fellow-apprentices in over hours were cracking jokes on the kitchen
settle, lounging about the yard, tormenting or being tormented by
Kezia, had served somewhat to isolate and lift him above them, albeit
he took his meals in the kitchen with the rest. This separation was now
confirmed by orders Kezia received to “serve Clegg’s dinner in his own
room,” orders which Kezia resented with asperity, and at least three
days’ ill-humour, and which James declined to execute. He was “not
goin’ to disgrace his cloth by waitin’ on ’prentice lads!” Ready-handed
Cicily came to the rescue, and took the office on herself, amid the
banter of the kitchen, which the quick-witted maid returned with right
good will and right good temper.
Permission to receive his friends in his own room occasionally had been
graciously accorded by Mrs. Ashton herself, with the characteristic
observation—
“They are worthy people, Jabez Clegg, and you owe them a son’s duty;
besides, you need some relaxation—‘The over-strained bow is apt to
snap,’ and ‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.’”
Altogether he was more than satisfied. He was not demonstrative, but
his heart swelled as he felt within himself that all these little
things were stepping stones upwards; and he mentally resolved to mount
them fairly. He recognised that he was rising, and ere the week was out
he found that others recognised it also.
His blood-stained garments had been removed, whither he knew not, and
he had had to fall back on his grey frieze Sunday suit. Be sure he
began to calculate the chances of getting a fresh one.
As he was able to go out, he was employed on out-door business until
his arm should regain its full vitality, and one of his errands was
with a note to Mr. Chadwick’s tailor, in King Street. At first he
thought there was some mistake when the fraction of a man proceeded
without more ado to take his measure.
Saturday night proved there had been no mistake. On his bed,
accompanied by a very kind note from Mr. Chadwick (written with his
left hand), lay not only a well-cut, well-made suit of clothes, but a
hat, white linen shirts, neck-cloths, and hose.
Did ever young girl turn up her back hair, or young man assume his
first coat indifferently? To Jabez—the foundling—the Blue-coat
apprentice, this was not merely a first coat, not merely a badge of
approaching manhood. The whole outfit, provided as it was by his
master’s brother-in-law, seemed a recognition of the station he was
henceforth to fill. No clerk in the counting-house was so well equipped
as he, when he stood before his oval swing-glass (for the first time
far too small), and endeavoured to survey himself therein, that fine
September Sunday morning.
I will not presume to say that he looked the conventional gentleman in
that suit of glossy brown broadcloth, and beaver hat; I will not say
that he did not feel stiff in them. Only use gives ease; but this I
will say, that a more manly figure never gave shape to garments, or a
more noble head to a hat, albeit there was more of strength than beauty
in the face it shaded.
His forehead was broad and well developed; the reflective as well as
the perceptive faculties were there. There was just a slight defensive
rise on the else straight nose; the eyebrows were full save where a
scar broke the line of one. Firm but pleasant were mouth and dimpled
chin, and the lower jaw was somewhat massive; but his full grey eyes,
dark almost to blackness, and standing far apart, were clear and deep
as wells where truth lay hid, though deep emotion had power to kindle
them with the luminosity of stars.
I am afraid he was not the only one on whom Parson Gatliffe’s
eloquence was thrown away that Sabbath morning. If he looked up at the
Blue-coat boys in the Chetham Gallery with their quaint blue robes
and neat bands, to throw memory back and imagination forward, others
were doing likewise, from old Simon in his free seat to his envious
fellow-’prentices in the pew, whose mocking grimaces drew upon them the
sharp censure of the beadle.
Party spirit was then at a white heat. Had Peterloo been written on his
forehead it could not have marked him out for curious eyes more surely
than his sling.
Greetings, not altogether congratulatory, followed him through the
churchyard. But old Simon caught his left hand in a tremulous grasp,
his eyes moist with proud emotion. Tom Hulme beamed upon him, and
Mrs. Clowes, energetic as ever, overtook them a few yards from the
chapter-house, just as Joshua Brookes emerged from the door.
“Well, my lad, I’m glad to see you at church again!” she exclaimed,
shaking him warmly by the left hand. “I hardly knew you in your fine
clothes. They’ve made quite a gentleman of you. We shall have to call
you Mr. Clegg now, I reckon.”
“Now, Mother Clowes, don’t you give Jabez _humbug_ of that sort; it’s
sweet, but not wholesome. ‘Fine feathers make fine birds.’ He’s as
proud as a peacock already. _Mr._ Clegg, indeed!—and him a ’prentice
lad not out of his time! Let him stick to the name we gave him at his
baptism—it’s worth all your fine Misters.” And Joshua turned off,
muttering, “Mr. Clegg, indeed!” as he went away.
