Before I parted with Bubbleton that evening be promised to breakfast
with me on the following morning; and true to his word, entered my
quarters soon after ten o'clock. I longed to have an opportunity of
talking to him alone, and learning some intelligence of that country,
which, young as I had left it, was still hallowed in memory as my own.
“Eh, by Jupiter! this is something like a quarter,--gilded mouldings,
frescos, silk hangings, and Persian rugs. I say, Tom, are you sure you
haven't made a mistake, my boy, and just imagined that you were somebody
else,--Murat or Bernadotte, for example? The thing is far easier than
you may think; it happened to me before now.”
“Be tranquil on that score,” said I, “we are both at home; though
these quarters are, as you remark, far beyond the mark of a captain of
hussars.”
“A captain! Why, hang it, you're not captain already?”
“Yes, to be sure. What signifies it? Only think of your own rapid rise
since we parted; you were but a captain then, and to be now a
lieutenant-general!”
“Ah, true, very true,” said he, hurriedly, while he bustled about the
room, examining the furniture, and inspecting the decorations most
narrowly. “Capital service this must be,” muttered he, between his
teeth; “not much pay, I fancy, but a deal of plunder and private
robbery.”
“I cannot say much on that head,” said I, laughing outright at what
he intended for a soliloquy; “but I must confess I have no reason to
complain of my lot.”
“Egad! I should think not,” rejoined he; “better than Old George's
Street. Well, well, I wish I were but back there,--that's all.”
“Come, sit down to your breakfast; and perhaps when we talk it over some
plan may present itself for your exchange.”
How thoroughly had I forgotten my friend when I uttered the sentiment;
for scarcely was he seated at table, when he launched out, as of old,
into one of his visionary harangues,--throwing forth dark hints of his
own political importance, and the keen watch the Emperor had set upon
his movements.
“No, my friend, the thing is impossible,” said he, ominously. “Nap.
knows me; he knows my influence with the Tories. To let me escape would
be to blow all his schemes to the winds. I am destined for the 'Temple,'
if not for the guillotine.”
The solemnity of his voice and manner at this moment was too much for
me, and I laughed outright.
“Ay, you may laugh; so does Anna Maria.”
“And is Miss Bubbleton here, too?”
“Yes; we are both here,” ejaculated he, with a deep sigh. “Rue Neuve
des Capucines, No. 46, four flights above the entresol! Ay, and in
that entresol they have two spies of Fouché's police; I know them well,
though they pretend to be hairdressers. I'm too much for old Fouché yet;
depend upon it, Tom.”
It was in vain I endeavored to ascertain what circumstances led him
to believe himself suspected by the Government; neither was I more
fortunate in discovering how he first became a _détenu_. The mist of
imaginary events, places, and people which he had conjured up around
him, prevented his ever being able to see his way, or know clearly any
one fact connected with his present position. Dark hints about spies,
suspicious innuendoes of concealed enemies, plotting préfets and opened
letters, had actually filled his brain to the exclusion of everything
rational and reasonable, and I began seriously to fear for my poor
friend's intellect.
Hoping by a change of topic to induce a more equable tone of thinking, I
asked about Ireland.
“All right there! they've hanged 'em all,” said he. Then, as if suddenly
remembering himself, he added, with a slight confusion, “You were well
out of that scrape, Tom. Your old friend Barton had a warrant for you
the morning you left, and there was a reward of five hundred pounds for
your apprehension; and something, too, for a confounded old piper,--old
Blast-the-Bellows, I think they called him.”
“Darby! What of him, Bubbleton? they did not take him, I trust?”
“No, by Jove! They hanged two fellows, each of whom they believed to
be him, and he was in the crowd looking on, they say. But he's at large
still; and the report goes, Barton does not stir out at night for fear
of meeting him, as the fellow has an old score to settle with him.”
“And so, all hopes of liberty would seem extinguished now,” said I,
gloomily.
“That is as you may take it, Tom. I'm a bad judge of these things; but I
fancy that a man who can live here might contrive to eke out life under
a British Government; though he might yearn now and then for a secret
police, a cabinet noir, or perhaps a tight cravat in the Temple.”
“Hush! my friend.”
