The Way We Live Now Part 60

And she gave her own account of that night on which John Crumb and Mr.

Mixet ate their supper at the farm, and of the manner in which her grandfather had treated her because she would not have John Crumb.

Mrs. Pipkin was a respectable woman in her way, always preferring respectable lodgers if she could get them;--but bound to live. She gave Ruby very good advice. Of course if she was "dead-set" against John Crumb, that was one thing! But then there was nothing a young woman should look to so much as a decent house over her head,--and victuals. "What's all the love in the world, Ruby, if a man can't do for you?" Ruby declared that she knew somebody who could do for her, and could do very well for her. She knew what she was about, and wasn't going to be put off it. Mrs. Pipkin's morals were good wearing morals, but she was not strait-laced. If Ruby chose to manage in her own way about her lover she must. Mrs. Pipkin had an idea that young women in these days did have, and would have, and must have more liberty than was allowed when she was young. The world was being changed very fast. Mrs. Pipkin knew that as well as others. And therefore when Ruby went to the theatre once and again,--by herself as far as Mrs. Pipkin knew, but probably in company with her lover,--and did not get home till past midnight, Mrs. Pipkin said very little about it, attributing such novel circ.u.mstances to the altered condition of her country. She had not been allowed to go to the theatre with a young man when she had been a girl,--but that had been in the earlier days of Queen Victoria, fifteen years ago, before the new dispensation had come. Ruby had never yet told the name of her lover to Mrs. Pipkin, having answered all inquiries by saying that she was right. Sir Felix's name had never even been mentioned in Islington till Paul Montague had mentioned it. She had been managing her own affairs after her own fashion,--not altogether with satisfaction, but still without interruption; but now she knew that interference would come. Mr. Montague had found her out, and had told her grandfather's landlord. The Squire would be after her, and then John Crumb would come, accompanied of course by Mr. Mixet,--and after that, as she said to herself on retiring to the couch which she shared with two little Pipkins, "the fat would be in the fire."

"Who do you think was at our place yesterday?" said Ruby one evening to her lover. They were sitting together at a music-hall,--half music-hall, half theatre, which pleasantly combined the allurements of the gin-palace, the theatre, and the ball-room, trenching hard on those of other places. Sir Felix was smoking, dressed, as he himself called it, "incognito," with a Tom-and-Jerry hat, and a blue silk cravat, and a green coat. Ruby thought it was charming. Felix entertained an idea that were his West End friends to see him in this attire they would not know him. He was smoking, and had before him a gla.s.s of hot brandy and water, which was common to himself and Ruby.

He was enjoying life. Poor Ruby! She was half-ashamed of herself, half-frightened, and yet supported by a feeling that it was a grand thing to have got rid of restraints, and be able to be with her young man. Why not? The Miss Longestaffes were allowed to sit and dance and walk about with their young men,--when they had any. Why was she to be given up to a great ma.s.s of stupid dust like John Crumb, without seeing anything of the world? But yet, as she sat sipping her lover's brandy and water between eleven and twelve at the music-hall in the City Road, she was not altogether comfortable. She saw things which she did not like to see. And she heard things which she did not like to hear. And her lover, though he was beautiful,--oh, so beautiful!--was not all that a lover should be. She was still a little afraid of him, and did not dare as yet to ask him for the promise which she expected him to make to her. Her mind was set upon--marriage, but the word had hardly pa.s.sed between them. To have his arm round her waist was heaven to her. Could it be possible that he and John Crumb were of the same order of human beings? But how was this to go on? Even Mrs. Pipkin made disagreeable allusions, and she could not live always with Mrs. Pipkin, coming out at nights to drink brandy and water and hear music with Sir Felix Carbury. She was glad therefore to take the first opportunity of telling her lover that something was going to happen. "Who do you suppose was at our place yesterday?"

Sir Felix changed colour, thinking of Marie Melmotte, thinking that perhaps some emissary from Marie Melmotte had been there; perhaps Didon herself. He was amusing himself during these last evenings of his in London; but the business of his life was about to take him to New York. That project was still being elaborated. He had had an interview with Didon, and nothing was wanting but the money. Didon had heard of the funds which had been intrusted by him to Melmotte, and had been very urgent with him to recover them. Therefore, though his body was not unfrequently present, late in the night, at the City Road Music-Hall, his mind was ever in Grosvenor Square. "Who was it, Ruby?"

"A friend of the Squire's, a Mr. Montague. I used to see him about in Bungay and Beccles."

"Paul Montague!"

"Do you know him, Felix?"

"Well;--rather. He's a member of our club, and I see him constantly in the city--and I know him at home."

"Is he nice?"

"Well;--that depends on what you call nice. He's a prig of a fellow."

"He's got a lady friend where I live."

"The devil he has!" Sir Felix of course had heard of Roger Carbury's suit to his sister, and of the opposition to this suit on the part of Hetta, which was supposed to have been occasioned by her preference for Paul Montague. "Who is she, Ruby?"