Neither the old woman in her antiquated gown and kerchief-covered
mutch, nor the old parson in his cassock and square cap, modulated
their loud voices. Jabez blushed painfully. Both had touched sensitive
chords.
But others had heard the “Mr. Clegg,” and _he_ heard it again, from
Kezia and the apprentices in every tone of mockery and derision. Thence
it travelled into the warehouse. He bore it with set teeth through
many a painful week, until the title stuck to him, and the taunt was
forgotten in the force of habit.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-THIRD.
IN THE THEATRE ROYAL.[19]
It has been said that Madame Broadbent had various subtle ways of
advertising her “Academy” (as the directory has it), by which she
generally contrived to “kill two birds with one stone.” One of these
would scarcely have been practicable in any but a theatrical town like
Manchester, where not even the fierceness of party politics could
close the theatre doors. She was particularly fond of a good play, and
as particularly careful of her own pocket. So she watched for such
occasions as a special benefit or “Bespeak” night, to engage one of the
dress-boxes, and take tickets for a select party of her pupils. The
young ladies—apart from all natural love of amusement and display—were
taught to regard their admission to Mrs. Broadbent’s train as a high
honour—a mark of exceeding distinction; and few were the parents so
stern or so niggardly as to refuse the four shillings for a box-ticket
when Madame invited and Miss pleaded.
The then Theatre Royal, in Fountain Street, which was opened in 1807,
under Macready’s management, and brought to the ground by fire in 1844,
was, in 1820, a building so capacious—so solidly built—it might not
fear comparison with Drury Lane. Stage, scene-rooms, dressing-rooms,
were all on an extensive scale. There were three tiers of boxes, a
large pit, and an immense gallery breaking the line of the third tier.
With the exception of the large side boxes, which were partially on the
stage, all these boxes were open to the view, having only a divisional
barrier the height of the parapet, light iron pillars supporting the
weight above. There were no chairs—only narrow, baize-covered benches,
innocent of backs. And the theatre was lighted by sperm-oil lamps,
those round the auditorium being suspended by cords over pulleys, so
as to be lowered for lighting, trimming, &c. But the glory of that
theatre, of which it was shorn at a later date, was its box-lobby, a
lofty, open promenade, wide as a street, and long in proportion, for
its one grand entrance was in Fountain Street, the other in Back Mosley
Street. Only for the step or two at either end, carriages might have
driven through, or depositing their living loads within at the saloon
doors, have turned easily and driven back.
This lobby was naturally a lounge, as well as a waiting-place for
servants and others with wraps and pattens, neither carriage nor
hackney-coaches being numerous, and the streets being—well, not quite
so clean or well-paved as at present.
The ten days’ trial of Henry Hunt and his compatriots at York had,
as is well known, resulted in sentence of imprisonment for different
terms, to the discomfiture of one party, the exultation of the other.
Close upon the promulgation of this sentence came Easter week, at the
beginning of April, 1820, when Jabez had little more than a month
to serve of his apprenticeship. Edmund Kean was then playing at the
Theatre Royal, supported by Sophia M‘Gibbon—daughter of Woodfall, the
memorable printer of “Junius”—a favourite on the Manchester “boards.”
Either to mark their satisfaction at the result of the trial, or their
admiration of the great tragedian, the officers of the Manchester
Yeomanry Cavalry bespoke “Othello” for the Wednesday evening, and Mrs.
Broadbent made the most of the glorious opportunity. She engaged a box
close to the centre of the dress-circle, on terms well understood, and
as small people take less room than large ones, and her front row was
very juvenile, she contrived to make it a profitable investment even
though she took a teacher with her (at a lower rate). The young ladies
assembled at the school, and made quite a procession to the theatre,
where Mrs. Broadbent’s own maid took charge of hats and cloaks,
and waited drearily in the saloon. Then, duly marshalled by Madame
Broadbent and Miss Nuttall, they filed into the box decorously, and
took their seats, the youngest in the van—the whole programme having
been re-hearsed and re-hearsed for a day or two beforehand.
A boquet of white rosebuds they might have been called, white muslin
was so general; but one young lady blushed in pink gauze, and Augusta
Ashton’s lovely head and shoulders were set off by delicate blue crape.
