"Say no more--say no more. They are the finest critics in the world. If you please them it is enough. Why should I not engage you, myself?"
"You--engage--me? You--Madame?"
"Friend Will," she laid her hand on mine, "there are reasons why I wish you well and would stand by you if I could. I will tell you, another day, what those reasons are. Let me treat you as a friend. When we are alone, I am not Madame: I am Jenny."
There are some women who if they said such a thing as this, would be taken as declaring the pa.s.sion of love. No one could look at Jenny"s face which was all simplicity and candour and entertain the least suspicion of such a thing.
"Nay, I can only marvel," I said. For I still thought that I was talking to some great lady. "I think that I must be dreaming."
"Since you know not where you are, this is the Soho a.s.sembly and I am Madame Vallance."
I seemed to have heard of Madame Vallance.
"You know nothing. That is because you have been in the King"s Bench. I will now tell you, what n.o.body else knows, that Madame Vallance is Jenny Wilmot. I have left the stage, for a time, to avoid a certain person.
Here, if I go among the company, I can wear a domino and remain unknown.
Do you know nothing about us? We have masquerades, galas, routs--everything. Come with me. I will show you my Ball Room."
She led me up the grand staircase from the Hall into a most n.o.ble room.
On the walls were hung many mirrors: between the mirrors were painted Cupids and flowers: rout seats were placed all round the room: the hanging candelabra contained hundreds of candles: at one end stood a music gallery.
"Will," she said, "go upstairs and play me something."
I obeyed.
I found an instrument, which I tuned. Then I stood up in the gallery and played.
She stood below listening. "Well played!" she cried. "Now play me a dance tune. See if you can make me dance."
I played a tune which I had often played to the jolly sailors. I know not what it is called. It is one of those tunes which run in at the ears and down to the heels which it makes as light as a feather and as quick silver for nimbleness. In a minute she was dancing--with such grace, such spirit, such quickness of motion, as if every limb was without weight. And her fair face smiling and her blue eyes dancing!--never was there such a figure of grace: as for the step, it was as if invented on the spot, but I believe that she had learned it. Afraid of tiring her, I laid down the violin and descended into the hall.
She gave me both her hands. "Will," she said. "You will make my fortune if you consent to join my orchestra. There never was such playing. Those sailors! How could they let you go? Now listen. I can pay you thirty shillings. Will you come? The Treasury pays every Sat.u.r.day morning. You shall have, besides, four weeks in advance. Spend it in generous food after your long Lent. Say--Will you accept?"
"It is too much, Jenny." I took her hand and kissed it. "First you take me out of prison: then you give me the means of living. How can I thank you sufficiently? How repay----"
"There is nothing to repay. I will tell you another time why I take an interest in you."
"When the most beautiful woman in the world----"
"Stop, Will. I warn you. There must be no love-making." I suppose she saw the irresistible admiration in my eyes. "Oh! I am not angry. But compliments of that kind generally lead to love-making. They all try it, but it is quite useless--now," she added with a sigh. "And you, of all men, must not."
I made no reply, not knowing what to say.
"There is another face in your home, Will, that is far more beautiful than mine. Think of that face. Enough said."
"I protest----" I began.
She laid her hand upon my lips. "There must be no compliments," she said. Her voice was severe but her smiling eyes forgave.
I left her and hastened home with dancing feet.
I was returning with an engagement of thirty shillings a week: I had four weeks" pay in my pocket: Fortune once more smiled upon me: I ran in and kissed my wife with an alacrity and a cheerfulness which rejoiced her as much as it astonished her. I threw down the money. "Take it, my dear," I said. "There is more to come. We are saved again. Oh! Alice--we are saved--and by the same hand as before."
"I have heard of Madame Vallance," said Tom, presently. "She comes from no one knows where: she keeps herself secluded: at the a.s.semblies she always wears a mask: the people say she is generous: some think she is rich: others that the expense of the place must break her."
"I hope she is another Croesus," I said. "I hope that the River of Pactolus will flow into her lap. I hope she will inherit the mines of Golgonda. I hope she will live a thousand years and marry a Prince. And we will drink her health in a bowl of punch this very night."
CHAPTER III
THE MASQUERADE
I commenced my duties in the music gallery on one of the nights devoted to the amus.e.m.e.nt called the Masquerade. It was an amus.e.m.e.nt new to me and to all except those who can afford to spend five guineas, besides the purchase of a dress, on the pleasure of a single night. I understand the Masquerade has taken a great hold upon the fashionable world and upon those who have money to spend and are eager for the excitement of a new pleasure. "Give--give" is the cry of those who live, day by day, for the pleasure of the moment.
Truly in a Masquerade there is everything; the novelty or the beauty of the disguise: the music: the dancing: the revelry after supper: the gambling: the pursuit of beauty in disguise--it is wonderful to reflect, in the quiet corner of the earth in which I write, that, across the Atlantic, in London City, there are thousands who are never happy save when they are crowded together, seeking such excitement as is afforded by the masquerade, the a.s.sembly, the promenade and the pleasure garden.
