The Story of Antony Grace

“Are you, though? Engineering, eh? Well, I’m sorry for it. No, no: I’m glad of it, my lad. I hope you will get on. But I liked you for a reading-boy. You were the only chap I ever had who could stand by me when I took snuff without sneezing all over the slips, and that’s a great thing. Have a pinch?” he said, offering me his box. “No, no: of course not, I forgot. Glad you came to see me, Grace – very glad. Here, Mrs Jennings,” he cried, going to the door, and shouting down the stairs; “I’ve got a young friend here: bring up some sugar-candy and biscuits and cinnamon; anything nice you’ve got.”

“I really don’t want anything, Mr Jabez,” I said.

“Oh, yes, you do, boy. Ho, hi! Mrs Jennings, bring up some figs.”

He toddled back to his chair, but was up again directly, to shout down the staircase:

“Bring up some almonds and raisins, and candied peel, Mrs Jennings.”

“Lor’ bless the man, do you want the whole shop?” shouted a sharp voice.

“No, I don’t,” said Mr Jabez grumpily, as he toddled back. “I was an out-and-outer for candied peel when I was a boy,” he said, rubbing his hands. “Those dried apples, too, that look as if they had been sat upon by old women, Grace. Ah, I spent a lot of pennies on them when I was a boy.”

A red-faced woman here made her appearance with a plateful of the sweets that Mr Jabez had named, and she rather scowled at me, and banged the plate down hard enough almost to break it as she whisked out of the room again and slammed the door.

“Now, Grace, fall to, as they say in copy about feasts. See that woman?”

“Yes, Mr Jabez.”

“She’s a Tartar, she is. I live here because that woman acts as a lighthouse to me.”

“A lighthouse, sir? Because she has got such a red face?”

“Get out! No, you young joker. A warning, a beacon, a bell-buoy, a light-ship, to warn me off the rocks and shoals of matrimony. I should have married, Grace, years ago, if I hadn’t seen what a life a woman can lead a man. She has nearly made her husband a lunatic.”

“Indeed, Mr Jabez?”

“Well, say imbecile. Peg away, my boy,” he continued, laughing; “these figs are beautiful. Peel’s good, too.”

So it seemed, for Mr Jabez was feasting away with great gusto, and eating two of everything to my one.

“Yes, sir, I should have been married and a poor man, instead of comparatively rich – at least, was. Money matters are rather awkward just now.”

“I’m very sorry to hear it, Mr Jabez,” I said.

“I’m sorry to feel it,” said Mr Jabez, with a fig in one hand and a piece of candied peel in the other. “Come, you don’t eat. By Jingo, there’s Grimstone,” he cried, as a step was heard upon the stairs; and in his excitement and dread of being seen engaged in eating sweets, he stuffed a fig into one breeches-pocket, some peel into the other, and snatched up his snuff-box, while I felt terribly discomposed at the idea of meeting my old tyrant.

“Is it Mr Grimstone?” I faltered.

“Yes, but you don’t eat. Take another fig,” cried Mr Jabez, as, without knocking, Mr Grimstone entered the room.

“Hallo,” he said, without taking off his hat, “what the deuce are you doing here?”

“I’ve come to see Mr Jabez, Mr Grimstone,” I replied.

“Oh, have you? So have I. How long are you going to stop?”

“Oh, hours yet,” said Mr Jabez. “Sit down, Grim. He doesn’t matter; speak out. He doesn’t belong to the shop now. Well: what news?”

“Bad!” said Mr Grimstone, throwing himself into a chair. “Here, boy, take my hat.”

I took it quite obediently, and resumed my seat, while Mr Grimstone wiped his bald head with a bright orange handkerchief.

“You don’t say so?” said Mr Jabez uneasily.

“Yes, I do,” said Mr Grimstone, taking the box out of the reader’s hand and helping himself to a pinch; “I said it quite plain.”

“It’s a bad job.”

“Have you just found that out?” snarled the overseer. “Pretty pair of fools we’ve been. Look here, send that boy away.”

“No, no; no, no. Sit still, Grace. Eat some more figs, boy. I’ll call Mrs Jennings when you’ve eaten them. There, go on, Grim. Antony Grace isn’t a chatterer.”

“Just as you like,” said Grimstone. “Well, if he doesn’t get married to that gal right off, and bank her money, the game’s up, and your 500 pounds and my 750 pounds are gone to the deuce.”

“Is it 750 pounds, Grimstone?”

“Yes, curse him! he got round me with all sorts of promises.”

“Of bonus, Grim, eh?”

