“Yes. He and Lord Fleetwood.”
“The Nonpareil?”
“Yes.”
Mr. Scunthorpe drew a breath, and turned to address his friend. “You hear that, Bertram?”
“Well, of course I heard it!”
“Didn’t think you could have. You see this coat of mine?”
Both Tallants stared at his coat in some bewilderment.
“Got my man to copy the lapels of one Weston made for the Nonpareil,” said Mr. Scunthorpe, with simple pride.
“Good God, what has that to say to anything?” demanded Bertram.
“Thought you might be interested,” explained Mr. Scunthorpe apologetically.
“Never mind him!” Bertram told his sister. “If it wasn’t just like you, Bella, to fly into a miff, and go off into one of your crazy starts! Mind, I don’t say I blame you! Did he spread the story over London?”
“I think it was Lord Fleetwood who did that. Mr. Beaumaris told me once that he had not discussed the matter with anyone but Lord Fleetwood. Sometimes I have wondered whether—whether he had guessed the truth, but I cannot believe that he has, for he would despise me dreadfully, I am sure, if he knew how odiously I behaved, and certainly not stand up with me at all the balls—for he very seldom dances!—or take me out driving in his curricle.”
Mr. Scunthorpe looked very much impressed. “He does that?”
“Oh, yes!”
Mr. Scunthorpe nodded portentously at Bertram. “You know what, dear boy? All the crack, your sister! Not a doubt of it. Knows all the best people. Drives out with the Nonpareil. Good thing she said she was an heiress.”
“Oh, no, no, I wish I had never done so, for it has made everything so uncomfortable!”
“Now, Bella, that’s gammon! I know you! Don’t you try to tell me you don’t like being all the go, because I wouldn’t believe you if you did!” said Bertram, with brotherly candour.
Arabella thought it over. Then she gave a reluctant smile. “Well, yes, perhaps I do like it, but when I remember the cause of it I do indeed wish I had never said such a thing! Only consider what a fix I am in! If the truth were known now I should be utterly discredited. No one would even bow to me, I daresay, and I have the greatest dread that Lady Bridlington would send me home in disgrace! And then Papa would know, and—Bertram, I had almost rather throw myself into the river than have him know such a thing of me!”
“Lord, yes!” he agreed, with a shudder. “But it won’t come to that! If anyone asks me any prying questions, I shall say you are well known to me, and so will Felix!”
“Yes, but that is not all!” Arabella pointed out. “I can never, never accept any offer made to me, and what Mama will think of such selfishness I dare not consider! For she so much hoped that I should form an eligible connection, and Lady Bridlington is bound to tell her that—that quite a number of very eligible gentlemen have paid me the most marked attentions!”
Bertram knit his brows over this. “Unless—No, you’re right, Bella; devilish awkward fix! You would have to tell the truth, if you accepted an offer, and ten to one he’d cry off. What a tiresome girl you are, to be sure! Dashed if I see what’s to be done! Do you, Felix?”
“Very difficult situation,” responded Mr. Scunthorpe, shaking his head. “Only one thing to be done.”
“What’s that?”
Mr. Scunthorpe gave a diffident cough. “Just a little thing that occurred to me. Daresay you won’t care about it: can’t say I care about it myself, but can’t hang back when a lady’s in a fix.”
“But what is it?”
“Mind, only a notion I had!” Mr. Scunthorpe warned him. “You don’t like it: you say so! I don’t like it, but ought to offer.” He perceived that the Tallants were quite mystified, blushed darkly, and uttered in a strangled voice; “Marriage!”
Arabella stared at him for a moment, and then went into a peal of mirth. Bertram said scornfully: “Of all the cork-brained notions—! You don’t want to marry Bella!”
“No,” conceded Mr. Scunthorpe. “Promised I would help her out of the scrape, though!”
“What’s more,” Bertram said severely, “those trustees of yours would never let you! You’re not of age.”
“Talk them over,” said Mr. Scunthorpe hopefully.
However. Arabella, thanking him for his kind offer, said that she did not think they would suit. He seemed grateful, and relapsed into the silence which appeared to be natural to him.
“I daresay I shall hit upon something,” said Bertram. “I’ll think about it, at all events. Should I stay to do the pretty to this godmother of yours, do you think?”
