Lownds!
Servant.��Monsieur Twisden!
Mr. Twysden.��Mr. Lowndes, how are you?
Mr. Lowndes.��Very well, thank you; how are you?
Mr. Hely.��Lowndes is uncommonly brilliant to-day.
Mr. Twysden.��Not the worse for last night? Some of us were a little elevated, I
think!
Mr. Lowndes.��Some of us quite the reverse. (Little cad, what does he want?
Elevated! he couldn't keep his little legs!)
Mr. Twysden.��Eh! Smoking, I see. Thank you. I very seldom do��but as you are so
kind��puff. Eh ��uncommonly handsome person that, eh��Madame C�risette.
The O'R.��Thank ye for telling us.
Mr. Lowndes.��If she meets with your applause, Mr. Twysden, I should think
Mademoiselle C�risette is all right.
The O'R.��Maybe they'd raise her salary if ye told her.
Mr. Twysden.��Heh��I see you're chaffing me. We have a good deal of that kind of
thing in Somerset�� in our��in��hem! This tobacco is a little strong. I am a
little shaky this morning. Who, by the way, is that Prince Boutzoff who played
lansquenet with us? Is he one of the Livonian Boutzoffs, or one of the Hessian
Boutzoffs? I remember at my poor uncle's, Lord Ringwood, meeting a Prince
Blucher de Boutzoff, something like this man, by the way. You knew my poor
uncle?
Mr. Lowndes.��Dined with him here three months ago at the "Trois Fr�res."
Mr. Twysden.��Been at Whipham, I daresay? I was bred up there. It was said once
that I was to have been his heir. He was very fond of me. He was my godfather.
The O'R.��Then he gave you a mug, and it wasn't a beauty (sotto voce).
Mr. Twysden.��You said somethin? I was speaking of Whipham, Mr. Lowndes��one of
the finest places in England, I should say, except Chatsworth, you know, and
that sort of thing. My grandfather built it��I mean my great grandfather, for
I'm of the Ringwood family.
Mr. Lowndes.��Then was Lord Ringwood your grandfather, or your grand godfather.
Mr. Twysden.��He! he! My mother was his own niece. My grandfather was his own
brother, and I am��
Mr. Lowndes.��Thank you. I see now.
Mr. Halkin.��Das ist sehr interessant. Ich versichere ihnen das ist SEHR
interessant.
Mr. Twysden.��Said somethin? (This cigar is really ��I'll throw it away,
please.) I was sayin that at Whipham, where I was bred up, we would be forty at
dinner, and as many more in the upper servants' hall.
Mr. Lowndes.��And you dined in the��you had pretty good dinners?
Mr. Twysden.��A French chef. Two aids, besides turtle from town. Two or three
regular cooks on the establishment, besides kitchen-maids, roasters, and that
kind of thing, you understand. How many have you here now? In Lord Estridge's
kitchen you can't do, I should say, at least without,��let me see��why, in our
small way��and if you come to London my father will be dev'lish glad to see
you��we��
Mr. Lowndes.��How is Mrs. Woolcomb this morning? That was a fair dinner Woolcomb
gave us yesterday.
Mr. Twysden.��He has plenty of money, plenty of money. I hope, Lowndes, when you
come to town�� the first time you come, mind��to give you a hearty welcome and
some of my father's old por��
Mr. Hely.��Will nobody kick this little beast out?
Servant.��Monsieur Chesham peut-il voir M. Firmin?
Mr. Chesham.��Certainly. Come in, Firmin!
Mr. Twysden.��Mr. Fearmang��Mr. Fir��Mr. who? You don't mean to say you receive
that fellow, Mr. Chesham?
Mr. Chesham.��What fellow? and what do you mean, Mr. Whatdycallem?
Mr. Twysden.��That blackg��oh��that is, I��I beg your��
Mr. Firmin�� (entering and going up to Mr. Chesham).�� I say, give me a bit of
news of to-day. What you were saying about that��hum and hum and haw�� mayn't I
have it? (He is talking confidentially with Mr. Chesham, when he sees Mr.
Twysden.) What! you have got that little cad here?
Mr. Lowndes.��You know Mr. Twysden, Mr. Firmin? He was just speaking about you.
Mr. Firmin.��Was he? So much the worse for me.