"Well;--she's a Mrs. Hurtle. Such a stunning woman! Aunt says she's an American. She's got lots of money."

"Is Montague going to marry her?"

"Oh dear yes. It's all arranged. Mr. Montague comes quite regular to see her;--not so regular as he ought, though. When gentlemen are fixed as they're to be married, they never are regular afterwards. I wonder whether it'll be the same with you?"

"Wasn't John Crumb regular, Ruby?"

"Bother John Crumb! That wasn't none of my doings. Oh, he'd been regular enough, if I'd let him; he'd been like clockwork,--only the slowest clock out. But Mr. Montague has been and told the Squire as he saw me. He told me so himself. The Squire's coming about John Crumb.

I know that. What am I to tell him, Felix?"

"Tell him to mind his own business. He can't do anything to you."

"No;--he can't do nothing. I ain't done nothing wrong, and he can't send for the police to have me took back to Sheep's Acre. But he can talk,--and he can look. I ain't one of those, Felix, as don't mind about their characters,--so don't you think it. Shall I tell him as I'm with you?"

"Gracious goodness, no! What would you say that for?"

"I didn't know. I must say something."

"Tell him you're nothing to him."

"But aunt will be letting on about my being out late o'nights; I know she will. And who am I with? He'll be asking that."

"Your aunt does not know?"

"No;--I've told n.o.body yet. But it won't do to go on like that, you know,--will it? You don't want it to go on always like that;--do you?"

"It's very jolly, I think."

"It ain't jolly for me. Of course, Felix, I like to be with you.

That's jolly. But I have to mind them brats all the day, and to be doing the bedrooms. And that's not the worst of it."

"What is the worst of it?"

"I'm pretty nigh ashamed of myself. Yes, I am." And now Ruby burst out into tears. "Because I wouldn't have John Crumb, I didn't mean to be a bad girl. Nor yet I won't. But what'll I do, if everybody turns against me? Aunt won't go on for ever in this way. She said last night that--"

"Bother what she says!" Felix was not at all anxious to hear what aunt Pipkin might have to say upon such an occasion.

"She's right too. Of course she knows there's somebody. She ain't such a fool as to think that I'm out at these hours to sing psalms with a lot of young women. She says that whoever it is ought to speak out his mind. There;--that's what she says. And she's right. A girl has to mind herself, though she's ever so fond of a young man."

Sir Felix sucked his cigar and then took a long drink of brandy and water. Having emptied the beaker before him, he rapped, for the waiter and called for another. He intended to avoid the necessity of making any direct reply to Ruby's importunities. He was going to New York very shortly, and looked on his journey thither as an horizon in his future beyond which it was unnecessary to speculate as to any farther distance. He had not troubled himself to think how it might be with Ruby when he was gone. He had not even considered whether he would or would not tell her that he was going, before he started. It was not his fault that she had come up to London. She was an "awfully jolly girl," and he liked the feeling of the intrigue better, perhaps, than the girl herself. But he a.s.sured himself that he wasn't going to give himself any "d----d trouble." The idea of John Crumb coming up to London in his wrath had never occurred to him,--or he would probably have hurried on his journey to New York instead of delaying it, as he was doing now. "Let's go in, and have a dance," he said.

Ruby was very fond of dancing,--perhaps liked it better than anything in the world. It was heaven to her to be spinning round the big room with her lover's arm tight round her waist, with one hand in his and her other hanging over his back. She loved the music, and loved the motion. Her ear was good, and her strength was great, and she never lacked breath. She could spin along and dance a whole room down, and feel at the time that the world could have nothing to give better worth having than that;--and such moments were too precious to be lost. She went and danced, resolving as she did so that she would have some answer to her question before she left her lover on that night.

"And now I must go," she said at last. "You'll see me as far as the Angel, won't you?" Of course he was ready to see her as far as the Angel. "What am I to say to the Squire?"

"Say nothing."

"And what am I to say to aunt?"

"Say to her? Just say what you have said all along."

"I've said nothing all along,--just to oblige you, Felix. I must say something. A girl has got herself to mind. What have you got to say to me, Felix?"

He was silent for about a minute, meditating his answer. "If you bother me I shall cut it, you know."

"Cut it!"

"Yes;--cut it. Can't you wait till I am ready to say something?"

"Waiting will be the ruin o' me, if I wait much longer. Where am I to go, if Mrs. Pipkin won't have me no more?"

"I'll find a place for you."

"You find a place! No; that won't do. I've told you all that before.

I'd sooner go into service, or--"

"Go back to John Crumb."

"John Crumb has more respect for me nor you. He'd make me his wife to-morrow, and only be too happy."

"I didn't tell you to come away from him," said Sir Felix.

"Yes, you did. You told me as I was to come up to London when I saw you at Sheepstone Beeches;--didn't you? And you told me you loved me;--didn't you? And that if I wanted anything you'd get it done for me;--didn't you?"