until she appeared in her drawing-room: meanwhile it was
announced to her that Mrs. Bute Crawley had come up
from Hampshire by the mail, was staying at the Gloster,
sent her love to Miss Crawley, and asked for breakfast
with Miss Briggs. The arrival of Mrs. Bute, which would
not have caused any extreme delight at another period,
was hailed with pleasure now; Miss Crawley being pleased
at the notion of a gossip with her sister-in-law regarding
the late Lady Crawley, the funeral arrangements pending,
and Sir Pitt's abrupt proposal to Rebecca.
It was not until the old lady was fairly ensconced in
her usual arm-chair in the drawing-room, and the
preliminary embraces and inquiries had taken place between
the ladies, that the conspirators thought it advisable to
submit her to the operation. Who has not admired the
artifices and delicate approaches with which women
"prepare" their friends for bad news? Miss Crawley's two
friends made such an apparatus of mystery before they
broke the intelligence to her, that they worked her up to
the necessary degree of doubt and alarm.
"And she refused Sir Pitt, my dear, dear Miss Crawley,
prepare yourself for it," Mrs. Bute said, "because--
because she couldn't help herself."
"Of course there was a reason," Miss Crawley answered.
"She liked somebody else. I told Briggs so yesterday."
"LIKES somebody else!" Briggs gasped. "O my dear
friend, she is married already."
"Married already," Mrs. Bute chimed in; and both sate
with clasped hands looking from each other at their
victim.
"Send her to me, the instant she comes in. The little
sly wretch: how dared she not tell me?" cried out Miss
Crawley.
"She won't come in soon. Prepare yourself, dear friend
--she's gone out for a long time--she's--she's gone
altogether."
"Gracious goodness, and who's to make my chocolate?
Send for her and have her back; I desire that she come
back," the old lady said.
"She decamped last night, Ma'am," cried Mrs. Bute.
"She left a letter for me," Briggs exclaimed. "She's
married to--"
"Prepare her, for heaven's sake. Don't torture her, my
dear Miss Briggs."
"She's married to whom?" cries the spinster in a
nervous fury.
"To--to a relation of--"
"She refused Sir Pitt," cried the victim. "Speak at once.
Don't drive me mad."
"O Ma'am--prepare her, Miss Briggs--she's married
to Rawdon Crawley."
"Rawdon married Rebecca--governess--nobod--
Get out of my house, you fool, you idiot--you stupid old
Briggs how dare you? You're in the plot--you made
him marry, thinking that I'd leave my money from him--
you did, Martha," the poor old lady screamed in hysteric
sentences.
"I, Ma'am, ask a member of this family to marry a
drawing-master's daughter?"
"Her mother was a Montmorency," cried out the old
lady, pulling at the bell with all her might.
"Her mother was an opera girl, and she has been on
the stage or worse herself," said Mrs. Bute.
Miss Crawley gave a final scream, and fell back in a
faint. They were forced to take her back to the room
which she had just quitted. One fit of hysterics succeeded
another. The doctor was sent for--the apothecary arrived.
Mrs. Bute took up the post of nurse by her bedside. "Her
relations ought to be round about her," that amiable
woman said.
She had scarcely been carried up to her room, when a
new person arrived to whom it was also necessary to break
the news. This was Sir Pitt. "Where's Becky?" he said,
coming in. "Where's her traps? She's coming with me to
Queen's Crawley."
"Have you not heard the astonishing intelligence
regarding her surreptitious union?" Briggs asked.
"What's that to me?" Sir Pitt asked. "I know she's
married. That makes no odds. Tell her to come down at
once, and not keep me."
"Are you not aware, sir," Miss Briggs asked, "that she
has left our roof, to the dismay of Miss Crawley, who is
nearly killed by the intelligence of Captain Rawdon's union
with her?"
When Sir Pitt Crawley heard that Rebecca was married
to his son, he broke out into a fury of language, which it
would do no good to repeat in this place, as indeed it
sent poor Briggs shuddering out of the room; and with her
we will shut the door upon the figure of the frenzied old
man, wild with hatred and insane with baffled desire.
