Contains some Ball-practising
Under some calico draperies in the shady embrasure of a window, Arthur
Pendennis chose to assume a very gloomy and frowning countenance, and
to watch Miss Bell dance her first quadrille with Mr. Pynsent for a
partner. That gentleman was as solemn and severe as Englishmen are upon
such occasions, and walked through the dance as he would have walked up
to his pew in church, without a smile upon his face, or allowing any
outward circumstance to interfere with his attention to the grave duty
in which he was engaged. But Miss Laura’s face was beaming with
pleasure and good-nature. The lights and the crowd and music excited
her. As she spread out her white robes, and performed her part of the
dance, smiling and happy, her brown ringlets flowing back over her fair
shoulders from her honest rosy face, more than one gentleman in the
room admired and looked after her; and Lady Fogey, who had a house in
London and gave herself no small airs of fashion when in the country,
asked of Lady Rockminster who the young person was, mentioned a
reigning beauty in London whom, in her ladyship’s opinion, Laura was
rather like, and pronounced that she would “do.”
Lady Rockminster would have been very much surprised if any protegee of
hers would not “do,” and wondered at Lady Fogey’s impudence in judging
upon the point at all. She surveyed Laura with majestic glances through
her eyeglass. She was pleased with the girl’s artless looks, and gay
innocent manner. Her manner is very good, her ladyship thought. Her
arms are rather red, but that is a defect of her youth. Her tone is far
better than that of the little pert Miss Amory, who is dancing opposite
to her.
Miss Blanche was, indeed, the vis-a-vis of Miss Laura, and smiled most
killingly upon her dearest friend, and nodded to her and talked to her,
when they met during the quadrille evolutions, and patronised her a
great deal. Her shoulders were the whitest in the whole room: and they
were never easy in her frock for one single instant: nor were her eyes,
which rolled about incessantly: nor was her little figure:—it seemed to
say to all the people, “Come and look at me—not at that pink, healthy,
bouncing country lass, Miss Bell, who scarcely knew how to dance till I
taught her. This is the true Parisian manner—this is the prettiest
little foot in the room, and the prettiest little chaussure too. Look
at it, Mr. Pynsent. Look at it, Mr. Pendennis, you who are scowling
behind the curtain—I know you are longing to dance with me.”
Laura went on dancing, and keeping an attentive eye upon Mr. Pen in the
embrasure of the window. He did not quit that retirement during the
first quadrille, nor until the second, when the good-natured Lady
Clavering beckoned to him to come up to her to the dais or place of
honour where the dowagers were,—and whither Pen went blushing and
exceedingly awkward, as most conceited young fellows are. He performed
a haughty salutation to Lady Rockminster, who hardly acknowledged his
bow, and then went and paid his respects to the widow of the late
Amory, who was splendid in diamonds, velvet, lace, feathers, and all
sorts of millinery and goldsmith’s ware.
Young Mr. Fogey, then in the fifth form at Eton, and ardently expecting
his beard and his commission in a dragoon regiment, was the second
partner who was honoured with Miss Bell’s hand. He was rapt in
admiration of that young lady. He thought he had never seen so charming
a creature. “I like you much better than the French girl” (for this
young gentleman had been dancing with Miss Amory before), he candidly
said to her. Laura laughed, and looked more good-humoured than ever;
and in the midst of her laughter caught a sight of Pen, and continued
to laugh as he, on his side, continued to look absurdly pompous and
sulky. The next dance was a waltz, and young Fogey thought, with a
sigh, that he did not know how to waltz, and vowed he would have a
master the next holidays.
