Hows'ever, that's neither here nor there. You want me to accept of half
a guinea. Wery well, I'm agreeable: I can't say no fairer than that,
can I, sir?' (Mr. Pickwick smiled.) Then the next question is, what the
devil do you want with me, as the man said, wen he see the ghost?'
'We want to know--' said Mr. Wardle.
'Now, my dear sir--my dear sir,' interposed the busy little man.
Mr. Wardle shrugged his shoulders, and was silent.
'We want to know,' said the little man solemnly; 'and we ask the
question of you, in order that we may not awaken apprehensions
inside--we want to know who you've got in this house at present?'
'Who there is in the house!' said Sam, in whose mind the inmates were
always represented by that particular article of their costume, which
came under his immediate superintendence. 'There's a vooden leg in
number six; there's a pair of Hessians in thirteen; there's two pair
of halves in the commercial; there's these here painted tops in the
snuggery inside the bar; and five more tops in the coffee-room.'
'Nothing more?' said the little man.
'Stop a bit,' replied Sam, suddenly recollecting himself. 'Yes; there's
a pair of Vellingtons a good deal worn, and a pair o' lady's shoes, in
number five.'
'What sort of shoes?' hastily inquired Wardle, who, together with Mr.
Pickwick, had been lost in bewilderment at the singular catalogue of
visitors.
'Country make,' replied Sam.
'Any maker's name?'
'Brown.'
'Where of?'
'Muggleton.
'It is them,' exclaimed Wardle. 'By heavens, we've found them.'
'Hush!' said Sam. 'The Vellingtons has gone to Doctors' Commons.'
'No,' said the little man.
'Yes, for a licence.'
'We're in time,' exclaimed Wardle. 'Show us the room; not a moment is to
be lost.'
'Pray, my dear sir--pray,' said the little man; 'caution, caution.' He
drew from his pocket a red silk purse, and looked very hard at Sam as he
drew out a sovereign.
Sam grinned expressively.
'Show us into the room at once, without announcing us,' said the little
man, 'and it's yours.'
Sam threw the painted tops into a corner, and led the way through a
dark passage, and up a wide staircase. He paused at the end of a second
passage, and held out his hand.
'Here it is,' whispered the attorney, as he deposited the money on the
hand of their guide.
The man stepped forward for a few paces, followed by the two friends and
their legal adviser. He stopped at a door.
'Is this the room?' murmured the little gentleman.
Sam nodded assent.
Old Wardle opened the door; and the whole three walked into the room
just as Mr. Jingle, who had that moment returned, had produced the
licence to the spinster aunt.
The spinster uttered a loud shriek, and throwing herself into a chair,
covered her face with her hands. Mr. Jingle crumpled up the licence, and
thrust it into his coat pocket. The unwelcome visitors advanced into the
middle of the room. 'You--you are a nice rascal, arn't you?' exclaimed
Wardle, breathless with passion.
'My dear Sir, my dear sir,' said the little man, laying his hat on
the table, 'pray, consider--pray. Defamation of character: action for
damages. Calm yourself, my dear sir, pray--'
'How dare you drag my sister from my house?' said the old man.
Ay--ay--very good,' said the little gentleman, 'you may ask that. How
dare you, sir?--eh, sir?'
'Who the devil are you?' inquired Mr. Jingle, in so fierce a tone, that
the little gentleman involuntarily fell back a step or two.
'Who is he, you scoundrel,' interposed Wardle. 'He's my lawyer,
Mr. Perker, of Gray's Inn. Perker, I'll have this fellow
prosecuted--indicted--I'll--I'll--I'll ruin him. And you,' continued Mr.
Wardle, turning abruptly round to his sister--'you, Rachael, at a time
of life when you ought to know better, what do you mean by running away
with a vagabond, disgracing your family, and making yourself miserable?
Get on your bonnet and come back. Call a hackney-coach there, directly,
and bring this lady's bill, d'ye hear--d'ye hear?' 'Cert'nly, Sir,'
replied Sam, who had answered Wardle's violent ringing of the bell with
a degree of celerity which must have appeared marvellous to anybody who
didn't know that his eye had been applied to the outside of the keyhole
during the whole interview.
