'Pon my word, you exclaim, this looks very serious!
I beg to differ from you. We had been brought together legitimately
enough, down at the church-decoration-gathering in the school-room: we
had been regularly introduced by no less a clerical authority than
little Miss Pimpernell, the vicar's sister: we had then and there
associated under the safest chaperonage--good heavens! would not Miss
Spight's jealous green eyes, that were certain to pick out the tiniest
blot in her fellow man or woman, and Lady Dasher's stately, albeit
melancholy presence, satisfy you? Thus, the "convenances," that horrid
Anglo-French pseudonym, of the still more horrible bugbear "society,"
had no cause to consider themselves neglected and find an excuse for
taking umbrage. From this point, our acquaintanceship naturally and
gradually ripened. We got intimate: it was our fate, I suppose--what
more or less would you have expected?
Besides, although, mind you, I do not consider myself in any way bound
to allay your curiosity and satisfy your compunctious scruples, you
should remember that all of us young parishioners of Saint Canon's--
Horner, Baby Blake, Lizzie Dangler and the rest--had known each other
almost from the distant days of childhood; and, consequently, were in
the habit of _tutoyer_-ing one another, using our respective "given"
names in familiar conversation. The habit may be a bad one, it is true,
but you cannot prevent it sometimes. There is no practice so capable of
imitation as that of calling one another by the Christian name. It is
just like that of the monkeys all cleaning their teeth along the banks
of the Amazon with pieces of stick, because they saw Professor Agassiz
setting them an example one fine morning, when engaged on his toilet in
company with a tooth-brush. You can't help yourself: you must bow to
the custom and follow suit.
In this instance, there was Miss Pimpernell, always addressing _her_ as
"Min," and _me_ as "Frank." The Dasher girls and others soon learnt to
do the same. What more likely than that we ourselves should fall into a
similar friendly system? It was only reasonable; and a result which
even a less alert person than yourself would have looked for. At all
events, neither of us meant any harm by it; and I am willing to "take my
affidavit" to that effect any day you please to name, in any Court of
Justice you may appoint.
Notwithstanding the intimate footing that now existed between Min and
myself, the fact of my non-acquaintance with her mother, annoyed me
extremely. You need not flatter yourself, however. It was not in the
least on account of any conscientious qualms, like yours.
I wished to know her personally from a totally different motive; and
yet, in spite of all attempts and stratagems on my part, I never could
get a chance of meeting her when I was in the company of some kind
friend to act as go-between and soothe the exigencies of introduction;
although, when alone I would encounter her frequently. This was very
vexing--especially so after a while; and I'll tell you how it was.
As the days flew by, and the new year, born in a moment, grew with giant
strides in that hasty growth common to all new years--they have a habit
of shooting ahead the first few months of their existence, as if they
desired to "force the pace," and make all the "running" they can--my
facilities for intercourse with Min became "small by degrees and
beautifully less." There you have the cause of my annoyance at once.
I could see her at the window, certainly. I also frequently passed her
mother and herself in the street, or on The Terrace, or along the
Prebend's Walk, when I was taking an airing abroad with dog Catch at my
heels; yet, I don't know how it was, but I invariably chanced to be on
the opposite side of the street, or road, or terrace, whenever I thus
passed them. I never failed to receive the timid little bow and smile
from Min, with a rosy heightening of her complexion the while--to which
I had now got so accustomed that, should I have been debarred from their
receipt, I would have considered myself very hardly used and felt a
morbid inclination to go mad and drown myself. But, Min's bow was
hardly sufficient to introduce me to her mother, even if people could be
introduced from opposite sides of roads. Thus it was that I remained a
stranger to Mrs Clyde, and did not have a chance of meeting her
daughter and talking to her, as I might have done if I could but have
visited her at home.
I never was able to have a word with her now, never could hear her
darling voice repeat my name in those soft accents I loved so well. It
was very hard--very hard, indeed! You see, I had ample reasons, beyond
the requirements of mere social etiquette, for wishing to know Mrs
Clyde.
Our suburb, you must know, was an extremely quiet place--"remote,
unfriended, solitary, slow."
Although everybody knew everybody, who happened to be anybody at all,
there was not much of current sociability and party giving. We were not
sociable. On the contrary, we were a very humdrum lot; rising early and
going to town to our business and daily toil--such of us as had any sort
of business to attend to--and coming back at a fixed regular hour. We
were in the habit of having our respective dinners and teas, and,
mayhap, suppers, at certain appointed times and seasons--also duly
regulated--and subsequently going to bed, to recruit for the same
routine on the morrow, without any excitements, or renovation and
destruction of tissue worth speaking of.