One day after he went to Queen's Crawley, he burst
like a madman into the room she had used when there
--dashed open her boxes with his foot, and flung about
her papers, clothes, and other relics. Miss Horrocks, the
butler's daughter, took some of them. The children
dressed themselves and acted plays in the others. It was
but a few days after the poor mother had gone to her
lonely burying-place; and was laid, unwept and
disregarded, in a vault full of strangers.
"Suppose the old lady doesn't come to," Rawdon said to
his little wife, as they sate together in the snug little
Brompton lodgings. She had been trying the new piano
all the morning. The new gloves fitted her to a nicety; the
new shawls became her wonderfully; the new rings
glittered on her little hands, and the new watch ticked at her
waist; "suppose she don't come round, eh, Becky?"
"I'LL make your fortune," she said; and Delilah patted
Samson's cheek.
"You can do anything," he said, kissing the little hand.
"By Jove you can; and we'll drive down to the Star and
Garter, and dine, by Jove."
CHAPTER XVII
How Captain Dobbin Bought a Piano
If there is any exhibition in all Vanity Fair which Satire
and Sentiment can visit arm in arm together; where you
light on the strangest contrasts laughable and tearful:
where you may be gentle and pathetic, or savage and
cynical with perfect propriety: it is at one of those public
assemblies, a crowd of which are advertised every day in
the last page of the Times newspaper, and over which
the late Mr. George Robins used to preside with so much
dignity. There are very few London people, as I fancy,
who have not attended at these meetings, and all with a
taste for moralizing must have thought, with a sensation
and interest not a little startling and queer, of the day
when their turn shall come too, and Mr. Hammerdown
will sell by the orders of Diogenes' assignees, or will be
instructed by the executors, to offer to public competition,
the library, furniture, plate, wardrobe, and choice cellar
of wines of Epicurus deceased.
Even with the most selfish disposition, the Vanity Fairian,
as he witnesses this sordid part of the obsequies of a
departed friend, can't but feel some sympathies and regret.
My Lord Dives's remains are in the family vault: the
statuaries are cutting an inscription veraciously
commemorating his virtues, and the sorrows of his heir,
who is disposing of his goods. What guest at Dives's table
can pass the familiar house without a sigh? .--the familiar
house of which the lights used to shine so cheerfully at
seven o'clock, of which the hall-doors opened so readily,
of which the obsequious servants, as you passed up the
comfortable stair, sounded your name from landing to
landing, until it reached the apartment where jolly old
Dives welcomed his friends! What a number of them he
had; and what a noble way of entertaining them. How
witty people used to be here who were morose when they
got out of the door; and how courteous and friendly men
who slandered and hated each other everywhere else! He
was pompous, but with such a cook what would one not
swallow? he was rather dull, perhaps, but would not
such wine make any conversation pleasant? We must get
some of his Burgundy at any price, the mourners cry at
his club. "I got this box at old Dives's sale," Pincher says,
handing it round, "one of Louis XV's mistresses--pretty
thing, is it not?--sweet miniature," and they talk of the
way in which young Dives is dissipating his fortune.
How changed the house is, though! The front is patched
over with bills, setting forth the particulars of the furniture
in staring capitals. They have hung a shred of carpet out
of an upstairs window--a half dozen of porters are lounging
on the dirty steps--the hall swarms with dingy guests
of oriental countenance, who thrust printed cards into
your hand, and offer to bid. Old women and amateurs
have invaded the upper apartments, pinching the bed-
curtains, poking into the feathers, shampooing the
mattresses, and clapping the wardrobe drawers to and fro.
