He roat as many noats as she had done befor; swoar against delay and cerymony; talked of the pleasures of Hyming, the ardship that the ardor of two arts should be allowed to igspire, the folly of waiting for the consent of Lady Griffin. She was but a step-mother, and an unkind one.
Miss was (he said) a major, might marry whom she liked; and suttnly had paid Lady G. quite as much attention as she ought, by paying her the compliment to ask her at all.
And so they went on. The curious thing was, that when master was pressed about his cause for not coming out till night-time, he was misterus; and Miss Griffin, when asked why she wooden marry, igsprest, or rather, DIDN"T igspress, a simlar secrasy. Wasn"t it hard? the cup seemed to be at the lip of both of "em, and yet somehow, they could not manitch to take a drink.
But one morning, in reply to a most desprat epistol wrote by my master over night, Deuceace, delighted, gits an answer from his soal"s beluffd, which ran thus:--
MISS GRIFFIN TO THE HON. A. P. DEUCEACE.
"DEAREST,--You say you would share a cottage with me; there is no need, luckily, for that! You plead the sad sinking of your spirits at our delayed union. Beloved, do you think MY heart rejoices at our separation? You bid me disregard the refusal of Lady Griffin, and tell me that I owe her no further duty.
"Adored Algernon! I can refuse you no more. I was willing not to lose a single chance of reconciliation with this unnatural step-mother. Respect for the memory of my sainted father bid me do all in my power to gain her consent to my union with you: nay, shall I own it? prudence dictated the measure; for to whom should she leave the share of money accorded to her by my father"s will but to my father"s child.
"But there are bounds beyond which no forbearance can go; and, thank heaven, we have no need of looking to Lady Griffin for sordid wealth: we have a competency without her. Is it not so, dearest Algernon?
"Be it as you wish, then, dearest, bravest, and best. Your poor Matilda has yielded to you her heart long ago; she has no longer need to keep back her name. Name the hour, and I will delay no more; but seek for refuge in your arms from the contumely and insult which meet me ever here.
"MATILDA.
"P.S. Oh, Algernon! if you did but know what a n.o.ble part your dear father has acted throughout, in doing his best endeavors to further our plans, and to soften Lady Griffin! It is not his fault that she is inexorable as she is. I send you a note sent by her to Lord Crabs; we will laugh at it soon, n"est-ce pas?"
II.
"MY LORD,--In reply to your demand for Miss Griffin"s hand, in favor of your son, Mr. Algernon Deuceace, I can only repeat what I before have been under the necessity of stating to you,--that I do not believe a union with a person of Mr. Deuceace"s character would conduce to my stepdaughter"s happiness, and therefore REFUSE MY CONSENT. I will beg you to communicate the contents of this note to Mr. Deuceace; and implore you no more to touch upon a subject which you must be aware is deeply painful to me.
"I remain your lordship"s most humble servant,
"L. E. GRIFFIN.
"THE RIGHT HON. THE EARL OF CRABS."
"Hang her ladyship!" says my master, "what care I for it?" As for the old lord who"d been so afishous in his kindness and advice, master recknsiled that pretty well, with thinking that his lordship knew he was going to marry ten thousand a year, and igspected to get some share of it; for he roat back the following letter to his father, as well as a flaming one to Miss:
"Thank you, my dear father, for your kindness in that awkward business.
You know how painfully I am situated just now, and can pretty well guess BOTH THE CAUSES of my disquiet. A marriage with my beloved Matilda will make me the happiest of men. The dear girl consents, and laughs at the foolish pretensions of her mother-in-law. To tell you the truth, I wonder she yielded to them so long. Carry your kindness a step further, and find for us a parson, a license, and make us two into one. We are both major, you know; so that the ceremony of a guardian"s consent is unnecessary.
"Your affectionate
"ALGERNON DEUCEACE.
"How I regret that difference between us some time back! Matters are changed now, and shall be more still AFTER THE MARRIAGE."
I knew what my master meant,--that he would give the old lord the money after he was married; and as it was probble that miss would see the letter he roat, he made it such as not to let her see two clearly into his present uncomfrable situation.
I took this letter along with the tender one for Miss, reading both of "em, in course, by the way. Miss, on getting hers, gave an inegspressable look with the white of her i"s, kist the letter, and prest it to her busm. Lord Crabs read his quite calm, and then they fell a-talking together; and told me to wait awhile, and I should git an anser.
After a deal of counseltation, my lord brought out a card, and there was simply written on it,
To-morrow, at the Amba.s.sador"s, at Twelve.
"Carry that back to your master, Chawls," says he, "and bid him not to fail."
You may be sure I stept back to him pretty quick, and gave him the card and the messinge. Master looked sattasfied with both; but suttnly not over happy; no man is the day before his marridge; much more his marridge with a hump-back, Harriss though she be.
Well, as he was a-going to depart this bachelor life, he did what every man in such suckmstances ought to do; he made his will,--that is, he made a dispasition of his property, and wrote letters to his creditors telling them of his lucky chance; and that after his marridge he would sutnly pay them every stiver. BEFORE, they must know his povvaty well enough to be sure that paymint was out of the question.
To do him justas, he seam"d to be inclined to do the thing that was right, now that it didn"t put him to any inkinvenients to do so.
"Chawls," says he, handing me over a tenpun-note, "here"s your wagis, and thank you for getting me out of the sc.r.a.pe with the bailiffs: when you are married, you shall be my valet out of liv"ry, and I"ll treble your salary."
