CAMPAIGNING AT HOME
THE SOLDIER IN PEACE--THE LION AND THE LAMB--“THE GIRLS WE
LEAVE BEHIND US”--A PLAIN QUESTION--THE STRONG MAN’S
STRUGGLE--FATHERLY KINDNESS--THE “PEACE AND PLENTY”--A
LADY-KILLER’S PROJECTS--WAKING THOUGHTS
In a neat, well-appointed barouche, with clever, high-stepping brown
horses and everything complete, a party of three well-dressed persons
are gliding easily out of town, sniffing by anticipation the breezes
of the country, and greeting every morsel of verdure with a rapture
only known to those who have been for several weeks in London. Past
the barracks at Knightsbridge, where the windows are occupied by a
race of giants in moustaches and shirt-sleeves, and the officers in
front of their quarters are educating a poodle; past the gate at
Kensington, with its smartest of light-dragoon sentries, and the
gardens with their fine old trees disguised in soot; past dead walls
overtopped with waving branches; on through a continuous line of
streets that will apparently reach to Bath; past public-houses
innumerable, and grocery-shops without end; past Hammersmith, with its
multiplicity of academies, and Turnham Green, and Chiswick, and
suburban terraces with almost fabulous names, and detached houses with
the scaffolding still up; past market-gardens and rosaries, till
Brentford is reached, where the disappointed traveller, pining for the
country, almost deems himself transported back again east of Temple
Bar. But Brentford is soon left behind, and a glimpse of the “silver
Thames” rejoices eyes that have been aching for something farther
afield than the Serpentine, and prepares them for the unbounded views
and free, fresh landscape afforded by Hounslow Heath. “This is really
the country,” says Blanche, inhaling the pure air with a sigh of
positive delight, while the General exclaims, at the same instant,
with his accustomed vigour, “Zounds! the blockhead’s missed the turn
to the barracks, after all.”
The ladies are very smart; and even Mary Delaval (the third occupant
of the carriage), albeit quieter and more dignified than ever, has
dressed in gaudier plumage than is her wont, as is the practice of her
sex when they are about to attend what they are pleased to term “a
breakfast.” As for Blanche, she is too charming--such a little,
gossamer bonnet stuck at the very back of that glossy little head, so
that the beholder knows not whether to be most fascinated by the
ethereal beauty of the fabric, or wonder-struck at the dexterity with
which it is kept on. Then the dresses of the pair are like the hues of
the morning, though of their texture, as of their “trimmings,” it
becomes us not to hazard an opinion. Talk of beauty unadorned, and all
that! Take the handsomest figure that ever inspired a statuary--dress
her, or rather undress her to the costume of the Three Graces, or the
Nine Muses, or any of those _dowdies_ immortalised by ancient art, and
place her alongside of a moderately good-looking Frenchwoman, with
dark eyes and small feet, who has been permitted to dress _herself_:
why, the one is a mere corporeal mass of shapely humanity, the other a
sparkling emanation of light and smiles and “tulle” (or whatever they
call it) and coquetry and all that is most irresistible. Blanche and
Mary, with the assistance of good taste and good milliners, were
almost perfect types of their different styles of feminine beauty. The
General, too, was wondrously attired. Retaining the predilections of
his youth, he shone in a variety of under-waistcoats, each more
gorgeous than its predecessor, surmounting the whole by a blue coat of
unexampled brilliancy and peculiar construction. Like most men who are
not in the habit of “getting themselves up” every day, he was always
irritable when thus clothed in “his best,” and was now peculiarly
fidgety as to the right turn by which his carriage should reach the
barracks where the “Loyal Hussars,” under the temporary command of
Major D’Orville, were about to give a breakfast of unspeakable
splendour and hospitality.
“That way--no--the other way, you blockhead!--straight on, and short
to the right!” vociferated the General to his bewildered coachman, as
they drew up at the barrack-gate; and Blanche timidly suggested they
should ask “that officer,” alluding to a dashing, handsome individual
guarding the entrance from behind an enormous pair of dark moustaches.