Arabella urged him strongly to do so. She was inclined to grieve over his necessary incognito, but he told her frankly that it would not at all suit him to be for ever gallanting her to the ton parties. “Very dull work!” he said. “I know you are gone civility-mad since you came to town, but it’s not in my line.” He then enumerated the sights he meant to see in London, and since these seemed to consist mostly of such inocuous entertainments as Astley’s Amphitheatre, the Royal Menagerie at the Tower, Madame Tussaud’s Waxworks, a look-in at Tattersall’s, the departure of the Brighton coaches from the White Horse Cellar, and the forthcoming Military Review in Hyde Park, his anxious sister’s worst qualms were allayed. At first sight he had seemed to her to have grown a great deal older, for he was wearing a sophisticated waistcoat, and had brushed his hair in a new style; but when he told her about the peep-show which had diverted him so much in Coventry Street, and expressed a purely youthful desire to witness that grand spectacle, The Burning of Moscow (supported by Tight-rope Walking, and an Esquestrian Display) she could feel that he was still boy enough not to hanker after the more sophisticated and by far more dangerous amusements to be found in London. But, then, as he confidentially informed Mr. Scunthorpe, when they presently left Park Street together, females took such foolish notions into their heads that it would have been ridiculous to have disclosed to her that he had an equally ardent desire to see a bout of fisticuffs at the Fives-court, to blow a cloud with all the Corinthians at the Daffy Club, to penetrate the mysteries of the Royal Saloon, and the Peerless Pool, and certainly to put in an appearance at the Opera—not, he hastened to assure his friend, because he wanted to listen to music, but because he was credibly informed that to stroll in the Fops’ Alley was famous sport, and all the go. Since he had decided, very prudently, to put up at one of the City inns, where, if he chose, he could be sure of a tolerable dinner at the Ordinary, which was very moderately priced, he entertained reasonable hopes of being able to afford all these diversions. But first, he perceived, it was necessary to buy a much higher-crowned and more curly-brimmed beaver to set on his head; a pair of Hessians with tassels; a fob, and perhaps a seal; and certainly a pair of natty yellow gloves. Without these adjuncts to a gentleman’s costume he would look like a Johnny Raw. Mr. Scunthorpe agreed, and ventured to point out that a driving-coat with only two shoulder-capes was thought, in well-dressed circles, to be a paltry affair. He said he would take Bertram along to his own man, a devilish clever tailor, even though he had not acquired the fame of a Weston or a Stultz. However, as the great advantage of patronizing this rising man lay in the assurance that he would be willing to rig out any friend of Mr. Scunthorpe’s on tick, Bertram raised no objection to jumping into a hackney at once, and telling the jarvey to drive with all speed to Clifford Street. Mr. Scunthorpe vouched for it that Swindon’s art would give his friend quite a new touch, and as this seemed extremely desirable to Bertram, he thought he could hardly lay out a substantial sum of money to better advantage. Mr. Scunthorpe then imparted to him a few useful hints,. particularly warning him against such extravagances of style as must give rise to the suspicion that he belonged to the extreme dandy-set frowned upon by the real Pinks of the Ton. Beyond question, the finest model for any aspiring gentleman to copy was the Nonpareil, that Go amongst the Goers. This put Bertram in mind of something which had been sligh
tly troubling his mind, and he said: “I say, Felix, do you think my sister should be driving about the town with him? I don’t mind telling you I don’t like it above half!”
Here Mr. Scunthorpe was able at once to allay his qualms: for a lady to drive in a curricle or a phaeton, with a groom riding behind, was unexceptionable. “Mind, it would not do for a female to go in a tilbury!” he said.
His brotherly concern relieved, Bertram abandoned the question, merely remarking that he would give a monkey to see his father’s face if he knew how racketty Bella had become.
