Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1

"It's very important to be able to tell who are real and who false friends, as I was saying just now, my dear Titmouse," said Gammon, seriously.

"I think so. Now look for instance, there's that fellow Huckaback. I should say he"–

"Pho! pho! my dear sir, a mere beetle—he's not worth thinking of, one way or the other. But can't you guess another sham friend, who has changed so suddenly?"

"Do you mean Mr. Tag-rag—eh?"

"I mention no names; but it's rather odd, that when I am speaking of hollow-hearted friends, you should at once name Mr. Tag-rag—ah, ha, Mr. Titmouse!"

"The proof of the pudding—handsome is that handsome does; and I've got £5 of his money, at any rate."

"Of course he took no security for such a trifle, between such very close friends?"

"Oh—why—now you mention it—But 'twas only a line—one line—a mere mem. betwixt two gents—and I noticed it had no stamp!"

"I guessed as much, my dear sir," interrupted Gammon, calmly, with a significant smile—"Tag-rag and Huckaback are quite on a par—a brace of worthies—ah, ha, ha! My dear Titmouse, you are too honest and confiding!"

"What keen eyes you lawyers have to be sure! Well—I never"—said Titmouse, looking very grave—for he was evidently somewhat staggered. "I—I—must say," he presently added, looking gratefully at Gammon, "I think I do now know of a true friend, that sent me two five-pound notes, and never asked for any security."

"My dear sir, you really pain me by alluding to such a matter!"

[Oh, Gammon, is not this too bad? What are the papers which you know are now in your pocket, signed only this very evening by Titmouse?]

"You are not a match for Tag-rag, Mr. Titmouse; because he was made for a tradesman—you are not. Do you think he would have parted with his £5 but for value received? Oh, Tag-rag! Tag-rag!"

"I—I really begin to think, Mr. Gammon—'pon my soul, I do think you're right."

"Think!—why—for a man of your acuteness—how could he imagine you could forget the long course of insult and tyranny which you have endured under him: that he should change all of a sudden—just now, when"–

"Ay, by Jove! just when I'm coming into my property," interrupted Titmouse, quickly.

"To be sure—to be sure! just now, I say, to make this sudden change! Bah! bah!"

"I hate Tag-rag, and always did. Now he's trying to take me in, just as he does everybody; but I've found him out; I won't lay out a penny with him!"

"Would you, do you think, ever have seen the inside of Satin Lodge, if you hadn't"–

"Why, I don't know; I really think—hem!"

"Would you, my dear sir?—But now a scheme occurs to me—a very amusing idea indeed! Ah, ha, ha!—Shall I tell you a way of proving to his own face how insincere and interested he is towards you? Go to dinner by all means, eat his good things, hear all that the whole set of them have to say, and just before you go, (it will require you to have your wits about you,) pretend, with a long face, that our affair is all a bottle of smoke: say that Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap have told you the day before that they had made a horrid mistake, and you were the wrong man"–

"'Pon my life, I—I—really," stammered Titmouse "daren't—I couldn't—I couldn't keep it up—he'd half kill me. Besides, there will be Miss Tag-rag—it would be the death of her, I know."

"Miss Tag-rag! Gracious Heavens! What on earth can you have to do with her? You—why, if you really succeed in getting this fine property, she might make a very suitable wife for one of your grooms—ah, ha!—But for you—absurd!"

"Ah! I don't know—she may be a devilish fine girl, and the old fellow will have a tolerable penny to leave her—and a bird in the hand—eh? Besides, I know what she's all along thought—hem!—but that doesn't signify."