There were round necklaces of coral or pearl, long loose gloves of
cambric or kid, and every damsel in her teens had her fan. But of
fans, commend me to Madame Broadbent’s. It was no light trifle of ivory
or sandal-wood, but of strong green paper, spotted with gold, with
ribs and frame of ebony, and it measured half-a-yard when closed. Her
well-saved, long-waisted, stiff brocaded robe and petticoat might have
been her wedding-dress kept for state occasions; but that fan, slung by
a ribbon from her wrist, was part of her individuality—the symbol of
her authority inseparable from her walking self. A relic of her younger
days, she employed it—citing Queen Charlotte as her exemplar—to arrest
attention, to admonish, to chastise; and woe to the luckless little
lady on whom it came in admonition!
The box was filled to the very door, where Miss Nuttall kept guard.
Madame Broadbent displayed her own important person on the third row
above the curly heads of the smaller fry, and to Augusta Ashton—being
a profitable pupil, of whom she had reason to be proud—was allotted a
seat next to herself.
The house was full and fashionable, both stage-boxes being occupied by
members of the Manchester Yeomanry, resplendent in silver and blue.
Laurence Aspinall, John Walmsley, and Ben Travis were of the party. In
the pit were the critics, pressing as closely as possible to the stage.
Nods and smiles from friends in different quarters of the theatre
greeted the component parts of Madame Broadbent’s bevy of innocents,
and smiles responded.
Then rose the green curtain upon Edmund Kean’s Othello, and Mrs.
M‘Gibbon’s Desdemona. The audience was enthralled. Act by act the
players kept attention fixed, and all went well until the last scene.
But, as Othello pressed the murderous pillow down, one of Madame
Broadbent’s white-frocked misses in the front row, with whose relatives
Desdemona lodged when she was not Desdemona, started up, and cried out
piteously—
“He’s killing Mrs. M‘Gibbon! He’s killing Mrs. M‘Gibbon!”
The clear voice rang through the house, to the consternation of the
actors, the amusement of some, and the annoyance of the audience. Some
of the officers laughed outright in the very face of the tragic Moor;
but Madame Broadbent was furious, all the more that she was bound to
suppress her passion then and there.
For the credit of her “Academy,” she, however, felt bound to resent
so flagrant a breach of decorum. Tapping the tearful culprit on the
shoulder with her ready fan, in a stern whisper, scarcely less audible
than the child’s impulsive tribute to the great tragedian, she asked,
“How can you bemean yourself so far, miss, to the disgrace of the
school?” and beckoning the child forth, she was passed to Miss Nuttall
at the very back of the box, sobbing more for Mrs. M‘Gibbon than for
Mrs. Broadbent.
This caused a change of places, which brought Miss Ashton more
prominently into view. Laurence Aspinall, an ardent admirer of
beauty, put his hand on the shoulder of the officer before him, and
said—“Good heavens, Walmsley! Do you see that lovely creature in Mother
Broadbent’s box?”
“Which?” was the obtuse answer.
“Which!” (contemptuously echoed.) “The divine beauty in celestial blue.
Who is she?” And his admiring gaze brought a conscious blush to the
young lady’s forehead, although the querist was beyond her hearing.
“In blue?” And Walmsley lazily scanned the group. “Oh! that’s
Charlotte’s cousin, Augusta Ashton! Yes, she is rather pretty;” and the
married man turned away to the stage.
“Rather pretty! She’s an angel! You must introduce me!”
“Well, well!” answered the other testily, anxious to end a colloquy
which distracted his attention from the tragedy, “I’ll see. But she’s
only a school-girl—not yet sixteen!”
“Egad! but she looks seventeen, and she’ll mend of that
disqualification every day;” and still he kept his eyes on Augusta in
a manner extremely disconcerting, though her romantic little heart
fluttered, for in him she recognised the “Adonis” who had reared his
horse so threateningly in front of her Uncle Chadwick’s house.
The green curtain came down amid universal plaudits. Ladies rose to
rest themselves and chat, as was the custom. Gentlemen quitted their
seats to join friends elsewhere, to lounge in saloon or box-lobby, or
to take a hasty glass at the “Garrick’s Head” adjoining.
Amongst the latter were Walmsley and Aspinall; but they did not return
when the prompter’s bell rang the curtain up. There was a _pas de deux_
of Tyrolean peasants by the chief dancers of the company. Then followed
an interlude, and then a comic song, all before the last piece; but the
comrades did not return; and Augusta found herself wondering whether
the handsome officer, with the rich copper-coloured hair, would come
back at all.