Mr. Twysden.��Sir! We don't speak. You've no right to speak to me in this
manner! Don't speak to me: and I won't speak to you, sir��there! Good morning,
town. And ��one word��(he holds Mr. Lowndes by the button. By the way, he has
very curious resemblances to Twysden senior)��we shall be here for ten days
certainly. I think Lady Estridge has something next week. I have left our cards,
and��
Mr. Lowndes.��Take care. He will be there (pointing to Mr. Firmin).
Mr. Twysden.��What? That beggar? You don't mean to say Lord Estridge will
receive such a fellow as��Good-by, good-by! (Exit Mr. Twysden.)
Mr. Firmin.��I caught that little fellow's eye. He's my cousin, you know. We
have had a quarrel. I am sure he was speaking about me.
Mr. Lowndes.��Well, now you mention it, he was speaking about you.
Mr. Firmin.��Was he? Then, don't believe him, Mr. Lowndes. That is my advice.
Mr. Hely(at his desk composing).��"Maiden of the blushing cheek, maiden of
the��oh, Charlotte, Char��" [He bites his pen and dashes off rapid rhymes on
Government paper.]
Mr. Firmin.��What does he say? He said Charlotte.
Mr. Lowndes.��He is always in love and breaking his heart, and he puts it into
poems; he wraps it up in paper, and falls in love with somebody else. Sit down
and smoke a cigar, won't you?
Mr. Firmin.��Can't stay. Must make up my letter. We print to-morrow.
Mr. Lowndes.��Who wrote that article pitching into Peel?
Mr. Firmin.��Family secret��can't say��good-by. (Exit Mr. Firmin.)
Mr. Chesham.��In my opinion, a most ill-advised and intemperate article. That
journal, the Pall Mall Gazette, indulges in a very needless acrimony, I think.
Mr. Lowndes.��Chesham does not like to call a spade a spade. He calls it a
horticultural utensil. You have a great career before you, Chesham. You have a
wisdom and gravity beyond your years. You bore us slightly, but we all respect
you��we do, indeed. What was the text at church last Sunday? Oh, by the way,
Hely, you little miscreant, you were at church?
Mr. Chesham.��You need not blush, Hely. I am not a joking man: but this kind of
jesting does not strike me as being particularly amusing, Lowndes.
Mr. Lowndes.��You go to church because you are good, because your aunt was a
bishop or something. But Hely goes because he is a little miscreant. You
hypocritical little beggar, you got yourself up as if you were going to a
d�je�n�, and you had your hair curled, and you were seen singing out of the same
hymn-book with that pretty Miss Baynes, you little wheedling sinner; and you
walked home with the family��my sisters saw you��to a boarding-house where they
live ��by Jove! you did. And I'll tell your mother!
Mr. Chesham.��I wish you would not make such a noise, and let me do my work,
Lowndes. You��
Here Asmodeus whisks us out of the room, and we lose the rest of the young men's
conversation. But enough has been overheard, I think, to show what direction
young Mr. Hely's thoughts had ta
ken. Since he was seventeen years of age (at the
time when we behold him he may be twenty-three) this romantic youth has been
repeatedly in love: with his elderly tutor's daughter, of course; with a young
haberdasher at the university; with his sister's confidential friend; with the
blooming young Danish beauty last year; and now, I very much fear, a young
acquaintance of ours has attracted the attention of this imaginative Don Juan.
Whenever Hely is in love, he fancies his passion will last for ever, makes a
confidant of the first person at hand, weeps plenteously, and writes reams of
verses. Do you remember how in a previous chapter we told you that Mrs. Tuffin
was determined she would not ask Philip to her soir�es, and declared him to be a
forward and disagreeable young man? She was glad enough to receive young
Walsingham Hely, with his languid air, his drooping head, his fair curls, and
his flower in his button-hole; and Hely, being then in hot pursuit of one of the
tall Miss Blacklocks, went to Mrs. Tuffin's, was welcomed there with all the
honours; and there, fluttering away from Miss Blacklock, our butterfly lighted
on Miss Baynes. Now Miss Baynes would have danced with a mopstick, she was so
fond of dancing: and Hely, who had practised in a thousand Chaumi�res, Mabilles
(or whatever was the public dance-room then in vogue), was a most amiable,
agile, and excellent partner. And she told Philip next day what a nice little
partner she had found��poor Philip, who was not asked to that paradise of a
party. And Philip said that he knew the little man; that he believed he was
rich; that he wrote pretty little verses:�� in a word, Philip, in his leonine
way, regarded little Hely as a lion regards a lapdog.