"Pho! pho! Ridiculous! Ha, ha, ha! Fancy Miss Tag-rag Mrs. Titmouse! Your eldest son—ah, ha, ha! Tag-rag Titmouse, Esq. Delightful! Your honored father a draper in Oxford Street!" All this might be very clever, but it did not seem to tell upon Titmouse, whose little heart had been reached by a cunning hint of Tag-rag's concerning his daughter's flattering estimate of Titmouse's personal appearance. The reason why Gammon attacked so seriously a matter which appeared so chimerical and preposterous, was this—that according to his present plan, Titmouse was to remain for some considerable while at Tag-rag's, and might, with his utter weakness of character, be worked upon by Tag-rag and his daughter, and get inveigled into an engagement which might be productive hereafter of no little embarrassment. Gammon succeeded, however, at length, in obtaining Titmouse's promise to adopt his suggestion, and thereby discover the true nature of the feelings entertained towards him at Satin Lodge. He shook Titmouse energetically by the hand, and left him perfectly certain that if there was one person in the world worthy of his esteem, and even reverence, that person was Oily Gammon, Esq.

As he bent his steps towards Saffron Hill, he reflected rather anxiously on several matters which had occurred to him during the interview which I have just described. On reaching the office, he was presently closeted with Mr. Quirk, to whom, first and foremost, he exhibited and delivered the documents to which he had obtained Titmouse's signature, and which, the reader will allow me to assure him, were of a somewhat different texture from a certain legal instrument or security which I laid before him some little time ago.

"Now, Gammon," said the old gentleman, as soon as he had locked up in his safe the above-mentioned documents—"Now, Gammon, I think we may be up and at 'em; load our guns, and blaze away," and he rubbed his hands.

"Perhaps so, Mr. Quirk," replied Gammon; "but we must, for no earthly consideration, be premature in our operations! Let me, by the way, tell you one or two little matters that have just happened to Titmouse!"—Then he told Mr. Quirk of the effects which had followed the use of the potent Cyanochaitanthropopoion, at which old Quirk almost laughed himself into fits. When, however, Gammon, with a serious air, mentioned the name of Miss Tag-rag, and his grave suspicions concerning her, Quirk bounced up out of his chair, almost startling Gammon out of his. If Mr. Quirk had just been told that his banker had broken, he could scarce have shown more emotion.

The fact was, that he, too, had a daughter—an only child—Miss Quirk—whom he had destined to become Mrs. Titmouse.

"A designing old villain!" he exclaimed at length, and Gammon agreed with him; but strange to say, with all his acuteness, never adverted to the real cause of Quirk's sudden and vehement exclamation. When Gammon told him of the manner in which he had opened Titmouse's eyes to the knavery of Tag-rag, and the expedient he had suggested for its complete demonstration to Titmouse, Quirk could have worshipped Gammon, and could not help rising and shaking him very energetically by the hand, much to his astonishment. After a long consultation, they determined to look out fresh lodgings for Titmouse, and remove him presently altogether from the company and influence of Tag-rag. Some time after they had parted, Mr. Quirk came with an eager air into Mr. Gammon's room, with a most important suggestion; viz. whether it would not be possible for them to get Tag-rag to become a surety to them, by and by, on behalf of Titmouse? Gammon was delighted!—He heartily commended Mr. Quirk's sagacity, and promised to turn it about in his thoughts very carefully. Not having been let entirely into Quirk's policy, (of which the reader has, however, just had a glimpse,) Mr. Gammon did not see the difficulties which kept Quirk awake almost all that night; viz. how to protect Titmouse from the machinations of Tag-rag and his daughter, and yet keep Tag-rag sufficiently interested in, and intimate with, Titmouse, to entertain, by and by, the idea of becoming surety for him to them, the said Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap; and—withal—how to manage Titmouse all the while, so as to forward their objects, and also that of turning his attention towards Miss Quirk; all this formed really rather a difficult problem!—Quirk looked down on Tag-rag with honest indignation, as a mean and mercenary fellow, whose unprincipled schemes, thank Heaven! he already saw through, and from which he resolved to rescue his innocent and confiding client, who was made for better things—to wit, Miss Quirk.

