The Road to Paris Part 22

As they were entering their own coach, they saw Lord Alderby get down from his; he bowed to Lord George, but bestowed on d.i.c.k a swift look of pretended contempt, though it showed real hostility.

"Miss Mallby must have praised you to Alderby last night," said Lord George, lightly.

That evening Wetheral and Lord George stayed late at a fashionable tavern in Pall Mall, their party having increased to a numerous and merry one. Finally it was joined by no other than Lord Alderby himself, with whom came a thin, middle-aged Irish gentleman addressed as captain and wearing a c.o.c.kade in his hat. Neither of these newcomers had much to say for awhile. Presently the talk fell upon the American war, and an argument arose as to whether General Howe's evacuation of Boston was to be accounted a British defeat. The name of cowards being applied to the Americans, d.i.c.k broke out with the a.s.sertion that, to his personal knowledge, Americans had given as convincing proofs of courage as he had ever seen or heard of as coming from Englishmen.

"Courage is like many other things," put in Lord Alderby, not looking at d.i.c.k, yet speaking with a quiet sneer; "people are apt to set up as judges of if, who never practise it themselves."

A surprised silence fell over the company.

"If you mean that remark for me, sir," said d.i.c.k, as soon as he could command his voice, "I am ready to let you judge of my practice, whenever and wherever you choose!"

"Without knowing very well who you are, sir," replied Lord Alderby, who was thickly built and below middle height, but all the more arrogant in his tone for that, "I believe there is a difference in rank between us, which forbids my giving your courage an opportunity."

"Perhaps there is a difference of courage itself, as well!" snapped out d.i.c.k.

"I take that, gintlemen," put in the Irish captain, who, it was plain, had been brought in by Lord Alderby for precisely what he now proceeded to do, "as a reflection on the opinion of ivery man that knows what my Lord Alderby's courage is. And, as I'm one of thim min, and seeing there's no difference of rank bechune this gintleman and me, I offer him here ivery opportunity he may require for the dishplay of courage."

"And I take your offer," cried d.i.c.k instantly. "I've no scruples about difference in rank, and I'm willing to fight anybody, high or low,--even a hired lickspittle that takes up gentlemen's quarrels for pay! Lord Alderby can tell you where I lodge; he knows where he can find that out!"

Lord Alderby indeed found that out,--not from Miss Mallby, but through his valet, who knew Lord George Winston's. And next day, to Bond Street, came Captain Delahenty's challenge in regular form. Lord George, who never concerned himself about his rank, or let it affect his doings, readily consented to serve d.i.c.k in the business; and so, on the following morning, at dawn, d.i.c.k found himself in Hyde Park, about to undertake his first duel.

He had chosen to fight with swords, the blade being the weapon in whose use he most desired practice. In his shirt-sleeves, with that acquired serenity which comes of the mind's forcing itself not to contemplate the peril at hand, he stood under a tree at one end of a clear s.p.a.ce, while his antagonist, seconded by an old faded beau, emerged from a hackney coach and got himself ready. The men fought in the centre of the clear s.p.a.ce. d.i.c.k began defensively, but he had not parried more than three of the captain's thrusts, till he perceived that the enemy was shaky with liquor. d.i.c.k therefore waited only until the other's panting indicated failing wind. Then he suddenly pressed matters, with such accuracy and persistence that the whole thing was over in a minute,--d.i.c.k putting on his waistcoat and frock, with Lord George's a.s.sistance, and Captain Delahenty on the ground with a wounded shoulder that the surgeon was p.r.o.nouncing likely to heal in a month or six weeks.

d.i.c.k drove back to Bond Street in great elation, eager for more duels.

Lord Alderby's state of mind towards d.i.c.k was not sweetened by this occurrence, as was shown by his lordship's ill-sustained pretence of ignoring d.i.c.k's presence when next the two were in the same company.