“That’s only the sentry, Blanche,” remarked Mary Delaval, whose early
military experience made her more at home here than her companion.
“Dear,” replied Blanche, colouring a little at her mistake, “I thought
he was a captain, at least--_he’s very good-looking_.”
But the barouche rolls on to the mess-room door, and although the
ladies are somewhat disappointed to find their entertainers in plain
clothes (a woman’s idea of a hussar being that he should live and die
_en grande tenue_), yet the said plain clothes are so well put on, and
the moustaches and whiskers so carefully arranged, and the fair ones
themselves received with such _empressement_, as to make full amends
for any deficiency of warlike costume. Besides, the surrounding
atmosphere is so thoroughly military. A rough-rider is bringing a
young horse from the school; a trumpet is sounding in the
barrack-yard; troopers lounging about in picturesque undress are
sedulously saluting their officers; all is suggestive of the show and
glitter which makes a soldier’s life so fascinating to woman.
Major D’Orville is ready to hand them out of the carriage. Lacquers is
stationed on the door steps. Captain Clank and Cornet Capon are in
attendance to receive their cloaks. Even Sir Ascot Uppercrust, who is
here as a guest, lays aside his usual _nonchalance_, and actually
“hopes Miss Kettering didn’t catch cold yesterday getting home from
Chiswick.” Clank whispers to Capon that he thinks “Uppy is making
strong running”; and Capon strokes his nascent moustaches, and
oracularly replies, “The divil doubt him.”
No wonder ladies like a military entertainment. It certainly is the
fashion among soldiers, as among their seafaring brethren, to profess
far greater devotion and exhibit more _empressement_ in their manner
to the fair sex than is customary in this age with civilians.
The latter, more particularly that maligned class, “the young men of
the present day,” are not prone to put themselves much out of their
way for any one, and treat you, fair daughters of England, with a
mixture of patronage and carelessness which is far from complimentary.
How different you find it when you visit a barrack or are shown over a
man-of-war! Respectful deference waits on your every expression,
admiring eyes watch your charming movements, and stalwart arms are
proffered to assist your delicate steps. Handsome, sunburnt
countenances explain to you how the biscuit is served out; or
moustaches of incalculable volume wait your answer as to “what polka
you choose their band to perform.” You make conquests all around you,
and wherever you go your foot is on their necks; but do not for this
think that your image never _can_ be effaced from these warlike
hearts. A good many of them, even the best-looking ones, have got
wives and children at home; and the others, unencumbered though they
be, save by their debts, are apt to entertain highly anti-matrimonial
sentiments, and to frame their conduct on sundry aphorisms of a very
faithless tendency, purporting that “blue water is a certain cure for
heart-ache”; that judicious hussars are entitled “to love and to ride
away”; with other maxims of a like inconstant nature. Nay, in both
services there is a favourite air of inspiriting melody, the burden
and title of which, monstrous as it may appear, are these unfeeling
words, “The girls we leave behind us!” It is _always_ played on
marching out of a town.
But however ill our “captain bold” of the present day may behave to
“the girl he leaves behind him,” the lady in his front has small cause
to complain of remissness or inattention. The mess-room at Hounslow is
fitted up with an especial view to the approbation of the fair sex.
The band outside ravishes their ears with its enchanting harmony; the
officers and male guests dispose themselves in groups with those
whose society they most affect; and Blanche finds herself the centre
of attraction to sundry dashing warriors, not one of whom would
hesitate for an instant to abandon his visions of military
distinction, and link himself, his debts, and his moustaches, to the
fortunes of the pretty heiress.
