and his soul within him thrilled secretly somehow
at the knowledge of his power. He would be generous-
minded, Sultan as he was, and raise up this kneeling
Esther and make a queen of her: besides, her sadness
and beauty touched him as much as her submission, and
so he cheered her, and raised her up and forgave her, so
to speak. All her hopes and feelings, which were dying
and withering, this her sun having been removed from
her, bloomed again and at once, its light being restored.
You would scarcely have recognised the beaming little
face upon Amelia's pillow that night as the one that was
laid there the night before, so wan, so lifeless, so
careless of all round about. The honest Irish maid-servant,
delighted with the change, asked leave to kiss the face
that had grown all of a sudden so rosy. Amelia put her
arms round the girl's neck and kissed her with all her
heart, like a child. She was little more. She had that night
a sweet refreshing sleep, like one--and what a spring of
inexpressible happiness as she woke in the morning sunshine!
"He will be here again to-day," Amelia thought. "He is
the greatest and best of men." And the fact is, that
George thought he was one of the generousest creatures
alive: and that he was making a tremendous sacrifice in
marrying this young creature.
While she and Osborne were having their delightful
tete-a-tete above stairs, old Mrs. Sedley and Captain
Dobbin were conversing below upon the state of the
affairs, and the chances and future arrangements of the
young people. Mrs. Sedley having brought the two lovers
together and left them embracing each other with all their
might, like a true woman, was of opinion that no power
on earth would induce Mr. Sedley to consent to the match
between his daughter and the son of a man who had so
shamefully, wickedly, and monstrously treated him. And
she told a long story about happier days and their earlier
splendours, when Osborne lived in a very humble way in
the New Road, and his wife was too glad to receive some
of Jos's little baby things, with which Mrs. Sedley
accommodated her at the birth of one of Osborne's own
children. The fiendish ingratitude of that man, she was
sure, had broken Mr. S.'s heart: and as for a marriage,
he would never, never, never, never consent.
"They must run away together, Ma'am," Dobbin said,
laughing, "and follow the example of Captain Rawdon
Crawley, and Miss Emmy's friend the little governess."
Was it possible? Well she never! Mrs. Sedley was all
excitement about this news. She wished that Blenkinsop were
here to hear it: Blenkinsop always mistrusted that Miss
Sharp.--What an escape Jos had had! and she described
the already well-known love-passages between Rebecca and
the Collector of Boggley Wollah.
It was not, however, Mr. Sedley's wrath which Dobbin
feared, so much as that of the other parent concerned,
and he owned that he had a very considerable doubt
and anxiety respecting the behaviour of the black-browed
old tyrant of a Russia merchant in Russell Square. He
has forbidden the match peremptorily, Dobbin thought.
He knew what a savage determined man Osborne was, and
how he stuck by his word. The only chance George has
of reconcilement," argued his friend, "is by distinguishing
himself in the coming campaign. If he dies they both go
together. If he fails in distinction--what then? He has
some money from his mother, I have heard enough to
purchase his majority--or he must sell out and go and
dig in Canada, or rough it in a cottage in the country."
With such a partner Dobbin thought he would not mind
Siberia--and, strange to say, this absurd and utterly
imprudent young fellow never for a moment considered that
the want of means to keep a nice carriage and horses,
and of an income which should enable its possessors to
entertain their friends genteelly, ought to operate as bars
to the union of George and Miss Sedley.
It was these weighty considerations which made him
think too that the marriage should take place as quickly
as possible. Was he anxious himself, I wonder, to have it
over.?--as people, when death has occurred, like to press
forward the funeral, or when a parting is resolved upon,
hasten it. It is certain that Mr. Dobbin, having taken the
matter in hand, was most extraordinarily eager in the
conduct of it. He urged on George the necessity of immediate
action: he showed the chances of reconciliation with
his father, which a favourable mention of his name in the
Gazette must bring about. If need were he would go himself
and brave both the fathers in the business. At all
events, he besought George to go through with it before
the orders came, which everybody expected, for the
departure of the regiment from England on foreign service.