“Yes, I suppose so,” growled the overseer. “That bill-discounter chap, Brandysheim, or Brandyman or something’s, cornering him. He was at the office to-day, and there was a regular shine.”

“Was Ruddle there?”

“No, but I hear that Brandysheim threatened to come down on him if he wasn’t paid.”

“And what then?”

“What then?” growled Grimstone, with a show of his teeth; “why, Lister’s smashed up – bankrupt, and you and I may sit and stare at each other for a pair of fools.”

“But it won’t hurt Ruddle.”

“No, only bother him. If Lister’s bankrupt, he’s partner no longer, and Ruddle will have to find out what share he has in the business.”

“Yes, that’s what I thought,” said Mr Jabez dolefully.

“And we shan’t get a penny!”

“Not even interest,” said Mr Jabez.

“Not even interest,” echoed Grimstone.

“Not even bonus,” said Mr Jabez.

“Not even bonus,” echoed Grimstone again.

“What’s he done with his money, that’s what I want to know?” said Mr Jabez.

“Wine – women – horse-racing – foolery! He’s been carrying on like mad, and what I suspect is this – Miss Carr begins to smell a rat, and I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if the wedding didn’t come off.”

Mr Jabez stared dolefully at Mr Grimstone, and the overseer kept on taking pinches of snuff till the box was empty; and, after searching round with finger and thumb, threw the box impatiently down.

“Well, I don’t see that we can do anything,” said Mr Jabez at last, “except wait.”

“No,” said Grimstone, “unless we can see the lady, and make her consent to pay us our 1,250 pounds.”

“And interest,” said Mr Jabez.

“And bonus,” said Grimstone, “down on the nail.”

“Which we can’t do,” said Mr Jabez, shaking his head.

“Of course we can’t,” said Grimstone. “All I wish is that I hadn’t let you persuade me into lending him the money – the savings of a whole life.”

“Oh, I like that!” said Mr Jabez, catching up a pen, and making a mark as if he were correcting Grimstone.

“Like it or not, I don’t care,” said Grimstone, “there it is. Here! boy, my hat.”

“Going?” said Mr Jabez.

“Going! of course I’m going. Think I’m going to stop in this dog-hole, smelling of red-herrings and oil?”

“Won’t you take something? Try a fig.”

Mr Grimstone snatched his hat from my hands, gazed at me as if he would have liked to set me to pick up pie, and bounced out of the room.

“I don’t know which is most unpleasant, Grace,” said the old man, “Grimstone or his news. Well, he’s gone. Of course, you won’t talk about what you’ve heard. It’s a very bad job, though, for me – very – very. Hi! Mrs Jennings,” he cried at the top of the stairs, “half an ounce of best Scotch and Rappee.”

He tapped with his box on the handrail as he spoke, and having had it replenished, he came back to sit and take pinches, becoming so abstracted and ill at ease, that I rose to go when he was a quarter through the half-ounce.

“Going, Grace?” he said. “Ah, I’m bad company to-night, but come again. Let me see, though,” he said, fumbling at some letters in his breast-pocket, “I’ve got a letter here from that bad boy, Peter. Just the same as usual. Tut – tut – oh, here it is. ‘Remember me to that boy,’ – ah, blunder I call it boy – ‘Antony Grace. Tell him I shall come to see him if ever I get two London.’ There’s a fellow for you,” said Mr Jabez, “spells ‘to’ like the figure 2. But he always did want a deal of correcting, did Peter. Good-night, good-night.”

And I went my way, sadly troubled at heart about Miss Carr and Mr Lister, and wondering whether she would, after all, refuse to be his wife.

Chapter Thirty Seven.

An Angry Parting

I had four days to wait before going to Westmouth Street to receive my usual welcome – at least, not my usual welcome, for though she seemed to grow more sad and pale, Miss Carr’s reception of me increased each time in warmth, till at last, had I been a younger brother she could not have been more kind. I was a good deal troubled at heart about what I knew, and puzzled myself as to my duties in the case. Ought I to take Mr Hallett into my confidence, and ask his advice, or ought I to tell Miss Carr herself? It was hard to settle, and I have often thought since of how strangely I was brought at so young an age into the consideration of the weighty matters of life of those with whom I was in contact.

It seemed to me that my patroness ought to know what people said about Mr Lister, and that if it were true she ought not to marry him. Certainly, at the interview at which I was an unwilling listener, there had appeared to be no probability of the wedding taking place soon, but all the same, Miss Carr had seemed to me terribly cut up, consequent upon the parting with Mr Lister.

