Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1

"Lord, sir!" exclaimed Titmouse, getting more and more irritated and impatient as he reflected on the length of his absence from Tag-rag & Co.'s.

"I quite feel for your anxiety—so perfectly natural"–

"Oh, dear sir! if you'd only tell me the least bit"–

"If, my dear sir, I were to disclose just now the exact object we had in inserting that advertisement in the papers"–

"How did you come to know of it at all, sir? Come, there can't be any harm in that anyhow"–

"Not the least, my dear sir. It was in the course of business—in the course of business."

"Is it money that's been left me—or—anything of that sort?"

"It quite pains me, I assure you, Mr. Titmouse, to suppose that our having put this advertisement into the papers may have misled you, and excited false hopes—I think, by the way"—added Gammon, suddenly, as something occurred to him of their previous conversation, which he was not quite sure of—"you told me that that Bible had been given you by your father."

"Oh yes, sir! yes– no doubt of it; surely that can't signify, seeing he's dead, and I'm his only son?" asked Titmouse, quickly and eagerly.

"Oh, 'tis only a circumstance—a mere circumstance; but in business, you know, Mr. Titmouse, every little helps—and you really, by the way, have no recollection of your mother, Mr. Titmouse?"

"No, sir, I said so! And—meaning no offence, sir—I can't abide being put off in this kind of way,—I must own!—See what I have told you—you've told me nothing at all. I hope you haven't been only making me a cat's-paw of? 'Pon my soul, I hate being made a cat's-paw of, sir!"

"Good heavens, Mr. Titmouse! how can you imagine it? Matters in some degree connected with one or two former members of your family, are at this moment the object of some little of our anxiety"–

"Not meaning it rudely, sir—please to tell me at once, plainly, am I to be the better for anything you're now about, or was that advertisement all fudge?"

"That may or may not be, sir," answered Mr. Gammon, in the same imperturbable manner, drawing on his gloves, and rising from his chair. "In justice to yourself, and other parties concerned"–

"Oh! is anybody to share in it?" exclaimed Titmouse, alarmedly.

"I am sure," said Gammon, smiling, "that you will give us credit for consulting your best interests, if they should prove to be in any degree concerned in our present inquiries! We should, in that event, sincerely desire to advance them. But—it is really," looking at his watch, "upwards of an hour since we quitted your place of business—I fear I shall get into disgrace with that respectable gentleman, your employer. Will you favor us with a call at our office to-morrow night, when the business of the day is over? When do you quit at night?"

"About half-past nine o'clock, sir; but really—to-morrow night! Couldn't I come to-night, sir?"

"Not to-night, I fear, my dear sir. We have a very important engagement. Let us say to-morrow night, at a quarter past ten—shall we say that hour?" inquired Mr. Gammon, with an imperative smile.

"Well, sir, if not before—yes—I'll be with you. But I must say"– quoth Titmouse, with a sulky disconcerted air.

"Good-day, Mr. Titmouse," said Mr. Gammon—they were by this time in Oxford Street again.—"Good-day, my dear sir—good-day—to-morrow night, as soon after ten as possible—eh? Good-by."

This was all that Mr. Titmouse could get out of Mr. Gammon, who, hailing a coach off the stand beside them, got in, and it was soon making its way eastward. What a miserable mixture of doubts, hopes, and fears, had he left Titmouse! He felt as if he were a squeezed orange; he had told everything he knew about himself, and got nothing in return out of the smooth, imperturbable, impenetrable Mr. Gammon, but empty civilities.—"Lord, Lord!" thought Titmouse, as Mr. Gammon's coach turned the corner; "what would I give to know half about it that that gent knows! But Mr. Tag-rag! by Jove! what will he say? It's struck twelve. I've been more than an hour away—and he gave me ten minutes! Sha'n't I catch it?"

And he did. Almost the very first person whom he met, on entering the shop, was his respected employer; who, plucking his watch out of his fob, and looking furiously at it, motioned the trembling Titmouse to follow him to the farther end of the long shop, where there happened to be then no customers.

"Is this your ten minutes, sir, eh?"

"I am sorry"–

"Where may you have been, sir, all this while?"

"With that gentleman, sir, and I really did not know"–

"You didn't know, sir! Who cares what you know, or don't know? This, at any rate, you know—that you ought to have been back fifty-five minutes ago, sir. You do, sir! Isn't your time my property, sir? Don't I pay for it, sir? An hour!—in the middle of the day! I've not had such a thing happen this five years! I'll stop it out of your salary, sir."