Arrived in Clifford Street, they obtained instant audience of Mr. Swindon, who was so obliging as to bring out his pattern-card immediately, and to advise his new client on the respective merits of Superfine and Bath Suiting. He thought six capes would be sufficient for a light drab driving-coat, an opinion in which Mr. Scunthorpe gravely concurred, explaining to Bertram that it would never do for him to ape the Goldfinches, with their row upon row of capes. Unless one was an acknowledged Nonesuch, capable of driving to an inch, or one of the Melton men, it was wiser, he said, to aim at neatness and propriety rather than the very height of fashion. He then bent his mind to the selection of a cloth for a coat, he was persuaded to do so, as much by the assertion of Mr. Swindon that a single-breasted garment of corbeau-coloured cloth, with wide lapels, and silver buttons, would set his person off to advantage, as by the whispered assurance of his friend that the snyder always gave his clients long credit. Indeed, Mr. Scunthorpe was rarely troubled with his tailor’s account, since that astute man of business was well aware that being a fatherless minor Mr. Scunthorpe’s considerable fortune was held in trust by tight-fisted guardians, who doled him out a beggarly allowance. Nothing so ungenteel as cost or payment was mentioned during the session in Clifford Street, so that Bertram left the premises torn between relief and a fear that he might have pledged his credit for a larger sum than he could afford to pay. But the novelty and excitement of a first visit to the Metropolis soon put such untimely thoughts to route, while a lucky bet at the Fives-court clearly showed the novice the easiest way of raising the wind.
A close inspection of such sprigs of fashion as were to be seen at the Fives-court made Bertram very glad to think he had bespoken a new coat, and he confided to Mr. Scunthorpe that he would not visit the haunts of fashion until his clothes had been sent home. Mr. Scunthorpe thought this a wise decision, and, as it was of course absurd to suppose that Bertram should kick his heels at the City inn which enjoyed his patronage, he volunteered to show him how an evening full of fun and gig could be spent in less exalted circles. This entertainment, beginning as it did in the Westminster Pit, where it seemed to the staring Bertram that representatives of every class of society, from the Corinthian to the dustman, had assembled to watch a contest between two dogs; and proceeding by way of the shops of Tothill Fields, where adventurous bucks tossed off noggins of Blue Ruin, or bumpers of heavy wet, in company with bruisers, prigs, coal-heavers, Nuns, Abbesses, and apple-women, to a coffee-shop, ended in the watch-house, Mr. Scunthorpe having become bellicose under the influence of his potations. Bertram, quite unused to such quantities of liquor as he had imbibed, was too much fuddled to have any very clear notion of what circumstance it was that had excited his friend’s wrath, though he had a vague idea that it was in some way connected with the advances being made by a gentleman in Petersham trousers towards a lady who had terrified him earlier in the proceedings by laying a palpable lure for him. But when a mill was in progress it was not his part to enquire into the cause of it, but to enter into the fray in support of his cicerone. Since he was by no means unlearned in the noble art of self-defence, he was able to render yeoman service to Mr. Scunthorpe, no proficient, and was in a fair way to milling his way out of the shop when the watch, in the shape of several Charleys, all springing their rattles, burst in upon them and, after a spirited set-to, over-powered the two peacebreakers, and hailed them off to the watch-house. Here, after considerable parley, conducted for the defence by the experienced Mr. Scunthorpe, they were admitted to bail, and warned to present themselves next day in Bow Street, not a moment later than twelve o’clock. The night-constable then packed them both into a hackney, and they drove to Mr. Scunthorpe’s lodging in Clarges Street, where Bertram passed what little was left of the night on the sofa in his friend’s sitting-room. He awoke later with a splitting headache, no very clear recollection of the late happenings, but a lively dread of the possible consequences of what he feared had been a very bosky evening. However, when Mr. Scunthorpe’s man had revived his master, and he emerged from his bedchamber, he was soon able to allay any such misgivings. “Nothing to be in a fret for, dear boy!” he said. “Been piloted to the lighthouse scores of times! Watchman will produce broken lantern in evidence—they always do it!—you give false name, pay fine, and all’s right!”
