CHAPTER XXI.
DIRECTLY as I closed the door, I saw laid on the table two letters; mythought was, that they were notes of invitation from the friends of someof my pupils; I had received such marks of attention occasionally, andwith me, who had no friends, correspondence of more interest was outof the question the postman's arrival had never yet been an event ofinterest to me since I came to Brussels. I laid my hand carelessly onthe documents, and coldly and slowly glancing at them, I prepared tobreak the seals; my eye was arrested and my hand too; I saw what excitedme, as if I had found a vivid picture where I expected only to discovera blank page: on one cover was an English postmark; on the other, alady's clear, fine autograph; the last I opened first:--
"MONSIEUR,
"I FOUND out what you had done the very morning after your visit to me;you might be sure I should dust the china, every day; and, as no one butyou had been in my room for a week, and as fairy-money is not currentin Brussels, I could not doubt who left the twenty francs on thechimney-piece. I thought I heard you stir the vase when I was stoopingto look for your glove under the table, and I wondered you shouldimagine it had got into such a little cup. Now, monsieur, the moneyis not mine, and I shall not keep it; I will not send it in this notebecause it might be lost--besides, it is heavy; but I will restore itto you the first time I see you, and you must make no difficulties abouttaking it; because, in the first place, I am sure, monsieur, you canunderstand that one likes to pay one's debts; that it is satisfactoryto owe no man anything; and, in the second place, I can now very wellafford to be honest, as I am provided with a situation. This lastcircumstance is, indeed, the reason of my writing to you, for it ispleasant to communicate good news; and, in these days, I have only mymaster to whom I can tell anything.
"A week ago, monsieur, I was sent for by a Mrs. Wharton, an Englishlady; her eldest daughter was going to be married, and some richrelation having made her a present of a veil and dress in costly oldlace, as precious, they said, almost as jewels, but a little damaged bytime, I was commissioned to put them in repair. I had to do it at thehouse; they gave me, besides, some embroidery to complete, and nearlya week elapsed before I had finished everything. While I worked, MissWharton often came into the room and sat with me, and so did Mrs.Wharton they made me talk English; asked how I had learned to speak itso well; then they inquired what I knew besides--what books I had read;soon they seemed to make a sort of wonder of me, considering me no doubtas a learned grisette. One afternoon, Mrs. Wharton brought in a Parisianlady to test the accuracy of my knowledge of French; the result ofit was that, owing probably in a great degree to the mother's anddaughter's good humour about the marriage, which inclined them todo beneficent deeds, and partly, I think, because they are naturallybenevolent people, they decided that the wish I had expressed to dosomething more than mend lace was a very legitimate one; and the sameday they took me in their carriage to Mrs. D.'s, who is the directressof the first English school at Brussels. It seems she happened to be inwant of a French lady to give lessons in geography, history, grammar,and composition, in the French language. Mrs. Wharton recommended mevery warmly; and, as two of her younger daughters are pupils in thehouse, her patronage availed to get me the place. It was settled that Iam to attend six hours daily (for, happily, it was not required thatI should live in the house; I should have been sorry to leave mylodgings), and, for this, Mrs. D. will give me twelve hundred francs perannum.
"You see, therefore, monsieur, that I am now rich; richer almost thanI ever hoped to be: I feel thankful for it, especially as my sight wasbeginning to be injured by constant working at fine lace; and I wasgetting, too, very weary of sitting up late at nights, and yet not beingable to find time for reading or study. I began to fear that I shouldfall ill, and be unable to pay my way; this fear is now, in a greatmeasure, removed; and, in truth, monsieur, I am very grateful to God forthe relief; and I feel it necessary, almost, to speak of my happinessto some one who is kind-hearted enough to derive joy from seeing othersjoyful. I could not, therefore, resist the temptation of writing to you;I argued with myself it is very pleasant for me to write, and it willnot be exactly painful, though it may be tiresome to monsieur toread. Do not be too angry with my circumlocution and inelegancies ofexpression, and, believe me
"Your attached pupil,
"F. E. HENRI."