Now, Sir Ascot Uppercrust has resolved this day to do or die--“to be a
man or a mouse,” as he calls it. Of this young gentleman we have as
yet said but little, inasmuch as he is one of that modern school
which, abounding in specimens through the higher ranks of society, is
best described by a series of negatives. He was _not_ good-looking--he
was _not_ clever--he was _not_ well-educated; but, on the other hand,
he was not to be intimidated--not to be excited--and _not_ to be taken
in. Coolness of mind and body were his principal characteristics; no
one ever saw “Uppy” in a hurry, or a dilemma, or what is called “taken
aback”; he would have gone into the ring and laid the odds to an
archbishop without a vestige of astonishment, and with a carelessness
of demeanour bordering upon contempt; or he would have addressed the
House of Commons, had he thought fit to honour that formidable
assemblage by his presence, with an equanimity and _insouciance_ but
little removed from impertinence. A quaint boy at Eton, _cool hand_ at
Oxford, a deep card in the regiment, man or woman never yet had the
best of “Uppy”; but to-day he felt, for once, nervous and dispirited,
and wished “the thing was over,” and settled one way or the other. He
was an only son, and not used to be contradicted. His mother had
confided to him her own opinion of his attractions, and striven hard
to persuade her darling that he had but to see and conquer;
nevertheless, the young gentleman was not at all sanguine of success.
Accustomed to view things with an impartial and by no means a
charitable eye, he formed a dispassionate idea of his own attractions,
and extended no more indulgence to himself than to his friends.
“Plain, but neat,” he soliloquised that very morning, as he thought
over his proceedings whilst dressing; “not much of a talker, but a
_devil to think_--good position--certain rank--she’ll be a _lady_,
though rather a _Brummagem_ one--house in Lowndes Street--place in
the West--family diamonds--and a fairish rent-roll (when the mortgages
are paid)--that’s what she would get. Now, what should I get? Nice
girl--’gad, she _is_ a nice girl, with her ‘sun-bright hair’ as some
fellow says--good temper--good action--_and_ three hundred thousand
pounds. The exchange is _rather_ in my favour; but then all girls want
to be married, and that squares it, perhaps. If she says ‘Yes,’ sell
out--give up hunting--drive her about in a phaeton, and buy a yacht.
If she says ‘No,’ get _second leave_--go to Melton in November--and
hang on with the regiment, which ain’t a bad sort of life, after all.
So it’s hedged both ways. Six to one and half-a-dozen to the other.
Very well; to-day we’ll settle it.”
With these sentiments it is needless to remark that Sir Ascot was none
of your sighing, despairing, fire-eating adorers, whose violence
frightens a woman into a not unwilling consent; but a cautious, quiet
lover, on whom perhaps a civil refusal might be the greatest favour
she could confer. Nevertheless, he liked Blanche, too, in his own way.
Well, the band played, and the luncheon was discussed, and the room
was cleared for an impromptu dance (meditated for a fortnight); and
some waltzed, and some flirted, and some walked about and peeped into
the troop-stables and inspected the riding-school, and Blanche found
herself, rather to her surprise, walking _tête-à-tête_ with Sir Ascot
from the latter dusty emporium, lingering a little behind the rest of
the party, and separated altogether from the General and Mary Delaval.
Sir Ascot having skilfully detached Lacquers, by informing him that he
had made a fatal impression on Miss Spanker, who was searching
everywhere for the credulous hussar; and having thus possessed himself
of Blanche’s ear, now stopped dead-short, looked the astonished girl
full in the face, and without moving a muscle of his own countenance,
carelessly remarked, “Miss Kettering, would you like to marry me?”
Blanche thought he was joking, and although it struck her as an
ill-timed piece of pleasantry, she strove to keep up the jest, and
replied, with a laugh and low curtsey, “Sir Ascot Uppercrust, you do
me too much honour.”
“No, but will you, Miss Kettering?” said Sir Ascot, getting quite
warm (for him). “Plain fellow--do what I can--make you happy--and all
that.”
[Illustration: “‘Sir Ascot Uppercrust, you do me too much honour.’”
