not seen him these three days." And he gives an arch look at poor Charlotte. A
burning blush flamed up in little Charlotte's pale face, as she looked at her
parents and then at their old friend. "Mr. Firmin does not come, because papa
and mamma have forbidden him," says Charlotte. "I suppose he only comes where he
is welcome." And, having made this audacious speech, I suppose the little maid
tossed her little head up; and wondered, in the silence which ensued, whether
all the company could hear her heart thumping.
Madame, from her central place, where she is carving, sees, from the looks of
her guests, the indignant flushes on Charlotte's face, the confusion on her
father's, the wrath on Mrs. Baynes's, that some dreadful words are passing; and
in vain endeavours to turn the angry current of talk. "Un petit canard
d�licieux, go�tez-en, madame!" she cries. Honest Colonel Bunch sees the little
maid with eyes flashing with anger, and trembling in every limb. The offered
duck having failed to create a diversion, he, too, tries a feeble commonplace.
"A little difference, my dear," he says in an under voice. "There will be such
in the best regulated families. Canard sauvage tres bong, madame, avec��" but he
is allowed to speak no more, for��
"What would you do, Colonel Bunch," little Charlotte breaks out with her poor
little ringing, trembling voice��"that is, if you were a young man, if another
young man struck you, and insulted you?" I say she utters this in such a clear
voice, that Fran�oise, the femme-de-chambre, that Auguste, the footman, that all
the guests hear, that all the knives and forks stop their clatter.
"Faith, my dear, I'd knock him down, if I could," says Bunch; and he catches
hold of the little maid's sleeve, and would stop her speaking if he could.
"And that is what Philip did," cries Charlotte aloud; "and mamma has turned him
out of the house��yes, out of the house, for acting like a man of honour!"
"Go to your room this instant, miss!" shrieks mamma. As for old Baynes, his
stained old uniform is not more dingy-red than his wrinkled face and his
throbbing temples. He blushes under his wig, no doubt, could we see beneath that
ancient artifice.
"What is it? madame your mother dismisses you of my table? I will come with you,
my dear Miss Charlotte!" says madame, with much dignity. "Serve the sugared
plate, Auguste! My ladies, you will excuse me! I go to attend the dear miss, who
seems to me ill." And she rises up, and she follows poor little blushing,
burning, weeping Charlotte: and again, I have no doubt, takes her in her arms,
and kisses, and cheers, and caresses her��at the threshold of the door��there by
the staircase, among the cold dishes of the dinner, where Moira and MacGrigor
had one moment before been marauding.
"Courage, ma fille, courage, mon enfant! Tenez! Behold something to console
thee!" and madame takes out of her pocket a little letter, and gives it to the
girl, who at sight of it kisses the superscription, and then in an anguish of
love, and joy, and grief, falls on the neck of the kind woman, who consoles her
in her misery. Whose writing is it Charlotte kisses? Can you guess by any means?
Upon my word, Madame Smolensk, I never recommend ladies to take daughters to
your boarding-house. And I like you so much, I would not tell of you, but you
know the house is shut up this many a long day. Oh! the years slip away
fugacious; and the grass has grown over graves; and many and many joys and
sorrows have been born and have died since then for Charlotte and Philip: but
that grief aches still in their bosoms at times; and that sorrow throbs at
Charlotte's heart again whenever she looks at a little yellow letter in her
trinket-box: and she says to her children, "Papa wrote that to me before we were
married, my dears." There are scarcely half-a-dozen words in the little letter,
I believe; and two of them are "for ever."
I could draw a ground-plan of madame's house in the Champs Elys�es if I liked,
for has not Philip shown me the place and described it to me many times? In
front, and facing the road and garden, were madame's room and the salon; to the
back was the salle-�-manger; and a stair ran up the house (where the dishes used
to be laid during dinner-time, and where Moira and MacGrigor fingered the meats
and puddings). Mrs. General Baynes's rooms were on the first floor, looking on
the Champs Elys�es, and into the garden-court of the house below. And on this
day, as the dinner was necessarily short (owing to unhappy circumstances), and
the gentlemen were left alone glumly drinking their wine or grog, and Mrs.
