leaving me and Mr. Tidd to take our places at the opposite
side of the table.

  At dinner there was turbot and soup first, and boiled turkey afterwards of course. How is it that at all the great dinners they have this perpetual boiled turkey? It was real turtle-soup: the first time I had ever tasted it; and I remarked how Mrs. B., who insisted on helping it, gave all the green lumps of fat to her husband, and put several slices of the breast of the bird under the body, until it came to his turn to be helped.

  “I’m a plain man,” says John, “and eat a plain dinner. I hate your kickshaws, though I keep a French cook for those who are not of my way of thinking. I’m no egotist, look you; I’ve no prejudices; and Miss there has her béchamels and fallals according to her taste. Captain, try the volly-vong.”

  We had plenty of champagne and old madeira with dinner, and great silver tankards of porter, which those might take who chose. Brough made especially a boast of drinking beer; and, when the ladies retired, said, “Gentlemen, Tiggins will give you an unlimited supply of wine: there’s no stinting here;” and then laid himself down in his easy-chair and fell asleep.

  “He always does so,” whispered Mr. Tidd to me.

  “Get some of that yellow-sealed wine, Tiggins,” says the Captain. “That other claret we had yesterday is loaded, and disagrees with me infernally!”

  I must say I liked the yellow seal much better than Aunt Hoggarty’s Rosolio.

  I soon found out what Mr. Tidd was, and what he was longing for.

  “Isn’t she a glorious creature?” says he to me.

  “Who, sir?” says I.

  “Miss Belinda, to be sure!” cried Tidd. “Did mortal ever look upon eyes like hers, or view a more sylph-like figure?”

  “She might have a little more flesh, Mr. Tidd,” says the Captain, “and a little less eyebrow. They look vicious, those scowling eyebrows, in a girl. Qu’en dites-vous, Mr. Titmarsh, as Miss Brough would say?”

  “I think it remarkably good claret, sir,” says I.

  “Egad, you’re the right sort of fellow!” says the Captain. “Volto sciolto, eh? You respect our sleeping host yonder?”