Here we have no such excitements and we want none: life for us flows in a tranquil stream: for them it flows away in waterfalls and cataracts, leaping to the sea.
Madame managed her masquerades as she did everything, with the greatest care: she arranged everything: the selection of the music: the decorations: the supper: even the chalking of the floor. The doors were thrown open at eleven. Long before that hour the Square was filled with people, some were come to see the fashionable throng arrive--the fine dresses of the ladies and the masquerading of the men. Some were come to pick the pockets of the others. There was no confusion: the hackney coaches and the chairs were directed by Madame"s servants, who stood outside, to arrive by one road and to depart by another. Thus, one after the other, without quarrelling or fighting, drove to the doors, deposited their company and departed. The same order was observed in the departure.
For my own part, as there was nothing to do before eleven, I amused myself by going round and seeing the rooms all lit up with candles in sconces or by candelabra and painted with flowers and fruit and Cupids even to the ceiling, and hung with costly curtains. It is a large and s.p.a.cious house, of commanding appearance, built by an Earl of Carlisle.
There is a grand staircase, broad and stately: when a well-dressed Company are going up and down it looks like the staircase of a Palace: on the landing I found flowers in pots and bushes in tubs which gave the place a rural appearance and so might lead the thoughts of the visitor insensibly into the country. There are a great many rooms in the original House which has been very handsomely increased by the addition of two large chambers, one above the other, built out at the back, over part of the garden. One of these new rooms was the Ball Room which I have already mentioned. The other room below it, equally large but not so high, was used as the supper-room. It had its walls painted with dancing Satyrs and Fauns: gilded pilasters, raised an inch or so, relieved the flatness of the wall. This was the supper-room: for the moment it had nothing in it but long narrow tables arranged down the room in rows: the servants were already beginning to spread upon them the napery and lay the knives and forks for supper.
On the ground-floor on the right hand of the entrance hall was a large room used as a card room. Here stood a long table covered with a green cloth for the players of those games which require a Bank or a large company. They are Hazard, Lansquenet, Loo, Faro, and I know not how many more. But, whatever their names, they all mean the same thing and only one thing, viz., gambling. Along the wall on either side were small tables for parties of two or four, who came to play Quadrille, Whist, Piquet, Ecarte, and the like--games more dangerous to the young and the beginner than the more noisy gambling of the crowd. Candles stood on all the small tables and down the middle of the great table: there were also candles in sconces on the wall. As yet none of them were lit.
While I was looking round the empty room, Madame herself came in dressed in white satin, and carrying her domino in her hand.
"I look into every room," she said, "before the doors are open: but into this room I look two or three times every evening."
"You come to look at the players?"
"I have a particular reason for coming here. I will tell you some time or other--perhaps to-night, Will. If so, it will be the greatest surprise of your life--the very greatest surprise. Yes--I watch the players. Their faces amuse me. When I see a man losing time after time, and remaining calm and unmoved, I say to myself, "There is a gentleman."
Play is the finest test of good breeding. When a man curses his luck; curses his neighbour for bringing him bad luck; bangs the table with his fist; and calls upon all the G.o.ds to smite him dead, I say to myself, "That is a city spark.""
"I fear I am a city spark."
"When I see two sitting together at a table quiet and alone I ask myself which is the sharper and which is the flat. By watching them for a few minutes I can always find out--one of them always is the sharper, you see, and the other always the flat. And if you watch them for a few minutes you can always find out. Beware of this room, Will. Be neither sharper nor flat."
She turned and went off to see some other room.
Looking out at the back I saw that the garden had been hung with coloured lamps, and looked gay and bright. It was a warm fine evening: there would be many who would choose the garden for a promenade. Other rooms there were: the Blue Room: the Star Room: the Red Room: the Chinese Room: I know not what, nor for what they were all used.
But the time approached. I climbed up the steep stairs and took my place in the music gallery, where already most of the orchestra were a.s.sembled: like them I tuned my violin, and then waited the arrival of the Company.
They came by tickets which included supper. Each ticket cost five guineas, and admitted one gentleman or two ladies including supper. It seems a monstrous price for a single evening; but the cost of the entertainment was enormous. The ticket itself was a beautiful thing representing Venus with Cupids. They were gazing with interest upon a Nymph lying beside a fountain. She had, as yet, nothing upon her, and she was apparently engaged in thinking what she would wear for the evening. A pretty thing, prettily drawn. But five guineas for a single evening!
As soon as the doors were thrown open, a line of footmen received the company, took their tickets and showed them into the tea-room where that refreshment was offered before the ball commenced. When this room was full, the doors leading to the ball-rooms and the other rooms were also thrown open, and the company streamed along the great gallery which was lined with flowering shrubs. Here was stationed a small string band playing soft and pleasing music. Then they crowded up the Grand staircase. When most of the masqueraders were within the Ball-room, and before they had done looking about them and crying out for astonishment at the mirrors and the candelabra and the lights, we struck up the music in the gallery, and as soon as order was a little restored, the minuets began.