When Titmouse rose the next morning, (Saturday,) behold—he found his hair had become of a variously shaded purple or violet color! Astonishment and apprehension by turns possessed him, as he stared into the glass, at this unlooked-for change of color; and hastily dressing himself, after swallowing a very slight breakfast, off he went once more to the scientific establishment in Bond Street, to which he had been indebted for his recent delightful experiences. The distinguished inventor and proprietor of the Cyanochaitanthropopoion was behind the counter as usual—calm and confident as ever.

"Ah! I see—as I said! as I said!" quoth he, with a sort of glee in his manner. "Isn't it?—coming round quicker than usual—Really, I'm selling more of the article than I can possibly make."

"Well,"—at length said Titmouse, as soon as he had recovered from the surprise occasioned by the sudden volubility with which he had been assailed on entering—"then is it really going on tolerable well?" taking off his hat, and looking anxiously into a glass that hung close by.

"Tolerable well, my dear sir! Delightful! Perfect! Couldn't be better! If you'd studied the thing, you'd know, sir, that purple is the middle color between green and black. Indeed, black's only purple and green mixed, which explains the whole thing!" Titmouse listened with infinite satisfaction to this unanswerable and truly philosophical account of the matter.

"Remember, sir—my hair is to come like yours—eh? you recollect, sir? Honor—that was the bargain, you know!"

"I have very little doubt of it, sir—nay, I am certain of it, knowing it by experience."

[The scamp had been hired expressly for the purpose of lying thus in support of the Cyanochaitanthropopoion; his own hair being a natural black.]

"I'm going to a grand dinner to-morrow, sir," said Titmouse, "with some devilish great people at the west end of the town—eh? you understand? will it do by that time? Would give a trifle to get my hair a shade darker by that time—for—hem!—most lovely gal—eh? you understand the thing?—devilish anxious, and all that sort of thing, you know!"

"Yes—I do," replied the gentleman of the shop, in a confidential tone; and opening one of the glass doors behind him, took out a bottle considerably larger than the first, and handed it to Titmouse. "This," said he, "will complete the thing; it combines chemically with the purple particles, and the result is—generally arrived at in about two days' time"–

"But it will do something in a night's time—eh!—surely."

"I should think so! But here it is—it is called the Tetaragmenon Abracadabra."

"What a name!" exclaimed Titmouse, with a kind of awe. "'Pon honor, it almost takes one's breath away"–

"It will do more, sir; it will take your red hair away! By the way, only the day before yesterday, a lady of high rank, (between ourselves, Lady Caroline Carrot,) whose red hair always seemed as if it would have set her bonnet in a blaze—ha, ha!—came here, after two days' use of the Cyanochaitanthropopoion, and one day's use of this Tetaragmenon Abracadabra—and asked me if I knew her. Upon my soul I did not, till she solemnly assured me she was really Lady Caroline!"

"How much is it?" eagerly inquired Titmouse, thrusting his hand into his pocket, with no little excitement.

"Only nine-and-sixpence."

"Oh, my stars, what a price! Nine-and-six"–

"Ah, but would you have believed it, sir? This extraordinary fluid cost a great German chemist his whole life to bring to perfection; and it contains expensive materials from all the four corners of the world! It's ruined the proprietor long ago!"

"That may be—but really—I've laid out a large figure with you, sir, this day or two! Couldn't you say eight sh"–