I was so strange and quiet that afternoon that Miss Carr noticed it, and had just asked me what was the matter when the servant brought up a card and I saw her change colour.

“Show him up, Edward,” she said quietly; and though I did not see the card I felt sure from her manner that I knew who had come, and I looked up at Miss Carr, expecting to be told to go into the next room, but to my surprise she did not speak, and the next moment Mr Lister came in.

“Ah, Miriam!” he exclaimed; “how well – You here, Grace?”

“Yes, sir,” I said, feeling very much in the way, as I stood where I had risen.

“Sit down, Antony,” said Miss Carr quietly; and as I obeyed I saw an angry flush cross Mr Lister’s countenance.

“Will you give me a few minutes in the next room, Miriam dear?” he said in a low voice.

“In my last answer to your letters, John,” she replied, “I begged that you would not come to see me for a month or two. Why are you here now?”

“Why am I here now?” he said in a low, deep voice. “Can you ask me? Because I want to speak to you – particularly – come in the next room.”

I could not help looking hard at him as he spoke, and thinking about what I had heard concerning his affairs, and as I thought that he was to marry Miss Carr to pay off his debts, a strong feeling of resentment against him made me almost determine to utter some word of warning.

“He is so handsome, and has such a way with him,” I thought, “that she will do just as he wishes her;” but as the thoughts were in my mind, I was surprised and pleased by finding Miss Carr take quite a firm standing.

“You can have nothing more to say to me, John, than has been said already. I have told you that at least six months must elapse before I can consent to what you ask.”

“Will you come into the next room, or send away that boy?” he said in a low voice, but one which showed that he was fast losing his temper.

“No,” she said firmly; “and after my last letter I think it cruel of you to press me.”

“I cannot help whether it is cruel or not,” he said, growing white with anger at her opposition, “and you are forcing me to speak before this boy.”

“I leave that to your common-sense, John,” she said calmly, and with no little dignity in her manner. “I don’t know that I wish to hide anything from Antony Grace. He knows of our engagement.”

“Are you mad, Miriam?” he cried, unable to contain himself, and indirectly venting his spleen upon me. “You pick up a poor boy out of the gutter, and you take him and make him your bosom friend and confidant.”

Miss Carr caught my hand in hers, as I started, stung to the quick and mortified by his words.

“Shame, John Lister!” she said, with a look that should have brought him to his senses. “Shame! How can you speak like that in Antony Grace’s presence, and to me?”

“Because you make me desperate,” he cried angrily. “I can bear it no longer. I will not be trifled with. For months now you have treated me as a child. Once more, will you send away this boy, or come with me into another room?”

“Mr Lister,” she said, rising, “you are angry and excited. You are saying words now which you will afterwards grieve over, as much as I snail regret to have heard them spoken.”

“I can’t help that,” he exclaimed. “Day after day I have come to you, begging you to listen to me, but I have always been put off, until now I have grown desperate.”

“Desperate?” she said wonderingly.

“Yes, desperate. I do not wish to speak before this boy, but you force me to it.”

“What is there in our engagement that I should be ashamed to let the whole world hear?” she said proudly. “Why, if I listened to you, it would be published to every one who would hear.”

Mr Lister took a few strides up and down the room.

“Will you hear me, Miriam?” he cried, making an ineffectual effort to command his temper.

“John Lister,” she replied, “I have given you your answer, Come to me in six months’ time.”

“Am I to take that as final?” he said hoarsely.

“Yes. How can I reply otherwise to your violence?”

“Violence! It is enough to drive a man mad! But, once more, Miriam, give me your verbal answer to the note I sent you this morning. Yes or no. Pause before you answer, for you do not know how much depends upon it. You have made me desperate. Don’t leave me to repent of what I have done.”

“John, dear John!” she said softly, “I am alone in the world, with none to guide me, and I have prayed for help that I might give a right answer to your request.”

“Yes,” he said, with his lip curling, “and it is – ”

“It is for both our sakes, John,” she said softly; “I could not in justice to us both say yes, now; it must be no!”

He did not speak, but stood glaring at her for a few moments. Then, looking very white, and drawing in his breath with a long, low hiss, he turned upon his heel and left the room.

For a few minutes Miss Carr sat gazing at the door through which he had passed, and then, turning and seeing my hot, flushed face, she seemed to recall Mr Lister’s words about me, and she took my hand, sitting very quietly for a time.

“When people are angry, Antony,” she said quietly, “they say things they do not intend or mean. You must forgive Mr Lister his words about you – for my sake.”