“Ay, there it is! Now, if we were in Dame Street, we might abuse the
ministers and the army and the Lord-Lieutenant to our heart's content;
and if Jemmy O'Brien was n't one of the company, I 'd not mind a hit at
Barton himself.”
“But does England still maintain her proud tone of ascendency towards
Ireland? Is the Saxon the hereditary lord, and the Celt the slave,
still?”
“There again you puzzle me; for I never saw much of this same
ascendency, or slavery either. Loyal people, some way or other, were
usually in favor with the Government, and had what many thought a most
unjust proportion of the good things to their share. But even the
others got off in most cases easily too; a devilish deal better than you
treated those luckless Austrians the other day. You killed some thirty
thousand, and made bankrupts of the rest of the nation. But then, to be
sure, it was the cause of liberty you were fighting for. And as for the
Italians--”
“Yes! but you forget these were wars not of our seeking; the treachery
of false-hearted allies led to these sad results.”
“I suppose so. But certain it is, nations, like individuals, that have a
taste for fighting, usually have the good luck to find an adversary; and
as your Emperor here seems to have learned the Donnybrook Fair trick of
trailing his coat after him, it would be strange enough if nobody would
gratify him by standing on it.”
Without being able to say why, I felt piqued and annoyed at the tone of
Bubbleton's remarks, which, coming from one of his narrow intelligence
on ordinary topics, worried me only the more. I had long since seen that
the liberty with which in boyhood I was infatuated had no existence save
in the dreams of ardent patriotism; that the great and the mighty felt
ambition a goal, and power a birthright; that the watchwords of freedom
were inscribed on banners when the sentiments had died out of men's
hearts, while as a passion the more dazzling one of glory made every
other pale before it; and that the calm head and moderate judgment could
scarce survive contact with the intoxicating triumphs of a nation's
successes.
Such was, indeed, the real change Napoleon had wrought in France. Their
enthusiasm could not rest content with national liberty; glory alone
could satisfy a nation drunk with victory. Against the stern followers
of the Republican era--the soldiers of the Sambre and Meuse, the men
of Jemmappes--he had arrayed the ardent, high-spirited youth of the
Consulate and the Empire, the heroes of Areola, of Rivoli, of Cairo, and
Austerlitz. How vain to discuss questions of social order or national
freedom with the cordoned and glittering bands who saw monarchy and
kingdoms among the prizes of their ambition! And even I, who had few
ambitious hopes, how the ardor that once stimulated me and led me to the
soldier's life,--how had it given way to the mere conventional aspirings
of a class! The grade of colonel was far oftener in my thoughts than the
cause of freedom; the cross of the Legion would have reconciled me to
much that in my calmer judgment I might deem harsh and tyrannical.
“Believe me, Tom,” said Bubbleton, who saw in my silence that his
observations had their weight with me, “believe me, my philosophy is the
true one,--never to meddle where you cannot serve yourself or some
of your friends. The world will always consist of two parties,--one
governing, the other governed. We belong to the latter category, and
shall only get into a scrape by poking our heads where they have no
business to be.”
“Why, a few moments since you were full of state secrets, and plots, and
secret treaties, and Heaven knows what besides!”
“To be sure I was. And for whose interest, man,--for whose sake? George
Frederick Augustus Bubbleton's. Ay, no doubt of it. Here am I, a
_détenu_,--and have been these two years and a half--wasting away
existence at Verdun, while my property is going to the devil from sheer
neglect. My West India estates, who can say how I shall find them? my
Calcutta property, the same; then there's that fee-simple thing in
Norfolk. But I can't even think of it. Well, I verily believe no single
step has been taken for my release or exchange. The Whigs, you know,
will do nothing for me. I may tell you in confidence,”--here he dropped
his voice to a low whisper,--“I may tell you, Charles Fox hates me. But
more of this another time. What was I to do in all this mess of trouble
and misfortune? Stand still and bear it? No, faith; that's not Bubbleton
policy. You 'd never guess what I did.”
“I fear not.”
“Well, it chanced that some little literary labors of mine--you know I
dally sometimes with the muse--became known to the préfet at Verdun.
I saw that they watched me; and consequently I made great efforts at
secrecy, concealing my papers in the chimney, under the floor, sewing
them in the linings of my coat, and so on. The bait took: they made
a regular search, seizing my manuscripts, put great seals on all
the packages, and sent them up to Paris. The day after, I made
submission,--offered to reveal all to the Minister for Foreign Affairs.