Titmouse did not attempt to interrupt him.

"And pray what have you been gossiping about, sir, in this disgraceful manner?"

"Something that he wanted to say to me, sir."

"You low puppy!—do you suppose I don't see your impertinence? I insist, sir, on knowing what all this gossiping with that fellow has been about?"

"Then you won't know, sir, that's flat!" replied Titmouse, doggedly; returning to his usual station behind the counter.

"I sha'n't!!" exclaimed Mr. Tag-rag, almost aghast at the presumption of his inferior.

"No, sir, you sha'n't know a single word about it."

"Sha'n't know a single word about it! Vastly good, sir!!—Do you know whom you're talking to, sir? Do you really know in whose presence you are, sir?" inquired Mr. Tag-rag, nearly trembling with rage.

"Mr. Tag-rag, I presume, of the firm of Tag-rag and Co.," replied Titmouse, looking him full in the face.—One or two of his companions near him, almost turned pale at the audacity he was displaying.

"And who are you, sir, that dare to presume to bandy words with me, sir?" inquired Tag-rag, his deeply pitted face having turned quite white, and his whole body quivering with rage.

"Tittlebat Titmouse, at your service," was the answer, in a glib tone, and with a sufficiently saucy air; for Titmouse then felt that he had passed the Rubicon.

"You heard that, I hope?" inquired Tag-rag, with forced calmness, of a pale-faced young man, the nearest to him.

"Ye—es, sir," was the meekly reluctant answer.

"This day month you leave, sir!" said Mr. Tag-rag, solemnly—as if conscious that he was passing a sort of sentence of death upon the presumptuous delinquent.

"Very well, Mr. Tag-rag—anything that pleases you pleases your humble servant. I will go this day month, and welcome—I've long wished—and now, p'r'aps," he added significantly—"it's rather convenient than otherwise"–

"Then you sha'n't leave, sir," said Tag-rag, furiously.

"But I will, sir. You've given me warning; and, if you haven't, now I give you warning," replied Titmouse; turning, however, very pale, and experiencing a certain sudden sinking of the heart—for this was a serious and most unlooked-for event, and for a while put out of his head all the agitating thoughts of the last few hours. Poor Titmouse had enough to bear—what with the delicate raillery and banter of his refined companions for the rest of the day, find the galling tyranny of Mr. Tag-rag, (who dogged him about all day, setting him about the most menial and troublesome offices he could, and constantly saying mortifying things to him before customers,) and the state of miserable suspense in which Mr. Gammon had thought fit to leave him; I say that surely all this was enough for him to bear without having to encounter at night, as he did, on his return to his lodgings, his blustering landlady, who vowed that if she sold him out and out she would be put off no longer—and his pertinacious and melancholy tailor, who, with sallow unshaven face, told him of five children at home, all ill of the small-pox, and his wife in an hospital—and he implored a payment on account. This sufferer succeeded in squeezing out of Titmouse seven shillings on account, and his landlady extorted ten; which staved off a distress—direful word!—for some week or two longer; and so they left him in the possession of eight shillings or so, to last till next quarter-day—six weeks off! He sighed heavily, barred his door, and sat down opposite his little table, on which was nothing but a solitary thin candle, and on which his eyes rested unconsciously, till the stench of it, burning right down into the socket, roused him from his wretched revery. Then he unlocked his box, and took out his Bible and the papers which had been produced to Mr. Gammon, and gazed at them with intense but useless scrutiny. Unable to conjecture what bearing they could have upon himself or his fortunes, he hastily replaced them in his box, threw off his clothes, and flung himself on his bed, to pass a far more dismal night than he had known for years.

He ran the gantlet at Messrs. Tag-rag and Co.'s all Tuesday as he had done on the day preceding. One should have supposed that when his companions beheld him persecuted by their common tyrant, whom they all equally hated, they would have made common cause with their suffering companion, or at all events given no countenance to his persecution; yet it was far otherwise. Without stopping to analyze the feeling which produced it, (and which the moderately reflective reader may easily analyze for himself if so disposed,) I am grieved to have to say, that when all the young men saw that Tag-rag would be gratified by their cutting poor Titmouse, who, with all his little vanities, fooleries, and even selfishness, had never personally offended or injured any of them—they did cut him; and, when Tag-rag observed it, his miserable mind was unspeakably gratified with what they had done: and he spoke to all of them with unusual blandness; to the sinner, Titmouse, with augmented bitterness and sternness.