A "tea-party" was quite a sensation in the parish of Saint Canon's--
equivalent to one of the queen's garden fetes. Beyond school treats and
working parties, to which latter only the clergy and Lady Dorcases were
admitted, and the anniversary of Christmas, when we sometimes _did_
indulge a little in wholesome but subdued gaiety, we went on from year's
beginning to year's end without balls, or dinners, or dances, or any of
those resources which fashionable people have for killing time and
keeping up acquaintanceship.
We were not "high-toned" people; quite the reverse, in fact, as, I
believe, I have previously described. We only "dropped in" of an
evening to see friends, and spend a quiet hour or two over bezique and
music. On these occasions, a carpet cotillon or quadrille has been
sometimes indulged in; but it was the exception and not the rule. We
were generally satisfied with much milder pastime; our visits rarely
exceeding the interval between tea and "supper" time, when we partook of
a friendly, though seedy, abernethy and glass of wine or beer; and then
went home virtuously to bed.
Our society being thus constituted, it became a matter almost of
impossibility to meet any one particular person frequently, excepting
out in the street, unless you had the entree of their house. Hence, I
never could chat with Min, as I had done at the decorations; and,
naturally, I felt very much aggrieved thereanent.
What made it additionally provoking to me was, that Horner had contrived
to get introduced to Mrs Clyde almost as soon as she had settled in the
place, before I had returned from Paris; and there was Mr Mawley the
curate, too, exercising the privilege of his cloth by continually
frequenting her house. He drove me to desperation by going in and out,
apparently just as the fancy suited him, as if he were a tame cat about
the place.
His conduct was perfectly odious--that is, to any right-thinking person.
Curates and cousins are, I consider, two of the greatest obstacles to an
innocent layman's intimacy with the diviner portion of creation; and, in
these days of reform and disestablishment, of hereditary and other
conservative grievances, something ought to be done to abolish the
persons in question, or at least handicap them so that other deserving
young men might have a fair chance in the race for beauty's smile and
Hymen's chain. They have an enormous advantage, at present, over
outside men-folk. Girls like to have a sort of good-natured lap-dog
about them, to play with occasionally and run their errands, "do this"
and "that" for the asking--like Cornelius the centurion's obedient
servant--and make himself generally useful, without looking for any
ulterior reward on account of services rendered. You see, cousins and
curates are regarded as "harmless"--"detrimentals with the chill off,"
so to speak. His scrap of relationship throws a glimmer of possession
around the one, endowing with inherent right every act of his ministry;
while his "cloth" invests the other with a halo of sanctity and Platonic
freedom that disarms gossip of the usual clothes-peg whereon it hangs
its scandal. "Cousin Tom"--by-the-way, did you ever read Mackworth
Praed's lines on the same theme?--is allowed opportunities for, and
latitude in, flirtation, which poor Corydon, not a cousin never so
remote, may sigh in vain for; and, who would be so despicable as to
impute secular motives to the Reverend Hobplush's tender ministrations
towards those sweet young "sisters," who dote on his sucking sermons and
work him carpet slippers and text-markers without limit? Certainly, not
I.
I do not mean to say, however, that curates and cousins have it all
their own way always. There's a sweet little cupid who "sits up aloft,"
like Jack's guardian angel, to watch o'er the loves of poor laymen.
Still, it is very galling, to one of an ardent temperament especially,
to mark the anxious solicitude with which "Cousin Tom" may hang over the
divine creature--whom you can only look upon from afar as some distant
star--without attracting any observations anent his "attentions." The
confounded airs of possession he gives himself, while you are
languishing "out in the cold," in the expressive vernacular, are
frightful to contemplate. As for curate Hobplush, he may drop in
whenever he pleases, being treated like one of the family circle; while
you, miserable creature, can only call at stated intervals, always
dreading the horrid possibility of out-staying your welcome, and
receiving the metaphorical "cold shoulder"--though love may prompt you
to the sacrifice.
Such was my position now.
There was Mr Mawley visiting at Mrs Clyde's house some half-a-dozen
times a week, for all I knew to the contrary--and of course I imagined
the worst--and having endless chances and opportunities of conversing
with my darling, in the morning, at noontide, and at night; while poor,
wretched _I_ had to content myself with a passing bow and smile when we
chanced to meet abroad, or I should happen to see her dainty figure at
the window as I promenaded past her house.
You say I ought to have considered myself lucky to get even that slight
modicum of notice?
But I did _not_ so consider myself. I was not by any means contented.
Where did you ever find a lover worth his salt who was?