And accordingly they sent me up here with an escort. What would have
come next I cannot tell you, if Anna Maria had not found out Lord
Lauderdale, and trumped up some story to him, so that he interfered. And
we are now living at the Rue Neuve des Capucines; but how long we shall
be there, and where they may send us next, I wish I could only guess.”
A few minutes' consideration satisfied me that the police were concerned
in Bubbleton's movements, and, knowing at once that no danger was to
be apprehended from such a source, were merely holding him up for some
occasion when they could make use of him to found some charge against
the British Government,--a manoeuvre constantly employed, and always
successful with the Parisians, wherever an explanation became necessary
in the public papers.
It would have served no purpose to impart these suspicions of mine to
Bubbleton himself; on the contrary, he would inevitably have destroyed
all clew to their confirmation by some false move, had I done so. With
this impression, then, I resolved to wait patiently, watch events, and
when the time came, see what best could be done towards effecting his
liberation.
As I was disposed to place more reliance on Miss Bubbleton's statements
than those of her imaginative brother, I agreed to his proposal to pay
her a visit; and accordingly we set out together for the Rue Neuve des
Capucines.
Lieutenant-General Bubbleton's quarters were by no means of that
imposing character which befitted his rank in the British army.
Traversing a dirty courtyard strewed with firewood, we entered a little
gloomy passage, from which a still gloomier stair ascended to the
topmost regions of the house, where, unlocking a door, he pushed me
before him into a small, meanly-furnished apartment, the centre of which
was occupied by a little iron stove, whose funnel pierced the ceiling
above, and gave the chamber somewhat the air of a ship's cabin.
Bubbleton, however, either did not or would not perceive any want of
comfort or propriety in the whole; on the contrary, he strode the floor
with the step of an emperor, and placed the chair for me to sit on as
though he were about to seat me on a throne. While exchanging his coat
for a most ragged dressing-gown, he threw himself on an old sofa with
such energy of ease that the venerable article of furniture creaked and
groaned in every joint.
“She's out,” said he, with a toss of his thumb to a half-open door;
“gone to take a stroll in the Tuileries for half an hour, so that we
shall have a little chat before she comes. And now, what will ye take? A
little sherry and water? a glass of maraschino, eh? or what say you to a
nip of real Nantz?”
“Nothing, my dear friend; you forget the hour, not to speak of my French
education.”
“Oh, very true,” said he. “When I was in the Forty-fifth--” When he had
uttered these words, he stopped suddenly, hesitated, and stammered,
and at last, fairly overcome with confusion, he unfolded a huge
pocket-handkerchief, and blew his nose with the sound of a cavalry
trumpet, while he resumed: “We had a habit in the old Forty-fifth--a
deuced bad one, I confess--of a mess breakfast, that began after parade
and always ran into luncheon--But hush! here she comes,” cried he,
in evident delight at the interruption so opportunely arriving. Then,
springing up, he threw open the door, and called out, “I say, Anna
Maria, you 'll not guess who's here?”
Either the ascent of the steep stair called for all the lady's spare
lungs, or the question had little interest for her, as she certainly
made no reply whatever, but continued to mount, step by step, with
that plodding, monosyllabic pace one falls into at the highest of six
flights.
“No,” cried he aloud, “no, you're wrong; it is not Lauderdale.” Then,
turning towards me, with a finger to his nose, he added, with pantomimic
action, “She thinks you are Yarmouth. Wrong again, by Jove! What do you
say to Tom Burke,--Burke of 'Ours.' as I used to call him long ago?”
By this time Miss Bubbleton had reached the door, and was holding the
handle to recover her breath after the fatigue of the ascent. Even in
that momentary glance, however, I recognized her. Nothing altered
by time, she was the same crabbed, crossgrained-looking personage I
remembered years before. She carried a little basket on her arm, of
which her brother hastened to relieve her, and showed no little concern
to remove out of sight. Being divested of this, she held out her hand,
and saluted me with more cordiality than I looked for.