Mr. Pynsent again claimed Miss Bell’s hand for this dance; and Pen
beheld her, in a fury, twirling round the room, her waist encircled by
the arm of that gentleman. He never used to be angry before when, on
summer evenings, the chairs and tables being removed, and the governess
called downstairs to play the piano, he and the Chevalier Strong (who
was a splendid performer, and could dance a British hornpipe, a German
waltz, or a Spanish fandango, if need were), and the two young ladies,
Blanche and Laura, improvised little balls at Clavering Park. Laura
enjoyed this dancing so much, and was so animated, that she even
animated Mr. Pynsent. Blanche, who could dance beautifully, had an
unlucky partner, Captain Broadfoot, of the Dragoons, then stationed at
Chatteris. For Captain Broadfoot, though devoting himself with great
energy to the object in view, could not get round in time: and, not
having the least ear for music, was unaware that his movements were too
slow.
So, in the waltz as in the quadrille, Miss Blanche saw that her dear
friend Laura had the honours of the dance, and was by no means pleased
with the latter’s success. After a couple of turns with the heavy
dragoon, she pleaded fatigue, and requested to be led back to her
place, near her mamma, to whom Pen was talking; and she asked him why
he had not asked her to waltz, and had left her for the mercies of that
great odious man in spurs and a red coat?
“I thought spurs and scarlet were the most fascinating objects in the
world to young ladies,” Pen answered. “I never should have dared to put
my black coat in competition with that splendid red jacket.”
“You are very unkind and cruel and sulky and naughty,” said Miss Amory,
with another shrug of the shoulders. “You had better go away. Your
cousin is looking at us over Mr. Pynsent’s shoulder.”
“Will you waltz with me?” said Pen.
“Not this waltz. I can’t, having just sent away that good Captain
Broadfoot. Look at Mr. Pynsent, did you ever see such a creature? But I
will dance the next waltz with you, and the quadrille too. I am
promised, but I will tell Mr. Poole that I had forgotten my engagement
to you.”
“Women forget very readily,” Pendennis said.
“But they always come back, and are very repentant and sorry for what
they’ve done,” Blanche said. “See, here comes the Poker, and dear Laura
leaning on him. How pretty she looks!”
Laura came up, and put out her hand to Pen, to whom Pynsent made a sort
of bow, appearing to be not much more graceful than that domestic
instrument to which Miss Amory compared him.
But Laura’s face was full of kindness. “I am so glad to have come, dear
Pen,” she said. “I can speak to you now. How is mamma? The three dances
are over, and I am engaged to you for the next, Pen.”
“I have just engaged myself to Miss Amory,” said Pen; and Miss Amory
nodded her head, and made her usual little curtsey. “I don’t intend to
give him up, dearest Laura,” she said.
“Well, then, he’ll waltz with me, dear Blanche,” said the other. “Won’t
you, Pen?”
“I promised to waltz with Miss Amory.”
“Provoking!” said Laura, and making a curtsey in her turn she went and
placed herself under the ample wing of Lady Rockminster.
Pen was delighted with his mischief. The two prettiest girls in the
room were quarrelling about him. He flattered himself he had punished
Miss Laura. He leaned in a dandified air, with his elbow over the wall,
and talked to Blanche: he quizzed unmercifully all the men in the
room—the heavy dragoons in their tight jackets—the country dandies in
their queer attire—the strange toilettes of the ladies. One seemed to
have a bird’s nest in her head; another had six pounds of grapes in her
hair, besides her false pearls. “It’s a coiffure of almonds and
raisins,” said Pen “and might be served up for dessert.” In a word, he
was exceedingly satirical and amusing.
During the quadrille he carried on this kind of conversation with
unflinching bitterness and vivacity, and kept Blanche continually
laughing, both at his wickedness and jokes, which were good, and also
because Laura was again their vis-a-vis, and could see and hear how
merry and confidential they were.
“Arthur is charming to-night,” she whispered to Laura, across Cornet
Perch’s shell-jacket, as Pen was performing cavalier seul before them,
drawling through that figure with a thumb in the pocket of each
waistcoat.
“Who?” said Laura.
“Arthur,” answered Blanche, in French. “Oh, it’s such a pretty name!”