'Get on your bonnet,' repeated Wardle.
'Do nothing of the kind,' said Jingle. 'Leave the room, Sir--no business
here--lady's free to act as she pleases--more than one-and-twenty.'
'More than one-and-twenty!' ejaculated Wardle contemptuously. 'More than
one-and-forty!'
'I ain't,' said the spinster aunt, her indignation getting the better of
her determination to faint.
'You are,' replied Wardle; 'you're fifty if you're an hour.'
Here the spinster aunt uttered a loud shriek, and became senseless.
'A glass of water,' said the humane Mr. Pickwick, summoning the
landlady.
'A glass of water!' said the passionate Wardle. 'Bring a bucket, and
throw it all over her; it'll do her good, and she richly deserves it.'
'Ugh, you brute!' ejaculated the kind-hearted landlady. 'Poor dear.' And
with sundry ejaculations of 'Come now, there's a dear--drink a little of
this--it'll do you good--don't give way so--there's a love,' etc.
etc., the landlady, assisted by a chambermaid, proceeded to vinegar the
forehead, beat the hands, titillate the nose, and unlace the stays of
the spinster aunt, and to administer such other restoratives as are
usually applied by compassionate females to ladies who are endeavouring
to ferment themselves into hysterics.
'Coach is ready, Sir,' said Sam, appearing at the door.
'Come along,' cried Wardle. 'I'll carry her downstairs.'
At this proposition, the hysterics came on with redoubled violence.
The landlady was about to enter a very violent protest against this
proceeding, and had already given vent to an indignant inquiry whether
Mr. Wardle considered himself a lord of the creation, when Mr. Jingle
interposed--
'Boots,' said he, 'get me an officer.'
'Stay, stay,' said little Mr. Perker. 'Consider, Sir, consider.'
'I'll not consider,' replied Jingle. 'She's her own mistress--see who
dares to take her away--unless she wishes it.'
'I WON'T be taken away,' murmured the spinster aunt. 'I DON'T wish it.'
(Here there was a frightful relapse.)
'My dear Sir,' said the little man, in a low tone, taking Mr. Wardle
and Mr. Pickwick apart--'my dear Sir, we're in a very awkward situation.
It's a distressing case--very; I never knew one more so; but really,
my dear sir, really we have no power to control this lady's actions. I
warned you before we came, my dear sir, that there was nothing to look
to but a compromise.'
There was a short pause.
'What kind of compromise would you recommend?' inquired Mr. Pickwick.
'Why, my dear Sir, our friend's in an unpleasant position--very much so.
We must be content to suffer some pecuniary loss.'
'I'll suffer any, rather than submit to this disgrace, and let her, fool
as she is, be made miserable for life,' said Wardle.
'I rather think it can be done,' said the bustling little man. 'Mr.
Jingle, will you step with us into the next room for a moment?'
Mr. Jingle assented, and the quartette walked into an empty apartment.
'Now, sir,' said the little man, as he carefully closed the door, 'is
there no way of accommodating this matter--step this way, sir, for a
moment--into this window, Sir, where we can be alone--there, sir, there,
pray sit down, sir. Now, my dear Sir, between you and I, we know very
well, my dear Sir, that you have run off with this lady for the sake of
her money. Don't frown, Sir, don't frown; I say, between you and I, WE
know it. We are both men of the world, and WE know very well that our
friends here, are not--eh?'
Mr. Jingle's face gradually relaxed; and something distantly resembling
a wink quivered for an instant in his left eye.
'Very good, very good,' said the little man, observing the impression
he had made. 'Now, the fact is, that beyond a few hundreds, the lady has
little or nothing till the death of her mother--fine old lady, my dear
Sir.'
'OLD,' said Mr. Jingle briefly but emphatically.
'Why, yes,' said the attorney, with a slight cough. 'You are right, my
dear Sir, she is rather old. She comes of an old family though, my dear
Sir; old in every sense of the word. The founder of that family came
into Kent when Julius Caesar invaded Britain;--only one member of it,
since, who hasn't lived to eighty-five, and he was beheaded by one of
the Henrys. The old lady is not seventy-three now, my dear Sir.' The
little man paused, and took a pinch of snuff.