Scarcely had our greetings been exchanged, when Bubbleton broke in, “I
've told him everything, Anna Maria. He knows the whole affair; no use
in boring him with any more. I say, isn't he grown prodigiously? And a
captain already,--just think of that.”
“And so, sir, you've heard of the sad predicament his folly has brought
us into?”
“Hush, hush, Anna Maria!” cried Bubbleton; “no nonsense, old girl. Burke
will put all to rights; he's aide-de-camp to Murat, and dines with him
every day,--eh, Tom?”
“What if he be?” interrupted the lady, without permitting me time to
disclaim the honor. “How can he ever--”
“I tell you, it's all arranged between us; and don't make a fuss about
nothing. You 'll only make bad worse, as you always do. Come, Tom; the
secret is, I shall be ruined if I don't get back to England soon. Heaven
knows who receives my dividends all this time. Then that confounded
tin mine! they 've mismanaged the thing so much I haven't received five
hundred pounds from Cornwall since this time twelve months.”
“That you haven't,” said the lady, as with clasped hands and eyes fixed
she sat staring at the little stove with the stern stoicism of a martyr.
“She knows that,” said Bubbleton, with a nod, as if grateful for even so
much testimony in his favor. “And as for that scoundrel, Thistlethwait,
the West India agent, I've a notion he's broke; not a shilling from him
either.”
“Not sixpence,” echoed the lady.
“You hear that,” cried he, overjoyed at the concurrence. “And the fact
is,--you will smile when I tell you, but upon my honor it's true,--I am
actually hard up for cash.”
The idea tickled him so much, and seemed so ludicrous withal, that he
fell back on the sofa, and laughed till the tears ran down his face. Not
so Miss Bubbleton: her grim face grew more fixed, every feature hardened
as if becoming stone, while gradually a sneer curled her thin lip; but
she never spoke a word.
“I'll not speak of the annoyance of being out of England, nor the loss
of influence a man sustains after a long absence,” said Bubbleton, as he
paced the room with his hands deep thrust in his dressing-gown pockets.
“These are things one can feel; and as for me, they weigh more on my
mind than mere money considerations.”
“But, General,” said I--
“General!” echoed the lady with a start round, and holding up both her
hands,--“General! You have n't been such a fool,--it's not possible you
could be such a fool--”
“Will you please to be quiet, old damsel?” said Bubbleton, with more of
harshness than he had yet used in his manner. “Can you persuade yourself
to mind your own household concerns, and leave George Frederick Augustus
Bubbleton to manage his own matters as he deems best?”
Here he turned short round towards me, and throwing up his eyebrows to
their full height, he touched his forehead knowingly with the tip of his
forefinger, and uttered the words,--
“You understand! Poor thing!” concluding the pantomime with a deep sigh
from the bottom of his chest, while he added something in a low whisper
about “a fall from an elephant when she was a child!”
“Mr. Burke, will you listen to me?” said the lady, with an energy
of voice and manner there was no gainsaying--“listen to me for five
minutes; and probably, short as the time is, I may be able to put you in
possession of a few plain facts concerning our position, and if you have
the inclination and the power to serve us, you may then know how best it
can be done.”
Bubbleton made me a sign to gratify her desire of loquaciousness, while
with a most expressive shrug he intimated that I should probably hear a
very incoherent statement. This done, he lighted his meerschaum, wrapped
his ragged _robe de chambre_ around him, and lay down full length on
the sofa, with the air of a man who had fortified himself to undergo any
sacrifices that might be demanded at his hands; taking care the while to
assume his position in such a manner that he could exchange glances with
me without his being observed by his sister.
“We came over, Mr. Burke, only a few months before the war broke out,
and like the rest of our countrymen and women were made _détenus_. This
was bad enough; but my wise brother made it far worse, for instead of
giving his name, with his real rank and position, he would call himself
a lieutenant-general, affect to have immense wealth and great political
influence. The consequence was, when others were exchanged and sent
home, his name not being discoverable in any English list, was passed
over; while his assumed fortune involved us in every expense and
extravagance, and his mock importance made us the object of the secret
police, who never ceased to watch and spy after us.”
“Capital! excellent! by Jove!” cried Bubbleton, as he rolled forth a
long curl of blue smoke from the angle of his mouth; “she 's admirable!”