And now the young ladies went over to Pen’s side, and Cornet Perch
performed a pas seul in his turn. He had no waistcoat pocket to put his
hands into, and they looked large and swollen as they hung before him
depending from the tight arms in the jacket.
During the interval between the quadrille and the succeeding waltz, Pen
did not take any notice of Laura, except to ask her whether her
partner, Cornet Perch, was an amusing youth, and whether she liked him
so well as her other partner, Mr. Pynsent. Having planted which two
daggers in Laura’s gentle bosom, Mr. Pendennis proceeded to rattle on
with Blanche Amory, and to make jokes good or bad, but which were
always loud. Laura was at a loss to account for her cousin’s sulky
behaviour, and ignorant in what she had offended him; however, she was
not angry in her turn at Pen’s splenetic mood, for she was the most
good-natured and forgiving of women, and besides, an exhibition of
jealousy on a man’s part is not always disagreeable to a lady.
As Pen would not dance with her, she was glad to take up with the
active Chevalier Strong, who was a still better performer than Pen; and
being very fond of dancing, as every brisk and innocent young girl
should be, when the waltz music began she set off, and chose to enjoy
herself with all her heart. Captain Broadfoot on this occasion occupied
the floor in conjunction with a lady of proportions scarcely inferior
to his own; Miss Roundle, a large young woman in a strawberry-ice
coloured crape dress, the daughter of the lady with the grapes in her
head, whose bunches Pen had admired.
And now taking his time, and with his fair partner Blanche hanging
lovingly on the arm which encircled her, Mr. Arthur Pendennis set out
upon his waltzing career, and felt, as he whirled round to the music,
that he and Blanche were performing very brilliantly indeed. Very
likely he looked to see if Miss Bell thought so too; but she did not or
would not see him, and was always engaged with her partner Captain
Strong. But Pen’s triumph was not destined to last long; and it was
doomed that poor Blanche was to have yet another discomfiture on that
unfortunate night. While she and Pen were whirling round as light and
brisk as a couple of opera-dancers, honest Captain Broadfoot and the
lady round whose large waist he was clinging, were twisting round very
leisurely according to their natures, and indeed were in everybody’s
way. But they were more in Pendennis’s way than in anybody’s else, for
he and Blanche, whilst executing their rapid gyrations, came bolt up
against the heavy dragoon and his lady, and with such force that the
centre of gravity was lost by all four of the circumvolving bodies;
Captain Broadfoot and Miss Roundle were fairly upset, as was Pen
himself, who was less lucky than his partner Miss Amory, who was only
thrown upon a bench against a wall.
But Pendennis came fairly down upon the floor, sprawling in the general
ruin with Broadfoot and Miss Roundle. The Captain, though heavy, was
good-natured, and was the first to burst out into a loud laugh at his
own misfortune, which nobody therefore heeded. But Miss Amory was
savage at her mishap; Miss Roundle placed on her seant, and looking
pitifully round, presented an object which very few people could see
without laughing; and Pen was furious when he heard the people giggling
about him. He was one of those sarcastic young fellows that did not
bear a laugh at his own expense, and of all things in the world feared
ridicule most.
As he got up Laura and Strong were laughing at him; everybody was
laughing; Pynsent and his partner were laughing; and Pen boiled with
wrath against the pair, and could have stabbed them both on the spot.
He turned away in a fury from them, and began blundering out apologies
to Miss Amory. It was the other couple’s fault—the woman in pink had
done it—Pen hoped Miss Amory was not hurt—would she not have the
courage to take another turn?
Miss Amory in a pet said she was very much hurt indeed, and she would
not take another turn; and she accepted with great thanks a glass of
water which a cavalier, who wore a blue ribbon and a three-pointed
star, rushed to fetch for her when he had seen the deplorable accident.