_Page 182_]
Poor Blanche blushed crimson up to her eyes. Good heavens! then the
man was in earnest after all! What had she done--she, the pet of
“Cousin Charlie,” and the _protégée_ of Frank Hardingstone--that such
a creature as this should presume to ask her such a question? She
hesitated--felt very angry--half inclined to laugh and half inclined
to cry; and Sir Ascot went on, “Silence gives consent, Miss
Kettering--’pon my soul, I’m immensely flattered--can’t express
what I feel--no poet, and that sort of thing--but I really
am--eh!--very--eh!” It was getting too absurd; if she did not take
some decisive step, here was a dandy quite prepared to affiance her
against her will, and what to say or how to say it, poor little
Blanche, who was totally unused to this sort of thing, and tormented,
moreover, with an invincible desire to laugh, knew no more than the
man in the moon.
“You misunderstand, Sir Ascot,” at last she stammered out; “I didn’t
mean--that is--I meant, or rather I intended--to--to--to--decline--or,
I should say--in short, _I couldn’t for the world_!” With which
unequivocal declaration Blanche blushed once more up to her eyes, and
to her inexpressible relief, put her arm within Major D’Orville’s,
that officer coming up opportunely at that moment; and seeing the
girl’s obvious confusion and annoyance, extricating her, as he seemed
always to do, from her unpleasant dilemma and her matter-of-fact
swain.
And this was Blanche’s first proposal. Nothing so alarming in it,
young ladies, after all. We fear you may be disappointed at the blunt
manner in which so momentous a question can be put. Here was no
language of flowers--no giving of roses and receiving of
carnations--no hoarding of locks of hair, or secreting of bracelets,
or kidnapping of gloves--none of the petty larceny of courtship--none
of the dubious, half-expressed, sentimental flummery which _may_
signify all that mortal heart can bestow, or _may_ be the mere
coquetry of conventional gallantry. When _he_ comes to the point, let
us hope his meaning may be equally plain, whether it is couched in a
wish that he might “be _always_ helping you over stiles,” or a
request that you will “give him a _right_ to walk with you by
moonlight without being scolded by mamma,” or an inquiry as to whether
you “can live in the country, and _only_ come to London for three
months during the season,” or any other roundabout method of asking a
straightforward question. Let us hope, moreover, that the applicant
may be _the right one_, and that you may experience, to the extent of
actual impossibility, the proverbial difficulty of saying--No.
Now, it fell out that Major D’Orville arrived in the nick of time to
save Blanche from further embarrassment, in consequence of his
inability, in common with the rest of his fellow-creatures, “to know
his own mind.” The Major had got up the _fête_ entirely, as he
imagined, with the idea of prosecuting his views against the heiress,
and hardly allowed to himself that, in his innermost soul, there
lurked a hope that Mrs. Delaval might accompany her former charge, and
he might see her _just once more_. Had D’Orville been thoroughly
_bad_, he would have been a successful man; as it was, there gleamed
ever and anon upon his worldly heart a ray of that higher nature, that
nobler instinct, which spoils the villain, while it makes the hero.
Mary had pierced the coat-of-mail in which the _roué_ was encased;
probably her very indifference was her most fatal weapon. D’Orville
really loved her--yes, though he despised himself for the weakness
(since weakness it is deemed in creeds such as his), though he would
grind his teeth and stamp his foot in solitude, while he muttered,
“Fool! fool! to bow down before a woman!” yet the spell was on him,
and the chain was eating into his heart. In the watches of the night
_her image_ sank into his brain and tortured him with its calm,
indifferent smile. In his dreams _she_ bent over him, and her drooping
hair swept across his forehead, till the strong man woke, and yearned
like a child for a fellow-mortal’s love. But not for him the childlike
trust that can repose on human affection. Gaston had eaten of the tree
of knowledge, the knowledge of good and evil; much did the evil
predominate over the good, and still the galling thought goaded
him almost to madness. “Suppose I should gain this woman’s
affections--suppose I should sacrifice my every hope to that sweet
face, and find her, after all, like the rest of them! Suppose _I_,
too, should weary, as I have wearied before of faces well-nigh as
fair--hearts even far more kind--is there no green branch on earth? Am
I to wander for ever seeking rest and finding none? Am I to be cursed,