sensibility and a fine taste, which was most readily touched by innocence and
beauty. He had tears, I won't say at command; for they were under no command,
and gushed from his fine eyes in spite of himself. Charlotte's innocence and
freshness smote him with a keen pleasure. Bon Dieu! What was that great, tall
Miss Blacklock, who had tramped through a thousand ball-rooms, compared to this
artless, happy creature? He danced away from Miss Blacklock, and after
Charlotte, the moment he saw our young friend; and the Blacklocks, who knew all
about him, and his money, and his mother, and his expectations��who had his
verses in their poor album�� by whose carriage he had capered day after day in
the Bois de Boulogne��stood scowling and deserted, as this young fellow danced
off with that Miss Baynes, who lived in a boarding-house, and came to parties in
a cab with her horrid old mother! The Blacklocks were as though they were not
henceforth for Mr. Hely. They asked him to dinner. Bless my soul, he utterly
forgot all about it! He never came to their box on their night at the opera. Not
one twinge of remorse had he. Not one pang of remembrance. If he did remember
them, it was when they bored him, like those tall tragic women in black who are
always coming in their great long trains to sing sermons to Don Juan. Ladies,
your name is down in his lordship's catalogue; his servant has it; and you, Miss
Anna, are number one thousand and three.
But as for Miss Charlotte, that is a different affair. What innocence! What a
fraicheur! What a merry good humour! Don Slyboots is touched, he is tenderly
interested: her artless voice thrills through his frame; he trembles as he
waltzes with her; as his fine eyes look at her, psha! what is that film coming
over them? O Slyboots, Slyboots! And as she has nothing to conceal, she has told
him all he wants to know before long. This is her first winter in Paris: her
first season of coming out. She has only been to two balls before, and two plays
and an opera. And her father met Mr. Hely at Lord Trim's. That was her father
playing at whist. And they lived at Madame Smolensk's boarding-house in the
Champs Elys�es. And they had been to Mr. Dash's, and to Mrs. Blank's, and she
believed they were going to Mrs. Star's on Friday. And did they go to church? Of
course they went to church, to the Rue d'Aguesseau, or wherever it might be. And
Slyboots went to church next Sunday. You may perhaps guess to what church. And
he went the Sunday after. And he sang his own songs, accompanying himself on the
guitar at his lodgings. And he sang elsewhere. And he had a very pretty little
voice, Slyboots had. I believe those poems under the common title of "Gretchen"
in our Walsingham's charming volume were all inspired by Miss Baynes. He began
to write about her and himself the very first night after seeing her. He smoked
cigarettes and drank green tea. He looked so pale��so pale and sad, that he
quite pitied himself in the looking-glass in his apartments in the Rue
Mirom�nil. And he compared himself to a wrecked mariner, and to a grave, and to
a man entranced and brought to life. And he cried quite freely and
satisfactorily by himself. And he went to see his mother and sister next day at
the H�tel de la Terrasse; and cried to them and said he was in love this time
for ever and ever. And his sister called him a goose. And after crying he ate an
uncommonly good dinner. And he took every one into his confidence, as he always
did whenever he was in love: always telling, always making verses, and always
crying. As for Miss Blacklock, he buried the dead body of that love deep in the
ocean of his soul. The waves engulphed Miss B. The ship rolled on. The storm
went down. And the stars rose, and the dawn was in his soul, Well, well! The
mother was a vulgar woman, and I am glad you are out of it. And what sort of
people are General Baynes and Mrs. Baynes?
"Oh, delightful people! Most distinguished officer, the father; modest��doesn't
say a word. The mother, a most lively, brisk, agreeable woman. You must go and
see her, ma'am. I desire you'll go immediately."
"And leave cards with P. P. C. for the Miss Blacklocks!" says Miss Hely, who was
a plain, lively person. And both mother and sister spoiled this young Hely; as
women ought always to spoil a son, a brother, a father, husband,
grandfather��any male relative, in a word.