Having read this letter, I mused on its contents for a fewmoments--whether with sentiments pleasurable or otherwise I willhereafter note--and then took up the other. It was directed in a handto me unknown--small, and rather neat; neither masculine nor exactlyfeminine; the seal bore a coat of arms, concerning which I could onlydecipher that it was not that of the Seacombe family, consequently theepistle could be from none of my almost forgotten, and certainly quiteforgetting patrician relations. From whom, then, was it? I removed theenvelope; the note folded within ran as follows:
"I have no doubt in the world that you are doing well in that greasyFlanders; living probably on the fat of the unctuous land; sitting likea black-haired, tawny-skinned, long-nosed Israelite by the flesh-potsof Egypt; or like a rascally son of Levi near the brass cauldrons of thesanctuary, and every now and then plunging in a consecrated hook, anddrawing out of the sea of broth the fattest of heave-shoulders and thefleshiest of wave-breasts. I know this, because you never write to anyone in England. Thankless dog that you are! I, by the sovereign efficacyof my recommendation, got you the place where you are now living inclover, and yet not a word of gratitude, or even acknowledgment, haveyou ever offered in return; but I am coming to see you, and smallconception can you, with your addled aristocratic brains, form of thesort of moral kicking I have, ready packed in my carpet-bag, destined tobe presented to you immediately on my arrival.
"Meantime I know all about your affairs, and have just got information,by Brown's last letter, that you are said to be on the point of formingan advantageous match with a pursy, little Belgian schoolmistress--aMdlle. Zenobie, or some such name. Won't I have a look at her when Icome over! And this you may rely on: if she pleases my taste, or if Ithink it worth while in a pecuniary point of view, I'll pounce on yourprize and bear her away triumphant in spite of your teeth. Yet I don'tlike dumpies either, and Brown says she is little and stout--the betterfitted for a wiry, starved-looking chap like you. "Be on the look-out,for you know neither the day nor hour when your ----" (I don't wish toblaspheme, so I'll leave a blank)--cometh.
"Yours truly,
"HUNSDEN YORKE HUNSDEN."
"Humph!" said I; and ere I laid the letter down, I again glanced at thesmall, neat handwriting, not a bit like that of a mercantile man, nor,indeed, of any man except Hunsden himself. They talk of affinitiesbetween the autograph and the character: what affinity was there here?I recalled the writer's peculiar face and certain traits I suspected,rather than knew, to appertain to his nature, and I answered, "A greatdeal."
Hunsden, then, was coming to Brussels, and coming I knew not when;coming charged with the expectation of finding me on the summit ofprosperity, about to be married, to step into a warm nest, to liecomfortably down by the side of a snug, well-fed little mate.
"I wish him joy of the fidelity of the picture he has painted," thoughtI. "What will he say when, instead of a pair of plump turtle doves,billing and cooing in a bower of roses, he finds a single leancormorant, standing mateless and shelterless on poverty's bleak cliff?Oh, confound him! Let him come, and let him laugh at the contrastbetween rumour and fact. Were he the devil himself, instead of beingmerely very like him, I'd not condescend to get out of his way, or toforge a smile or a cheerful word wherewith to avert his sarcasm."
Then I recurred to the other letter: that struck a chord whose sound Icould not deaden by thrusting my fingers into my ears, for it vibratedwithin; and though its swell might be exquisite music, its cadence was agroan.
That Frances was relieved from the pressure of want, that the curse ofexcessive labour was taken off her, filled me with happiness; that herfirst thought in prosperity should b
e to augment her joy by sharingit with me, met and satisfied the wish of my heart. Two results of herletter were then pleasant, sweet as two draughts of nectar; but applyingmy lips for the third time to the cup, and they were excoriated as withvinegar and gall.
Two persons whose desires are moderate may live well enough in Brusselson an income which would scarcely afford a respectable maintenance forone in London: and that, not because the necessaries of life are somuch dearer in the latter capital, or taxes so much higher than in theformer, but because the English surpass in folly all the nations onGod's earth, and are more abject slaves to custom, to opinion, tothe desire to keep up a certain appearance, than the Italians are topriestcraft, the French to vain-glory, the Russians to their Czar, orthe Germans to black beer. I have seen a degree of sense in the modestarrangement of one homely Belgian household, that might put to shame theelegance, the superfluities, the luxuries, the strained refinements ofa hundred genteel English mansions. In Belgium, provided you canmake money, you may save it; this is scarcely possible in England;ostentation there lavishes in a month what industry has earned in ayear. More shame to all classes in that most bountiful and beggarlycountry for their servile following of Fashion I could write a chapteror two on this subject, but must forbear, at least for the present. HadI retained my 60l. per annum I could, now that Frances was in possessionof 50l., have gone straight to her this very evening, and spoken out thewords which, repressed, kept fretting my heart with fever; our unitedincome would, as we should have managed it, have sufficed well forour mutual support; since we lived in a country where economy was notconfounded with meanness, where frugality in dress, food, and furniture,was not synonymous with vulgarity in these various points. But theplaceless usher, bare of resource, and unsupported by connections, mustnot think of this; such a sentiment as love, such a word as marriage,were misplaced in his heart, and on his lips. Now for the first time didI truly feel what it was to be poor; now did the sacrifice I had madein casting from me the means of living put on a new aspect; instead ofa correct, just, honourable act, it seemed a deed at once light andfanatical; I took several turns in my room, under the goading influenceof most poignant remorse; I walked a quarter of an hour from the wall tothe window; and at the window, self-reproach seemed to face me; at thewall, self-disdain: all at once out spoke Conscience:--
"Down, stupid tormenters!" cried she; "the man has done his duty;you shall not bait him thus by thoughts of what might have been; herelinquished a temporary and contingent good to avoid a permanent andcertain evil he did well. Let him reflect now, and when your blindingdust and deafening hum subside, he will discover a path."