She drank the water, smiled upon the bringer gracefully, and turning
her white shoulder at Mr. Pen in the most marked and haughty manner,
besought the gentleman with the star to conduct her to her mamma; and
she held out her hand in order to take his arm.
The man with the star trembled with delight at this mark of her favour;
he bowed over her hand, pressed it to his coat fervidly, and looked
round him with triumph.
It was no other than the happy Mirobolant whom Blanche had selected as
an escort. But the truth is, that the young lady had never fairly
looked in the artist’s face since he had been employed in her mother’s
family, and had no idea but it was a foreign nobleman on whose arm she
was leaning. As she went off, Pen forgot his humiliation in his
surprise, and cried out, “By Jove, it’s the cook!”
The instant he had uttered the words, he was sorry for having spoken
them—for it was Blanche who had herself invited Mirobolant to escort
her, nor could the artist do otherwise than comply with a lady’s
command. Blanche in her flutter did not hear what Arthur said; but
Mirobolant heard him, and cast a furious glance at him over his
shoulder, which rather amused Mr. Pen. He was in a mischievous and
sulky humour; wanting perhaps to pick a quarrel with somebody; but the
idea of having insulted a cook, or that such an individual should have
any feeling of honour at all, did not much enter into the mind of this
lofty young aristocrat, the apothecary’s son.
It had never entered that poor artist’s head, that he as a man was not
equal to any other mortal, or that there was anything in his position
so degrading as to prevent him from giving his arm to a lady who asked
for it. He had seen in the fêtes in his own country fine ladies, not
certainly demoiselles (but the demoiselle Anglaise he knew was a great
deal more free than the spinster in France), join in the dance with
Blaise or Pierre; and he would have taken Blanche up to Lady Clavering,
and possibly have asked her to dance too, but he heard Pen’s
exclamation, which struck him as if it had shot him, and cruelly
humiliated and angered him. She did not know what caused him to start,
and to grind a Gascon oath between his teeth.
But Strong, who was acquainted with the poor fellow’s state of mind,
having had the interesting information from our friend Madame Fribsby,
was luckily in the way when wanted, and saying something rapidly in
Spanish, which the other understood, the Chevalier begged Miss Amory to
come and take an ice before she went back to Lady Clavering. Upon which
the unhappy Mirobolant relinquished the arm which he had held for a
minute, and with a most profound and piteous bow, fell back. “Don’t you
know who it is?” Strong asked of Miss Amory, as he led her away. “It is
the chef Mirobolant.”
“How should I know?” asked Blanche. “He has a croix; he is very
distingue; he has beautiful eyes.”
“The poor fellow is mad for your beaux yeux, I believe,” Strong said.
“He is a very good cook, but he is not quite right in the head.”
“What did you say to him in the unknown tongue?” asked Miss Blanche.
“He is a Gascon, and comes from the borders of Spain,” Strong answered.
“I told him he would lose his place if he walked with you.”
“Poor Monsieur Mirobolant!” said Blanche.
“Did you see the look he gave Pendennis?”—Strong asked, enjoying the
idea of the mischief—“I think he would like to run little Pen through
with one of his spits.”
“He is an odious, conceited, clumsy creature, that Mr. Pen,” said
Blanche.
“Broadfoot looked as if he would like to kill him too, so did Pynsent,”
Strong said. “What ice will you have—water ice or cream ice?”
“Water ice. Who is that odd man staring at me—he is decore too.”
“That is my friend Colonel Altamont, a very queer character, in the
service of the Nawaub of Lucknow. Hallo! what’s that noise? I’ll be
back in an instant,” said the Chevalier, and sprang out of the room to
the ballroom, where a scuffle and a noise of high voices was heard.
The refreshment-room, in which Miss Amory now found herself, was a room
set apart for the purposes of supper, which Mr. Rincer the landlord had
provided for those who chose to partake, at the rate of five shillings
per head. Also, refreshments of a superior class were here ready for
the ladies and gentlemen of the county families who came to the ball;
but the commoner sort of persons were kept out of the room by a waiter
who stood at the portal, and who said that was a select room for Lady
Clavering and Lady Rockminster’s parties, and not to be opened to the
public till supper-time, which was not to be until past midnight.