To see this spoiled son married was the good-natured mother's fond prayer. An
eldest son had died a rake; a victim to too much money, pleasure, idleness. The
widowed mother would give anything to save this one from the career through
which the elder had passed. The young man would be one day so wealthy, that she
knew many and many a schemer would try and entrap him. Perhaps, she had been
made to marry his father because he was rich; and she remembered the gloom and
wretchedness of her own union. Oh, that she could see her son out of temptation,
and the husband of an honest girl! It was the young lady's first season? So much
the more likely that she should be unworldly. "The general��don't you remember a
nice old gentleman ��in a��well, in a wig��that day we dined at Lord Trim's,
when that horrible old Lord Ringwood was there? That was General Baynes; and he
broke out so enthusiastically in defence of a poor young man��
Dr. Firmin's
son��who was a bad man, I believe; but I shall never have confidence in another
doctor again, that I shan't. And we'll call on these people, Fanny. Yes, in a
brown wig��the general, I perfectly well remember him, and Lord Trim said he was
a most distinguished officer. And I have no doubt his wife will be a most
agreeable person. Those generals' wives who have travelled over the world must
have acquired a quantity of delightful information. At a boarding-house, are
they? I daresay very pleasant and amusing. And we'll drive there and call on
them immediately."
On that day, as MacGrigor and Moira Baynes were disporting in the little front
garden of Madame Smolensk's; I think Moira was just about to lick MacGrigor,
when his fratricidal hand was stopped by the sight of a large yellow carriage��a
large London dowager family carriage��from which descended a large London family
footman, with side-locks begrimed with powder, with calves such as only belong
to large London family footmen, and with cards in his hand. "Ceci Madam
Smolensk?" says the large menial. "Oui," says the boy, nodding his head; on
which the footman was puzzled, for he thought from his readiness in the use of
the French language that the boy was a Frenchman.
"Ici demure General Bang?" continued the man.
"Hand us over the cards, John. Not at home," said Moira.
"Who ain't at 'ome?" inquired the menial.
"General Baynes, my father, ain't at home. He shall have the pasteboard when he
comes in. Mrs. Hely? Oh, Mac, it's the same name as that young swell who called
the other day! Ain't at home, John. Gone out to pay some visits. Had a fly on
purpose. Gone out with my sister. 'Pon my word, they have, John." And from this
accurate report of the boy's behaviour, I fear that the young Baynes must have
been brought up at a classical and commercial academy, where economy was more
studied than politeness.
Philip comes trudging up to dinner, and as this is not his post day, arrives
early. He hopes, perhaps, for a walk with Miss Charlotte, or a coze in Madame
Smolensk's little private room. He finds the two boys in the forecourt; and they
have Mrs. Hely's cards in their hand; and they narrate to him the advent and
departure of the lady in the swell carriage, the mother of the young swell with
the flower in his button-hole, who came the other day on such a jolly horse.
Yes. And he was at church last Sunday, Philip, and he gave Charlotte a
hymn-book. And he sang: he sang like the piper who played before Moses, Pa said.
And Ma said it was wicked, but it wasn't: only Pa's fun, you know. And Ma said
you never came to church. Why don't you?
Philip had no taint of jealousy in his magnanimous composition, and would as
soon have accused Charlotte of flirting with other men, as of stealing madame's
silver spoons. "So you have had some fine visitors," he says, as the fly drives
up. "I remember that rich Mrs. Hely, a patient of my father's. My poor mother
used to drive to her house."
"Oh, we have seen a great deal of Mr. Hely, Philip!" cries Miss Charlotte, not
heeding the scowls of her mother, who is nodding and beckoning angrily at the
girl.
"You never once mentioned him. He is one of the greatest dandies about Paris:
quite a lion," remarks Philip.
"Is he? What a funny little lion! I never thought about him," says Miss
Charlotte, quite simply. Oh, ingratitude! ingratitude! And we have told how Mr.
Walsingham was crying his eyes out for her.
"She never thought about him?" cries Mrs. Baynes, quite eagerly.
"The piper, is it, you're talking about?" asks papa. "I called him Piper, you
see, because he piped so sweetly at ch�� Well, my love?"
Mrs. Baynes was nudging her general at this moment. She did not wish that the
piper should form the subject of conversation, I suppose.
"The piper's mother is very rich, and the piper will inherit after her. She has
a fine house in London. She gives very fine parties. She drives in a great