"The never a doubt on"t, madam," rejoined Mr Caleb. "Loneliness is poor company; and I would marry to-morrow, were it for nothing else than to produce some stir of life in my deserted house."
"And, for society"s sake, I would almost be tempted to change condition, too," rejoined she, rising to put past the policy and conceal her blushes.
Unluckily, at this interesting moment, an acquaintance entered, and put an end to a conversation that was clearly tending towards a crisis, to which the boldness of Mr Caleb would soon have brought it. But enough had been said to dream upon; and by the time that the two met next day in the woods, the matter had been arranged in the minds of both. The question was "popped," a gracious answer returned, and, as Caleb had clearly induced her to believe, without any direct statement, that he had not a single child to mar Mrs Jemima"s happiness, he saw the necessity of getting the transaction concluded without the loss of a moment of time, lest discoveries might break it up. But the widow was just as anxious for quick despatch as he was; and he did not fail to take advantage of so favourable a circ.u.mstance. So to Perth he went, and got all things put in readiness for a proclamation of banns. This preliminary was gone through on the following Sunday; on the Monday after, Mr Caleb Crabbin and Mrs Jemima Bowsie were man and wife; and thus had Caleb disposed of himself, for the third time, on terms which he conceived to form the elements of a good bargain.
These matters we have run over rapidly, leaving it, of course, to be understood that several explanations--such as the localities of their locked-up houses, their connections, and so forth, were mutually made and mutually relied on; and it becomes us, in the same manner, to leave to the fancy all the pretty excursions and conversations that lasted for the legitimate period of the sweet moon, at the end of which the couple arrived in Edinburgh to take possession of the husband"s deserted house.
And, to be sure, the house was empty enough, in so far as regarded human beings; for there was no one in it, and Mrs Jemima Crabbin surveyed it as her future home with no small expression of satisfaction. A new servant was got. A week pa.s.sed, and all was as it should be--not a word of the six children having, as yet, been uttered by Caleb, and no one of the neighbours having taken it upon them to supply the want of knowledge which Caleb conceived to be necessary to a continuation of his happiness. On the eighth day, they went out together to draw the quarterly annuity from the agent of the Atlas Company; and never was a man better pleased with himself than Caleb, when he pocketed the thirty-seven pounds ten shillings, the first earnest of many drawings, even so long as the life of his helpmate. This was clearly not fated to last; because it behoved Caleb to make the necessary disclosure, to prevent its being made, perhaps, in a manner fraught with more pain to her who apparently looked forward to a life of genteel ease. It was clear that the sooner the disclosure was made the better; and a stronger cup of tea than usual (brewed on the head of the quarter"s annuity) having been served up, he sat ruminating on the best way of breaking the intelligence.
"What are you thinking of, Mr Crabbin?" said the lady, as she sat filling out the first cup of tea, and while the door stood open that the servant might bring in the toast.
"There he is, you little darlings," said Mrs Reddie of Pennicuick, as she entered; and at the same instant Master Caleb Reddie Crabbin, Master Andrew Reddie Crabbin, and Miss Maria Reddie Crabbin, rushed forward with a united cry of "Papa! papa! papa!" and hung round his neck, and jumped on his knee, with a demonstration of affection that a father, in ordinary circ.u.mstances, would have been delighted to see.
"I couldna keep them awa, sir," said the woman. "They would be in, reason or nane."
Mrs Crabbin sat with the teapot in her hand, held nearly as high as her mouth, and contemplated the affectionate scene, with open lips and wide staring eyes; but never a word had Mr Caleb said, though the dear little ones hugged him more fondly than ever.
"Are these your children, Mr Crabbin?" at last said the wife.
Caleb looked at her, and saw something like a smile playing round the corner of her lips, in the midst of sufficient indications of surprise; but the meaning thereof transcended all his powers of construction.
"The children, you hear, say I"m their father," replied he, still gazing in her face, to try if he could catch again the same symptom he had observed before; and, to be sure, he did catch it, and, with it, another symptom that astonished him more still; for Mrs Crabbin immediately e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed--
"Why did you not tell me of this, Mr Crabbin? What nice, dear, sweet creatures! I"m delighted to see them. Come to me, George; come to me, Andrew; and, Maria, you are the prettiest little girl in the world."
"What an amiable wife I have got!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed he, as he saw her take the little ones and fondle them as kindly as if they had been her own.
"When saw ye the others," said Mrs Reddie--"George, Amelia, and Augustus? Are they weel aneugh?"
"Three more!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mrs Crabbin.
And Caleb again searched her face, to see if there was not some irony lurking about the muscles; but the never a trace could he find but satisfaction. He was puzzled as never man was puzzled since the days of OEdipus.
"Have I been at all these pains," muttered he, "to conceal what yields her pleasure rather than chagrin?"
"Now, Mr Crabbin," said his wife, as she still fondled the children, "you must send to-morrow for the others, that I may see them; for I long to show them that I shall be as kind to them as would have been their own mother."
"The never such another woman is to be found in all Christendom!"
muttered Caleb.
"Jenny," cried Mrs Crabbin, "bring cups here, that the children may have their tea."
And so the cups were brought; and the whole group, Mrs Reddie--whose mouth had been closed up by the effect of the extraordinary scene--included, sat down in the most perfect harmony.
On the very next day, a messenger was sent off for Master George Reddie Crabbin, Miss Amelia Reddie Crabbin, and Master Augustus Reddie Crabbin; and they were expected to arrive at the house of their father within three days afterwards. Meanwhile, Mrs Crabbin displayed still the same degree of kindness she had at first exhibited; and Caleb continued to wonder more and more at conduct that seemed to set at defiance all the matrimonial maxims he had got proved to him by the many women he had solicited to become his wife. Nor can there be a doubt that he was pleased--if, indeed, it might not be said that he was delighted; for it cannot be denied that the weight of the secret he had carried about had materially interfered with his connubial happiness; and even the light of the honeymoon had been dashed with streaks of shade, thrown up from the cavern where the dread fact had lain concealed.
