Part 76 (2/2)

My party? I had here to divulge, with some little trepidation, the plan which I had been making overnight; to explain how I thought that Clive's great talents were wasted at Boulogne, and could only find a proper market in London; how I was pretty certain, through my connection with booksellers, to find some advantageous employment for him, and would have done so months ago had I known the state of the case; but I had believed, until within a very few days since, that the Colonel, in spite of his bankruptcy, was still in the enjoyment of considerable military pensions.

This statement, of course, elicited from the widow a number of remarks not complimentary to my dear old Colonel. He might have kept his pensions had he not been a fool--he was a baby about money matters--misled himself and everybody--was a log in the house, etc. etc.

etc.

I suggested that his annuities might possibly be put into some more satisfactory shape--that I had trustworthy lawyers with whom I would put him in communication--that he had best come to London to see to these matters--and that my wife had a large house where she would most gladly entertain the two gentlemen.

This I said with some reasonable dread--fearing, in the first place, her refusal; in the second, her acceptance of the invitation, with a proposal, as our house was large, to come herself and inhabit it for a while. Had I not seen that Campaigner arrive for a month at poor James Binnie's house in Fitzroy Square, and stay there for many years? Was I not aware that when she once set her foot in a gentleman's establishment, terrific battles must ensue before she could be dislodged? Had she not once been routed by Clive? and was she not now in command and possession? Do I not, finally, know something of the world; and have I not a weak, easy temper? I protest it was with terror that I awaited the widow's possible answer to my proposal.

To my great relief, she expressed the utmost approval of both my plans.

I was uncommonly kind, she was sure, to interest myself about the two gentlemen, and for her blessed Rosa's sake, a fond mother thanked me.

It was most advisable that he should earn some money by that horrid profession which he had chosen to adopt--a trade, she called it. She was clearly anxious get rid both of father and son, and agreed that the sooner they went the better.

We walked back arm-in-arm to the Colonel's quarters in the Old Town, Mrs. Mackenzie, in the course of our walk, doing me the honour to introduce me by name to several dingy acquaintances, whom we met sauntering up the street, and imparting to me, as each moved away, the pecuniary cause of his temporary residence in Boulogne. Spite of Rosey's delicate state of health, Mrs. Mackenzie did not hesitate to break the news to her of the gentlemen's probable departure, abruptly and eagerly, as if the intelligence was likely to please her:--and it did, rather than otherwise. The young woman, being in the habit of letting mamma judge for her, continued it in this instance; and whether her husband stayed or went, seemed to be equally content or apathetic. ”And is it not most kind and generous of dear Mr. and Mrs. Pendennis to propose to receive Mr. Newcome and the Colonel?” This opportunity for grat.i.tude being pointed out to Rosey, she acquiesced in it straightway--it was very kind of me, Rosey was sure. ”And don't you ask after dear Mrs.

Pendennis and the dear children--you poor dear suffering darling child?”

Rosey, who had neglected this inquiry, immediately hoped Mrs. Pendennis and the children were well. The overpowering mother had taken utter possession of this poor little thing. Rosey's eyes followed the Campaigner about, and appealed to her at all moments. She sat under Mrs. Mackenzie as a bird before a boa-constrictor, doomed--fluttering--fascinated--scared and fawning as a whipt spaniel before a keeper.

The Colonel was on his accustomed bench on the rampart at this sunny hour. I repaired thither, and found the old gentleman seated by his grandson, who lay, as yesterday, on the little bonne's lap, one of his little purple hands closed round the grandfather's finger. ”Hus.h.!.+”

says the good man, lifting up his other finger to his moustache, as I approached, ”Boy's asleep. Il est bien joli quand il dort--le Boy, n'est-ce pas, Marie?” The maid believed monsieur well--the boy was a little angel. ”This maid is a most trustworthy, valuable person, Pendennis,” the Colonel said, with much gravity.

The boa-constrictor had fascinated him, too--the lash of that woman at home had cowed that helpless, gentle, n.o.ble spirit. As I looked at the head so upright and manly, now so beautiful and resigned--the year of his past life seemed to pa.s.s before me somehow in a flash of thought.

