Part 48 (1/2)
”According to that symbolical view of the case,” said Audley, ”you should lodge in an attic.”
”So I would, but that I abhor new slippers. As for hairbrushes, I am indifferent.”
”What have slippers and hair-brushes to do with attics?”
”Try! Make your bed in an attic, and the next morning you will have neither slippers nor hair-brushes!”
”What shall I have done with them?”
”s.h.i.+ed them at the cats!”
”What odd things you say, Harley!”
”Odd! By Apollo and his nine spinsters! there is no human being who has so little imagination as a distinguished member of parliament. Answer me this, thou solemn Right Honourable,--Hast thou climbed to the heights of august contemplation? Hast thou gazed on the stars with the rapt eye of song? Hast thou dreamed of a love known to the angels, or sought to seize in the Infinite the mystery of life?”
”Not I indeed, my poor Harley.”
”Then no wonder, poor Audley, that you cannot conjecture why he who makes his bed in an attic, disturbed by base catterwauls, s.h.i.+es his slippers at cats. Bring a chair into the balcony. Nero spoiled my cigar to-night. I am going to smoke now. You never smoke. You can look on the shrubs in the square.”
Audley slightly shrugged his shoulders, but he followed his friend's counsel and example, and brought his chair into the balcony. Nero came too, but at sight and smell of the cigar prudently retreated, and took refuge under the table.
”Audley Egerton, I want something from Government.”
”I am delighted to hear it.”
”There was a cornet in my regiment, who would have done better not to have come into it. We were, for the most part of us, puppies and fops.”
”You all fought well, however.”
”Puppies and fops do fight well. Vanity and valour generally go together. CAesar, who scratched his head with due care of his scanty curls, and even in dying thought of the folds in his toga; Walter Raleigh, who could not walk twenty yards because of the gems in his shoes; Alcibiades, who lounged into the Agora with doves in his bosom, and an apple in his hand; Murat, bedizened in gold lace and furs; and Demetrius, the City-Taker, who made himself up like a French marquise, were all pretty good fellows at fighting. A slovenly hero like Cromwell is a paradox in nature, and a marvel in history. But to return to my cornet. We were rich; he was poor. When the pot of clay swims down the stream with the bra.s.s-pots, it is sure of a smash. Men said Digby was stingy; I saw he was extravagant. But every one, I fear, would be rather thought stingy than poor. Bref--I left the army, and saw him no more till to-night. There was never shabby poor gentleman on the stage more awfully shabby, more pathetically gentleman. But, look ye, this man has fought for England. It was no child's play at Waterloo, let me tell you, Mr. Egerton; and, but for such men, you would be at best a sous prefet, and your parliament a Provincial a.s.sembly. You must do something for Digby. What shall it be?”
”Why, really, my dear Harley, this man was no great friend of yours, eh?”
”If he were, he would not want the Government to help him,--he would not be ashamed of taking money from me.”
”That is all very fine, Harley; but there are so many poor officers, and so little to give. It is the most difficult thing in the world that which you ask me. Indeed, I know nothing can be done: he has his half-pay?”
”I think not; or, if he has it, no doubt it all goes on his debts.
That's nothing to us: the man and his child are starving.”
”But if it is his own fault,--if he has been imprudent?”
”Ah, well, well; where the devil is Nero?”
”I am so sorry I can't oblige you. If it were anything else--”
”There is something else. My valet--I can't turn him adrift-excellent fellow, but gets drunk now and then. Will you find him a place in the Stamp Office?”