Bent upon these hymeneal projects, and with the applause
and consent of Mrs. Sedley, who did not care to
break the matter personally to her husband, Mr. Dobbin
went to seek John Sedley at his house of call in the City,
the Tapioca Coffee-house, where, since his own offices
were shut up, and fate had overtaken him, the poor
broken-down old gentleman used to betake himself daily,
and write letters and receive them, and tie them up into
mysterious bundles, several of which he carried in the
flaps of his coat. I don't know anything more dismal than
that business and bustle and mystery of a ruined man: those
letters from the wealthy which he shows you: those worn
greasy documents promising support and offering
condolence which he places wistfully before you, and on
which he builds his hopes of restoration and future fortune.
My beloved reader has no doubt in the course of
his experience been waylaid by many such a luckless
companion. He takes you into the corner; he has his bundle
of papers out of his gaping coat pocket; and the tape off,
and the string in his mouth, and the favourite letters
selected and laid before you; and who does not know the
sad eager half-crazy look which he fixes on you with his
hopeless eyes?
Changed into a man of this sort, Dobbin found the
once florid, jovial, and prosperous John Sedley. His
coat, that used to be so glossy and trim, was white at the
seams, and the buttons showed the copper. His face had
fallen in, and was unshorn; his frill and neckcloth hung
limp under his bagging waistcoat. When he used to treat
the boys in old days at a coffee-house, he would shout
and laugh louder than anybody there, and have all the
waiters skipping round him; it was quite painful to see
how humble and civil he was to John of the Tapioca, a
blear-eyed old attendant in dingy stockings and cracked
pumps, whose business it was to serve glasses of wafers,
and bumpers of ink in pewter, and slices of paper to the
frequenters of this dreary house of entertainment, where
nothing else seemed to be consumed. As for William
Dobbin, whom he had tipped repeatedly in his youth, and
who had been the old gentleman's butt on a thousand
occasions, old Sedley gave his hand to him in a very
hesitating humble manner now, and called him "Sir." A
feeling of shame and remorse took possession of William
Dobbin as the broken old man so received and addressed
him, as if he himself had been somehow guilty of the
misfortunes which had brought Sedley so low.
"I am very glad to see you, Captain Dobbin, sir," says
he, after a skulking look or two at his visitor (whose lanky
figure and military appearance caused some excitement
likewise to twinkle in the blear eyes of the waiter in the
cracked dancing pumps, and awakened the old lady in
black, who dozed among the mouldy old coffee-cups in the
bar). "How is the worthy alderman, and my lady, your
excellent mother, sir?" He looked round at the waiter as
he said, "My lady," as much as to say, "Hark ye, John, I
have friends still, and persons of rank and reputation,
too." "Are you come to do anything in my way, sir? My
young friends Dale and Spiggot do all my business for me
now, until my new offices are ready; for I'm only here
temporarily, you know, Captain. What can we do for you.
sir? Will you like to take anything?"
Dobbin, with a great deal of hesitation and stuttering,
protested that he was not in the least hungry or thirsty;
that he had no business to transact; that he only came
to ask if Mr. Sedley was well, and to shake hands with
an old friend; and, he added, with a desperate perversion
of truth, "My mother is very well--that is, she's been very
unwell, and is only waiting for the first fine day to go out
and call upon Mrs. Sedley. How is Mrs. Sedley, sir? I
hope she's quite well." And here he paused, reflecting on
his own consummate hypocrisy; for the day was as fine,
and the sunshine as bright as it ever is in Coffin Court,
where the Tapioca Coffee-house is situated: and Mr.
Dobbin remembered that he had seen Mrs. Sedley himself
only an hour before, having driven Osborne down to Fulham
in his gig, and left him there tete-a-tete with Miss Amelia.