Baynes had gone upstairs to her own apartment, had slapped her boys, and was
looking out of window��was it not provoking that of all days in the world young
Hely should ride up to the house on his capering mare, with his flower in his
button-hole, with his little varnished toe-tips just touching his stirrups, and
after performing various caracolades and gambadoes in the garden, kiss his
yellow-kidded hand to Mrs. General Baynes at the window, hope Miss Baynes was
quite well, and ask if he might come in and take a cup of tea? Charlotte, lying
on madame's bed in the ground-floor room, heard Mr. Hely's sweet voice asking
after her health, and the crunching of his horse's hoofs on the gravel, and she
could even catch glimpses of that little form as the horse capered about in the
court, though of course he could not see her where she was lying on the bed with
her letter in her hand. Mrs. Baynes at her window had to wag her withered head
from the casement, to groan out, "My daughter is lying down, and has a bad
headache, I am sorry to say," and then she must have had the mortification to
see Hely caper off, after waving her a genteel adieu. The ladies in the front
salon, who assembled after dinner, witnessed the transaction, and Mrs. Bunch, I
daresay, had a grim pleasure at seeing Eliza Baynes's young spring of fashion,
of whom Eliza was for ever bragging, come at last, and obliged to ride away, not
bootless, certainly, for where were feet more beautifully chauss�s? but after a
bootless errand.
Meanwhile the gentlemen sate awhile in the dining-room, after the British custom
which such veterans liked too well to give up. Other two gentlemen boarders went
away, rather alarmed by that storm and outbreak in which Charlotte had quitted
the dinner-table, and left the old soldiers together, to enjoy, according to
their after-dinner custom, a sober glass of "something hot," as the saying is.
In truth, madame's wine was of the poorest; but what better could you expect for
the money?
Baynes was not eager to be alone with Bunch, and I have no doubt began to blush
again when he found himself t�te-�-t�te with his old friend. But what was to be
done? The general did not dare to go up-stairs to his own quarters, where poor
Charlotte was probably crying, and her mother in one of her tantrums. Then in
the salon there were the ladies of the boarding-house party, and there Mrs.
Bunch would be sure to be at him. Indeed, since the Bayneses were launched in
the grea
t world, Mrs. Bunch was untiringly sarcastic in her remarks about lords,
ladies, attach�s, ambassadors, and fine people in general. So Baynes sate with
his friend, in the falling evening, in much silence, dipping his old nose in the
brandy-and-water.
Litte square-faced, red-faced, whisker-dyed Colonel Bunch sate opposite his old
companion, regarding him not without scorn. Bunch had a wife. Bunch had
feelings. Do you suppose those feelings had not been worked upon by that wife in
private colloquies? Do you suppose��when two old women have lived together in
pretty much the same rank of life,��if one suddenly gets promotion, is carried
off to higher spheres, and talks of her new friends, the countesses, duchesses,
ambassadresses, as of course she will��do you suppose, I say, that the
unsuccessful woman will be pleased at the successful woman's success? Your
knowledge of your own heart, my dear lady, must tell you the truth in this
matter. I don't want you to acknowledge that you are angry because your sister
has been staying with the Duchess of Fitzbattleaxe, but you are, you know. You
have made sneering remarks, to your husband on the subject, and such remarks, I
have no doubt, were made by Mrs. Colonel Bunch to her husband, regarding her
poor friend Mrs. General Baynes.
During this parenthesis we have left the general dipping his nose in the
brandy-and-water. He can't keep it there for ever. He must come up for air
presently. His face must come out of the drink, and sigh over the table.
"What's this business, Baynes?" says the colonel. "What's the matter with poor
Charley?"
"Family affairs��differences will happen," says the general.
"I do hope and trust nothing has gone wrong with her and young Firmin, Baynes?"
The general does not like those fixed eyes staring at him under those bushy
eyebrows, between those bushy, blackened whiskers.
