That pretty little house, the last in Pocklington Square, was lately
occupied by a young widow lady who wore a pink bonnet, a short silk
dress, sustained by a crinoline, and a light blue mantle, or over-jacket
(Miss C. is not here to tell me the name of the garment); or else a
black velvet pelisse, a yellow shawl, and a white bonnet; or else--but
never mind the dress, which seemed to be of the handsomest sort money
could buy--and who had very long glossy black ringlets, and a peculiarly
brilliant complexion,--No. 96, Pocklington Square, I say, was lately
occupied by a widow lady named Mrs. Stafford Molyneux.
The very first day on which an intimate and valued female friend of mine
saw Mrs. Stafford Molyneux stepping into a brougham, with a splendid bay
horse, and without a footman, (mark, if you please, that delicate sign
of respectability,) and after a moment's examination of Mrs. S. M.'s
toilette, her manners, little dog, carnation-colored parasol, &c., Miss
Elizabeth Clapperclaw clapped to the opera-glass with which she had been
regarding the new inhabitant of Our Street, came away from the window
in a great flurry, and began poking her fire in a fit of virtuous
indignation.
"She's very pretty," said I, who had been looking over Miss C.'s
shoulder at the widow with the flashing eyes and drooping ringlets.
"Hold your tongue, sir," said Miss Clapperclaw, tossing up her virgin
head with an indignant blush on her nose. "It's a sin and a shame that
such a creature should be riding in her carriage, forsooth, when honest
people must go on foot."
Subsequent observations confirmed my revered fellow-lodger's anger and
opinion. We have watched Hansom cabs standing before that lady's house
for hours; we have seen broughams, with great flaring eyes,
keeping watch there in the darkness; we have seen the vans from the
comestible-shops drive up and discharge loads of wines, groceries,
French plums, and other articles of luxurious horror. We have seen Count
Wowski's drag, Lord Martingale's carriage, Mr. Deuceace's cab drive up
there time after time; and (having remarked previously the pastry-cook's
men arrive with the trays and entrees), we have known that this widow
was giving dinners at the little house in Pocklington Square--dinners
such as decent people could not hope to enjoy.
My excellent friend has been in a perfect fury when Mrs. Stafford
Molyneux, in a black velvet riding-habit, with a hat and feather, has
come out and mounted an odious gray horse, and has cantered down the
street, followed by her groom upon a bay.
"It won't last long--it must end in shame and humiliation," my dear Miss
C. has remarked, disappointed that the tiles and chimney-pots did not
fall down upon Mrs. Stafford Molyneux's head, and crush that cantering,
audacious woman.
But it was a consolation to see her when she walked out with a French
maid, a couple of children, and a little dog hanging on to her by a blue
ribbon. She always held down her head then--her head with the drooping
black ringlets. The virtuous and well-disposed avoided her. I have
seen the Square-keeper himself look puzzled as she passed; and Lady
Kicklebury walking by with Miss K., her daughter, turn away from Mrs.
Stafford Molyneux, and fling back at her a ruthless Parthian glance that
ought to have killed any woman of decent sensibility.
That wretched woman, meanwhile, with her rouged cheeks (for rouge it
IS, Miss Clapperclaw swears, and who is a better judge?) has walked on
conscious, and yet somehow braving out the Street. You could read pride
of her beauty, pride of her fine clothes, shame of her position, in her
downcast black eyes.
As for Mademoiselle Trampoline, her French maid, she would stare the sun
itself out of countenance. One day she tossed up her head as she passed
under our windows with a look of scorn that drove Miss Clapperclaw back
to the fireplace again.
It was Mrs. Stafford Molyneux's children, however, whom I pitied the
most. Once her boy, in a flaring tartan, went up to speak to Master
Roderick Lacy, whose maid was engaged ogling a policeman; and the
children were going to make friends, being united with a hoop which
Master Molyneux had, when Master Roderick's maid, rushing up, clutched
her charge to her arms, and hurried away, leaving little Molyneux sad
and wondering.
"Why won't he play with me, mamma?" Master Molyneux asked--and his
mother's face blushed purple as she walked away.
"Ah--heaven help us and forgive us!" said I; but Miss C. can never
forgive the mother or child; and she clapped her hands for joy one day
when we saw the shutters up, bills in the windows, a carpet hanging out
over the balcony, and a crowd of shabby Jews about the steps--giving
token that the reign of Mrs. Stafford Molyneux was over. The
pastry-cooks and their trays, the bay and the gray, the brougham and the
groom, the noblemen and their cabs, were all gone; and the tradesmen in
the neighborhood were crying out that they were done.
"Serve the odious minx right!" says Miss C.; and she played at piquet
that night with more vigor than I have known her manifest for these last
ten years.
What is it that makes certain old ladies so savage upon certain
subjects? Miss C. is a good woman; pays her rent and her tradesmen;
gives plenty to the poor; is brisk with her tongue--kind-hearted in the
main; but if Mrs. Stafford Molyneux and her children were plunged into
a caldron of boiling vinegar, I think my revered friend would not take
them out.