The History of Pendennis Part 51

"Her birth, sir; her father was the mate of a s.h.i.+p, they say: and she has not money enough," objected Pen, in a dandified manner. "What's ten thousand pound and a girl bred up like her?"

"You use my own words, and it is all very well. But, I tell you in confidence, Pen,--in strict honour, mind,--that it's my belief she has a devilish deal more than ten thousand pound: and from what I saw of her the other day, and--and have heard of her--I should say she was a devilish accomplished, clever girl: and would make a good wife with a sensible husband."

"How do you know about her money?" Pen asked, smiling. "You seem to have information about everybody, and to know about all the town."

"I do know a few things, sir, and I don't tell all I know. Mark that,"

the uncle replied. "And as for that charming Miss Amory,--for charming, begad! she is,--if I saw her Mrs. Arthur Pendennis, I should neither be sorry nor surprised, begad! and if you object to ten thousand pound, what would you say, sir, to thirty, or forty, or fifty?" and the Major looked still more knowingly, and still harder at Pen.

"Well, sir," he said to his G.o.dfather and namesake, "make her Mrs.

Arthur Pendennis. You can do it as well as I."

"Psha! you are laughing at me, sir," the other replied rather peevishly, "and you ought not to laugh so near a church gate. Here we are at St.

Benedict's. They say Mr. Oriel is a beautiful preacher."

Indeed, the bells were tolling, the people were trooping into the handsome church, the carriages of the inhabitants of the lordly quarter poured forth their pretty loads of devotees, in whose company Pen and his uncle, ending their edifying conversation, entered the fane. I do not know whether other people carry their worldly affairs to the church door. Arthur, who, from habitual reverence and feeling, was always more than respectful in a place of wors.h.i.+p, thought of the incongruity of their talk, perhaps; whilst the old gentleman at his side was utterly unconscious of any such contrast. His hat was brushed: his wig was trim: his neckcloth was perfectly tied. He looked at every soul in the congregation, it is true: the bald heads and the bonnets, the flowers and the feathers: but so demurely that he hardly lifted up his eyes from his book--from his book which he could not read without gla.s.ses. As for Pen's gravity, it was sorely put to the test when, upon looking by chance towards the seats where the servants were collected, he spied out, by the side of a demure gentleman in plush, Henry Foker, Esquire, who had discovered this place of devotion. Following the direction of Harry's eye, which strayed a good deal from his book, Pen found that it alighted upon a yellow bonnet and a pink one: and that these bonnets were on the heads of Lady Clavering and Blanche Amory. If Pen's uncle is not the only man who has talked about his worldly affairs up to the church door, is poor Harry Foker the only one who has brought his worldly love into the aisle?

When the congregation issued forth at the conclusion of the service, Foker was out amongst the first, but Pen came up with him presently, as he was hankering about the entrance, which he was unwilling to leave, until my lady's barouche, with the bewigged coachman, had borne away its mistress and her daughter from their devotions.

When the two ladies came out, they found together the Pendennises, uncle and nephew, and Harry Foker, Esquire, sucking the crook of his stick, standing there in the suns.h.i.+ne. To see and to ask to eat were simultaneous with the good-natured Begum, and she invited the three gentlemen to luncheon straightway.

Blanche was, too, particularly gracious. "O! do come," she said to Arthur, "if you are not too great a man. I want so to talk to you about--but we mustn't say what, here, you know. What would Mr.

Oriel say?" And the young devotee jumped into the carriage after her mamma.--"I've read every word of it. It's adorable," she added, still addressing herself to Pen.

"I know who is," said Mr. Arthur, making rather a pert bow.

"What's the row about?" asked Mr. Foker, rather puzzled.

"I suppose Miss Clavering means 'Walter Lorraine,'" said the Major, looking knowing, and nodding at Pen.

"I suppose so, sir. There was a famous review in the Pall Mall this morning. It was Warrington's doing though, and I must not be too proud."

"A review in Pall Mall?--Walter Lorraine? What the doose do you mean?"

Foker asked. "Walter Lorraine died of the measles, poor little beggar, when we were at Grey Friars. I remember his mother coming up."

"You are not a literary man, Foker," Pen said, laughing, and hooking his arm into his friend's. "You must know I have been writing a novel, and some of the papers have spoken very well of it. Perhaps you don't read the Sunday Papers?"

"I read Bell's Life regular, old boy," Mr Foker answered: at which Pen laughed again, and the three gentlemen proceeded in great good-humour to Lady Clavering's house.

The subject of the novel was resumed after luncheon by Miss Amory, who indeed loved poets and men of letters if she loved anything, and was sincerely an artist in feeling. "Some of the pa.s.sages in the book made me cry, positively they did," she said.