like a lost spirit, with longings for that happiness which my very
nature will not permit me to enjoy? Oh that I were wholly good, or
wholly bad! that I could loathe the false excitement and the dazzling
charms of vice, or steep my better feelings in the petrifying waters
of perdition! I _will_ conquer my weakness. What should I care for
this stone-cold governess? I _will_ be free, and this Mrs. Delaval
shall discover that _I_ too can be as careless, and as faithless, and
as hard-hearted as--_a woman_!” With which laudable and manly
resolution our dashing Major proceeded to make the agreeable to his
guests, and to lose no opportunity of exchanging glances and mixing in
conversation with the very lady he had sworn so stoutly to avoid. But
with all his tactics, all his military proficiency in manœuvring,
he found it impossible to detach Mary from her party, or to engage her
in a _tête-à-tête_ with himself. True-hearted and dignified, with her
pure affection fixed upon another, she was not a person to descend to
coquetry for the mere pleasure of a conquest, and she clung to the
General for the purpose of avoiding the Major, till old Bounce became
convinced that she was to add another name to the list of victims who
had already succumbed before his many fascinations. The idea had been
some time nascent in his mind, and as it now grew and spread, and
developed itself into a certainty, his old heart warmed with a thrill
he had not felt since the reign of the widow at Cheltenham, and he
made the agreeable in his own way by pointing out to Mary all the
peculiarities and arrangements of a barrack-yard, interspersed with
many abrupt exclamations and voluminous personal anecdotes. Major
D’Orville hovered round them the while, and perhaps the very
difficulty of addressing his former love enhanced the charm of her
presence and the fascination against which he struggled. It is amusing
to see a thorough man of the world, one accustomed to conquer and
enslave where he is himself indifferent, awkward as the veriest
schoolboy, timid and hesitating as a girl, where he is _really_
touched--though woman--
“Born to be controlled,
Stoop to the forward and the bold.”
She thereby gauges with a false measure the devotion for which she
pines. Would she know her real power, would she learn where she is
truly loved, let her take note of the averted eye, the haunting step,
ever hovering near, seldom daring to approach, the commonplace remark
that shrinks from the one cherished topic, and above all the quivering
voice, which, steady and commanding to the world beside, fails only
when it speaks to her. Mary Delaval might have noted this had her
heart not been in Kaffirland, or had the General allowed her leisure
to attend to anything but himself. “Look ye, my dear Mrs. Delaval, our
stables in India were ventilated quite differently. Climate? how d’ye
mean? climate makes no difference--why, I’ve had the Kedjerees
picketed in thousands round my tent. What? D’Orville, you’ve been on
the Sutlej--’gad, sir, your fellows would have been astonished if I’d
dropped among you there.”
“And justly so,” quietly remarked the Major; “if I remember right, you
were in cantonments more than three thousand miles off.”
“Well, at any rate, I taught those black fellows how to
look after their nags,” replied the General. “I left them
the best-mounted corps in the Presidency, and six weeks after my back
was turned they weren’t _worth a row of pins_. Zounds, don’t tell me!
jobbing--jobbing--nothing but jobbing! What? No _sore backs_ whilst I
commanded them--at least among _the horses_,” added our
disciplinarian, reflectively; “can’t say as much with regard to the
_men_. But there is nothing like a big stick for a nigger--so let’s go
and see the riding-school.”
“I have still got the grey charger, Mrs. Delaval,” interposed the
Major, wishing old Bounce and his Kedjerees in a hotter climate than
India; “poor fellow, he’s quite white now, but as great a favourite
still as he was in ‘the merry days,’” and the Major’s voice shook a
little. “Would you like to see him?”
Mary understood the allusion, but her calm affirmative was as
indifferent as ever, and the trio were proceeding to the Major’s
stables, that officer going on before to find his groom, when he met
Blanche, as we have already said, and divining intuitively what had
taken place by her flushed countenance and embarrassed manner, offered
his arm to conduct her back to her party, thereby earning her eternal
gratitude, no less than that of Sir Ascot, who, as he afterwards
confided to an intimate friend, “was _completely in the hole_, and
didn’t the least know what the devil to do next.”