They did make their appearance during the progress of the drama
(Monk Lewis’s “Castle Spectre,” in which Mrs. M‘Gibbon gave ocular
demonstration that she was not killed), both seemingly exhilarated, but
they left again before the drama concluded.
Well drilled as were Madame Broadbent’s pupils, they could not quit
their box in the same order they entered it—big people so seldom
recognise the right of little ones to precedence. They straggled into
the saloon, separated by the crowd. There Madame Broadbent, assisted
by Miss Nuttall, collected her brood, and passing on to the box-lobby,
they looked around for their respective attendants.
There was one—a fine young man, in height some five feet ten—who sprang
forward with shawl and calesh for Miss Ashton, at the same time bowing
deferentially to the pompous dame with the big fan. He proceeded to
adjust the shawl round the dimpled shoulders so very precious to him,
and said—
“I hope you have had a pleasant evening, Miss Augusta.”
Then bowing again to Mrs. Broadbent, he offered his hand respectfully
to the young lady, to conduct her home.
On the instant they were intercepted by Aspinall and Walmsley, neither
so sober as he might have been.
“Augusta, here’s my friend, Aspinall; deuced good fellow—quite struck
with you,” was Captain Walmsley’s unceremonious introduction—at a time,
too, when introductions were somewhat formal.
“Quite, Miss Ashton,” he assented. “’Pon my soul, I am! Your charming
face has quite captivated me, and those eyes pierce my heart like
bullets. Permit me to escort you home.”
There was an amusing consciousness of his own attractions in this free
expression of his admiration. A woman of the world, with her weapons
ready, might have dismissed him either with hauteur, badinage, or cool
indifference; but to Augusta Ashton, almost a child in years, it was
bewildering and disconcerting.
Her eyes fell—her colour rose. She stood silent, abashed, and confused.
Native modesty took alarm.
Jabez came to her relief.
“Miss Ashton is under my protection, sir; she requires no other escort.”
The words were cool as those of a man who, having his temper well under
control, did not choose to quarrel, though his pulses were beating
like drums. With cool effrontery his old antagonist looked him full in
the face.
“So it’s you again, yellow-skirt! A nice fellow to protect a pretty
girl: a fellow without skill to defend himself, or spirit to resent an
insult;” and the speaker’s red lips curled with derision.
The eyes of Jabez kindled and his teeth set. There was no lack of
spirit, but not the spirit of which common brawls are made. He was
anxious to get the trembling Augusta away from the gathering crowd.
Madame Broadbent, shorn of half her pretty train, came up aghast.
“Young lady! Miss Ashton! What is——”
A wave of the silver-braided sleeve set her aside, chafed and indignant
at the freedom and impertinence.
“Keep out of the way, Mother Broadbent. Look after the rest of your
lambkins. Miss Ashton’s cousin and I propose to see your pupil home.”
“All right, Augusta,” said Walmsley, thickly; “we’ll see you home.”
But she clung in dismay to the arm of Jabez; and not Hercules himself
could have torn her from him. Ignoring the coarse taunt of Lieutenant
Aspinall, he endeavoured to lead her past them, simply saying to
Captain Walmsley—
“Mr. Ashton committed his daughter to my care. I am answerable for her
safety.”
Aspinall, mistaking his calmness for pusillanimity, again intercepted
their passage, and would have taken Augusta’s hand. But a will
strong as his own—an arm strengthened by lifting and carrying heavy
burdens—was opposed to him. Jabez struck no blow: he thrust out an arm
with muscles like leather, swept the offensive lieutenant aside, and
down he went on the stone pavement of the lobby.
“Bravo, Clegg!” exclaimed a voice from the rear; and the burly form
of Ben Travis parted the curious crowd, as leviathan parts the waves,
before the infuriated Aspinall could rise, or Walmsley interpose;
“that’s right; take the young lady away, and leave these gallant bucks
to me. I’ll guard the honour of our corps.”
The terrified young lady and the inebriated young bully were alike in
sure hands. But consequential Madame Broadbent, ignored, forgotten,
had received a blow to her importance she was not likely to forget or
overlook.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FOURTH.
MADAME BROADBENT’S FAN.
They had made their exit from the Fountain Street end of the box-lobby,
to avoid the rush from the gallery door in Back Mosley Street, which
somewhat lengthened the short distance Jabez had to convey his precious
charge, who appeared more apprehensive of offending Madame Broadbent by
scant and unceremonious leave-taking than troubled by the impertinence
of the young officers.
