Somehow Good - William Frend De Morgan (the little red hen read aloud .TXT) 📗

did."

"The Goody--oh yes! (By-the-bye, mother says I mustn't call your ma Goody Wilson, or I shall do it to her face, and there'll be a pretty how-do-you-do.) Prosy's parent broods over one, and gloats as if one was crumpets; but Prosy himself is very good about her--aware of her shortcomings."

"I don't care what you call _my_ mother. Call her any name you like. But what does Dr. Vereker say?"

"About his'n? Says she's a dear good mother, and I mustn't mind her. I say, Tishy!"

"What, dear?"

"What _is_ the present position of the row? You said your mother. You know you did--coming from the bath--after Henriette went away."

"I did say my mother, dear. But I wish it were otherwise. I've told Mr. Bradshaw so."

"You'd be much nicer if you said Julius. Told him what?"

"Told him a girl can't run counter to the wishes of her family in practice. Of course, M--well, then, Julius, if you will have it--is ready to wait. But it's really ridiculous to talk in this way, when, after all, nothing's been said."

"_Has_ nothing?"

"Not _to_ anybody. Only him and me."

"At Riverfordhook?"

"Why, yes, what I told you. We needn't go over it again."

"In the avenue. And moonrise and things. What o'clock was it, please, ma'am?"

"About ten-fifteen, dear. We were in by eleven." This was a faint attempt to help dignity by a parade of accuracy in figures, and an affectation of effrontery. "But really we needn't go over it again. You know what a nice letter he wrote Aunt Frances?" And instead of waiting for an answer, Tishy, perhaps to avoid catechism about the moonrise and things, ploughs straight on into a recitation of her lover's letter to her aunt: "Dear Lady Sales--Of course it will (quite literally) give me the _greatest possible_ pleasure to come. I will bring the Strad"; and then afterwards he said: "I hope your niece will give a full account of me, and not draw any veils over my social position. However, this being written at my desk here on the shop-paper will prevent any misunderstanding."

"Your Aunt Frances has been hatching you--you two!" says Sally, ignoring the letter.

"She is a dear good woman, if ever there was one. I wish mamma was my aunt-by-marriage, and she her!" And then Laetitia went on to tell many things about the present position of the "row" between herself and her mother, concerning which it can only be said that nothing transpired that justified its existence. Seeing that no recognition was asked for of any formal engagement either by the "young haberdasher" himself--for that was the epithet applied to him (behind his back, of course) by the older lady--or by the object of his ambitious aspirations, it might have been more politic, as well as more graceful, on her part, to leave the affair to die down, as love-affairs unopposed are so very apt to do. Instead of which she needs must begin endeavouring to frustrate what at the time of her first interference was the merest flirtation between a Romeo who was tied to a desk all day, and a Juliet who was constantly coming into contact with other potential Romeos--plenty of them. Our own private opinion is that if the Montagus and Capulets had tried to bury the hatchet at a public betrothal of the two young people, the latter would have quarrelled on the spot. Setting their family circles by the ears again would almost have been as much fun as a secret wedding by a friar. You doubt it? Well, we may be wrong. But we are quite certain that the events which followed shortly after the chat between the two girls recorded above either would never have come to pass, or would have taken an entirely different form, if it had not been for the uncompromising character of Mrs. Sales Wilson's attitude towards her daughter's Romeo.

We will give this collateral incident in our history a chapter to itself, for your convenience more than our own. You can skip it, you see, if you want to get back to Krakatoa Villa.


CHAPTER XXI


OF JULIUS BRADSHAW'S INNER SOUL. AND OF THE HABERDASHER'S BATTLE AT LADBROKE GROVE ROAD. ON CARPET STRETCHING, AND VACCINATION FROM THE CALF. AN AFTER-DINNER INTERVIEW, AND GOOD RESOLUTIONS. EVASIVE TRAPPISTS

You can remember, if you are male and middle-aged, or worse, some little incident in your own early life more or less like that effervescence of unreal passion which made us first acquainted with Mr. Julius Bradshaw and his violin. Do you shake your head, and deny it? Are you prepared to look us in the face, and swear you never, when a young man, had a sleepless night because of some girl whom you had scarcely spoken to, and who would not have known who you were if you had been able to master your trepidation and claim acquaintance; and who, in the sequel, changed her identity, and became what the greatest word-coiner of our time called a "speech-friend" of yours, without a scrap of romance or tenderness in the friendship?

Sally's sudden change of identity from the bewitching little gardener who had fascinated this susceptible youth, to a merely uncommonly nice girl, was no doubt assisted by his introduction just at that moment to the present Mrs. Julius Bradshaw. For it would be the merest affectation to conceal the ultimate outcome of their acquaintance.