And now D’Orville practically demonstrated the advantage in the game
of flirtation possessed by an untouched heart. With the governess he
had been diffident, hesitating, almost awkward; with the pupil he was
eloquent and winning as usual. His good taste told him it would be
absurd to ignore Blanche’s obvious trepidation, and his knowledge of
the sex taught him that the “soothing system,” with a mixture of
lover-like respect and paternal kindness, might produce important
results. So he begged Blanche to lean on his arm and compose her
nerves, and talked kindly to her in his soft, deep voice. “I can see
you have been annoyed, Miss Kettering--you know the interest I take in
you, and I trust you will not consider me presumptuous in wishing to
extricate you from further embarrassment. I am an old fellow now,” and
the Major smiled his own winning smile, “and therefore a fit chaperon
for young ladies. I have nobody to care for” (D’Orville, D’Orville!
you would shoot a man who called you a liar), “and I have watched you
as if you were a sister or a child of my own. Pray do not tell me more
than if I can be of any service to you; and if I can, my dear Miss
Kettering, command me to the utmost extent of my powers!” What could
Blanche do but thank him warmly? and who shall blame the girl for
feeling gratified by the interest of such a man, or for entertaining a
vague sort of satisfaction that after all she was neither his sister
nor his daughter. Had he been ten years older she would have thrown
her arms round his neck, and kissed him in childlike confidence; as it
was, she pressed closer to his side, and felt her heart warm to the
kind, considerate protector. The Major saw his advantage, and
proceeded--“I am alone in the world, you know, and seldom have an
opportunity of doing any one a kindness. We soldiers lead a sadly
unsatisfactory, desultory sort of life. Till you ‘came out’ this year,
I had no one to care for, no one to interest myself about; but since I
have seen you every day, and watched you enjoying yourself, and
admired and sought after, I have felt like a different man. I have a
great deal to thank you for, Miss Kettering; I was rapidly growing
into a selfish, heartless old gentleman, but you have renewed my
youthful feelings and freshened up my better nature, till I sometimes
think I am almost happy. How can I repay you but by watching over your
career, and should you ever require it, placing my whole existence at
your disposal? It would break my heart to see you thrown away--no;
believe me, Miss Kettering, you have no truer friend than myself, none
that admires or loves you better than your old chaperon;” and as the
Major spoke he looked so kindly and sincerely into the girl’s face,
that albeit his language might bear the interpretation of actual love,
and was, as Hairblower would have said, “uncommon near the wind,” it
seemed the most natural thing in the world under the circumstances,
and Blanche leaned on his arm, and talked and laughed, and told him to
get the carriage, and otherwise ordered him about with a
strangely-mixed feeling of childlike confidence and gratified vanity.
The party broke up at an early hour, many of them having
dinner-engagements in London; and as D’Orville handed Blanche into her
carriage, he felt that he had to-day made a prodigious stride towards
the great object in view. He had gained the girl’s confidence, no
injudicious movement towards gaining her heart _and_ her fortune. He
pressed her hand as she wished him good-bye; and while he did so,
shuddered at the consciousness of his meanness. Too well he knew he
loved another--a word, a look from Mary Delaval, would have saved him
even now; but her farewell was cold and short as common courtesy would
admit of, and he ground his teeth as he thought those feet would spurn
him, at which he would give his very life to fall. The worst passions
of his nature were aroused. He swore, some day, to humble that proud
heart in the dust, but the first step at all events must be to win
the heiress. This morning he could have given up all for Mary, but
_now_ he was himself again, and the Major walked moodily back to
barracks, a wiser (as the world would opine), but certainly not a
better man.
Care, however, although, as Horace tells us, “she sits behind the
horseman,” is a guest whose visits are but little encouraged by the
light dragoon. Our gallant hussars were not inclined to mope down at
Hounslow after their guests had returned to town, and the last
carriage had scarcely driven off with its fair freight, ere phaeton,
buggy, riding-horse, and curricle were put in requisition, to take
their military owners back to the metropolis; that victim of
discipline, the orderly officer, being alone left to console himself
in his solitude, as he best might, with his own reflections and the
society of a water-spaniel. To-morrow morning they must be again on
the road, to reach head-quarters in time for parade; but to-morrow
morning is a long way off from gentlemen who live every hour of their
lives; so away they go, each on his own devices, but one and all
resolved to make the most of the present, and glitter, whilst they
may, in the sunshine of their too brief noon.