"My wife will be very happy to see her ladyship,"
Sedley replied, pulling out his papers. "I've a very kind
letter here from your father, sir, and beg my respectful
compliments to him. Lady D. will find us in rather a
smaller house than we were accustomed to receive our
friends in; but it's snug, and the change of air does good
to my daughter, who was suffering in town rather--you
remember little Emmy, sir?--yes, suffering a good deal."
The old gentleman's eyes were wandering as he spoke, and
he was thinking of something else, as he sate thrumming
on his papers and fumbling at the worn red tape.
"You're a military man," he went on; "I ask you, Bill
Dobbin, could any man ever have speculated upon the
return of that Corsican scoundrel from Elba? When the
allied sovereigns were here last year, and we gave 'em
that dinner in the City, sir, and we saw the Temple of
Concord, and the fireworks, and the Chinese bridge in
St. James's Park, could any sensible man suppose that
peace wasn't really concluded, after we'd actually sung Te
Deum for it, sir? I ask you, William, could I suppose that
the Emperor of Austria was a damned traitor--a traitor,
and nothing more? I don't mince words--a double-faced
infernal traitor and schemer, who meant to have his son-
in-law back all along. And I say that the escape of Boney
from Elba was a damned imposition and plot, sir, in
which half the powers of Europe were concerned, to
bring the funds down, and to ruin this country. That's
why I'm here, William. That's why my name's in the
Gazette. Why, sir?--because I trusted the Emperor of
Russia and the Prince Regent. Look here. Look at my
papers. Look what the funds were on the 1st of March
--what the French fives were when I bought for the
count. And what they're at now. There was collusion, sir,
or that villain never would have escaped. Where was the
English Commissioner who allowed him to get away? He
ought to be shot, sir--brought to a court-martial, and
shot, by Jove."
"We're going to hunt Boney out, sir," Dobbin said,
rather alarmed at the fury of the old man, the veins of
whose forehead began to swell, and who sate drumming
his papers with his clenched fist. "We are going to hunt
him out, sir--the Duke's in Belgium already, and we
expect marching orders every day."
"Give him no quarter. Bring back the villain's head, sir.
Shoot the coward down, sir," Sedley roared. "I'd enlist
myself, by--; but I'm a broken old man--ruined by
that damned scoundrel--and by a parcel of swindling
thieves in this country whom I made, sir, and who are
rolling in their carriages now," he added, with a break in
his voice.
Dobbin was not a little affected by the sight of this once
kind old friend, crazed almost with misfortune and raving
with senile anger. Pity the fallen gentleman: you to whom
money and fair repute are the chiefest good; and so,
surely, are they in Vanity Fair.
"Yes," he continued, "there are some vipers that you
warm, and they sting you afterwards. There are some
beggars that you put on horseback, and they're the first
to ride you down. You know whom I mean, William
Dobbin, my boy. I mean a purse-proud villain in Russell
Square, whom I knew without a shilling, and whom I
pray and hope to see a beggar as he was when I
befriended him."
"I have heard something of this, sir, from my friend
George," Dobbin said, anxious to come to his point. "The
quarrel between you and his father has cut him up a great
deal, sir. Indeed, I'm the bearer of a message from him."
"O, THAT'S your errand, is it?" cried the old man,
jumping up. "What! perhaps he condoles with me, does he?
Very kind of him, the stiff-backed prig, with his dandified
airs and West End swagger. He's hankering about my
house, is he still? If my son had the courage of a man,
he'd shoot him. He's as big a villain as his father. I won't
have his name mentioned in my house. I curse the day
that ever I let him into it; and I'd rather see my daughter
dead at my feet than married to him."
"His father's harshness is not George's fault, sir. Your
daughter's love for him is as much your doing as his. Who
are you, that you are to play with two young people's
affections and break their hearts at your will?"
"Recollect it's not his father that breaks the match off,"
old Sedley cried out. "It's I that forbid it. That family and
mine are separated for ever. I'm fallen low, but not so
low as that: no, no. And so you may tell the whole race--