Pynsent, who danced with his constituents’ daughters, took them and
their mammas in for their refreshment there. Strong, who was manager
and master of the revels wherever he went, had of course the entree—and
the only person who was now occupying the room was the gentleman with
the black wig and the orders in his button-hole; the officer in the
service of his Highness the Nawaub of Lucknow.
This gentleman had established himself very early in the evening in
this apartment, where, saying he was confoundedly thirsty, he called
for a bottle of champagne. At this order the waiter instantly supposed
that he had to do with a grandee, and the Colonel sate down and began
to eat his supper and absorb his drink, and enter affably into
conversation with anybody who entered the room.
Sir Francis Clavering and Mr. Wagg found him there, when they left the
ballroom, which they did pretty early—Sir Francis to go and smoke a
cigar, and look at the people gathered outside the ballroom on the
shore, which he declared was much better fun than to remain within; Mr.
Wagg to hang on to a Baronet’s arm, as he was always pleased to do on
the arm of the greatest man in the company. Colonel Altamont had stared
at these gentlemen in so odd a manner, as they passed through the
‘Select’ room, that Clavering made inquiries of the landlord who he
was, and hinted a strong opinion that the officer of the Nawaub’s
service was drunk.
Mr. Pynsent, too, had had the honour of a conversation with the servant
of the Indian potentate. It was Pynsent’s cue to speak to everybody
(which he did, to do him justice, in the most ungracious manner); and
he took the gentleman in the black wig for some constituent, some
merchant captain, or other outlandish man of the place. Mr. Pynsent,
then, coming into the refreshment-room with a lady, the wife of a
constituent, on his arm, the Colonel asked him if he would try a glass
of Sham? Pynsent took it with great gravity, bowed, tasted the wine,
and pronounced it excellent, and with the utmost politeness retreated
before Colonel Altamont. This gravity and decorum routed and surprised
the Colonel more than any other kind of behaviour probably would: he
stared after Pynsent stupidly, and pronounced to the landlord over the
counter that he was a rum one. Mr. Rincer blushed, and hardly knew what
to say. Mr. Pynsent was a county Earl’s grandson, going to set up as a
Parliament man. Colonel Altamont on the other hand, wore orders and
diamonds, jingled sovereigns constantly in his pocket, and paid his way
like a man; so not knowing what to say, Mr. Rincer said, “Yes,
Colonel—yes, ma’am, did you say tea? Cup a tea for Mr. Jones, Mrs. R.,”
and so got off that discussion regarding Mr. Pynsent’s qualities, into
which the Nizam’s officer appeared inclined to enter.
In fact, if the truth must be told, Mr. Altamont, having remained at
the buffet almost all night, and employed himself very actively whilst
there, had considerably flushed his brain by drinking, and he was still
going on drinking, when Mr. Strong and Miss Amory entered the room.
When the Chevalier ran out of the apartment, attracted by the noise in
the dancing-room, the Colonel rose from his chair with his little red
eyes glowing like coals, and, with rather an unsteady gait advanced
towards Blanche, who was sipping her ice. She was absorbed in absorbing
it, for it was very fresh and good; or she was not curious to know what
was going on in the adjoining room, although the waiters were, who ran
after Chevalier Strong. So that when she looked up from her glass, she
beheld this strange man staring at her out of his little red eyes. “Who
was he? It was quite exciting.”
“And so you’re Betsy Amory,” said he, after gazing at her. “Betsy
Amory, by Jove!”
“Who—who speaks to me?” said Betsy, alias Blanche.
But the noise in the ballroom is really becoming so loud, that we must
rush back thither, and see what is the cause of the disturbance.