“I will do what you wish,” I said, and then I began wondering whether I ought to tell Miss Carr what I knew about Mr Lister’s affairs, for it seemed to me that the words I had heard must be true, and that this was the explanation of his great anxiety to fix the day.

A dozen times over the words were on my lips, but I felt that it would seem as if I took advantage of my position, and were trying to blacken Mr Lister to gain her favour. More likely, I thought, it would make her bitter and angry against me, and, reflecting that she had determinedly insisted that he should wait six months for her answer, I remained silent.

Miss Carr strove very hard to make me forget the unpleasantry of the early part of my visit, but she was at times very quiet and subdued, and I believe we both looked upon it as a relief when the time came for my departure.

Chapter Thirty Eight.

A Wedding Trip

“You’re getting such a fine gent now. Ant’ny,” said Revitts to me one morning; “but, if so be as you wouldn’t mind, Mary and me’s made up our minds to have a bit of a trip out, a kind of s’rimp tea, just by way of celebrating my being made sergeant, and getting well again.”

“Why, my dear old Bill,” I cried, “why should I mind your having a trip? Where are you going?”

“Well, you see, it’s a toss up, Ant’ny; Gravesend’s best for s’rimps, but Hampton Court’s the nicer sorter place for a day, and Mary ain’t never been.”

“Then go to Hampton Court,” I said.

“Hampton Court it is, Mary,” he said. “That settles it.”

“And I hope you’ll both enjoy yourselves.”

“What, won’t you come?” said Revitts blankly.

“Come! what – with you?” I said.

“Why, of course, Ant’ny. You don’t suppose we should care about going alone. Won’t you come?”

“You didn’t ask me.”

“Oh, come now; that I did!” he exclaimed.

“That you did not,” I said stoutly. “Did he, Mary?”

“He meant to, Master Antony,” said Mary, looking up with a very red face, and one hand apparently in a grey boxing-glove, though it was only one of Revitts’ worsted stockings, in need of another darn.

“Well, I’ll ask you now, then,” exclaimed Revitts. “Will you come along with us?”

“When?”

“Sat’day next, being your half-holiday.”

“Yes,” I said, “but I must write and tell Miss Carr I’m not coming till Sunday.”

“That’s settled, then,” said Revitts, holding out his big hand for me to shake; and I could not help noticing how thin and soft it was; but he was fast recovering his strength, and was again on duty.

We walked down from Pentonville together, and as we went along, he introduced the subject of his accident for the first time for some weeks.

“You wouldn’t think as I’m a-trying hard to conjure out who it was fetched me that crack on the head, Antony?”

“No,” I said; “I thought you had forgotten all about it.”

“Not I,” he said, shaking his head. “What, me, a sergeant, just promoted, and let a case like that go by without conjuring it out! Why, it couldn’t be done! I should feel as if I was a disgrace to the force. That’s speaking ’ficially,” he said. “Now, speaking as a man, I’ve got this here to say, that I shan’t rest comfortable till I’ve put something on that there fellows wrists.”

“And shall you know him again?” I asked.

“Know him! Out o’ ten thousand – out o’ ten millions o’ men. I only wish I knew the gal. It would be such a clue.”

“It’s no use to be revengeful, Bill,” I said. “Let it go. It brought Mary up to town.”

“Yes, it did, didn’t it?” he said, with the sheepish, soft look coming over his face for a moment. But it was gone directly, and he was the officer once more. “’Taint revengeful,” he said; “it’s dooty. We can’t let outrageous outrages like that take place in the main streets. No, Antony: I feel as if my reputation’s at stake, to find out who did that, and I shan’t rest till I do.”

We parted then, and the rest of the week passed swiftly away. I told Hallett that I was going to spend the afternoon out on the Saturday, so that most likely I should go to Miss Carr’s on the Sunday, and he was not to expect me for my usual walk with him, one which had grown into a custom; and being thus clear, I went off in the morning to Westminster, it being understood that I was to meet Revitts and Mary at the White Horse Cellar. Piccadilly, and go down to Hampton Court at midday by the omnibus.

Punctual to my time, I went across the park and up Saint James’s Street and saw Revitts and Mary, long before I reached them, by the show they made. Mary was in white book muslin, with a long blade silk scarf, and a bonnet that I could not pretend to describe, save that over it she carried a blue parasol shot with red; and Revitts was in black frock-coat, buff waistcoat, and white trousers, with a tremendous show of collar standing bolt out of a sky-blue watered-silk stock, while his hat shone as if it was a repetition of the patent leather of his shoes.