Pen said, with some fatuity, "I am happy to think I have a part of vos larmes, Miss Blanche,"--and the Major (who had not read more than six pages of Pen's book) put on his sanctified look, saying, "Yes, there are some pa.s.sages quite affecting, mons'ous affecting:" and,--"Oh, if it makes you cry,"--Lady Amory declared she would not read it, "that she wouldn't."

"Don't, mamma," Blanche said, with a French shrug of her shoulders; and then she fell into a rhapsody about the book, about the s.n.a.t.c.hes of poetry interspersed in it about the two heroines, Leonora and Neaera; about the two heroes, Walter Lorraine and his rival the young Duke--"and what good company you introduce us to," said the young lady archly "quel ton! How much of your life have you pa.s.sed at court, and are you a prime minister's son, Mr. Arthur?"

Pen began to laugh--"It is as cheap for a novelist to create a Duke as to make a Baronet," he said. "Shall I tell you a secret, Miss Amory? I promoted all my characters at the request of the publisher. The young Duke was only a young Baron when the novel was first written; his false friend, the Viscount, was a simple commoner and so on with all the characters of the story."

"What a wicked, satirical, pert young man you have become! Comme vous voila forme!" said the young lady. "How different from Arthur Pendennis of the country! Ah! I think I like Arthur Pendennis of the country best, though!" and she gave him the full benefit of her eyes,--both of the fond appealing glance into his own, and of the modest look downwards towards the carpet, which showed off her dark eyelids and long fringed lashes.

Pen of course protested that he had not changed in the least, to which the young lady replied by a tender sigh; and thinking that she had done quite enough to make Arthur happy or miserable (as the case might be), she proceeded to cajole his companion, Mr. Harry Foker, who during the literary conversation had sate silently imbibing the head of his cane, and wis.h.i.+ng that he was a clever chap like that Pen.

If the Major thought that by telling Miss Amory of Mr. Foker's engagement to his cousin, Lady Ann Milton (which information the old gentleman neatly conveyed to the girl as he sate by her side at luncheon below-stairs),--if, we say, the Major thought that the knowledge of this fact would prevent Blanche from paying any further attention to the young heir of Foker's Entire, he was entirely mistaken. She became only the more gracious to Foker: she praised him, and everything belonging to him; she praised his mamma; she praised the pony which he rode in the Park; she praised the lovely breloques or gimcracks which the young gentleman wore at his watch-chain, and that dear little darling of a cane, and those dear little delicious monkeys' heads with ruby eyes, which ornamented Harry's s.h.i.+rt, and formed the b.u.t.tons of his waistcoat.

And then, having praised and coaxed the weak youth until he blushed and tingled with pleasure, and until Pen thought she really had gone quite far enough, she took another theme.

"I am afraid Mr. Foker is a very sad young man," she said, turning round to Pen.

"He does not look so," Pen answered with a sneer.

"I mean we have heard sad stories about him. Haven't we, mamma? What was Mr. Poyntz saying here, the other day, about that party at Richmond? O you naughty creature!" But here, seeing that Harry's countenance a.s.sumed a great expression of alarm, while Pen's wore a look of amus.e.m.e.nt, she turned to the latter and said, "I believe you are just as bad: I believe you would have liked to have been there,--wouldn't you? I know you would: yes--and so should I."

"Lor, Blanche!" mamma cried.

"Well, I would. I never saw an actress in my life. I would give anything to know one; for I adore talent. And I adore Richmond, that I do; and I adore Greenwich, and I say, I should like to go there."

"Why should not we three bachelors," the Major here broke out, gallantly, and to his nephew's special surprise, "beg these ladies to honour us with their company at Greenwich? Is Lady Clavering to go on for ever being hospitable to us, and may we make no return? Speak for yourselves, young men,--eh, begad! Here is my nephew, with his pockets full of money--his pockets full, begad! and Mr. Henry Foker, who, as I have heard say, is pretty well to do in the world,--how is your lovely cousin, Lady Ann, Mr. Foker?--here are these two young ones,--and they allow an old fellow like me to speak. Lady Clavering, will you do me the favour to be my guest? and Miss Blanche shall be Arthur's, if she will be so good."

"Oh, delightful!" cried Blanche.

"I like a bit of fun too," said Lady Clavering; and we will take some day when Sir Francis----"

"When Sir Francis dines out,--yes, mamma," the daughter said, "it will be charming."

And a charming day it was. The dinner was ordered at Greenwich, and Foker, though he did not invite Miss Amory, had some delicious opportunities of conversation with her during the repast, and afterwards on the balcony of their room at the hotel, and again during the drive home in her ladys.h.i.+p's barouche. Pen came down with his uncle, in Sir Hugh Trumpington's brougham, which the Major borrowed for the occasion.

