Well my dear and so the evening readings of those jottings of the Major's
brought us round at last to the evening when we were all packed and going
away next day, and I do assure you that by that time though it was
deliciously comfortable to look forward to the dear old house in Norfolk
Street again, I had formed quite a high opinion of the French nation and
had noticed them to be much more homely and domestic in their families
and far more simple and amiable in their lives than I had ever been led
to expect, and it did strike me between ourselves that in one particular
they might be imitated to advantage by another nation which I will not
mention, and that is in the courage with which they take their little
enjoyments on little means and with little things and don't let solemn
big-wigs stare them out of countenance or speechify them dull, of which
said solemn big-wigs I have ever had the one opinion that I wish they
were all made comfortable separately in coppers with the lids on and
never let out any more.
"Now young man," I says to Jemmy when we brought our chairs into the
balcony that last evening, "you please to remember who was to 'top up.'"
"All right Gran" says Jemmy. "I am the illustrious personage."
But he looked so serious after he had made me that light answer, that the
Major raised his eyebrows at me and I raised mine at the Major.
"Gran and godfather," says Jemmy, "you can hardly think how much my mind
has run on Mr. Edson's death."
It gave me a little check. "Ah! it was a sad scene my love" I says, "and
sad remembrances come back stronger than merry. But this" I says after a
little silence, to rouse myself and the Major and Jemmy all together, "is
not topping up. Tell us your story my dear."
"I will" says Jemmy.
"What is the date sir?" says I. "Once upon a time when pigs drank wine?"
"No Gran," says Jemmy, still serious; "once upon a time when the French
drank wine."
Again I glanced at the Major, and the Major glanced at me.
"In short, Gran and godfather," says Jemmy, looking up, "the date is this
time, and I'm going to tell you Mr. Edson's story."
The flutter that it threw me into. The change of colour on the part of
the Major!
"That is to say, you understand," our bright-eyed boy says, "I am going
to give you my version of it. I shall not ask whether it's right or not,
firstly because you said you knew very little about it, Gran, and
secondly because what little you did know was a secret."
I folded my hands in my lap and I never took my eyes off Jemmy as he went
running on.
"The unfortunate gentleman" Jemmy commences, "who is the subject of our
present narrative was the son of Somebody, and was born Somewhere, and
chose a profession Somehow. It is not with those parts of his career
that we have to deal; but with his early attachment to a young and
beautiful lady."
I thought I should have dropped. I durstn't look at the Major; but I
know what his state was, without looking at him.
"The father of our ill-starred hero" says Jemmy, copying as it seemed to
me the style of some of his story-books, "was a worldly man who
entertained ambitious views for his only son and who firmly set his face
against the contemplated alliance with a virtuous but penniless orphan.
Indeed he went so far as roundly to assure our hero that unless he weaned
his thoughts from the object of his devoted affection, he would
disinherit him. At the same time, he proposed as a suitable match the
daughter of a neighbouring gentleman of a good estate, who was neither
ill-favoured nor unamiable, and whose eligibility in a pecuniary point of
view could not be disputed. But young Mr. Edson, true to the first and
only love that had inflamed his breast, rejected all considerations of
self-advancement, and, deprecating his father's anger in a respectful
letter, ran away with her."
My dear I had begun to take a turn for the better, but when it come to
running away I began to take another turn for the worse.
"The lovers" says Jemmy "fled to London and were united at the altar of
Saint Clement's Danes. And it is at this period of their simple but
touching story that we find them inmates of the dwelling of a
highly-respected and beloved lady of the name of Gran, residing within a
hundred miles of Norfolk Street."
I felt that we were almost safe now, I felt that the dear boy had no
suspicion of the bitter truth, and I looked at the Major for the first
time and drew a long breath. The Major gave me a nod.
"Our hero's father" Jemmy goes on "proving implacable and carrying his
threat into unrelenting execution, the struggles of the young couple in
London were severe, and would have been far more so, but for their good
angel's having conducted them to the abode of Mrs. Gran; who, divining
their poverty (in spite of their endeavours to conceal it from her), by a
thousand delicate arts smoothed their rough way, and alleviated the
sharpness of their first distress."
Here Jemmy took one of my hands in one of his, and began a marking the
turns of his story by making me give a beat from time to time upon his
other hand.
"After a while, they left the house of Mrs. Gran, and pursued their
fortunes through a variety of successes and failures elsewhere. But in
all reverses, whether for good or evil, the words of Mr. Edson to the
fair young partner of his life were, 'Unchanging Love and Truth will
carry us through all!'"
My hand trembled in the dear boy's, those words were so wofully unlike
the fact.
"Unchanging Love and Truth" says Jemmy over again, as if he had a proud
kind of a noble pleasure in it, "will carry us through all! Those were
his words. And so they fought their way, poor but gallant and happy,
until Mrs. Edson gave birth to a child."
"A daughter," I says.
"No," says Jemmy, "a son. And the father was so proud of it that he
could hardly bear it out of his sight. But a dark cloud overspread the
scene. Mrs. Edson sickened, drooped, and died."
"Ah! Sickened, drooped, and died!" I says.
"And so Mr. Edson's only comfort, only hope on earth, and only stimulus
to action, was his darling boy. As the child grew older, he grew so like
his mother that he was her living picture. It used to make him wonder
why his father cried when he kissed him. But unhappily he was like his
mother in constitution as well as in face, and lo, died too before he had
grown out of childhood. Then Mr. Edson, who had good abilities, in his
forlornness and despair, threw them all to the winds. He became
apathetic, reckless, lost. Little by little he sank down, down, down,
down, until at last he almost lived (I think) by gaming. And so sickness
overtook him in the town of Sens in France, and he lay down to die. But
now that he laid him down when all was done, and looked back upon the
green Past beyond the time when he had covered it with ashes, he thought
gratefully of the good Mrs. Gran long lost sight of, who had been so kind
to him and his young wife in the early days of their marriage, and he
left the little that he had as a last Legacy to her. And she, being
brought to see him, at first no more knew him than she would know from
seeing the ruin of a Greek or Roman Temple, what it used to be before it
fell; but at length she remembered him. And then he told her, with
tears, of his regret for the misspent part of his life, and besought her
to think as mildly of it as she could, because it was the poor fallen
Angel of his unchanging Love and Constancy after all. And because she
had her grandson with her, and he fancied that his own boy, if he had
lived, might have grown to be something like him, he asked her to let him
touch his forehead with his cheek and say certain parting words."
Jemmy's voice sank low when it got to that, and tears filled my eyes, and
filled the Major's.
"You little Conjurer" I says, "how did you ever make it all out? Go in
and write it every word down, for it's a wonder."
Which Jemmy did, and I have repeated it to you my dear from his writing.
Then the Major took my hand and kissed it, and said, "Dearest madam all
has prospered with us."
"Ah Major" I says drying my eyes, "we needn't have been afraid. We might
have known it. Treachery don't come natural to beaming youth; but trust
and pity, love and constancy,--they do, thank God!"