“I ought to have told you before,” said the lady, not paying the least
attention to his interruption, “that he was obliged to sell out of
the Forty-fifth; a certain Mr. Montague Crofts, whom you may remember,
having won every shilling he possessed, even to the sale of his
commission. This was the cause of our coming abroad; so that at the very
moment that he was giving himself these airs of pretended greatness, we
were ruined.”
“Upon my life, she believes all that,” whispered Bubbleton, with a wink
at me. “Poor old thing! I must get Larrey to look at her.”
“Happily, or unhappily--who shall say which?--there was a greater fool
even than himself in the village; and he was the _maire_. This
wise functionary became alarmed at the piles of papers and rolls of
manuscripts that were seen about our rooms, and equally suspicious about
the dark hints and mysterious innuendoes he threw out from time to time.
The préfet was informed of it; and the result was, an order for our
removal to Paris. Here, then, we are; with what destiny before us who
shall tell? For, as he still persists in his atrocious nonsense, and
calls himself major-general--”
“Lieutenant-general, my dear,” said Bubbleton, mildly; “I never was
major-general.”
“Is it not too bad?” said she. “Could any patience endure this?”
“Don't be violent; take care, Anna Maria,” said he, rebukingly. “Potts
said I should use restraint again, if you showed any return of the
paroxysm. That's the way she takes it,” said he in a low whisper,
“with a blinking about the eyes and a pattering of the feet. Bathe your
temples, dear, and you'll be better presently.”
Anna Maria sat still, not uttering a word, and actually fearing by a
gesture to encourage a commentary on her manner.
“Sometimes she 'll mope for hours,” muttered he in my ear; “at others,
she's furious,--there's no saying how it will turn. You wouldn't like a
pipe? I forgot to ask you.”
“And worse than all, sir,” said the lady, as if no longer able to
restrain her temper, “he is supposed to be a spy of the police. I heard
it myself this morning.”
“Eh, what!” exclaimed Bubbleton, jumping up in an ecstasy of delight. “A
spy! By Jove! I knew it. Lord! what fellows they are, these French! not
two days here yet, and they discovered I was no common man,--eh,
Burke? Maybe I haven't frightened them, my boy. It's not every one would
create such a sensation, let me tell you; I knew I'd do it.”
Miss Bubbleton looked at him for an instant with a sneer of the most
withering contempt, and then rising abruptly, left the room. But the
general little cared for such evidences of her censure; he danced about
the room, snapping his fingers, and chuckling with self-satisfaction,
the thought of being believed to be a police spy giving him the most
intense and heartfelt pleasure.
“She has moments, Tom, when she's downright clear; you 'd not think it,
but sometimes she's actually shrewd. You saw how she hit upon that.”
“Would that her brother was favored with some of these lucid intervals!”
was the thought that ran through my head at the moment; for I knew
better than he did how needful a clearer brain and sharper faculties
than his would be to escape the snares his folly and vanity were
spreading around him.
“Shall we make a morning call at our friend the countess's,
Tom?” said Bubbleton. “She told me she received every day about this
hour.”
I felt nowise disposed for the visit; and so, having engaged my friend
to dine with me at the Luxembourg the next day, we parted.
As I sauntered homewards, I was surprised how difficult I found it to
disabuse my mind of the absurd insinuations Bubbleton had thrown out
against his sister's sanity; for, though well knowing his fondness for
romance, and his taste for embellishment on every occasion, I. yet could
not get rid of the impression that her oddity of manner might only be
another feature of eccentricity, just as extravagant, but differing in
its tendencies, as his own.
To assist him whose kindness to myself of old I never ceased to remember
with gratitude, was my firm resolve; but to ascertain his exact position
was all-essential for this purpose, and I could not help saying, half
aloud, “If I had but Duchesne here now!”
“Speak of the devil, _mon ami!_” said he, drawing his arm within mine,
while I was scarcely able to avoid a cry of astonishment. “Where do you
dine to-day, Burke?” said he, in his quiet, easy tone.
“But where did you come from, Duchesne? Are you long here?”
“Answer my question first. Can you dine with me?”
“To be sure; with pleasure.”
“Then meet me at the corner of the Rue des Trois Têtes, at six o'clock,
and I 'll be your guide afterwards. This is _my_ way now. _Au revoir_.”