The Passionate Elopement
laughed at. Are you a friend of Mr. Chalkley?"
"Indeed, I hope I may describe myself as such," said Charles.
"Does he paint landskips as an Amateur?" inquired cunning Miss Sukey
Morton.
"Not that I am aware of."
The disappointment visible on her countenance recalled the incident of
the Valentine, and he made haste to add:
"Though now I come to think of it, I found him cutting out an ace of
hearts one day last week."
"An ace of hearts?" said Miss Morton very innocently, "why what would he
do that for?"
"I asked him as much, and he muttered something about a torn velvet
patch. But his behaviour that day was monstrous odd altogether, for I
remember I found him later on the bowling green of the _Blue Boar_
picking snowdrops, and when I rallied him, he asked me for a rhyme to
'white.'"
Miss Morton danced for the rest of the evening as though her scarlet
heels were little flames.
The hands of the clock were nearing the magick hour of the last
Cotillon, and everybody was hurrying in search of partners and places;
when the appearance of Gog and Magog, with Mr. Ripple's marble pedestal,
warned everybody that the Great little Man was about to make an
announcement. Everybody waited with extreme deference and not a whisper
disturbed the religious peace. The room was quite still save for the
tinkle of jewellery and the slow sighing of the fans.
The Beau ascended his pedestal, calm and majestick while the listeners
craned their necks to attention.
"My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen. You are doubtless all aware that we
have to lament the sudden death of that respected model of fortitude and
perseverance, Sir Jeremy Dummer."
A sympathetick murmur floated along the wind of the fans.
"I am happy to tell you that he died as he lived, fighting. He died, if
I may use so vulgar a metaphor, in harness--the harness of an old
war-horse who, having fought the foes of England during his prime,
continued to fight the greatest foe of England during his decay. That
energy which erstwhile displayed itself in the trenches of War enabled
him for twenty-one years to persecute by every means in his power that
enemy of all of us--the Gout.
"He sought to starve it into capitulation by restricted diet, he tried
to storm it by sudden charges of chalybeate. My lords, ladies and
gentlemen, it was in the middle of one of these gallant sallies that he
died. In a word, he was half-way through a glass of the cleansing liquid
when death overtook him. There it stood, that partially empty glass
beside the dead form of the veteran. May we not regard this relick as
the tears of AEsculapius? Shall we not enshrine these sparkling drops in
a lachrymatory and, having sealed the sacred fluid with the city seal,
shall we not set it in a prominent part of our civick museum? My lords,
ladies and gentlemen, we shall. I have consulted with my brother the
Mayor of this town, and he has agreed.
"Moreover, let me remind you of the last words of the great Socrates,
his last injunction to his friend to sacrifice a cock to AEsculapius. Let
us also, in memory of our deceased exemplar, present a new tap to our
publick fountain and so sacrifice, my lords, ladies and gentlemen, not a
cock, but a turncock to AEsculapius."
The Great little Man here paused to wipe away the tears of sorrow and
the heat of the atmosphere. "It seems," he continued, "out of place to
make any announcement of a new diversion, but pleasure is as inexorable
as death."
Here the audience seemed to murmur a mournful assent.
"Next Tuesday at 7 o'clock precisely will be held the Chinese
Masquerade. This, as you are aware, limits our costumes to those
authorized by gold-lackered cabinets and teacups of blue china. I myself
shall act as Gold Mandarin and my young friend Mr. Charles Lovely will
be the Blue Mandarin. There will be a grand minuet of Cathay, but I will
not detain you now with farther particulars of this entertainment. I
hope that we shall hold masquerades of assorted characters until May,
when we shall make an attempt to start the Fetes Champetres which were
so successful last year.
"Finally, my lords, ladies and gentlemen, you are aware that an incident
of an unpleasantly obtrusive habit deterred us from Terpsichore on
Monday night. I am, indeed, happy to say that the curtain has fallen
upon the whole affair without a dissentient voice. I should have been
inexpressibly grieved if the gloom consequent upon the defiance of my
authority, had been at all lasting. May I add that the rebels--if I may
call them so without offence--have acted in the handsomest manner and
have offered to set up in the portico of these rooms a tablet
commemorating the temporary cloud upon your delight. I should be more
than mortal if I were not proud of such a token of confidence in my
despotism.
"My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen, I am your very grateful, humble, and
obliged servant to command."
The Beau's descent from his pedestal was the signal for much waving of
lace handkerchiefs and fans. There were cries of 'Bravo, Beau,' 'Viva,
Ripple!'
Finally when old Lord Vanity stepped up to the dignified lord of
ceremonies and solemnly offered him his noted jade snuffbox full to
overflowing of the richest brown Rappee, and when the Beau, having
dropped his jewelled fingers into the modish soil, drew them forth and
raised them to his aquiline nose, a stillness fell upon the room, and
above the silence the sniffs of the great Beau, three in number, were
distinctly heard by all. It was as if he wished them Good Health. But
this was not enough for the Exquisite Mob. Somebody--it may have been
our hero--ran post haste for a bottle of champagne, and somebody else
rushed off for goblets. Presently, the prettiest Impromptu in the world
was enacted, and very proud indeed were the spectators of a scene
memorable for many years in the chronicles of fashion.