* * * * *
St. George’s clock tolls one, and Blanche has been asleep for hours in
her quiet room at the back of the house in Grosvenor Square. Pure
thoughts and pleasant dreams have hovered round the young girl’s
pillow, and the last image present to her eyes has been the kind,
handsome face of Major D’Orville--the hero who, commanding to all
besides, is so gentle, so considerate, so tender with her alone.
“Perhaps,” thought she, as the midnight rain beat against her
window-panes, “he is even now going his bleak rounds at Hounslow”
(Blanche had a vague idea that the hussars spent the night in
patrolling the heath), “wrapped in his cloak, on that dear white
horse, very likely thinking of _me_. How such a man is thrown away,
with his kindly feelings, and his noble mind, and his courageous
heart. ‘Nobody to care for,’ he said; ‘alone in the world’;” and
little Blanche sighed a sigh of that pity which is akin to a softer
feeling, and experienced for an instant that startling throb with
which love knocks at the door, like some unwelcome visitor, ere habit
has emboldened him to walk up-stairs, unbidden, and make himself at
home.
Let us see how right the maiden was in her conjectures, and follow the
Major through his bleak rounds, and his night of military hardships.
As we perambulate London at our loitering leisure, and stare about us
in the desultory, wandering manner of those who have nothing to do,
now admiring an edifice, now peeping into a print-shop, we are often
brought up, “all standing,” in one of the great thoroughfares, by the
magnificent proportions, the architectural splendour, of a building
which our peaceful calling debars us from entering. Nevertheless we
may gaze and gape at the stately outside; we may admire the lofty
windows, with their florid ornaments, and marvel for what purpose are
intended the upper casements, which seem to us like the bull’s-eyes
let into the deck of a three-decker, magnified to a gigantic
uselessness; we may stare till the nape of our neck warns us to
desist, at the classic ornaments raised in high relief around the
roof, where strange mythological devices, unknown to Lemprière,
mystify alike the antiquarian and the naturalist,--centaurs,
terminating in salmon-trout, career around the cornices, more
grotesque than the mermaid, more inexplicable than the sphinx. In vain
we cudgel our brains to ask of what faith, what principle these
monsters may be the symbols. Can they represent the _insignia_ of that
corps so strangely omitted in the _Army List_--known to a grateful
country as the horse marines? Are they a glorious emanation of modern
art? or are they, as the Irish gentleman suggested of our martello
towers, only intended to puzzle posterity? Splendid, however, as may
be the outward magnificence of this military palace, it is nothing
compared with the luxury that reigns within, and the heroes of both
services enjoy a delightful contrast to the hardships of war, in the
spacious saloons and exquisite repasts provided for its members by the
“Peace and Plenty Club.”
“Waiter--two large cigars and another sherry-cobbler,” lisps a voice
which, although somewhat thicker than usual, we have no difficulty in
recognising as the property of Captain Lacquers. That officer has
dined “severely,” as he calls it, and is slightly inebriated. He is
reclining on three chairs, in a large, lofty apartment, devoid of
furniture, and surrounded by ottomans. From its airy situation,
general appearance, and pervading odour, we have no difficulty in
identifying it as the smoking-room of the establishment. At our
friend’s elbow stands a small table, with empty glasses, and opposite
him, with his heels above the level of his head, and a cigar of
“_sesquipedalian_” length in his mouth, sits Sir Ascot Uppercrust.
Gaston D’Orville is by his side, veiling his handsome face in clouds
of smoke, and they are all three talking about the heiress. Yes; these
are the Major’s _rounds_, these are the hardships innocent Blanche
sighed to think of. It is lucky that ladies can neither hear nor see
us in our masculine retreats.