This happened to be in a clubhouse in St. James's Street, d.i.c.k's name having been written down there by Lord George, to whom he had satisfactorily accounted for his ignorance of London and of London society. Chance brought Lord Alderby and d.i.c.k to the same card table, and not as partners. His lordship soon had his revenge, and a far greater one than he thought it to be, for d.i.c.k, playing on after first losses, in the confidence that fortune would serve him as usually, lost his every guinea. He would have staked the few loose shillings he still had left, but that the largeness of the bets would have made such a proposition ridiculous. He went home to Bond Street in a kind of consternation, faced by the reality that he was a pauper in London, and that luck had turned against him. Now that he had tasted the life of pleasure, poverty seemed not again endurable. Yet he braced himself to consider what was to be done.

Now that he had no money worth mentioning, the hospitality he received from Lord George was to d.i.c.k nothing else than charity. To continue accepting it would make his situation soon insupportable. He quickly took his resolution. He must fall back to a lower sphere, where a shilling was worth something, and recoup himself; that done, he would emerge again into the world to which Lord George had introduced him.

So, the next morning, pretending he had found at a lawyer's office in Chancery Lane a letter from his people, d.i.c.k told Lord George he must leave London immediately. Then, having sent for a hackney coach and taken a very friendly farewell of his lordship, he was driven to the starting-place of the Manchester stage. Being set down there, he hastened afoot, with his baggage, in search of cheap lodgings. These he presently found at a widow's house in George Street, which ran from the Strand towards the Thames. He engaged a room at sixteen shillings a week.

The widow had a grown-up son employed by a mercer in the Strand, and from him d.i.c.k learned where to dispose of clothes most profitably, the son giving the name of a salesman in Monmouth Street, and adding, "Be sure, tell him 'twas I recommended you to him." d.i.c.k parted first with the new black suit he had so recently bought, and so found himself comparatively well in fund for his present station.

Not finding his landlady's son a companion to his taste, and not making any acquaintances in the various coffee-houses, taverns, and eating-houses that he now frequented in and about Fleet Street and the Strand, he became afflicted with loneliness. A mere unnoticed mite among thousands, and utterly ignored by the hastening mult.i.tude, he sent his thoughts from the vast and crowded city, back to the bleak Maine wilderness, and he had a kind of homesick longing for the hearty comradeship of the time of freezing and starving there.

One evening, determined to enliven himself and have another fling at pleasure at any cost, he went to Westminster Bridge afoot, and thence by boat up the Thames, to Vauxhall. He had no sooner paid his shilling, on entering the garden, than his spirits began to rise. The sound of the orchestra and of singers, heard while he pa.s.sed by the little groves and the statues, brought back his zest for gay life, and this was redoubled as he came into the brilliantly lighted s.p.a.ce around the orchestra, where the small boxes on either side were filled with people who sat eating or drinking at the tables, and where the walks were thronged with pleasure-seekers of every rank. He sat down on an empty bench in one of the boxes, thinking to drink a bottle of wine and listen to the music.

Before the waiter had brought the wine, a gaily dressed young woman, handsome enough in her powder and paint, came with almost a rush to the vacant place at his side, and said, with a bold smile, "My dear sir, I can't endure to see so pretty a gentleman drink alone! I'm going to keep you company."

d.i.c.k, having inspected the amiable creature in a glance, was nothing loath. So the waiter, having brought the wine, was sent for an additional gla.s.s, and then again for eatables. d.i.c.k's companion proved so agreeable that he soon ordered more wine and presently forgot the music in contemplating her charms, her air of piquant impudence, her affectations, and the shallow smartness of her talk. He was so entertained by her that, when the night was late, on arriving with her at Westminster Bridge, he took a hackney coach and accompanied her to her lodgings, which, to his astonishment, were in the quite respectable-looking house of a hosier in High Holborn.

At his frank expression of surprise, she seemed huffed; wondered why she should not be supposed to live like any other lady, and said it was n.o.body's business if she chose now and then to go out for an evening of pleasure in a free and easy manner. Her ruffled feelings were soon smoothed down, however, and when d.i.c.k left her it was with an appointment to take her to the next Hampstead a.s.sembly.

This Vauxhall incident cost d.i.c.k so much of the money got from the sale of his new suit that he was soon fain to visit the Monmouth Street dealer again, this time carrying the gamekeeper's suit and wearing that bestowed on him by the whimsical gentleman met at Taunton. For both these suits, the shopkeeper gave him a sum of money and a very plain blue frock, a worn white waistcoat, and a pair of mended black breeches.

