This etext was prepared from the 1911 John Murray edition.
THE GREAT HOGGARTY DIAMOND
CHAPTER I
GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF OUR VILLAGE AND THE FIRST GLIMPSE OF THE
DIAMOND
When I came up to town for my second year, my aunt Hoggarty made me
a present of a diamond-pin; that is to say, it was not a diamond-
pin then, but a large old-fashioned locket, of Dublin manufacture
in the year 1795, which the late Mr. Hoggarty used to sport at the
Lord Lieutenant's balls and elsewhere. He wore it, he said, at the
battle of Vinegar Hill, when his club pigtail saved his head from
being taken off,--but that is neither here nor there.
In the middle of the brooch was Hoggarty in the scarlet uniform of
the corps of Fencibles to which he belonged; around it were
thirteen locks of hair, belonging to a baker's dozen of sisters
that the old gentleman had; and, as all these little ringlets
partook of the family hue of brilliant auburn, Hoggarty's portrait
seemed to the fanciful view like a great fat red round of beef
surrounded by thirteen carrots. These were dished up on a plate of
blue enamel, and it was from the GREAT HOGGARTY DIAMOND (as we
called it in the family) that the collection of hairs in question
seemed as it were to spring.
My aunt, I need not say, is rich; and I thought I might be her heir
as well as another. During my month's holiday, she was
particularly pleased with me; made me drink tea with her often
(though there was a certain person in the village with whom on
those golden summer evenings I should have liked to have taken a
stroll in the hayfields); promised every time I drank her bohea to
do something handsome for me when I went back to town,--nay, three
or four times had me to dinner at three, and to whist or cribbage
afterwards. I did not care for the cards; for though we always
played seven hours on a stretch, and I always lost, my losings were
never more than nineteenpence a night: but there was some infernal
sour black-currant wine, that the old lady always produced at
dinner, and with the tray at ten o'clock, and which I dared not
refuse; though upon my word and honour it made me very unwell.
Well, I thought after all this obsequiousness on my part, and my
aunt's repeated promises, that the old lady would at least make me
a present of a score of guineas (of which she had a power in the
drawer); and so convinced was I that some such present was intended
for me, that a young lady by the name of Miss Mary Smith, with whom
I had conversed on the subject, actually netted me a little green
silk purse, which she gave me (behind Hicks's hayrick, as you turn
to the right up Churchyard Lane)--which she gave me, I say, wrapped
up in a bit of silver paper. There was something in the purse,
too, if the truth must be known. First there was a thick curl of
the glossiest blackest hair you ever saw in your life, and next
there was threepence: that is to say, the half of a silver
sixpence hanging by a little necklace of blue riband. Ah, but I
knew where the other half of the sixpence was, and envied that
happy bit of silver!
The last day of my holiday I was obliged, of course, to devote to
Mrs. Hoggarty. My aunt was excessively gracious; and by way of a
treat brought out a couple of bottles of the black currant, of
which she made me drink the greater part. At night when all the
ladies assembled at her party had gone off with their pattens and
their maids, Mrs. Hoggarty, who had made a signal to me to stay,
first blew out three of the wax candles in the drawing-room, and
taking the fourth in her hand, went and unlocked her escritoire.
I can tell you my heart beat, though I pretended to look quite
unconcerned.
"Sam my dear," said she, as she was fumbling with her keys, "take
another glass of Rosolio" (that was the name by which she baptised
the cursed beverage): "it will do you good." I took it, and you
might have seen my hand tremble as the bottle went click--click
against the glass. By the time I had swallowed it, the old lady
had finished her operations at the bureau, and was coming towards
me, the wax-candle bobbing in one hand and a large parcel in the
other.
"Now's the time," thought I.
"Samuel, my dear nephew," said she, "your first name you received
from your sainted uncle, my blessed husband; and of all my nephews
and nieces, you are the one whose conduct in life has most pleased
me."
When you consider that my aunt herself was one of seven married
sisters, that all the Hoggarties were married in Ireland and
mothers of numerous children, I must say that the compliment my
aunt paid me was a very handsome one.
"Dear aunt," says I, in a slow agitated voice, "I have often heard
you say there were seventy-three of us in all, and believe me I do
think your high opinion of me very complimentary indeed: I'm
unworthy of it--indeed I am."
"As for those odious Irish people," says my aunt, rather sharply,
"don't speak of them, I hate them, and every one of their mothers"
(the fact is, there had been a lawsuit about Hoggarty's property);
"but of all my other kindred, you, Samuel, have been the most
dutiful and affectionate to me. Your employers in London give the
best accounts of your regularity and good conduct. Though you have
had eighty pounds a year (a liberal salary), you have not spent a
shilling more than your income, as other young men would; and you
have devoted your month's holidays to your old aunt, who, I assure
you, is grateful."
"Oh, ma'am!" said I. It was all that I could utter.
"Samuel," continued she, "I promised you a present, and here it is.
I first thought of giving you money; but you are a regular lad; and
don't want it. You are above money, dear Samuel. I give you what
I value most in life--the p,--the po, the po-ortrait of my sainted
Hoggarty" (tears), "set in the locket which contains the valuable
diamond that you have often heard me speak of. Wear it, dear Sam,
for my sake; and think of that angel in heaven, and of your dear
Aunt Susy."