"Well, then, yes, Bunch, something has gone wrong; and given me and��and Mrs.
Baynes��a deuced deal of pain too. The young fellow has acted like a blackguard,
brawling and fighting at an ambassador's ball, bringing us all to ridicule. He's
not a gentleman; that's the long and short of it, Bunch; and so let's change the
subject."
"Why, consider the provocation he had!" cries the other, disregarding entirely
this very day. A fellow swears at Firmin; runs at him; brags that he has pitched
him over; and is knocked down for his pains. By George! I think Firmin was quite
right. Were any man to do as much to me or you, what should we do, even at our
age?"
"We are military men. I said I didn't wish to talk about the subject, Bunch,"
says the general in rather a lofty manner.
"You mean that Tom Bunch has no need to put his oar in?"
"Precisely so," says the other, curtly.
"Mum's the word! Let us talk about the dukes and duchesses at the ball. That's
more in your line, now," says the colonel, with rather a sneer.
"What do you mean by duchesses and dukes? What do you know about them, or what
the deuce do I care?" asks the general.
"Oh, they are tabooed too! Hang it! there's no satisfying you," growls the
colonel.
"Look here, Bunch," the general broke out; "I must speak, since you won't leave
me alone. I am unhappy. You can see that well enough. For two or three nights
past I have had no rest. This engagement of my child and Mr. Firmin can't come
to any good. You see what he is��an overbearing, ill-conditioned, quarrelsome
fellow. What chance has Charley of being happy with such a fellow?"
"I hold my tongue, Baynes. You told me not to put my oar in," growls the
colonel.
"Oh, if that's the way you take it, Bunch, of course there's no need for me to
go on any more," cries General Baynes. "If an old friend won't give an old
friend advice, by George, or help him in a strait, or say a kind word when he's
unhappy, I have done. I have known you for forty years, and I am mistaken in
you�� that's all."
"There's no contenting you. You say, Hold your tongue, and I shut my mouth. I
hold my tongue, and you say, Why don't you speak? Why don't I? Because you won't
like what I say, Charles Baynes: and so, what's the good of more talking?"
"Confound it!" cries Baynes, with a thump of his glass on the table, "but what
do you say?"
"I say, then, as you will have it," cries the other, clenching his fists in his
pockets��"I say you are wanting a pretext for breaking off this match, Baynes. I
don't say it is a good one, mind; but your word is passed, and your honour
engaged to a young fellow to whom you are under deep obligation."
"What obligation? Who has talked to you about my private affairs?" cries the
general, reddening. "Has Philip Firmin been bragging about his��?"
"You have yourself, Baynes. When you arrived here, you told me over and over
again what the young fellow had done: and you certainly thought he acted like a
gentleman then. If you choose to break your word to him now��"
"Break my word! Great powers, do you know what you are saying, Bunch?"
"Yes, and what you are doing, Baynes."
"Doing? and what?"
"A damned shabby action; that's what you are doing, if you want to know. Don't
tell me. Why, do you suppose Fanny��do you suppose everybody doesn't see what
you are at? You think you can get a better match for the girl, and you and Eliza
are going to throw the young fellow over: and the fellow who held his hand, and
might have ruined you if he liked. I say it is a cowardly action!"
"Colonel Bunch, do you dare to use such a word to me?" calls out the general,
starting to his feet.
"Dare be hanged! I say it's a shabby action!" roars the other, rising too.
"Hush! unless you wish to disturb the ladies! Of course you know what your
expression means, Colonel Bunch?" and the general drops his voice and sinks back
to his chair.
"I know what my words mean, and I stick to 'em, Baynes," growls the other;
"which is more than you can say of yours."
"I am dee'd if any man alive shall use this language to me," says the general in
the softest whisper, "without accounting to me for it."
"Did you ever find me backward, Baynes, at that kind of thing?" growls the
colonel, with a face like a lobster and eyes starting from his head.