Thus d.i.c.k left the shop in vastly different attire from that in which he had entered it, and when he returned to his lodging the change made his landlady's son gape with wonder.

Before d.i.c.k had made up his mind as to how he should rebuild his fortunes, he received one afternoon a visitor in a hackney coach, who was none other than the companionable young lady of Vauxhall, to whom he had made known his place of residence. Her errand now was to learn why he had failed to keep his engagement for the Hampstead a.s.sembly. She did not stay long to reproach him, for no sooner had she taken note of his cheapened appearance, and made sure that it came from necessity, than she swept out of his room and back to the coach, on the pretence of being offended at the broken appointment.

On leaving the house, she was seen by the landlady's son, who came to d.i.c.k presently, with a grin, and remarked that Sukey Green had become a great lady since she had ceased to walk the Strand of nights. On inquiring, d.i.c.k learned that his visitor was well known by sight to the landlady's son as having been, not many weeks before, one of the countless frail damsels infesting the sidewalks of the town after nightfall. Some turn of fortune had taken her from her rags and a hole in Butcher Row to the fine clothes and comfortable lodgings she now possessed, instead of to the Bridewell or the river or a pauper's grave, as another turn might have done. Perhaps she had but returned to the condition from which she had fallen.

d.i.c.k soon had fallen fortunes of his own to think of. He knew not how to attempt to make his money multiply; or rather he devised in his mind so many methods that he could not confine his thoughts to any one of them.

Thus rendered inert by his very versatility, he saw his money go for mere necessities, and at last he had to seek still cheaper lodgings, which he found in Green Arbor Court, a place redeemed in his eyes by the fact that Oliver Goldsmith had once lived there.

It was not a locality designed to increase his cheerfulness. He had a narrow, bare room, high up in a dirty, squalid house; from his window he could see old clothes flying from countless windows and lines; and the sounds most common to his ears were the voices of washerwomen laughing or quarrelling and of children shouting or squalling. Not far in one direction was Newgate Prison, and not far in another was that of the Fleet.

In going to Fleet Street, he had to descend Breakneck Stairs,--which numbered thirty-two and were in two steep flights and led him to the edge of Fleet Ditch,--traverse a narrow street, and go through Fleet Market. This was a route that d.i.c.k often took, for he preferred still to dine in and about Fleet Street, though no longer at the Grecian Coffee-house or d.i.c.k's or the Mitre Tavern, to all which places he had resorted while lodging in George Street, but at the cheaper places,--Clifton's Eating-house, in Butcher Row, for one. Sometimes his meal consisted solely of a pot of beer at the Goat Ale House in Shire Lane. He fell at last to the down-stairs eating-houses, where his table-mates were hackney coachmen, servants poorly paid or unemployed, and poverty-stricken devils and unsuccessful rascals of every sort. It was here that his fortune took an upward course again.

Appealed to, one day, in a low tavern, to settle a card dispute between two bloated, sore-faced fellows who had come to the point of accusing each other of being, one a footpad and the other a grave robber, d.i.c.k acted the umpire to the satisfaction of both, and then went on to do a few astonishing things with their cards. Others in the tavern gathered round him, until presently, seeing the crowd and the interest both increasing, d.i.c.k observed that his time was valuable and that he could not afford to show any more skill for nothing. But the body-stealer refused to receive the dirty cards handed back to him by d.i.c.k, and the footpad speedily took up a collection, with such a "money-or-your-life"

air that a hatful of greasy coins was soon raised to induce d.i.c.k to go on with his tricks. As many of these tricks were of old Tom's invention, they differed from those with which the London scamps were familiar.

The footpad and the resurrectionist now persuaded d.i.c.k to go to another tavern, where they opened the way for his apparently extemporaneous performances, and where they raised good sums for him. He wondered at first at the zeal with which they worked to enrich him, but he presently saw that they, pretending to be chance observers, were quietly making bets with other spectators on the results of certain of his card manipulations. He thereupon left off, and escaped from this undesired partnership. But he now engaged an honest, impoverished hack writer, whom he met in an eating-cellar, to sit at tavern tables with him and appear an interested observer of his card tricks, enlist the crowd's attention, and suggest the inevitable pa.s.sing around of the hat. This combination continued for a week, during which time the low taverns were visited in succession, from Whitefriars to St. Catherine's, from Cripplegate to Southwark. d.i.c.k's earnings consisted only of what the spectators willingly gave for their amus.e.m.e.nt, but at the week's end that amount sufficed for the purchase of a good suit of clothes at a tailor's in the Strand, and for another purpose besides, which d.i.c.k, once more clad like a gentleman, speedily set out upon.