She put the machine into my hands: it was about the size of the
lid of a shaving-box: and I should as soon have thought of wearing
it as of wearing a cocked-hat and pigtail. I was so disgusted and
disappointed that I really could not get out a single word.
When I recovered my presence of mind a little, I took the locket
out of the bit of paper (the locket indeed! it was as big as a
barndoor padlock), and slowly put it into my shirt. "Thank you,
Aunt," said I, with admirable raillery. "I shall always value this
present for the sake of you, who gave it me; and it will recall to
me my
uncle, and my thirteen aunts in Ireland."
"I don't want you to wear it in THAT way!" shrieked Mrs. Hoggarty,
"with the hair of those odious carroty women. You must have their
hair removed."
"Then the locket will be spoiled, Aunt."
"Well, sir, never mind the locket; have it set afresh."
"Or suppose," said I, "I put aside the setting altogether: it is a
little too large for the present fashion; and have the portrait of
my uncle framed and placed over my chimney-piece, next to yours.
It's a sweet miniature."
"That miniature," said Mrs. Hoggarty, solemnly, "was the great
Mulcahy's chef-d'oeuvre" (pronounced shy dewver, a favourite word
of my aunt's; being, with the words bongtong and ally mode de
Parry, the extent of her French vocabulary). "You know the
dreadful story of that poor poor artist. When he had finished that
wonderful likeness for the late Mrs. Hoggarty of Castle Hoggarty,
county Mayo, she wore it in her bosom at the Lord Lieutenant's
ball, where she played a game of piquet with the Commander-in-
Chief. What could have made her put the hair of her vulgar
daughters round Mick's portrait, I can't think; but so it was, as
you see it this day. 'Madam,' says the Commander-in-Chief, 'if
that is not my friend Mick Hoggarty, I'm a Dutchman!' Those were
his Lordship's very words. Mrs. Hoggarty of Castle Hoggarty took
off the brooch and showed it to him.
"'Who is the artist?' says my Lord. 'It's the most wonderful
likeness I ever saw in my life!'
"'Mulcahy,' says she, 'of Ormond's Quay.'
"'Begad, I patronise him!' says my Lord; but presently his face
darkened, and he gave back the picture with a dissatisfied air.
'There is one fault in that portrait,' said his Lordship, who was a
rigid disciplinarian; 'and I wonder that my friend Mick, as a
military man, should have overlooked it.'
"'What's that?' says Mrs. Hoggarty of Castle Hoggarty.
"'Madam, he has been painted WITHOUT HIS SWORD-BELT!' And he took
up the cards again in a passion, and finished the game without
saying a single word.
"The news was carried to Mr. Mulcahy the next day, and that
unfortunate artist WENT MAD IMMEDIATELY! He had set his whole
reputation upon this miniature, and declared that it should be
faultless. Such was the effect of the announcement upon his
susceptible heart! When Mrs. Hoggarty died, your uncle took the
portrait and always wore it himself. His sisters said it was for
the sake of the diamond; whereas, ungrateful things! it was merely
on account of their hair, and his love for the fine arts. As for
the poor artist, my dear, some people said it was the profuse use
of spirit that brought on delirium tremens; but I don't believe it.
Take another glass of Rosolio."
The telling of this story always put my aunt into great good-
humour, and she promised at the end of it to pay for the new
setting of the diamond; desiring me to take it on my arrival in
London to the great jeweller, Mr. Polonius, and send her the bill.
"The fact is," said she, "that the gold in which the thing is set
is worth five guineas at the very least, and you can have the
diamond reset for two. However, keep the remainder, dear Sam, and
buy yourself what you please with it."
With this the old lady bade me adieu. The clock was striking
twelve as I walked down the village, for the story of Mulcahy
always took an hour in the telling, and I went away not quite so
downhearted as when the present was first made to me. "After all,"
thought I, "a diamond-pin is a handsome thing, and will give me a
distingue air, though my clothes be never so shabby"--and shabby
they were without any doubt. "Well," I said, "three guineas, which
I shall have over, will buy me a couple of pairs of what-d'ye-call-
'ems;" of which, entre nous, I was in great want, having just then
done growing, whereas my pantaloons were made a good eighteen
months before.
Well, I walked down the village, my hands in my breeches pockets; I
had poor Mary's purse there, having removed the little things which
she gave me the day before, and placed them--never mind where: but
look you, in those days I had a heart, and a warm one too. I had
Mary's purse ready for my aunt's donation, which never came, and
with my own little stock of money besides, that Mrs. Hoggarty's
card parties had lessened by a good five-and-twenty shillings, I
calculated that, after paying my fare, I should get to town with a
couple of seven-shilling pieces in my pocket.
I walked down the village at a deuce of a pace; so quick that, if
the thing had been possible, I should have overtaken ten o'clock
that had passed by me two hours ago, when I was listening to Mrs.