I could fancy the accursed tyranny--the dumb acquiescence--the brutal jeer--the helpless remorse--the sleepless nights of pain and recollection--the gentle heart lacerated with deadly stabs--and the impotent hope. I own I burst into a sob at the sight, and thought of the n.o.ble suffering creature, and hid my face, and turned away.

He sprang up, releasing his hand from the child's, and placing it, the kind shaking hand, on my shoulder. ”What is it, Arthur--my dear boy?”

he said, looking wistfully in my face. ”No bad news from home, my dear?

Laura and the children well?”

The emotion was mastered in a moment, I put his arm under mine, and as we slowly sauntered up and down the sunny walk of the old rampart, I told him how I had come with special commands from Laura to bring him for a while to stay with us, and to settle his business, which I was sure had been wofully mismanaged, and to see whether we could not find the means of getting some little out of the wreck of the property for the boy yonder.

At first Colonel Newcome would not hear of quitting Boulogne, where Rosey would miss him--he was sure she would want him--but before the ladies of his family, to whom we presently returned, Thomas Newcome's resolution was quickly recalled. He agreed to go, and Clive coming in at this time was put in possession of our plan and gladly acquiesced in it.

On that very evening I came with a carriage to conduct my two friends to the steamboat. Their little packets were made and ready. There was no pretence of grief at parting on the women's side, but Marie, the little maid, with Boy in her arms, cried sadly; and Clive heartily embraced the child; and the Colonel, going back to give it one more kiss, drew out of his neckcloth a little gold brooch which he wore, and which, trembling, he put into Marie's hand, bidding her take good care of Boy till his return.

”She is a good girl--a most faithful, attached girl, Arthur, do you see,” the kind old gentleman said; ”and I had no money to give her--no, not one single rupee.”

CHAPTER LXXIV. In which Clive begins the World

We are ending our history, and yet poor Clive is but beginning the world. He has to earn the bread which he eats henceforth; and, as I saw his labours, his trials, and his disappointments, I could not but compare his calling with my own.

The drawbacks and penalties attendant upon our profession are taken into full account, as we well know, by literary men, and their friends.

Our poverty, hards.h.i.+ps, and disappointments are set forth with great emphasis, and often with too great truth by those who speak of us; but there are advantages belonging to our trade which are pa.s.sed over, I think, by some of those who exercise it and describe it, and for which, in striking the balance of our accounts, we are not always duly thankful. We have no patron, so to speak--we sit in ante-chambers no more, waiting the present of a few guineas from my lord, in return for a fulsome dedication. We sell our wares to the book-purveyor, between whom and us there is no greater obligation than between him and his paper-maker or printer. In the great towns in our country immense stores of books are provided for us, with librarians to cla.s.s them, kind attendants to wait upon us, and comfortable appliances for study. We require scarce any capital wherewith to exercise our trade. What other so-called learned profession is equally fortunate? A doctor, for example, after carefully and expensively educating himself, must invest in house and furniture, horses, carriage, and menservants, before the public patient will think of calling him in. I am told that such gentlemen have to coax and wheedle dowagers, to humour hypochondriacs, to practise a score of little subsidiary arts in order to make that of healing profitable. How many many hundreds of pounds has a barrister to sink upon his stock-in-trade before his returns are available? There are the costly charges of university education--the costly chambers in the Inn of Court--the clerk and his maintenance--the inevitable travels on circuit--certain expenses all to be defrayed before the possible client makes his appearance, and the chance of fame or competency arrives. The prizes are great, to be sure, in the law, but what a prodigious sum the lottery-ticket costs! If a man of letters cannot win, neither does he risk so much. Let us speak of our trade as we find it, and not be too eager in calling out for public compa.s.sion.

The artists, for the most part, do not cry out their woes as loudly as some gentlemen of the literary fraternity, and yet I think the life of many of them is harder; their chances even more precarious, and the conditions of their profession less independent and agreeable than ours.

I have watched Smee, Esq., R.A., flattering and fawning, and at the same time boasting and swaggering, poor fellow, in order to secure a sitter.

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