He went boldly back to Pall Mall, ran across several acquaintances to whom Lord George Winston had made him known, and got one of them to introduce him to a certain respectable-looking house in Covent Garden; and in that house, whose interior showed an activity not promised by its outside, he won at faro an amount that filled every other player at the table with resentful envy. When he left, he felt himself again a made man; his pockets were heavy with money.

The night was well advanced when he issued from the gambling-house, enjoying the relief and the fresh air after the excitement and heat of the rooms. He walked to the Strand and turned towards Temple Bar, intending to sup at the Turk's Head Coffee-house. When he reached the Strand end of Catherine Street, he was accosted, with more than ordinary importunity, by one of the most miserable-looking of the frail creatures that walked the street there. As he was in the act of avoiding her, she called out his name in sudden recognition, and he then knew her as the gay young woman of High Holborn whom he had met at Vauxhall.

Struck with pity to see in so sad a plight a person recently so prosperous, he could not but walk along with her to hear her story. She had lost the means of support that had enabled her to live in a good neighborhood and flaunt her finery at Vauxhall, Ranelagh, and the Hampstead a.s.sembly. She lodged no longer in High Holborn, nor even in Butcher's Row; in fact, she knew not where she was to pa.s.s that night.

She showed, through all her cast-down demeanor, a decided reawakening of regard for d.i.c.k, and even hinted, after they had talked for some time, that her loss of favor had arisen from her acceptance of his escort from Vauxhall. So d.i.c.k gave her a few shillings for her immediate necessities, and told her to call at his lodging in Green Arbor Court on the morrow, when they would discuss what might be done for her. It was at her own suggestion that his residence was selected as the place of meeting.

But, on the morrow, she did not call at the appointed time. So d.i.c.k went out to attend to business of pressing importance, which was no other than to buy a new black suit and other necessaries. In the afternoon he went to Pall Mall and renewed acquaintances, saying he had returned to London the day before yesterday. Pumping a young gentleman whom he knew to be on close terms with the Mallby family, he learned that the dazzling heiress was still in town and that a place had been taken for her for that night's performance at the little theatre in the Haymarket.

d.i.c.k hastened to secure a seat as near as possible to the box in which Miss Mallby was to be.

In the evening, which was that of Wednesday, July 10, attired in his best, d.i.c.k occupied a seat in the pit, in the midst of a crowded audience, and had the satisfaction of seeing not only the heiress, but also their Majesties, George III. and Queen Charlotte, who both laughed immoderately at Mr. Foote as "Lady Pentweazle,"--especially when he appeared under a vast head-dress filled with feathers, in exaggeration of the reigning mode.

It was some time before d.i.c.k's admiring gaze held the attention of Miss Mallby, which it caught while she scanned the crowded house from her box; and some time after that before she recalled who he was. But when she did recognize him, it was with a smile so radiant that Lord Alderby, then standing at her side, turned quite red and pale successively, and glared at d.i.c.k with a most deadly expression. In response to a slight movement of her fan, d.i.c.k forced his way to her, between acts, and had a brief chat about the audience, the weather, his supposed absence from town, Lord George Winston, and such matters, which in themselves certainly contained nothing to warrant the mischievous smiles on her part, and the languishing glances on his, that accompanied the talk.

Any one but d.i.c.k and Lord Alderby could have seen that the lady's sole motive was a desire to keep his lordship jealous. But d.i.c.k took all signs as they appeared on the surface, and when he left the playhouse it was with a flattering delusion that her hopes of seeing him soon again were from the heart. He did not observe that Lord Alderby, before handing Miss Mallby into her coach, pointed him out to a footman and hurriedly whispered some instructions.

d.i.c.k went on air to his room in Green Arbor Court,--for he intended to retain his lodging there until he should find a residence perfectly to his taste. He laughed to think of a gentleman of his figure coming home to Green Arbor Court, and wondered whether such contrast was typical of any one's else career, as it was of his.