CHAPTER II

A few minutes after ten o'clock that night, a gentle ringing at the bell of Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap's office, announced the arrival of poor Titmouse. The door was quickly opened by a very fashionably dressed clerk, who seemed in the act of quitting for the night.

"Ah—Mr. Titmouse, I presume?" he inquired, with a kind of deference in his manner to which Titmouse had never been accustomed.

"The same, sir—Tittlebat Titmouse."

"Oh! allow me, sir, to show you in to Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap; I know they're expecting to see you. It's not often they're here so late! Walk in, sir"– With this he led the way to an inner room, and opening a green-baize door in the farther side of it, announced and showed in Mr. Titmouse, and left him—sufficiently flustered. Three gentlemen were sitting at a large table, on which he saw, by the strong but circumscribed light of two shaded candlesticks, were lying a great number of papers and parchments. The three gentlemen rose when he entered, Mr. Quirk and Mr. Snap involuntarily starting on first catching sight of the figure of Titmouse: Mr. Gammon came and shook hands with him.

"Mr. Titmouse," said he, with a very polite air, "let me introduce you to Mr. Quirk"—(This was the senior partner, a short, stout elderly gentleman, dressed in black, with a shining bald crown fringed with white hair, and sharp black eyes, and who looked very earnestly, nay, with even a kind of dismay, at him)—"and Mr. Snap"—(This was the junior partner, having recently been promoted to be such after ten years' service in the office, as managing clerk: he was about thirty, particularly well dressed, slight, active, and with a face like a terrier—so hard, sharp, and wiry!) Of Mr. Gammon himself, I have already given the reader a slight notion. He appeared altogether a different style of person from both his partners. He was of most gentlemanly person and bearing—and at once acute, cautious, and insinuating—with a certain something about the eye, which had from the first made Titmouse feel uneasy on looking at him.

"A seat, sir," said Mr. Quirk, rising, and placing a chair for him, on which he sat down, they resuming theirs.

"You are punctual, Mr. Titmouse!" exclaimed Mr. Gammon, kindly; "more so than, I fear, you were yesterday, after our long interview, eh? Pray what did that worthy person, Mr. Rag-bag—or whatever his name is—say on your return?"

"Say, gents?"—(he tried to clear his throat, for he spoke somewhat more thickly, and his heart beat more perceptibly than usual)—"Meaning no offence—I'm ruined by it, and no mistake."

"Ruined! I'm sorry to hear it," interposed Mr. Gammon, with a concerned air.

"I am, indeed, sir. Such a towering rage as he has been in ever since; and he's given me warning to go on the 10th of next month." He thought he observed a faint smile flit over the faces of all three. "He has, indeed!"

"Dear me, Mr. Titmouse!—Did he allege any reason for dismissing you?" keenly inquired Mr. Quirk.

"Yes, sir"–

"What might it have been?"

"Stopping out longer than I was allowed, and refusing to tell him what this gentleman and I had been talking about."

"Don't think that'll do; sure it won't!" briskly exclaimed Mr. Snap; "no just cause of dismissal that," and he jumped up, whisked down a book from the shelves behind him, and eagerly turned over the leaves.

"Never mind that now, Mr. Snap," said Mr. Quirk, rather petulantly; "surely we have other matters to talk about to-night!"

"Asking pardon, sir, but I think it does matter to me, sir," interposed Titmouse; "for on the 10th of next month I'm a beggar—being next door to it now."

"Not quite, we trust," said Mr. Gammon, with a benignant smile.

"But Mr. Tag-rag said he'd make me as good as one."

"That's evidence to show malice," again eagerly interjected Mr. Snap, who was a second time tartly rebuffed by Mr. Quirk; even Mr. Gammon turning towards him with a surprised—"Really, Mr. Snap!"

"So Mr. Tag-rag said he'd make you a beggar?" inquired Mr. Quirk.

"He vowed he would, sir!—He did, as true as the gospel, sir!"

"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed Mr. Quirk and Mr. Gammon—but such a laugh!—not careless or hearty, but subdued, and with a dash of deference in it. "Well—it perhaps may not signify much, by that time;" said Mr. Quirk, and laughed again, followed by the soft laugh of Mr. Gammon, and a kind of sharp quick sound, like a bark, from Mr. Snap.