"We never abate, sir; it's not our style of doing business," replied the gentleman, in a manner that quite overawed poor Titmouse, who at once bought this, the third abomination; not a little depressed, however, at the heavy prices which he had paid for the three bottles, and the uncertainty he felt as to the ultimate issue. That night he was so well satisfied with the progress which he was making with his hair, (for, by candle light, it really looked much darker than could have been expected,) that he resolved—at all events for the present—to leave well alone; or at the utmost, to try the effects of the Tetaragmenon Abracadabra only upon his eyebrows and whiskers. Into them he rubbed the new specific; which, on the bottle being opened, surprised him in two respects: first, it was perfectly colorless; secondly, it had a most infernal smell. It was, however, no use hesitating: he had bought and paid for it; and the papers in which it was folded gave an account of its success that was really irresistible and unquestionable. Away, therefore, he rubbed; and when he had finished, got into bed, in humble hope as to the result, which would be disclosed by the morning's light. But, alas! would you have believed it? When he looked at himself in the glass, about six o'clock on the ensuing morning, (at which hour he awoke,) I protest it is a fact, that his eyebrows and whiskers were as white as snow; which, combined with the purple color of the hair on his head, rendered him one of the most astounding objects (in human shape) the eye of man had ever beheld. There was the wisdom of age seated in his white eyebrows and whiskers, unspeakable youthful folly in his features, and a purple crown of wonder on his head.

Really, it seemed as if the devil were wreaking his spite on Mr. Titmouse; nay, perhaps it was the devil himself who had served him with the bottles in Bond Street. Or was it a mere ordinary servant of the devil—some greedy, impudent, unprincipled speculator, who, desirous of acting on the approved maxim—Fiat experimentum in corpore vili—had pitched on Titmouse (seeing the sort of person he was) as a godsend, quite reckless what effect might be produced on his hair, so as the stuff were paid for, and its effects noted? It might possibly have been sport to the gentleman of the shop, but it was near proving death to poor Titmouse, who might possibly have resolved on throwing himself out of the window, only that he saw it was not big enough for a baby to get through. He turned aghast at the monstrous object which his little glass presented to him; and sank down upon the bed with the feeling that he was now fit for death. As before, Mrs. Squallop made her appearance with his kettle for breakfast. He was sitting at the table dressed, and with his arms folded, with a reckless air, not at all caring to conceal the new and still more frightful change which he had undergone since she saw him last. Mrs. Squallop stared at him for a second or two in silence; then, stepping back out of the room, suddenly drew to the door, and stood outside, laughing vehemently.

"I'll kick you down-stairs!" shouted Titmouse, rushing to the door pale with fury, and pulling it open.

"Mr.—Mr.—Titmouse, you'll be the death of me—you will—you will!" gasped Mrs. Squallop, almost black in the face, and the water running out of the kettle, which she was unconsciously holding aslant. After a while, however, they got reconciled. Mrs. Squallop had fancied he had been but rubbing chalk on his eyebrows and whiskers; and seemed dismayed, indeed, on hearing the true state of the case. He implored her to send out for a small bottle of ink; but as it was Sunday morning none could be got;—she knew that no one in the court used ink, and she teased him to try a little blacking! He did—but it was useless!—He sat for an hour or two, in an ecstasy of grief and rage. What would he now have given never to have meddled with the hair which Heaven had thought fit to send him into the world with? Alas, with what mournful force Mrs. Squallop's words again and again recurred to him! To say that he ate breakfast would be scarcely correct. He drank a single cup of cocoa, and ate a small fragment of roll, and then put away his breakfast things on the window shelf. If he had been in the humor to go to church, how could he? He would have been turned out as an object involuntarily exciting everybody to laughter!