So, indeed, it proved, but the experience a little shocked the Vicar’s son. This, coupled with the extremely unpleasant after-effects of drinking innumerable flashes of lightning, made him determine to be more circumspect in future. He spent several days in pursuing such harmless amusements as witnessing a badger drawn in a menagerie in Holborn, losing his heart to Miss O’Neill from a safe position in the pit, and being introduced by Mr. Scunthorpe into Gentleman Jackson’s exclusive Boxing School in Bond Street. Here he was much impressed by the manners and dignity of the proprietor (whose decision in all matters of sport, Mr. Scunthorpe informed him, was accepted as final by patrician and plebeian alike), and was gratified by a glimpse of such notable amateurs as Mr. Beaumaris, Lord Fleetwood, young Mr. Terrington, and Lord Withernsea. He had a little practise with the single-stick with one of Jackson’s assistants, felt himself honoured by receiving a smiling word of encouragement from the great Jackson himself, and envied the assurance of the Goers who strolled in, exchanged jests with Jackson, who treated them with the same degree of civility as he showed to his less exalted pupils, and actually enjoyed bouts with the ex-champion himself. He was quick to see that no consideration of rank or consequence was enough to induce Jackson to allow a client to plant a hit upon his person, unless his prowess deserved such a reward; and from having entered the saloon with a feeling of superiority he swiftly reached the realization that in the Corinthian world excellence counted for more than lineage. He heard Jackson say chidingly to the great Nonpareil himself (who stripped to remarkable advantage, he noticed) that he was out of training; and from that moment his highest ambition was to put on the gloves with this peerless master of the art.
At the end of a week, Mr. Swindon, urged thereto by Mr. Scunthorpe, delivered the new clothes, and after purchasing such embellishments to his costume as a tall cane, a fob, and a Marseilles waistcoat, Bertram ventured to show himself in the Park, at the fashionable hour of five o’clock. Here he had the felicity of seeing Lord Coleraine, Georgy a Cockhorse, prancing down Rotten Row on his mettlesome steed; Lord Morton, on his long-tailed gray; and, amongst the carriages, Tommy Onslow’s curricle; a number of dashing gigs and tilburies; the elegant barouches of the ladies; and Mr. Beaumaris’s yellow-winged phaeton-and-four, which he appeared to be able to turn within a space so small as to seem impossible to any mere whipster. Nothing would do for Bertram after that but to repair to the nearest jobmaster’s stables, and to arrange for the hire of a showy chestnut hack. Whatever imperfections might attach to the bearing and style of a young gentleman from the country, Bertram knew himself to be a bruising rider, and in this guise determined to show himself to the society which his sister already adorned.
As luck would have it, he encountered her on the day when he first sallied forth, mounted upon his hired hack. She was sitting up beside Mr. Beaumaris in his famous phaeton, animatedly describing to him the scene of the Drawing-room in which she had taken humble part. This event had necessarily occupied her thoughts so much during the past week that she had been able to spare very few for the activities of her adventurous brother. But when she caught sight of him, tro
tting along on his chestnut hack, she exclaimed, and said impulsively: “Oh, it is—Mr. Anstey! Do pray stop, Mr. Beaumaris!”
He drew up his team obediently, while she waved to Bertram. He brought his hack up to the phaeton, and bowed politely, only slightly quizzing her with his eyes. Mr. Beaumaris, glancing indifferently at him, caught this arch look, became aware of a slight tension in the trim figure beside him, and looked under his lazy eyelids from one to the other.
“How do you do? How do you go on?” said Arabella, stretching out her hand in its glove of white kid.
Bertram bowed over it very creditably, and replied: “Famously! I mean to come—I mean to visit you some morning, Miss Tallant!”
“Oh, yes, please do!” Arabella looked up at her escort,, blushed and stammered: “May I p-present Mr. Anstey to you, Mr. Beaumaris? He—he is a friend of mine!”
“How do you do?” responded Mr. Beaumaris politely. “From Yorkshire, Mr. Anstey?”
“Oh, yes! I have known Miss Tallant since I was in short coats!” grinned Bertram.
“You will certainly be much envied by Miss Tallant’s numerous admirers,” responded Mr. Beaumaris. “Are you staying in town?”
“Just a short visit, you know!” Bertram’s gaze reverted to the team harnessed to the phaeton, all four of them on the fret. “I say, sir, that’s a bang-up team you have in hand!” he said, with all his sister’s impulsiveness. “Oh, don’t look at this hack of mine—showy, but I never crossed a greater slug in my life!”
“You hunt, Mr. Anstey?”
“Yes, with my uncle’s pack, in Yorkshire. Of course, it is not like the Quorn country, or the Pytchley, but we get some pretty good runs, I can tell you!” Bertram confided.
“Mr. Anstey,” interrupted Arabella, fixing him with a very compelling look, “I think Lady Bridlington has sent you a card for her ball: I hope you mean to come!”
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