"But, gents, you'll excuse me if I say I think it does signify to me, and a'n't any laughing matter, by any means!" quoth Titmouse, earnestly, and coloring with anger. "Without being rude, I'd rather come to business, if there's any to be done, without so much laughing at one."

"Laughing at you! my dear sir,—no, no!" exclaimed all three in a breath—"laughing with you," said Mr. Quirk!—"By the time you mention, you may perhaps be able to laugh at Mr. Rag-bag, and everybody else, for"–

[—"No use mincing matters?" he whispered, in a low tone, to Mr. Gammon, who nodded, but in apparently very reluctant acquiescence, and fixed his eyes earnestly on Titmouse.]

"I really think we are warranted, sir, in preparing you to expect by that time—that is, you will understand, sir, if our efforts are successful in your behalf, and if you yield yourself implicitly in all things to our guidance—that is absolutely essential—a prospect—we say at present, you will observe, only a prospect—of a surprising and splendid change in your circumstances!" Titmouse began to tremble violently, his heart beat rapidly, and his hands were bedewed with a cold moisture.

"I hear, gents," said he, thickly; and he also heard a faint ringing in his ears.

"It's not impossible, sir, in plain English," continued Mr. Quirk, himself growing a little excited with the important communication which trembled on the tip of his tongue, "that you may at no distant time (if you really turn out to be the person we are in search of) be put into possession of an estate of somewhere about Ten Thousand a-year"–

The words seemed to have struck Titmouse blind—as he saw nothing for some moments; then everything appeared to be swimming around him, and he felt a sort of faintness or sickness stealing over him. They had hardly been prepared for their communication's affecting their little visitor so powerfully. Mr. Snap hastened out, and in again, with a glass of water; and the earnest attentions of the three soon restored Mr. Titmouse to his senses. It was a good while, however, before he could appreciate the little conversation which they now and then addressed to him, or estimate the full importance of the astounding intelligence which Mr. Quirk had just communicated, "Beg pardon—but may I make free to ask for a little brandy and cold water, gents? I feel all over in a kind of tremble," said he, some little time afterwards.

"Yes—by all means, Mr. Titmouse," replied Mr. Quirk—"Mr. Snap, will you be kind enough to order Betty to bring in a glass of cold brandy and water from the Jolly Thieves, next door?"—Snap shot out, gave the order, and returned in a trice. The old woman in a few minutes' time followed, with a large tumbler of dark brandy and water, quite hot, for which Mr. Gammon apologized, but Mr. Titmouse said he preferred it so—and soon addressed himself to the inspiriting mixture. It quickly manifested its influence, reassuring him wonderfully. As he sat sipping it, Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap being engaged in an earnest conversation, of which he could not comprehend a word, he had leisure to look about him, and observed that there was lying before them a large sheet of paper, at which they all of them often and earnestly looked, filled with marks, so—

with writing at the ends of each of them, and round and square figures. When he saw them all bending over and scrutinizing this mysterious object, it puzzled him (and many a better head than his has a pedigree puzzled before) sorely, and he began to suspect it was a sort of conjuring paper!—

"I hope, gents, that paper's all right—eh?" said he, supported by the brandy, which he had nearly finished. They turned towards him with a smile of momentary surprise, and then—

"We hope so—a vast deal depends on it," said Mr. Quirk, looking over his glasses at Titmouse. Now what he had hinted at, as far as he could venture to do so, was a thought that glanced across his as yet unsettled brain, that there might have been invoked more than mere earthly assistance; but he prudently pressed the matter no farther—that was all Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap's look-out; he had been no party to anything of the sort, nor would he knowingly. He also observed the same sheets of paper written all over, which Mr. Gammon had filled up at his (Titmouse's) room, the night before; and several new, and old-looking, papers and parchments. Sometimes they addressed questions to him, but found it somewhat difficult to keep his attention up to anything that was said to him for the wild visions which were chasing one another through his heated brain; the passage of which said visions was not a little accelerated by the large tumbler of brandy and water which he had just taken.

"Then, in point of fact," said Mr. Quirk, as Messrs. Gammon and Snap simultaneously sat down, after having been for some time standing poring over the paper before Mr. Quirk. "This Tittlebat Titmouse's title must have accrued in 18—. That's the point—eh, Gammon?"

"Precisely so," said Mr. Gammon, calmly.