The next day, to his astonishment,--for he supposed the Vauxhall girl to be the only outside person knowing where he lived,--he received in his wretched room a visit from a man dressed like a servant but evidently horrified at the rickety surroundings. This person, being a.s.sured by d.i.c.k that the latter was Mr. Richard Wetheral, handed him a letter, and fled forthwith. The letter, on clean plain paper, and in an ill-formed but fine feminine hand, read thus:

"HOUNERD SIR:

"I mak bolde to tell you for heavings sak taike outher lodgings and do not go neer them wch you now live att--tis a qestchun of life or Deth and sure do not go neer them at nite, this nite above all--do not waite a minute but take outher wons att wonse--from Won that noes and wch deesirs you noe harm yr respeckfull an dutyfull servt."

d.i.c.k was completely puzzled. What danger could he be in, through remaining at his present abode? Who could be his unknown warner? Not the Vauxhall girl, for she had written her name for him on a card, and this was not her handwriting. The quality and cleanliness of the paper indicated a person living in good case,--perhaps a maid-servant in some fine house. Then he recalled the face of the man who had brought the letter, and whom, at the moment, he had thought he had seen somewhere before. Recollecting singly each incident of his life in London, he at last located the man's face. It was that of a footman at the Mallbys'

house in Grosvenor Square. But what maid-servant in that house could have noticed d.i.c.k? Indeed, what person in that house had done so but Miss Mallby herself? So the heiress, to avoid discovery in the matter, might have caused her maid to send the warning. Now what possible danger to d.i.c.k could Miss Mallby be aware of, save one that Lord Alderby might have threatened or planned? But would Lord Alderby have informed her of such plans? Perhaps so, in a moment of anger, as men will antic.i.p.ate the pleasure of revenge, by announcing that revenge in advance; perhaps not.

If not, one or two of his lordship's servants would probably have been in his confidence, and thus the cat might have been let out of the bag to one of Miss Mallby's maids. So d.i.c.k concluded that, if he was in any danger, it must be from Lord Alderby, his only powerful enemy. But he resolved to disdain the warning, nevertheless, and he went forth to look in a leisurely way for suitable lodgings, as he had intended to do, though he would not move into them for two or three days.

But he wasted the day in riding about London, viewing things he had not seen before. In the evening the whim seized him to go to Ranelagh. It was not until late at night, when he turned from Fleet Street, through the market, that he thought of the morning's warning. He felt a momentary tremor, so dark and deserted was the narrow street leading to Breakneck Stairs. But he braced himself within, and strode along with apparent blitheness; yet he could not help thinking that Breakneck Stairs would be an excellent place for an attack by his enemies. Peering forward in the darkness, he turned from the border of Fleet Ditch, and mounted the first steps. At the side of the stairs, there ascended a row of houses, all now in deep shadow.

He had reached the landing between the two flights, without incident, when suddenly from the shadow at the side a dark lantern was flashed upon his face, and out rushed three or four burly figures. "Heave the spalpeen down the shtairs!" cried a voice from the shadow,--a voice that d.i.c.k instantly recognized as Captain Delahenty's, and from which he knew the attack was indeed at Lord Alderby's instigation.

The men were armed with bludgeons, and three rushed upon d.i.c.k at once.

But he had no mind to make his bed in Fleet Ditch; hence he met the middle rascal with a violent kick in the belly, and, getting instantly between the other two, shot out both arms simultaneously, clutching at their throats. But now the captain and one other man rushed out from the shadow, and d.i.c.k thought all was up.

Suddenly there came a cry from the top of the stairs, "Hold off, that man belongs to us!" There followed a flashing of other lanterns, and a scuffle of footsteps down from the top. In another moment, d.i.c.k's first a.s.sailants were resisting this new force, who had fallen upon them with bludgeons. A sharp, quick fight, in which d.i.c.k himself took no part whatever, left the newcomers in possession of the landing and of him, while Captain Delahenty and his gang were carrying their broken heads rapidly down the stairs and off towards Fleet Market.