Truth to tell, the whole adventure had a savour of Miss Bohanna’s
circulating library about it, and she felt herself elevated into a
heroine by the occurrence. But her appearance before Madame Broadbent
in the morning would be very real and unromantic, that lady resenting
nothing so much as disrespect.
“You see, Jabez, I did not even make a curtsey to her as we came away.
I am afraid she will be displeased.”
“If you think so, Miss Ashton,” he replied, respectfully, “I will
hasten back as soon as I have seen you safely home, and bear your
apologies to Madame Broadbent. She may not have left the theatre.
Besides, I feel that I also owe an apology for leaving a lady of her
age unprotected in the midst of such a scene. It was very remiss on my
part,” he added; “but, indeed, at the time I thought only of placing
you beyond reach of further insult;” and Augusta could hear him mutter
between his teeth, “The impertinent puppy!”
The distance even from Fountain Street was very inconsiderable, and
they had reached the broad steps of the door in Mosley Street, and his
hand was on the lion-headed knocker when this ejaculation escaped him.
Service from Jabez was so much a matter of course that Augusta regarded
his care for herself, and his proffer to run back at her bidding, only
in the light of apprentice-duty; but that muttered exclamation spoke of
smothered passion; and before James was roused from his doze in front
of the far-away kitchen fire by that peal on the knocker, and sleepily
opened the door, she had added a caution as an addendum to her message
to Madame Broadbent.
“I hope, Jabez, you are not going back to—to interfere or quarrel with
Mr. Walmsley and the other officer. If they are not quite sober, you
must remember _they are gentlemen_.”
“I will forget nothing I should remember, Miss Ashton,” said he, as
James unclosed the door for her entrance, and he darted off, the
emphasis she had laid on her closing words having stung him keenly with
a sense of his social inferiority in her sight. “She evidently thinks
the apprentice College-boy has no right to raise his hand against
gentility in uniform, however drunk or disorderly it may be,” he
thought, as he ran along, spurred by a manly desire to show that it was
not cowardice which had caused him to leave his prostrate enemy in the
hands of a deputy.
He was not three minutes more in reaching the box-entrance in Back
Mosley Street; but for all that, the short walk home, and the brief
delay caused by sleepy-headed James, had given ample time to empty and
close the theatre, from which more than half the audience had dispersed
before they left. Even the oil lamps over the doors were extinguished;
and though a few stragglers loitered about—the natural hangers-on to
histrionic skirts—and there were brawlers in the neighbourhood, he saw
none of those he went to seek.
The fact was, Captain Travis had hauled Lieutenant Aspinall from
the ground with little ceremony, and, with a sharp reproof for “the
disgrace he was bringing on their corps by insulting a young lady in
a public place, as if sufficient odium did not attach to the Yeomanry
already,” forced him into a waiting hackney-coach, giving the driver
orders to bear him home to his father’s house on Ardwick Green,
heedless of the young officer’s remonstrance to the contrary. But Jehu,
who knew his fare, drove him instead to the “George and Dragon” on the
opposite side of the Green, and Mr. Aspinall saw nothing of his hopeful
son that night.
Nor would Charlotte Walmsley have seen much more of her husband, had
not kind-hearted Ben gone far out of his own way to land John safely
at home. Perhaps it would be hardly fair to calculate too nicely how
far he was influenced to that by the relation of the Walmsleys to Ellen
Chadwick, since the secret springs of action often lie too far down
even for self-knowledge.
As for Madame Broadbent, no sooner had Miss Nuttall disposed of the
last of the budding misses than she hid her indignation in the deep
shadow of her large calesh, and, with an access of importance, left the
theatre, slightly in advance of her humble dependants, and made her
fearless way through Fountain Street and High street, with a step which
augured unpleasantness for all beneath her roof if her supper were not
done to a turn and served to a nicety.
Augusta was somewhat loth to leave her pillow in the morning, after the
night’s unusual dissipation, and was still more reluctant to encounter
her lessons and Mrs. Broadbent; and she for the first time remarked to
Cicily that she thought she was “quite too old to go to school.” As if
the world was not one huge school, wherein the dunces get punished most
severely, and even the best and brightest do not escape the rod. But
Augusta Ashton, buoyant, blooming, cherished, admired, adored, could
not see that her real schooling would begin when Madame Broadbent’s
reign ceased.
No doubt Mr. Ashton would have been coaxed into granting an extension
of his darling daughter’s Easter holiday, and suffered her to remain at
home that Thursday morning, but he was at Whaley-Bridge; and mamma met
her request with:—