H.'s long stories over her terrible Rosolio. The truth is, at ten
I had an appointment under a certain person's window, who was to
have been looking at the moon at that hour, with her pretty quilled
nightcap on, and her blessed hair in papers.
There was the window shut, and not so much as a candle in it; and
though I hemmed and hawed, and whistled over the garden paling, and
sang a song of which Somebody was very fond, and even threw a
pebble at the window, which hit it exactly at the opening of the
lattice,--I woke no one except a great brute of a house-dog, that
yelled, and howled, and bounced so at me over the rails, that I
thought every moment he would have had my nose between his teeth.
So I was obliged to go off as quickly as might be; and the next
morning Mamma and my sisters made breakfast for me at four, and at
five came the "True Blue" light six-inside post-coach to London,
and I got up on the roof without having seen Mary Smith.
As we passed the house, it DID seem as if the window curtain in her
room was drawn aside just a little bit. Certainly the window was
open, and it had been shut the night before: but away went the
coach; and the village, cottage, and the churchyard, and Hicks's
hayricks were soon out of sight.
* * *
"My hi, what a pin!" said a stable-boy, who was smoking a cigar, to
the guard, looking at me and putting his finger to his nose.
The fact is, that I had never undressed since my aunt's party; and
being uneasy in mind and having all my clothes to pack up, and
thinking of something else, had quite forgotten Mrs. Hoggarty's
brooch, which I had stuck into my shirt-frill the night before.
CHAPTER II
TELLS HOW THE DIAMOND IS BROUGHT UP TO LONDON, AND PRODUCES
WONDERFUL EFFECTS BOTH IN THE CITY AND AT THE WEST END
The circumstances recorded in this story took place some score of
years ago, when, as the reader may remember, there was a great
mania in the City of London for establishing companies of all
sorts; by which many people made pretty fortunes.
I was at this period, as the truth must be known, thirteenth clerk
of twenty-four young gents who did the immense business of the
Independent West Diddlesex Fire and Life Insurance Company,
at
their splendid stone mansion in Cornhill. Mamma had sunk a sum of
four hundred pounds in the purchase of an annuity at this office,
which paid her no less than six-and-thirty pounds a year, when no
other company in London would give her more than twenty-four. The
chairman of the directors was the great Mr. Brough, of the house of
Brough and Hoff, Crutched Friars, Turkey Merchants. It was a new
house, but did a tremendous business in the fig and sponge way, and
more in the Zante currant line than any other firm in the City.
Brough was a great man among the Dissenting connection, and you saw
his name for hundreds at the head of every charitable society
patronised by those good people. He had nine clerks residing at
his office in Crutched Friars; he would not take one without a
certificate from the schoolmaster and clergyman of his native
place, strongly vouching for his morals and doctrine; and the
places were so run after, that he got a premium of four or five
hundred pounds with each young gent, whom he made to slave for ten
hours a day, and to whom in compensation he taught all the
mysteries of the Turkish business. He was a great man on 'Change,
too; and our young chaps used to hear from the stockbrokers' clerks
(we commonly dined together at the "Cock and Woolpack," a
respectable house, where you get a capital cut of meat, bread,
vegetables, cheese, half a pint of porter, and a penny to the
waiter, for a shilling)--the young stockbrokers used to tell us of
immense bargains in Spanish, Greek, and Columbians, that Brough
made. Hoff had nothing to do with them, but stopped at home
minding exclusively the business of the house. He was a young
chap, very quiet and steady, of the Quaker persuasion, and had been
taken into partnership by Brough for a matter of thirty thousand
pounds: and a very good bargain too. I was told in the strictest
confidence that the house one year with another divided a good
seven thousand pounds: of which Brough had half, Hoff two-sixths,
and the other sixth went to old Tudlow, who had been Mr. Brough's
clerk before the new partnership began. Tudlow always went about
very shabby, and we thought him an old miser. One of our gents,
Bob Swinney by name, used to say that Tudlow's share was all
nonsense, and that Brough had it all; but Bob was always too
knowing by half, used to wear a green cutaway coat, and had his
free admission to Covent Garden Theatre. He was always talking
down at the shop, as we called it (it wasn't a shop, but as
splendid an office as any in Cornhill)--he was always talking about
Vestris and Miss Tree, and singing
"The bramble, the bramble,
The jolly jolly bramble!"
one of Charles Kemble's famous songs in "Maid Marian;" a play that
was all the rage then, taken from a famous story-book by one
Peacock, a clerk in the India House; and a precious good place he
has too.
When Brough heard how Master Swinney abused him, and had his
admission to the theatre, he came one day down to the office where
we all were, four-and-twenty of us, and made one of the most
beautiful speeches I ever heard in my life. He said that for
slander he did not care, contumely was the lot of every public man
who had austere principles of his own, and acted by them austerely;
but what he DID care for was the character of every single
gentleman forming a part of the Independent West Diddlesex
Association. The welfare of thousands was in their keeping;
millions of money were daily passing through their hands; the City-
-the country looked upon them for order, honesty, and good example.
And if he found amongst those whom he considered as his children--
those whom he loved as his own flesh and blood--that that order was
departed from, that that regularity was not maintained, that that