Yet, poor soul, in this extremity of misery, he was not utterly neglected; for he had that morning quite a little levee. First came Mr. Snap, who, having quite as keen and clear an eye for his own interest as his senior partners, had early seen how capable was an acquaintance with Titmouse of being turned to his (Snap's) great advantage. He had come, therefore, dressed very stylishly, to do a little bit of toadying on the sly, (on his own exclusive account;) and had brought with him, for the edification of Titmouse, a copy of that day's Sunday Flash, which contained a long account of a bloody fight between Birmingham Bigbones and London Littlego, for £500 a-side, (sixty rounds had been fought, both men killed, and their seconds had bolted to Boulogne.) Poor Snap, however, though he had come with the best intentions, and the most anxious wish to evince profound respect for the future master of ten thousand a-year, was quite taken by storm by the very first glimpse he got of Titmouse, and could not for a long while recover himself. He had come to ask Titmouse to dine with him at a tavern in the Strand, where there was to be capital singing in the evening; and also to accompany him, on the ensuing morning, to the Old Bailey, to hear "a most interesting trial" for bigamy, in which Snap was concerned for the prisoner—a miscreant, who had been married to five living women!! Snap conceived (and very justly) that it would give Titmouse a striking idea of his (Snap's) importance, to see him so much, and apparently so familiarly concerned with well-known counsel. In his own terse and quaint way, he was explaining to Titmouse the various remedies he had against the Bond Street impostor, both by indictment and action on the case, nay, (getting a little, however, beyond his depth,) he assured the eager Titmouse, that a bill of discovery would lie in equity, to ascertain what the Tetaragmenon Abracadabra was composed of, with a view to his preferring an indictment against its owner, when his learned display was interrupted by a double knock, and—oh, mercy on us!—enter Mr. Gammon. Whether he or Snap felt more disconcerted, I cannot say; but Snap looked the most confused and sneaking. Each told the other a lie, in as easy, good-natured a way as he could assume, concerning the object of his visit to Titmouse. Thus they were going on, when—another knock—and, "Is this Mr. Titmouse's?" inquired a voice, which brought a little color into the face of both Gammon and Snap; for it was absolutely old Quirk, who bustled breathless into the room, on his first visit, and seemed completely confounded by the sight of both his partners. What with this, and the amazing appearance presented by Titmouse, Mr. Quirk was so overwhelmed that he scarce spoke a syllable. Each of the three partners felt (in his own way) exquisite embarrassment. Huckaback, some time afterwards, made his appearance; but him Titmouse unceremoniously dismissed in a twinkling, in spite of a vehement remonstrance. Behold, however, presently another arrival—Mr. Tag-rag!! who had come to announce that his carriage (i. e. a queer, rickety, little one-horse chaise, with a tallow-faced boy in it, in faded livery) was waiting to convey Mr. Titmouse to Satin Lodge, and take him a long drive in the country! Each of these four worthies could have spit in the other's face: first, for detecting, and secondly, for rivalling him in his schemes upon Titmouse. A few minutes after the arrival of Tag-rag, Gammon, half-choked with disgust, and despising himself even more than he despised his fellow-visitors, slunk off, followed almost immediately by Quirk, who was dying to consult him on this new aspect of affairs which had presented itself. Snap (who ever since the arrival of Messrs. Quirk and Gammon had felt like an ape on hot irons) very shortly followed in the footsteps of his partners, having made no engagement whatever with Titmouse; and thus the enterprising and determined Tag-rag was left master of the field. He had in fact come to do business, and business he determined to do. As for Gammon, during the short time he had stayed, how he had endeared himself to Titmouse, by explaining, not aware that Titmouse had confessed all to Snap, the singular change in the color of his hair to have been occasioned simply by the intense mental anxiety through which he had lately passed! The touching anecdotes he told of sufferers, whose hair a single night's agony had changed to all the colors of the rainbow! Though Tag-rag outstayed all his fellow-visitors, in the manner which has been described, he could not prevail upon Titmouse to accompany him in his "carriage," for Titmouse pleaded a pressing engagement, (i. e. a desperate attempt he purposed making to obtain some ink,) but pledged himself to make his appearance at Satin Lodge at the appointed hour (half-past three or four o'clock.) Away, therefore, drove Tag-rag, delighted that Satin Lodge would so soon contain so resplendent a visitor—indignant at the cringing, sycophantic attentions of Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap, against whom he resolved to put Titmouse on his guard, and infinitely astonished at the extraordinary change which had taken place in the color of Titmouse's hair. Partly influenced by the explanation which Gammon had given of the phenomenon, Tag-rag resigned himself to feelings of simple wonder. Titmouse was doubtless passing through stages of physical transmogrification, corresponding with the marvellous change that was taking place in his circumstances; and for all he (Tag-rag) knew, other and more extraordinary changes were going on; Titmouse might be growing at the rate of half an inch a-day, and soon stand before him a man more than six feet high! Considerations such as these invested Titmouse with intense and overpowering interest in the estimation of Tag-rag; how could he make enough of him at Satin Lodge that day? If ever that hardened sinner felt inclined to utter an inward prayer, it was as he drove home that day—that Heaven would array his daughter in angel hues to the eyes of Titmouse!