I sat down; I propped my forehead on both my hands; I thought andthought an hour--two hours; vainly. I seemed like one sealed in asubterranean vault, who gazes at utter blackness; at blackness ensuredby yard-thick stone walls around, and by piles of building above,expecting light to penetrate through granite, and through cement firmas granite. But there are chinks, or there may be chinks, in thebest adjusted masonry; there was a chink in my cavernous cell; for,eventually, I saw, or seemed to see, a ray--pallid, indeed, and cold,and doubtful, but still a ray, for it showed that narrow path whichconscience had promised after two, three hours' torturing research inbrain and memory, I disinterred certain remains of circumstances, andconceived a hope that by putting them together an expedient might beframed, and a resource discovered. The circumstances were briefly these:
Some three months ago M. Pelet had, on the occasion of his fete, giventhe boys a treat, which treat consisted in a party of pleasure to acertain place of public resort in the outskirts of Brussels, of whichI do not at this moment remember the name, but near it were several ofthose lakelets called etangs; and there was one etang, larger than therest, where on holidays people were accustomed to amuse themselves byrowing round it in little boats. The boys having eaten an unlimitedquantity of "gaufres," and drank several bottles of Louvain beer, amidthe shades of a garden made and provided for such crams, petitionedthe director for leave to take a row on the etang. Half a dozen of theeldest succeeded in obtaining leave, and I was commissioned to accompanythem as surveillant. Among the half dozen happened to be a certain JeanBaptiste Vandenhuten, a most ponderous young Flamand, not tall, buteven now, at the early age of sixteen, possessing a breadth and depth ofpersonal development truly national. It chanced that Jean was the firstlad to step into the boat; he stumbled, rolled to one side, the boatrevolted at his weight and capsized. Vandenhuten sank like lead, rose,sank again. My coat and waistcoat were off in an instant; I had not beenbrought up at Eton and boated and bathed and swam there ten long yearsfor nothing; it was a natural and easy act for me to leap to the rescue.The lads and the boatmen yelled; they thought there would be two deathsby drowning instead of one; but as Jean rose the third time, I clutchedhim by one leg and the collar, and in three minutes more both he and Iwere safe landed. To speak heaven's truth, my merit in the action wassmall indeed, for I had run no risk, and subsequently did not even catchcold from the wetting; but when M. and Madame Vandenhuten, of whom JeanBaptiste was the sole hope, came to hear of the exploit, they seemedto think I had evinced a bravery and devotion which no thanks couldsufficiently repay. Madame, in particular, was "certain I must havedearly loved their sweet son, or I would not thus have hazarded my ownlife to save his." Monsieur, an honest-looking, though phlegmatic man,said very little, but he would not suffer me to leave the room, tillI had promised that in case I ever stood in need of help I would, byapplying to him, give him a chance of discharging the obligation underwhich he affirmed I had laid him. These words, then, were my glimmer oflight; it was here I found my sole outlet; and in truth, though the coldlight roused, it did not cheer me; nor did the outlet seem such as Ishould like to pass through. Right I had none to M. Vandenhuten's goodoffices; it was not on the ground of merit I could apply to him; no, Imust stand on that of necessity: I had no work; I wanted work; my bestchance of obtaining it lay in securing his recommendation. This I knewcould be had by asking for it; not to ask, because the request revoltedmy pride and contradicted my habits, would, I felt, be an indulgence offalse and indolent fastidiousness. I might repent the omission all mylife; I would not then be guilty of it.
That evening I went to M. Vandenhuten's; but I had bent the bow andadjusted the shaft in vain; the string broke. I rang the bell at thegreat door (it was a large, handsome house in an expensive part of thetown); a manservant opened; I asked for M. Vandenhuten; M. Vandenhutenand family were all out of town--gone to Ostend--did not know when theywould be back. I left my card, and retraced my steps.