"Very good, sir. To-morrow, at your earliest convenience. I shall be at
Galignani's from eleven till one. With a friend if possible.��What is it, my
love? A game at whist? Well, no, thank you; I think I won't play cards
It was Mrs. Baynes who entered the room when the two gentlemen were quarrelling;
and the bloodthirsty hypocrites instantly smoothed their ruffled brows and
smiled on her with perfect courtesy.
"Whist��no! I was thinking should we send out to meet him. He has never been in
Paris."
"Never been in Paris?" said the general, puzzled.
"He will be here to-night, you know. Madame has a room ready for him."
"The very thing, the very thing!" cries General Baynes,
with great glee. And
Mrs. Baynes, all unsuspicious of the quarrel between the old friends, proceeds
to inform Colonel Bunch that Major MacWhirter was expected that evening. And
then that tough old Colonel Bunch knew the cause of Baynes's delight. A second
was provided for the general��the very thing Baynes wanted.
We have seen how Mrs. Baynes, after taking counsel with her general, had
privately sent for MacWhirter. Her plan was that Charlotte's uncle should take
her for a while to Tours, and make her hear reason. Then Charley's foolish
passion for Philip would pass away. Then, if he dared to follow her so far, her
aunt and uncle, two dragons of virtue and circumspection, would watch and guard
her. Then, if Mrs. Hely was still of the same mind, she and her son might easily
take the post to Tours, where, Philip being absent, young Walsingham might plead
his passion. The best part of the plan, perhaps, was the separation of our young
couple. Charlotte would recover. Mrs. Baynes was sure of that. The little girl
had made no outbreak until that sudden insurrection at dinner which we have
witnessed; and her mother, who had domineered over the child all her life,
thought she was still in her power. She did not know that she had passed the
bounds of authority, and that with her behaviour to Philip her child's
allegiance had revolted.
Bunch then, from Baynes's look and expression, perfectly understood what his
adversary meant, and that the general's second was found. His own he had in his
eye��a tough little old army surgeon of Peninsular and Indian times, who lived
hard by, who would aid as second and doctor too, if need were��and so kill two
birds with one stone, as they say. The colonel would go forth that very instant
and seek for Dr. Martin, and be hanged to Baynes, and a plague on the whole
transaction and the folly of two old friends burning powder in such a quarrel.
But he knew what a bloodthirsty little fellow that henpecked, silent Baynes was
when roused; and as for himself��a fellow use that kind of language to me? By
George, Tom Bunch was not going to baulk him!
Whose was that tall figure prowling about madame's house in the Champs Elys�es
when Colonel Bunch issued forth in quest of his friend; who has been watched by
the police and mistaken for a suspicious character; who had been looking up at
madame's windows now that the evening shades had fallen? Oh, you goose of a
Philip! (for of course, my dears, you guess the spy was P. F. Esq.) you look up
at the premier, and there is the Beloved in madame's room on the ground
floor;��in yonder room, where a lamp is burning and casting a faint light across
the bars of the jalousie. If Philip knew she was there, he would be transformed
into a clematis, and climb up the bars of the window, and twine round them all
night. But you see he thinks she is on the first floor; and the glances of his
passionate eyes are taking aim at the wrong windows. And now Colonel Bunch comes
forth in his stout strutting way, in his little military cape��quick march��and
Philip is startled like a guilty thing surprised, and dodges behind a tree in
the avenue.
The colonel departed on his murderous errand. Philip still continues to ogle the
window of his heart (the wrong window), defiant of the policeman, who tells him
to circuler. He has not watched here many minutes more, ere a hackney-coach
drives up with portmanteaux on the roof and a lady and gentleman within.
You see Mrs. MacWhirter thought she as well as her husband might have a peep at
Paris. As Mac's coachhire was paid, Mrs. Mac could afford a little outlay of
money. And if they were to bring Charlotte back�� Charlotte in grief and
agitation, poor child��a matron, an aunt, would be a much fitter companion for
her than a major, however gentle. So the pair of MacWhirters journeyed from
Tours��a long journey it was before railways were invented��and after
four-and-twenty hours of squeeze in the diligence, presented themselves at