My friend Tittlebat made his appearance at the gate of Satin Lodge, at about a quarter to four o'clock. Good gracious, how he had dressed himself out! So as very considerably to exceed his appearance when first presented to the reader.

Miss Tag-rag had been before her glass ever since the instant of her return from chapel, up to within ten minutes' time of Titmouse's arrival. An hour and a half at least had she bestowed on her hair, disposing it in little corkscrew and somewhat scanty curls, which quite glistened in bear's grease, hanging on each side of a pair of lean and sallow cheeks. The color which ought to have distributed itself over her cheeks, in roseate delicacy, had, two or three years before, thought fit to collect itself into the tip of her sharp little nose. Her small gray eyes beamed with the gentle and attractive expression perceptible in her father's; and her projecting under lip reminded everybody of that delicate feature in her mother. She was very short, and her figure rather skinny and angular. She wore her lilac-colored frock; her waist being pinched in to a degree which made you think of a fit of the colic when you looked at her—and gave you a dim vision of a coroner's inquest on a case of death by tight lacing! A long red sash, tied in a most elaborate bow, gave a very brilliant air to her dress generally. She had a thin gold chain round her neck, and wore long white gloves; her left hand holding her pocket-handkerchief, which she had so suffused with bergamot that it scented the whole room. Mrs. Tag-rag had made herself very splendid, in a red silk gown and staring head-dress; in fact, she seemed on fire. As for Mr. Tag-rag, whenever he was dressed in his Sunday clothes, he looked the model of a dissenting minister; witness his black coat, waistcoat and trousers, and primly tied white neckerchief, with no shirt-collar visible. For some quarter of an hour had this interesting trio been standing at their parlor window, in anxious expectation of Titmouse's arrival; their only amusement being the numberless dusty stage-coaches driving every five minutes close past their gate, (which was about ten yards from their house,) at once enlivening and ruralizing the scene. Oh, that poor laburnum—laden with dust, drooping with drought, and evidently in the very last stage of a decline—that was planted beside the little gate! Tag-rag spoke of cutting it down; but Mrs. and Miss Tag-rag begged its life a little longer, because none of their neighbors had one!—and then that subject dropped. How was it that though both the ladies had sat under a thundering discourse from Mr. Dismal Horror that morning—they had never once since thought or spoken of him or his sermon—never even opened his exhilarating "Groans"? The reason was plain. They thought of Titmouse, who was bringing "airs from heaven;" while Horror brought only "blasts from–!" and those they had every day in the week, (his sermons on the Sunday, his "Groans" on the weekday.) At length Miss Tag-rag's little heart fluttered violently, for her papa told her that Titmouse was coming up the road—and so he was. Not dreaming that he could be seen, he stood beside the gate for a moment, under the melancholy laburnum; and, taking a dirty-looking silk handkerchief out of his hat, slapped it vigorously about his boots, (from which circumstance it may be inferred that he had walked,) and replaced it in his hat. Then he unbuttoned his surtout, adjusted it nicely, and disposed his chain and eyeglass just so as to let the tip only of the latter be seen peeping out of his waistcoat; twitched up his shirt-collar, plucked down his wristbands, drew the tip of a white pocket handkerchief out of the pocket in the breast of his surtout, pulled a white glove halfway on his left hand; and having thus given the finishing touches to his toilet, opened the gate, and—Tittlebat Titmouse, Esquire, the great guest of the day, for the first time in his life (swinging a little ebony cane about with careless grace) entered the domain of Mr. Tag-rag.