On the day on which the additional children were expected, Mrs Crabbin was occupied in making preparations for their home-coming. A thousand little matters were gone about with maternal a.s.siduity; and, everything having been arranged, the couple and the three children sat down to tea, much in the same spirit they had done on the previous occasion. It was about five o"clock; and the coach would arrive somewhere about that time.
"Here they come at last," said Caleb, as he listened to a tread of many steps on the stair, accompanied by the clear clack of the tongues of happy children.
And, to be sure, in they came; but there happened to be no fewer than five, accompanied by an old nurse; and they had no sooner entered, than they ran forward to Mrs Crabbin, crying out "Mamma! mamma! mamma!" all together, and hanging round her neck, and kissing her, and climbing on her knees, just in the same affectionate manner that had been exhibited by Mr Crabbin"s children on the prior occasion.
Meanwhile, Mrs Jemima Crabbin was busy with the face of Mr Caleb, to see what she could find there; but the man, who never had any great sense of justice, showed no smile, as she had done when _his_ children came so unexpectedly in upon her. A sombre gloom covered his face, and he sat and looked as glum as he did on every occasion when Mrs Amelia Crabbin had brought him a child; and, probably, if there had been any deeper shade, or rather five times as deep as that expression, it would have found a place upon his face.
"Are all these your children, madam?" said Caleb, with a voice that expressed with the question a tendency to choke.
"Yes," answered Mrs Crabbin; "but you see, my dear sir, you beat me; for, while I have only five, you have six."
"Eleven of a family to support on two thousand pounds of princ.i.p.al, at four per cent., and one hundred and fifty per annum on the life of Mrs Jemima Crabbin!" groaned Mr Caleb. "A deuced poor trafficker I am proved to be! Would I not have been better as a hosier?"
"A hosier!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mrs Crabbin. "I took you for a gentleman, as Mr Frederick Bowsie was, every inch of him."
"And I took you for a solitary widow, as you led me to believe,"
responded he.
"And so, to be sure, I took you for a solitary widower, carrying the key of your house in your pocket, as you previously told me," was the just reply.
At this juncture the conversation was interrupted by the entrance of the other three Crabbins, who acted over again the scene of their brothers and sister; and thus there were brought on the carpet no fewer than eleven of a family, one-half strangers to their half-brothers and sisters, and all talking, and laughing, and romping in a manner that might have afforded no small joy to well-conditioned parents. Yet Mr Caleb was not to be cajoled by their fun into anything like good humour, for no man likes to behold the evidence of the almost total defeat of a darling project, which he had held to be the pride and profit of his existence. Nor was the bringing of eight more tea-cups, instantly ordered by Mrs Crabbin, likely to effect what the romping of the "dear ones" had not been able to accomplish; and it is impossible to say how long he would have remained under the cloud of his gloom, had not Mrs Crabbin risen, and, going round to him by the backs of the circle of children, gently and playfully clapped him on the hanging clouded cheek.
"Come, now, Mr Crabbin," said she, "you see we are just in the position of the pot and kettle that fell into warfare, calling each other blackamores. You have cheated me, and I have cheated you, and therefore are we on a par. No good can come of complaining where each has so good a rejoinder; and, to be plain with you, if you gloom, I"ll gloom, having just as good a right; whereas, if you are well pleased, and love my five, I shall be well pleased, and love your six; and thus we may make the best of a bad bargain. What say you, Mr Caleb Crabbin?"
Caleb threw his eye around the table, and groaned; but necessity is a strong monitor; and so he turned round--where there was a matrimonial kiss awaiting him--and, having taken the offering for better and for worse--
"I believe, Jemima, you are right, after all," said he; "but still it is a bad business; for, if we add five or six more children to that small army, we may come to starve."
"You can begin business again as a merchant (but not in the hosiery way) with your two thousand, and I shall be as frugal a wife as ever made the two ends of coming and going out meet."
Caleb meditated.
"You are right again, Jemima," said he; "for, after all, I have not been happy under the trade of wiving I have driven for so many years--always idle, and pointed out as one who lives on the means of his wives--so, to be sure, I"ll immediately betake myself to an honourable calling, and before I die I may yet acquire the reputation of what is called a respectable member of society. For true it is," he added, "that a fortune-hunter, even if he has run down the game of thousands, is only a fortune-hunter to the end of the chapter. Out of my evil, you see, has come my good; and you, who a little ago seemed my bad angel, have turned out to be my good. So here be all our strife ended."
And another embrace settled the affair.
"Now," said Caleb, "you"ll be kind enough to tell me the names of these children. By my faith, they are pretty ones--as pretty as my own!"
"This is William--this is George--this is Andrew--this is Mary--and this is Margaret."
"Well, we must fall upon some way of distinguishing those of mine and those of yours, who carry the same name. Let it be your George and my George, your Andrew and my Andrew. I see now no difficulty about the matter."
"Neither do I," answered Jemima. "All we have to provide against is to avoid calling our own _mutual_ children George or Andrew, for a third of the name wouldn"t do."
"Neither it would," rejoined he.
According to these arrangements, Mr Crabbin commenced business again; and, having been taught experience by his former failure, did very well.
We believe there were at least two or three additional children born afterwards; but that was of no consequence, because Mr Crabbin"s means became, by his own industry, proportionate. A good lesson hangeth by the peg of our tale, or we are somewhat out.
THE SERJEANT"S TALES.