When Julius came to Krakatoa Villa, he came already half disillusioned about Sally. What sort of an _accolade_ he expected on arriving to keep his passion on its legs, Heaven only knows! He certainly had been chilled by her easy-going invitation to her mother's. A definite declaration of callous indifference would not have been half so effective. Sally had the most extraordinary power of pointing out that she stipulated to be considered as a chap; or conveying it, which came to the same thing. On the other hand, Laetitia, who had been freely spoken of by Sally as "making a great ass of herself about social tommy-rot and people's positions," and who was aware of the justice of the accusation, had been completely jerked out of the region of Grundy by Julius's splendid rendering of Tartini, and had felt disconcerted and ashamed; for Tishy was a thorough musician at heart. The consequence was an _amende honorable_ to the young man, on whom--he having no idea whatever of its provoking cause--it produced the effect that might have been anticipated. Any young lady who wishes to enslave a young man will really do better work by showing an interest in himself than by any amount of fascination and allurement, on the lines of Greuze. We are by no means sure that it is safe to reveal this secret, so do not let it go any farther. Young women are formidable enough, as it is, without getting tips from the camp of the enemy.

Anyhow, Sally became a totally different identity to Mr. Julius Bradshaw. He, for his part, underwent a complete transformation in hers--so much so that the vulgar child was on one occasion quite taken aback at a sudden recollection of his _debut_, and said to her stepfather: "Only think, Jeremiah! Tishy's Julius is really that young idiot that came philandering after me Sundays, and I had quite forgotten it!"

The young idiot had settled down to a reasonable personality; if not to a manifestation of his actual self, at any rate as near as he was likely to go to it for some time to come; for none of us ever succeeds in really showing himself to his fellow-creatures outright. That's impossible.

Sally had never said very much to her friend of this pre-introduction phase of Julius--had, in fact, thought little enough about it. Perhaps her taking care to say nothing at all of it in his later phase was her most definite acknowledgment of its existence at any time. It was only a laughable incident. She saw at once, when she took note of that sofa _seance_, which way the cat was going to jump; and we are bound to say it was a cat that soon made up its mind, and jumped with decision.

Mrs. Sales Wilson's endeavour to intercept that cat had been prompt and injudicious. She destroyed whatever chance there was of a sudden _volte-face_ on its part--and oh, the glorious uncertainty of this class of cat!--first by taking no notice of it aggressively, next by catching hold of its tail, too late. In the art of ignoring bystanders, she was no match for the cat. And detention seemed only to communicate impetus.

Julius Bradshaw's first receptions at the Ladbroke Grove House had been based mainly on his Stradivarius. The Dragon may be said to have admitted the instrument, but only to have tolerated its owner, as one might tolerate an organman who owned a distinguished monkey. Still, the position was an ambiguous one. The Dragon felt she had made a mistake in not shutting the door against this lion at first. She had "let him in, to see if she could turn him out again," and the crisis of the campaign had come over the question whether Mr. Bradshaw might, or should, or could be received into the inner bosom of the household--that is to say, the dinner-bosom. The Dragon said no--she drew the line at that. Tea, yes--dinner, no!

After many small engagements over the question in the abstract, the plot thickened with reference to the arrangements of a particular Thursday evening. The Dragon felt that a decisive battle must be fought; the more so that her son Egerton, whom she had relied on to back her against a haberdasher, though he might have been useless against a jockey or a professional cricketer, had gone over to the enemy, and announced (for the Professor had failed to communicate the virus of scholarship to this young man) that he was unanimous that Mr. Bradshaw should be forthwith invited to dinner.

His mother resorted to the head of the household as to a Court of Appeal, but not, as we think, in a manner likely to be effective. Her natural desire to avenge herself on that magazine of learning for marrying her produced an unconciliatory tone, even in her preamble.

"I suppose," she said, abruptly entering his library in the vital centre of a delectable refutation of an ignoramus--"I suppose it's no use looking to you for sympathy in a matter of this sort, but----"

"I'm busy," said the Professor; "wouldn't some other time do as well?"

"I knew what I had to expect!" said the lady, at once allowing her desire to embitter her relations with her husband to get the better of her interest in the measure she desired to pass through Parliament. She left the room, closing the door after her with venomous quietness.

The refutation would have to stand over; it was spoiled now, and the delicious sarcasm that was on his pen's tip was lost irrevocably. He blotted a sentence in the middle, put his pen in a wet sponge, and opened his door. He jerked it savagely open to express his attitude of mind towards interruption. His "_What_ is it?" as he did so was in keeping with the door-jerk.

"I can speak of nothing to you if you are so _tetchy_"--a word said spitefully, with a jerk explanatory of its meaning. "Another time will do better, now. I prefer to wait."

When these two played at the domestic game of exasperate-my-neighbour, the temper lost by the one was picked up by the other, and added to his or her pack. It was so often her pack that there must have