'Well,' cried Mr. Jingle.
'Well, my dear sir--you don't take snuff!--ah! so much the
better--expensive habit--well, my dear Sir, you're a fine young man, man
of the world--able to push your fortune, if you had capital, eh?'
'Well,' said Mr. Jingle again.
'Do you comprehend me?'
'Not quite.'
'Don't you think--now, my dear Sir, I put it to you don't you
think--that fifty pounds and liberty would be better than Miss Wardle
and expectation?'
'Won't do--not half enough!' said Mr. Jingle, rising.
'Nay, nay, my dear Sir,' remonstrated the little attorney, seizing him
by the button. 'Good round sum--a man like you could treble it in no
time--great deal to be done with fifty pounds, my dear Sir.'
'More to be done with a hundred and fifty,' replied Mr. Jingle coolly.
'Well, my dear Sir, we won't waste time in splitting straws,' resumed
the little man, 'say--say--seventy.' 'Won't do,' said Mr. Jingle.
'Don't go away, my dear sir--pray don't hurry,' said the little man.
'Eighty; come: I'll write you a cheque at once.'
'Won't do,' said Mr. Jingle.
'Well, my dear Sir, well,' said the little man, still detaining him;
'just tell me what WILL do.'
'Expensive affair,' said Mr. Jingle. 'Money out of pocket--posting, nine
pounds; licence, three--that's twelve--compensation, a hundred--hundred
and twelve--breach of honour--and loss of the lady--'
'Yes, my dear Sir, yes,' said the little man, with a knowing look,
'never mind the last two items. That's a hundred and twelve--say a
hundred--come.'
'And twenty,' said Mr. Jingle.
'Come, come, I'll write you a cheque,' said the little man; and down he
sat at the table for that purpose.
'I'll make it payable the day after to-morrow,' said the little
man, with a look towards Mr. Wardle; 'and we can get the lady away,
meanwhile.' Mr. Wardle sullenly nodded assent.
'A hundred,' said the little man.
'And twenty,' said Mr. Jingle.
'My dear Sir,' remonstrated the little man.
'Give it him,' interposed Mr. Wardle, 'and let him go.'
The cheque was written by the little gentleman, and pocketed by Mr.
Jingle.
'Now, leave this house instantly!' said Wardle, starting up.
'My dear Sir,' urged the little man.
'And mind,' said Mr. Wardle, 'that nothing should have induced me to
make this compromise--not even a regard for my family--if I had not
known that the moment you got any money in that pocket of yours, you'd
go to the devil faster, if possible, than you would without it--'
'My dear sir,' urged the little man again.
'Be quiet, Perker,' resumed Wardle. 'Leave the room, Sir.'
'Off directly,' said the unabashed Jingle. 'Bye bye, Pickwick.' If
any dispassionate spectator could have beheld the countenance of the
illustrious man, whose name forms the leading feature of the title of
this work, during the latter part of this conversation, he would have
been almost induced to wonder that the indignant fire which flashed from
his eyes did not melt the glasses of his spectacles--so majestic was his
wrath. His nostrils dilated, and his fists clenched involuntarily, as
he heard himself addressed by the villain. But he restrained himself
again--he did not pulverise him.
'Here,' continued the hardened traitor, tossing the licence at Mr.
Pickwick's feet; 'get the name altered--take home the lady--do for
Tuppy.'
Mr. Pickwick was a philosopher, but philosophers are only men in
armour, after all. The shaft had reached him, penetrated through his
philosophical harness, to his very heart. In the frenzy of his rage, he
hurled the inkstand madly forward, and followed it up himself. But Mr.
Jingle had disappeared, and he found himself caught in the arms of Sam.
'Hollo,' said that eccentric functionary, 'furniter's cheap where you
come from, Sir. Self-acting ink, that 'ere; it's wrote your mark upon
the wall, old gen'l'm'n. Hold still, Sir; wot's the use o' runnin' arter
a man as has made his lucky, and got to t'other end of the Borough by
this time?'
Mr. Pickwick's mind, like those of all truly great men, was open