"To be sure," confidently added Snap; who having devoted himself exclusively all his life to the sharpest practice of the criminal law, knew about as much of real property law as a snipe—but it would not have done to appear ignorant, or taking no part in the matter, in the presence of the heir-at-law, and the future great client of the House.

"Well, Mr. Titmouse," at length said Mr. Quirk, with a sort of grunt, laying aside his glasses—"if you turn out to be the Titmouse we have been speaking of, you are likely, through our immense exertions, to become one of the luckiest men that ever lived! We may be mistaken, but it appears to us that we shall by and by be able to put you into possession of a very fine estate in Yorkshire, worth some £10,000 or £12,000 a-year at the least!"

"You—don't—say—so!" exclaimed Titmouse, elevating his hands and opening his eyes with amazement—"Oh, gents, I do believe we're all dreaming! Is it all true, indeed?"

"It is, Mr. Titmouse—and we are very proud and happy indeed to be the honored instruments of establishing your rights, my dear sir," said Mr. Gammon, in a most impressive manner.

"Then all the money that's been spent this ten or twelve years has been my money, has it?"

"If we are right, it is undoubtedly as you say," answered Mr. Quirk, giving a quick apprehensive glance at Mr. Gammon.

"Then there'll be a jolly reckoning for some one, shortly—eh? My stars!"

"My dear Mr. Titmouse," said Mr. Gammon, gravely, "you have no more than a just regard for your own interests. There will be a reckoning, and a very terrible one ere long, for somebody—but we've a vast deal to go through, and a vast deal of money to be spent, before we come to discuss that matter! Only let us have the unspeakable happiness of seeing you once fairly in possession of your estates, and our office shall know no rest till you have got all you may be entitled to—even to the uttermost farthing!"

"Oh, never fear our letting them rest!" said Mr. Quirk, judiciously accommodating himself to the taste and apprehension of his excited auditor—"Those that must give up the goose, must give up the giblets also—ha, ha, ha!" Messrs. Gammon and Snap echoed the laugh, duly tickled with the joke of the head of the firm.

"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed Mr. Titmouse, immensely excited by the conjoint influence of the brandy, and the news of the night; "capital! capital! hurrah! Such goings on there will be! You're all of the right sort, gents, I see! 'Pon my life, law for ever! There's nothing like it! Let's all shake hands, gents! Come, if you please, all together! all friends to-night!" And the little fellow grasped each of the three readily-proffered right hands of Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap, with an energy that was likely to make all the high contracting parties to that quadruple alliance, remember its ratification.

"And is it all a ready-money affair, gents?—or rent, and all that kind of thing?" he inquired, after many eloquent expressions of delight.

"Why, almost entirely the latter," answered Mr. Quirk, "except the accumulations."

"Then, 'pon my soul—I'm a great landlord, am I?"

"Indeed, my dear Mr. Titmouse, you are—(that is, unless we have made a blunder such as—I will say—our house is not often in the habit of making)—and have two very fine houses, one in town and the other in the country."

"Capital! delightful! I'll live in both of them—we'll have such goings on!—And is it quite up to the mark of £10,000 a-year?"

"We really entertain no doubt at present that it is"–

"And such as that I can spend all of it, every year?"

"Certainly—no doubt of it—not the least. The rents are paid with most exemplary punctuality—at least," added Mr. Gammon, with a captivating, an irresistible smile, and taking him affectionately by the hand—"at least they will be, as soon as we have them fairly in our management."

"Oh, you're to get it all in for me, are you?" he inquired briskly. The three partners bowed, with the most deprecatingly-disinterested air in the world; intimating that, for his sake, they were ready to take upon themselves even that troublesome responsibility.

"Capital! couldn't be better! couldn't be better! Ah, ha, ha—you've catched the goose, and must bring me its eggs. Ah, ha, ha! a touch in your line, old gent!" said he, slapping Mr. Quirk's knee.

"Ha, ha, ha! excellent! ah, ha, ha!" laughed the three partners at the wit of their new client. Mr. Titmouse joined them, and snapped his fingers in the air. Then he added suddenly—

"Lord—by the way—I've just thought of Tag-rag and Company's—I seem as if I hadn't seen or heard of those gents for Lord knows how long! Only fancy old Tag-rag making me a beggar on the 10th of next month—ha, ha, ha!—I sha'n't see that infernal hole any more, anyhow!"