“So she refused you, Uppy; refused you point blank, did she? ’Gad, I
like her for it,” said Lacquers, the romance of whose disposition was
much enhanced by his potations.
“Deuced impertinent, I call it,” replied the repulsed; “won’t have
such a chance again. After all, she’s not _half_ a nice girl.”
“Don’t say that,” vociferated Lacquers, “don’t say that. She’s
_perfect_, my dear boy; she’s enchanting--she’s got _mind_, and
that--what’s a woman without intellect?--without the what-d’ye-call-it
spark?--a--a--you recollect the quotation.”
“A pudding without plums,” said Sir Ascot, who was a bit of a wag in a
quiet way; and “A fiddle without strings,” suggested the Major at the
same moment.
“Exactly,” replied Lacquers, quite satisfied; “well, my dear fellow,
I’m a man that adores all that sort of thing. ’Gad, I can’t do without
talent, and music, and so on. Do I ever miss an opera? Didn’t I half
ruin myself for Pastorelli, because she could dance? Now, I’ll tell
you what”--and the speaker, lighting a fresh cigar, forgot what he was
going to say.
“Then _you’re_ rather smitten with Miss Kettering, too,” observed
D’Orville, who, as usual, was determined not to throw a chance away.
“I thought a man of your many successes was _blasé_ with that sort of
thing;” and the Major smiled at Sir Ascot, whilst Lacquers went off
again at score.
“To be sure, I’ve gone very deep into the thing, old fellow, as you
know; and I think I _understand_ women. You may depend upon it they
like a fellow with brains. But I ought to settle; I ‘flushed’ a grey
hair yesterday in my whiskers, and this is just the girl to suit. It’s
not her money I care for; I’ve got plenty--at least I can get plenty
at seven per cent. No, it is her intellect, and her refusing Uppy,
that I like. What did you say, my boy? how did you begin?” he added,
thinking he might as well get a hint. “Did you tip her any poetry?
Tommy Moore, and that other fellow, little What’s-his-name?” Lacquers
was beginning to speak very thick, and did not wait for an answer.
“I’ll show you how to settle these matters to-morrow after parade.
First I’ll go to----Who’s that fellow just come in? ’Gad, it’s
Clank--good fellow, Clank. I say, Clank, will you come to my wedding?
Recollect I asked you to-night; be very particular about the date. Let
me see; to-morrow’s the second Sunday after Ascot. I’ll lay any man
three to two the match comes off before Goodwood.”
D’Orville smiles calmly. He hears the woman whom he intends to make
his wife talked of thus lightly, yet no feeling of bitterness rises in
his mind against the drunken dandy. Would he not resent such mention
of another name? But his finances will not admit of such a chance as
the present wager being neglected; so he draws out his betting-book,
and turning over its well-filled leaves for a clear place, quietly
observes, “I’ll take it--three to two, what in?”
“Pounds, ponies, or hundreds,” vociferates Lacquers, now decidedly
uproarious; “thousands if you like. Fortune favours the brave. Vogue
la thingumbob! Waiter! brandy-and-water! Clank, you’re a trump: shake
hands, Clank. We won’t go home till morning. Yonder he goes:
tally-ho!” And while the Major, who is a man of conscience, satisfies
himself with betting his friend’s bet in hundreds, Lacquers vainly
endeavours to make a corresponding memorandum; and finding his fingers
refuse their office, gives himself up to his fate, and with an
abortive attempt to embrace the astonished Clank, subsides into a
sitting posture on the floor.
The rest adjourn to whist in the drawing-room; and Gaston D’Orville
concludes his rounds by losing three hundred to Sir Ascot; “Uppy”
congratulating himself on not having made such a bad day’s work after
all.
As the Major walks home to his lodgings in the first pure
flush of the summer’s morning, how he loathes that man whose
fresh unsullied boyhood he remembers so well. What is he now?
Nothing to rest on; nothing to hope for--loving one--deceiving
another. If he gain his object, what is it but a bitter perjury?
Gambler--traitor--profligate--turn which way he will, there is nothing
but ruin, misery, and sin.