I instinctively felt that something was the matter as I drew near them, and, but for my genuine love and respect for them both, I believe I should have run away. I rebuked my cowardly shame directly after, though, and went up and shook hands.

There was not a vestige of tantrums left in Mary’s countenance, for it had softened itself into that dreadful smile – the same that was playing upon Revitts’ face, as he kept looking at her in a satisfied, half-imbecile way, before giving me a nudge with his elbow, covering his mouth with his hand, and exclaiming in a loud whisper, —

“We’ve been and done it, Ant’ny! Pouf!” This last was a peculiar laugh in which he indulged, while Mary cast down her eyes.

“Done it! – done what? What does he mean, Mary?”

Mary grew scarlet, and became puzzled over the button of one of her white kid gloves.

“Here, what do you mean, Bill?” I said.

“Done it. Pouf!” he exclaimed, with another laugh from behind his hand. “Done it – married.”

“Married?” I echoed.

“Yes. Pouf! Mrs Sergeant Revitts. White Sergeant. Pouf!”

“Oh, Mary,” I said, “and not to tell me!”

“It was all his doing, Master Antony,” pleaded Mary. “He would have me, and the more I wanted to go back to service, the more he made me get married. And now I hope he’s happy.”

There was no mistaking William Revitts’ happiness as he helped his wife on to the outside of the omnibus, behind the coachman – he sitting one side of Mary, and I next him; but try as I would, I could not feel as happy. I felt vexed and mortified; for, somehow, it seemed as if it was printed in large letters upon the backs of my companions – “Married this morning,” and this announcement seemed reflected upon me.

I wouldn’t have cared if they could have sat still and talked rationally; but this they did not do, for every now and then they turned to look in each other’s faces, with the same weak, half-imbecile smile, – after which Mary would cast down her eyes and look conscious, while Revitts turned round and smiled at me, finishing off with a nudge in my side.

At times, too, he had spasmodic fits of silent laughter – silent, except that they commenced with a loud chuckle, which he summarily stifled and took into custody by clapping his great hand over his mouth. There were intervals of relief, though; for when, from his coign of vantage, poor Bill saw one of his fraternity on ahead – revealed to him, perhaps, by a ray of sunshine flashing from the shiny top of his hat – for, of course, this was long before the days of helmets – the weak, amiable look was chased off his face by the official mask, and, as a sergeant, though of a different division, Revitts felt himself bound to stare very hard at the police-constable, and frown severely.

At first I thought it was foolish pride on my part, that I was being spoiled by Miss Carr, and that I was extra sensitive about my friends; but I was not long in awakening to the fact that they were the objects of ridicule to all upon the omnibus.

The first thing I noticed was, that the conductor and driver exchanged a wink and a grin, which were repeated several times between Piccadilly and Kensington, to the great amusement of several of the passengers. Then began a little mild chaff, sprinkled by the driver, who started with —

“I say, Joey, when are you going to be married?”

“Married? oh, I dunno. I’ve tried it on sev’ral times, but the parsons is all too busy.”

The innocent fit was on Revitts just then, and he favoured Mary and me with a left and right nudge.

“Do adone, William,” whispered Mrs Sergeant; and he grinned hugely.

“Shall you take a public, Joey, when you do it?” said the driver, leaning back for another shot.

“Lor’, no; it won’t run to a public, old man,” was the reply. “We was thinking of the green and tater line, with a cellar under, and best Wallsend one and six.”

I could feel that this was all meant for the newly wedded couple, and sat with flaming cheeks. “See that there wedding in Pickydilly, last week, Bill?” Revitts pricked up his ears, and was about to speak, but the driver turned half round, and shouted —

“What, where they’d got straw laid down, and the knocker tied up in a white kid glove?”

“No-o-o!” shouted the conductor. “That wasn’t it. I mean clost ter’ Arfmoon Street, when they was just going off.”

“Oh, ah, yes; I remember now.”

“See the old buffer shy the shoe outer the front winder?”

“No-o-o!”

“He did, and it ’it one o’ the post-boys slap in the eye. Old boy had been having too much champagne.”

“Did it though?”

“Yes. I say, Bill.”

“Hal-low!”

“It’s the right card to have champagne on your wedding morning, ain’t it?”

“Ah! some people stands it quite lib’ral like, if they’re nobs; them as ain’t, draws it old and mild.”

I had another nudge from Revitts just then, and sat feeling as if I should like to jump down and run away.

“Drop o’ Smith’s cool out o’ the cellar wouldn’t be amiss, Joey, would it?”

“No, old man. I wish we could fall across a wedding-party.”