Delicately veined hands untwisted the silver wire and tore off the gold
cap. Somebody fetched a corkscrew, somebody clenched the sombre green
bottle between his brocaded knees. An arm tapering to snowy peaks pulled
at the unwilling cork. A fairy explosion was followed by the dewy
vapours of long imprisoned sunshine. The amber liquid sparkled and
bubbled and flowed over the many faceted goblet in cream and foam.
The Beau mounted once more upon his pedestal and drank to the pleasure,
health, and beauty of the company, while Lord Vanity and my Lady
Bunbutter quaffed an answering toast in deputy for the lords, ladies and
gentlemen present. Salvoes of well-bred applause pattered round the
room, and the Beau's triumph was hailed with acclamations.
And you, beautiful women and fine gentlemen, roses and carnations of an
older century, nothing remains of you for us. Your very perfume is but a
name. You are no more to the world of to-day than those glossy candles
that spluttered to death in gilt sockets. And yet, from the ruin of
elegance, one relick of that famous evening remains; for the silver wire
of the bottle of champagne, flung heedless to the ground, caught in a
flounce of some Beauty's petticoat. Long ago the gossamer stuff
mouldered, long ago was Beauty herself a skeleton, but the wire
cherished by Beauty's family may still be seen in a glass-topped table
in the corner of a quiet library somewhere in the broad Midlands. O
insignificant wire, you are more durable than the flowers who despised
you!
And now another famous ball waned to a close, and all the world of taste
and fashion went home to bed.
_Chapter the Tenth_
AFTER THE ASSEMBLY
Mr. Charles Lovely walked back with Mr. Antony Clare to the _Blue Boar_,
and joined Mr. Francis Vernon in the Coffee Room.
The latter noticed that Clare frowned slightly when he saw him, and
explained, almost apologetically, that he had moved thither from his
lodgings in the Crescent. Charles was delighted and immediately proposed
a game of hazard.
"You'll play, Tony?" he said eagerly.
"Not I," his friend answered. "I'm too sleepy, for 'tis confoundedly
fatiguing to be on such polite behaviour for so long."
"That's true indeed," cried Charles, "and therefore we need recreation
the more." With this he gave a tug at the bell-pull of flowery chintz,
and presently Mr. Daish who had sent the waiters to bed, came yawning to
answer the summons.
"Daish, bring two bottles of Burgundy like the fine fellow and good
landlord that you are."
"Yes, Mr. Lovely, certainly, your honour, but I hope your honour will be
careful with the bottles; it would be a terrible thing for the house if
the watch was murdered as they nearly was twice over last week," said
Mr. Daish, crumpling into obsequiousness at the impudence of his
request, and retreating sidelong from the room.
Mr. Clare, seeing that it was useless to argue Charles out of his
determination, took a seat by the fire.
"Egad," said Lovely, "what a jealous dog it is, he won't play, but can't
bear to go to bed." Clare gave the fire a meditative poke.
"What shall it be, Mr. Vernon? Ecarte?"
"With pleasure."
"Or picket?"
"As you will."
"Why, then, picket, and if we find we grow too sleepy to count our
sequences, we shall, at any rate, not be too sleepy to trickle dice out
of a box, eh?"
Charles turned with these words to take some unbroken paquets of playing
cards from a small mahogany cabinet hanging against the wall. The
picture presented was a friendly one as the two men seated themselves at
the card table. The fire was burning brightly and rosy shadows flickered
over the ceiling. The curtains were close drawn and the ample flowers of
their pattern seemed to retain somehow the warmth and the light. By the
side of the grate sat Tony in a high grandfather's chair. He had taken
off his wig and was staring meditatively at the crisp curls, as it
reposed on his knee. The buckles of his shoes spat tiny glints of
flame--red, blue and green. Presently he leaned across to a small
bookshelf and took down some dry inn volume, but the print danced in the
fire-light and very soon he was dozing peacefully, while his wig slipped
to the ground and became a pleasant couch for a large tabby cat to purr
away comfortable hours.
At the table sat Vernon and Lovely face to face, and the green baize
made a prim battlefield for the debonair antagonists. It was a
meadow-fight viewed from towering Olympus. Here was pasture profitable
enough to some: to others barren as the unharvested sea. No crescent
moon lighted it, no sun parched the fresh greenery whose four tall
candles flickered only to chamber tempests, storms of tapestry, keyhole
zephyrs. At either end were ranged round guineas in wicked little heaps,
and along the borders stood serried packs of cards, shorn of their
meaner numbers as becomes the apparelled duel of picket. These had been
flung contemptuously on to the floor and the survivors lay face
downwards on the table with a new and alluring slimness. Their backs
were so innocent--mere festoons of flowers and bouquets of rosebuds;
yet their very innocence only served to enhance the red and black
determination of their faces. How the royal cards reflected in their
appearance the temper of their courts. How sombre-suited went the Queen
of Spades, how pensive seemed her consort, while the savage Ace was hung
with garlands of mourning and sable flowers of Proserpine. The Queen of
Diamonds looked harassed; the Knave had a lean eye and the King himself
seemed peaked and careworn. The Club Court was a swarthy and more brutal
counterpart of the gay Hearts, and the gay Hearts, with ripe dewy
mouths, had yet a certain sly sensuality that bred distrust.
Then the tournament began. The stacked guineas sprawled in golden
disarray and dwindled and swelled and tinkled to the tune of the game.