To tell the truth, I was horribly jealous of Mawley. He was not at all
a bad-looking fellow; and, with all his dogmatic tone and love of
argument, had a wonderfully taking way with ladies. Besides, his
connection with the Church gave him a considerable pull over me--girls
are so impressionable, as a rule, with regard to nice young curates,
that they generally have the pick of the parish! Really, all things
considered, I'm very much afraid that I had not that kind Christian
feeling and charity in my heart towards Mawley that the vicar had
enjoined in his Christmas sermon. I did not regard the curate even with
that reverence which his Oxford waistcoat should have inspired. I
believe that at that particular time I looked upon him with somewhat of
the same feeling with which the homicidal Cain regarded his brother Abel
about the sacrificing business.
Then, there was Horner, too, who was generally looked upon as an
"eligible" person, having a respectable position of his own in addition
to considerable expectations from his rich uncle, as I told you before.
I could see that Mrs Clyde encouraged him. He was always going there,
and frequently walking out with them also. I saw him, and it made my
heart bitter. One evening, I met him in full costume, with an opera-
glass slung round his shoulders, just before he reached their door. He
told me that Mrs Clyde had asked him to accompany her daughter and
herself to Covent Garden and share their box. They would have waited a
considerable time, I thought, before they would have been invited to
share _his_! I watched them drive off, and I went home mad. It was
getting too grievous for mortal to bear.
The house felt suffocating to me that evening. I could not stop in. I
determined to go and call on my old friend Miss Pimpernell, and see what
she could do to cheer me up.
"My dear boy," she said, as I entered the parlour, where she sat darning
the vicar's socks by the light of a moderator lamp, which stood on a
little table close beside her. "My dear boy, what is the matter with
you? You look quite haggard, and like a wild man from the woods! Have
you had your tea yet? I can ring for some in a moment."
"No, pray don't, thank you," I answered. "Miss Pimpernell," I
continued, in a determined voice, "I have had tea enough to-night to
last me for a twelvemonth! I can't bear this any longer. You must
introduce me to Mrs Clyde. I have never been able as yet to make her
acquaintance, and I want to go to her house as Horner does, and that
fellow Mawley."
"Hush, my dear boy!" she said, in her soothing way, as if she were
stroking me down the back like she stroked her tabby Tom--one of the
mousiest and most petted of cats. "You should not speak so of a
clergyman, my dear Frank. Think what the vicar would say if he heard
you!"
"Oh, never mind Mr Mawley," I said, somewhat petulantly; "I want to
know Mrs Clyde."
"Ah! that's what's the matter, is it, Frank? Then why did you not come
to old Sally before?"
"Well, Miss Pimpernell," I replied, "I never thought of you until to-
night."
"Never thought of me! You _are_ ungallant, Master Frank! But think of
me next time, my dear boy, whenever you find yourself in a difficulty;
and if Sally Pimpernell can help you out of it, she will, you may
depend!"
"Oh, thank you, dear Miss Pimpernell! And when will you introduce me to
Mrs Clyde?" I asked, thinking it best to "strike the iron" whilst it
was "hot."
"Come round to-morrow afternoon, Frank," she replied. "She is going to
be here by appointment, to see me about some charity in which she is
interested; and I'll try and manage it for you then."
"I'll be here, Miss Pimpernell, without fail," I said. "I can never be
sufficiently obliged to you, if you do it."
"All right, my boy," she said. "I'm sure I shall be very glad to help
you in such a trifling matter. But I do not want any of your soft
speeches, Frank! Keep them for somebody else who will appreciate them
better;" and she laughed her cheery, merry laugh, wishing me good-night
and sending me home much easier in my mind and happier than I had been
for many days past.
On the following afternoon I was introduced, as my old friend had
promised; and you may be certain that I tried to make myself as
agreeable as I could be to Min's mother. I think I succeeded, too; for,
when I took my leave early, in order to allow Miss Pimpernell and her
visitor an opportunity of discussing the best way of relieving the
parish poor, Mrs Clyde gave me an invitation.
"Mr Lorton," said she, "I should be glad if you would come round and
see us on Wednesday evening--I think you know our address? My daughter
is going to have a few friends in for a little music; and we shall both
be happy if you will join us. Miss Pimpernell tells me you are very
musical."
"With great pleasure," I answered, in society's stock phraseology. With
the "greatest" pleasure, I might have said, as I could almost have
jumped for joy. Just fancy! all that I had longed for was accorded in a
moment. My good fairy must undoubtedly have been hovering about the
vicarage premises that day; and I strongly suspect my good fairy in this
instance, as was the case also in many other circumstances of my life,
being none other than my very unfairylike old friend, little Miss
Pimpernell, the vicar's kind-hearted sister.
Did I not look forward to Wednesday evening? Did I not, when the time
for me to dress at last came round after an excruciatingly long
interval, bestow the most elaborate and unheard-of pains on my toilet,
almost rivalling Horner's generally unimpeachable "get up"? Did I not
proceed in the utmost joy and gladness towards the habitation of my
darling?