"I am an old soldier, begad," he said, "and I learned in early life to make myself comfortable."

And, being an old soldier, he allowed the two young men to pay for the dinner between them, and all the way home in the brougham he rallied Pen, about Miss Amory's evident partiality for him: praised her good looks, spirits, and wit: and again told Pen in the strictest confidence, that she would be a devilish deal richer than people thought.

CHAPTER XLII. Contains a novel Incident

Some account has been given, in a former part of this story, how Mr.

Pen, during his residence at home, after his defeat at Oxbridge, had occupied himself with various literary compositions, and amongst other works, had written the greater part of a novel. This book, written under the influence of his youthful embarra.s.sments, amatory and pecuniary, was of a very fierce, gloomy, and pa.s.sionate sort,--the Byronic despair, the Wertherian despondency, the mocking bitterness of Mephistopheles of Faust, were all reproduced and developed in the character of the hero; for our youth had just been learning the German language, and imitated, as almost all clever lads do, his favourite poets and writers. Pa.s.sages in the volumes once so loved, and now read so seldom, still bear the mark of the pencil with which he noted them in those days. Tears fell upon the leaf of the book, perhaps, or blistered the pages of his ma.n.u.script as the pa.s.sionate young man dashed his thoughts down. If he took up the books afterwards he had no ability or wish to sprinkle the leaves with that early dew of former times: his pencil was no longer eager to score its marks of approval: but as he looked over the pages of his ma.n.u.script, he remembered what had been overflowing feelings which had caused him to blot it, and the pain which had inspired the line. If the secret history of books could be written, and the author's private thoughts and meanings noted down alongside of his story, how many insipid volumes would become interesting, and dull tales excite the reader! Many a bitter smile pa.s.sed over Pen's face as he read his novel, and recalled the time and feelings which gave it birth. How pompous some of the grand pa.s.sages appeared; and how weak were others in which he thought he had expressed his full heart! This page was imitated from a then favourite author, as he could now clearly see and confess, though he had believed himself to be writing originally then. As he mused over certain lines he recollected the place and hour where he wrote them: the ghost of the dead feeling came back as he mused, and he blushed to review the faint image. And what meant those blots on the page? As you come in the desert to a ground where camels' hoofs are marked in the clay, and traces of withered herbage are yet visible, you know that water was there once; so the place in Pen's mind was no longer green, and the fons lacrymarum was dried up.

He used this simile one morning to Warrington, as the latter sate over his pipe and book, and Pen, with much gesticulation according to his wont when excited, and with a bitter laugh, thumped his ma.n.u.script down on the table, making the tea-things rattle, and, the blue milk dance in the jug. On the previous night he had taken the ma.n.u.script out of a long-neglected chest, containing old shooting jackets, old Oxbridge scribbling-books, his old surplice, and battered cap and gown, and other memorials of youth, school, and home. He read in the volume in bed until he fell asleep, for the commencement of the tale was somewhat dull, and he had come home tired from a London evening party.

"By Jove!" said Pen, thumping down his papers, "when I think that these were written but very few years ago, I am ashamed of my memory. I wrote this when I believed myself be eternally in love with that little coquette, Miss Amory. I used to carry down verses to her, and put them into the hollow of a tree, and dedicate them 'Amori.'"

"That was a sweet little play upon words," Warrington remarked, with a puff "Amory--Amori. It showed proof of scholars.h.i.+p. Let us hear a bit of the rubbish." And he stretched over from his easy-chair, and caught hold of Pen's ma.n.u.script with the fire-tongs, which he was just using in order to put a coal into his pipe. Thus, in possession of the volume, he began to read out from the 'Leaves from the Life-book of Walter Lorraine.'

"'False as thou art beautiful! heartless as thou art fair! mockery of Pa.s.sion!' Walter cried, addressing Leonora; 'what evil spirit hath sent thee to torture me so? O Leonora.----'"

"Cut that part," cried out Pen, making a dash at the book, which, however, his comrade would not release. "Well! don't read it out at any rate. That's about my other flame, my first--Lady Mirabel that is now.

I saw her last night at Lady Whiston's. She asked me to a party at her house, and said that, as old friends, we ought to meet oftener. She has been seeing me any time these two years in town, and never thought of inviting me before; but seeing Wenham talking to me, and Monsieur Dubois, the French literary man, who had a dozen orders on, and might have pa.s.sed for a Marshal of France, she condescended to invite me. The Claverings are to be there on the same evening. Won't it be exciting to meet one's two flames at the same table?"

"Two flames!--two heaps of burnt-out cinders," Warrington said. "Are both the beauties in this book?"