His vallit! praps his butler! Yes, thought I, here"s a chance--a vallit to ten thousand a year. Nothing to do but to shave him, and read his notes, and let my whiskers grow; to dress in spick and span black, and a clean shut per day; m.u.f.fings every night in the housekeeper"s room; the pick of the gals in the servants" hall; a chap to clean my boots for me, and my master"s opera bone reglar once a week. I knew what a vallit was as well as any genlmn in service; and this I can tell you, he"s genrally a hapier, idler, handsomer, mor genlmnly man than his master. He has more money to spend, for genlmn WILL leave their silver in their waistcoat pockets; more suxess among the gals; as good dinners, and as good wine--that is, if he"s friends with the butler: and friends in corse they will be if they know which way their interest lies.
But these are only ca.s.sels in the air, what the French call shutter d"Espang. It wasn"t roat in the book of fate that I was to be Mr.
Deuceace"s vallit.
Days will pa.s.s at last--even days befor a wedding, (the longist and unpleasantist day in the whole of a man"s life, I can tell you, excep, may be, the day before his hanging); and at length Aroarer dawned on the suspicious morning which was to unite in the bonds of Hyming the Honrable Algernon Percy Deuceace, Exquire, and Miss Matilda Griffin. My master"s wardrobe wasn"t so rich as it had been; for he"d left the whole of his nicknax and trumpry of dressing-cases and rob dy shams, his bewtifle museum of varnished boots, his curous colleckshn of Stulz and Staub coats, when he had been ableaged to quit so suddnly our pore dear lodginx at the Hotel Mirabew; and being incog at a friend"s house, ad contentid himself with ordring a coople of shoots of cloves from a common tailor, with a suffishnt quantaty of linning.
Well, he put on the best of his coats--a blue; and I thought it my duty to ask him whether he"d want his frock again: he was good natured and said, "Take it and be hanged to you." Half-past eleven o"clock came, and I was sent to look out at the door, if there were any suspicious charicters (a precious good nose I have to find a bailiff out, I can tell you, and an i which will almost see one round a corner); and presenly a very modest green gla.s.s coach droave up, and in master stept. I didn"t in corse, appear on the box; because, being known, my appearints might have compromised master. But I took a short cut, and walked as quick as posbil down to the Rue de Foburg St. Honore, where his exlnsy the English ambasdor lives, and where marridges are always performed betwigst English folk at Paris.
There is, almost nex door to the ambasdor"s hotel, another hotel, of that lo kind which the French call cabbyrays, or wine-houses; and jest as master"s green gla.s.s-coach pulled up, another coach drove off, out of which came two ladies, whom I knew pretty well,--suffiz, that one had a humpback, and the ingenious reader will know why SHE came there; the other was poor Miss Kicksey, who came to see her turned off.
Well, master"s gla.s.s-coach droav up, jest as I got within a few yards of the door; our carridge, I say, droav up, and stopt. Down gits coachmin to open the door, and comes I to give Mr. Deuceace an arm, when out of the cabaray shoot four fellows, and draw up betwigst the coach and emba.s.sy-doar; two other chaps go to the other doar of the carridge, and, opening it, one says--"Rendez-vous, M. Deuceace! Je vous arrete au nom de la loi!" (which means, "Get out of that, Mr. D.; you are nabbed and no mistake.") Master turned gashly pail, and sprung to the other side of the coach, as if a serpint had stung him. He flung open the door, and was for making off that way; but he saw the four chaps standing betwigst libbarty and him. He slams down the front window, and screams out, "Fouettez, cocher!" (which means, "Go it, coachmm!") in a despert loud voice; but coachmin wooden go it, and besides was off his box.
The long and short of the matter was, that jest as I came up to the door two of the b.u.ms jumped into the carridge. I saw all; I knew my duty, and so very mornfly I got up behind.
"Tiens," says one of the chaps in the street; "c"est ce drole qui nous a floure l"autre jour." I knew "em, but was too melumcolly to smile.
"Ou irons-nous donc?" says coachmin to the genlmn who had got inside.
A deep woice from the intearor shouted out, in reply to the coachmin, "A SAINTE PELAGIE!"
And now, praps, I ot to dixcribe to you the humors of the prizn of Sainte Pelagie, which is the French for Fleat, or Queen"s Bentch: but on this subject I"m rather shy of writing, partly because the admiral Boz has, in the history of Mr. Pickwick, made such a dixcripshun of a prizn, that mine wooden read very amyousingly afterwids; and, also, because, to tell you the truth, I didn"t stay long in it, being not in a humer to waist my igsistance by pa.s.sing away the ears of my youth in such a dull place.
My fust errint now was, as you may phansy, to carry a noat from master to his destined bride. The poar thing was sadly taken aback, as I can tell you, when she found, after remaining two hours at the Emba.s.sy, that her husband didn"t make his appearance. And so, after staying on and on, and yet seeing no husband, she was forsed at last to trudge dishconslit home, where I was already waiting for her with a letter from my master.
There was no use now denying the fact of his arrest, and so he confest it at onst: but he made a c.o.c.k-and-bull story of treachery of a friend, infimous fodgery, and heaven knows what. However, it didn"t matter much; if he had told her that he had been betrayed by the man in the moon, she would have bleavd him.
Lady Griffin never used to appear now at any of my visits. She kep one drawing-room, and Miss dined and lived alone in another; they quarld so much that praps it was best they should live apart; only my Lord Crabs used to see both, comforting each with that winning and innsnt way he had. He came in as Miss, in tears, was lisning to my account of master"s seazure, and hoping that the prisn wasn"t a horrid place, with a nasty horrid dunjeon, and a dreadfle jailer, and nasty horrid bread and water.
Law bless us! she had borrod her ideers from the novvles she had been reading!