Enterprising young housekeepers are measuring the
looking-glasses and hangings to see if they will suit the new
menage (Snob will brag for years that he has purchased
this or that at Dives's sale), and Mr. Hammerdown is
sitting on the great mahogany dining-tables, in the dining-
room below, waving the ivory hammer, and employing all
the artifices of eloquence, enthusiasm, entreaty, reason,
despair; shouting to his people; satirizing Mr. Davids for
his sluggishness; inspiriting Mr. Moss into action;
imploring, commanding, bellowing, until down comes the
hammer like fate, and we pass to the next lot. O Dives,
who would ever have thought, as we sat round the broad
table sparkling with plate and spotless linen, to have seen
such a dish at the head of it as that roaring auctioneer?
It was rather late in the sale. The excellent drawing-
room furniture by the best makers; the rare and famous
wines selected, regardless of cost, and with the well-known
taste of the purchaser; the rich and complete set of family
plate had been sold on the previous days. Certain of the
best wines (which all had a great character among
amateurs in the neighbourhood) had been purchased for his
master, who knew them very well, by the butler of our
friend John Osborne, Esquire, of Russell Square. A small
portion of the most useful articles of the plate had been
bought by some young stockbrokers from the City. And
now the public being invited to the purchase of minor
objects, it happened that the orator on the table was
expatiating on the merits of a picture, which he sought
to recommend to his audience: it was by no means so
select or numerous a company as had attended the
previous days of the auction.
"No. 369," roared Mr. Hammerdown. "Portrait of a
gentleman on an elephant. Who'll bid for the gentleman
on the elephant? Lift up the picture, Blowman, and let
the company examine this lot." A long, pale, military-
looking gentleman, seated demurely at the mahogany
table, could not help grinning as this valuable lot was
shown by Mr. Blowman. "Turn the elephant to the
Captain, Blowman. What shall we say, sir, for the elephant?"
but the Captain, blushing in a very hurried and discomfited
manner, turned away his head.
"Shall we say twenty guineas for this work of art?--
fifteen, five, name your own price. The gentleman
without the elephant is worth five pound."
"I wonder it ain't come down with him," said a
professional wag, "he's anyhow a precious big one"; at
which (for the elephant-rider was represented as of a very
stout figure) there was a general giggle in the room.
"Don't be trying to deprecate the value of the lot, Mr.
Moss," Mr. Hammerdown said; "let the company
examine it as a work of art--the attitude of the gallant
animal quite according to natur'; the gentleman in a
nankeen jacket, his gun in his hand, is going to the
chase; in the distance a banyhann tree and a pagody,
most likely resemblances of some interesting spot in our
famous Eastern possessions. How much for this lot?
Come, gentlemen, don't keep me here all day."
Some one bid five shillings, at which the military
gentleman looked towards the quarter from which this
splendid offer had come, and there saw another officer
with a young lady on his arm, who both appeared to be
highly amused with the scene, and to whom, finally, this
lot was knocked down for half a guinea. He at the
table looked more surprised and discomposed than ever
when he spied this pair, and his head sank into his
military collar, and he turned his back upon them, so as
to avoid them altogether.
Of all the other articles which Mr. Hammerdown had
the honour to offer for public competition that day it is
not our purpose to make mention, save of one only, a
little square piano, which came down from the upper
regions of the house (the state grand piano having
been disposed of previously); this the young lady tried
with a rapid and skilful hand (making the officer blush
and start again), and for it, when its turn came, her
agent began to bid.
But there was an opposition here. The Hebrew aide-de-
camp in the service of the officer at the table bid against
the Hebrew gentleman employed by the elephant
purchasers, and a brisk battle ensued over this little piano,
the combatants being greatly encouraged by Mr.
Hammerdown.
At last, when the competition had been prolonged for
some time, the elephant captain and lady desisted from
the race; and the hammer coming down, the auctioneer
said:--"Mr. Lewis, twenty-five," and Mr. Lewis's chief
thus became the proprietor of the little square piano.
Having effected the purchase, he sate up as if he was
greatly relieved, and the unsuccessful competitors
catching a glimpse of him at this moment, the lady
said to her friend,
"Why, Rawdon, it's Captain Dobbin."
