‘How did you come by that handbill?’ she repeated passionately.
‘I beg ten thousand pardons! My head was running on the family spirit. – How did I come by it? Briefly thus.’ Here Captain Wragge entered on his personal statement; taking his customary vocal exercise through the longest words of the English language, with the highest elocutionary relish. Having on this rare occasion nothing to gain by concealment, he departed from his ordinary habits; and with the utmost amazement at the novelty of his own situation, permitted himself to tell the unmitigated truth.
The effect of the narrative on Magdalen by no means fulfilled Captain Wragge’s anticipations in relating it. She was not startled; she was not irritated; she showed no disposition to cast herself on his mercy, and to seek his advice. She looked him steadily in the face; and all she said when he had neatly rounded his last sentence, was — ‘Go on.’
‘Go on?’ repeated the captain. ‘Shocked to disappoint you, I am sure – but the fact is, I have done.’
‘No, you have not,’ she rejoined; ‘you have left out the end of your story. The end of it is: You came here to look for me; and you mean to earn the fifty pounds reward.’
Those plain words so completely staggered Captain Wragge, that for the moment he stood speechless. But he had faced awkward truths of all sorts far too often to be permanently disconcerted by them. Before Magdalen could pursue her advantage, the vagabond had recovered his balance: Wragge was himself again.
‘Smart,’ said the captain, laughing indulgently, and drumming with his umbrella on the pavement. ‘Some men might take it seriously. I’m not easily offended. Try again.’
Magdalen looked at him through the gathering darkness, in mute perplexity. All her little experience of society, had been experience among people who possessed a common sense of honour, and a common responsibility of social position. She had hitherto seen nothing but the successful human product from the great manufactory of Civilization. Here was one of the failures – and, with all her quickness, she was puzzled how to deal with it.
‘Pardon me for returning to the subject,’ pursued the captain. ‘It has just occurred to my mind that you might actually have spoken in earnest. My poor child! how can I earn the fifty pounds before the reward is offered to me? Those handbills may not be publicly posted for a week to come. Precious as you are to all your relatives (myself included), take my word for it, the lawyers who are managing this case will not pay fifty pounds for you if they can possibly help it. Are you still persuaded that my needy pockets are gaping for the money? Very good. Button them up in spite of me, with your own fair fingers. There is a train to London at nine-forty-five to-night. Submit yourself to your friend’s wishes; and go back by it.’
‘Never!’ said Magdalen, firing at the bare suggestion, exactly as the captain had intended she should. ‘If my mind had not been made up before, that vile handbill would have decided me. I forgive Norah,’ she added, turning away, and speaking to herself, ‘but not Mr Pendril, and not Miss Garth.’
‘Quite right!’ observed Captain Wragge. ‘The family spirit. I should have done the same myself at your age. It runs in the blood. Hark! there goes the clock again – half-past seven. Miss Vanstone, pardon this seasonable abruptness! If you are to carry out your resolution – if you are to be your own mistress much longer, you must take a course of some kind before eight o’clock. You are young, you are inexperienced, you are in imminent danger. Here is a position of emergency on one side – and here am I, on the other, with an uncle’s interest in you, full of advice. Tap me.’
‘Suppose I choose to depend on nobody, and to act for myself?’ said Magdalen. ‘What then?’
‘Then,’ replied the captain, ‘you will walk straight into one of the four traps which are set to catch you in the ancient and interesting city of York. Trap the first, at Mr Huxtable’s house; trap the second, at all the hotels; trap the third, at the railway station; trap the fourth, at the theatre. That man with the handbills has had an hour at his disposal. If he has not set those four traps (with the assistance of the local solicitor) by this time, he is not the competent lawyer’s clerk I take him for. Come, come, my dear girl! if there is somebody else in the background, whose advice you prefer to mine —’
‘You see that I am alone,’ she interposed proudly. ‘If you knew me better, you would know that I depend on nobody but myself.’
Those words decided the only doubt which now remained in the captain’s mind – the doubt whether the course was clear before him. The motive of her flight from home was evidently what the handbills assumed it to be – a reckless fancy for going on the stage. ‘One of two things,’ thought Wragge to himself in his logical way. ‘She’s worth more than fifty pounds to me in her present situation, or she isn’t. If she is, her friends may whistle for her. If she isn’t, I have only to keep her till the bills are posted.’ Fortified by this simple plan of action, the captain returned to the charge; and politely placed Magdalen between the two inevitable alternatives of trusting herself to him, on the one hand, or of returning to her friends, on the other.
‘I respect independence of character, wherever I find it,’ he said, with an air of virtuous severity. ‘In a young and lovely relative, I more than respect – I admire it. But (excuse the bold assertion), to walk on a way of your own, you must first have a way to walk on. Under existing circumstances, where is your way? Mr Huxtable is out of the question, to begin with.’
‘Out of the question for to-night,’ said Magdalen; ‘but what hinders me from writing to Mr Huxtable, and making my own private arrangements with him for to-morrow?’
‘Granted with all my heart – a hit, a palpable hit. Now, for my turn. To get to to-morrow (excuse the bold assertion, once more), you must first pass through to-night. Where are you to sleep?’
‘Are there no hotels in York?’
‘Excellent hotels, for large families; excellent hotels for single gentlemen. The very worst hotels in the world for handsome young lathes, who present themselves alone at the door, without male escort, without a maid in attendance, and without a single article of luggage. Dark as it is, I think I could see a lady’s box, if there was anything of the sort in our immediate neighbourhood.’
‘My box is at the cloak-room. What is to prevent my sending the ticket for it?’
‘Nothing – if you want to communicate your address by means of your box – nothing whatever. Think; pray think! Do you really suppose that the people who are looking for you, are such fools as not to have an eye on the cloak-room? Do you think they are such fools – when they find you don’t come to Mr Huxtable’s at eight to-night – as not to inquire at all the hotels? Do you think a young lady of your striking appearance (even if they consented to receive you) could take up her abode at an inn, without becoming the subject of universal curiosity and remark? Here is night coming on as fast as it can. Don’t let me bore you; only let me ask once more – Where are you to sleep?’
There was no answer to that question: in Magdalen’s position, there was literally no answer to it on her side. She was silent.
‘Where are you to sleep?’ repeated the captain. ‘The reply is obvious – under my roof. Mrs Wragge will be charmed to see you. Look upon her as your aunt; pray look upon her as your aunt. The landlady is a widow, the house is close by, there are no other lodgers, and there is a bedroom to let. Can anything be more satisfactory, under all the circumstances? Pray observe, I say nothing about to-morrow – I leave to-morrow to you, and confine myself exclusively to the night. I may, or may not, command theatrical facilities, which I am in a position to offer you. Sympathy and admiration may, or may not, be strong within me, when I contemplate the dash and independence of your character. Hosts of examples of bright stars of the British drama, who have begun their apprenticeship to the stage as you are beginning yours, may, or may not, crowd on my memory. These are topics for the future. For the present, I confine myself within my strict range of duty. We are within five minutes’ walk
of my present address. Allow me to offer you my arm. No? You hesitate? You distrust me? Good Heavens! is it possible you can have heard anything to my disadvantage?’
‘Quite possible,’ said Magdalen, without a moment’s flinching from the answer.
‘May I inquire the particulars?’ asked the captain, with the politest composure. ‘Don’t spare my feelings; oblige me by speaking out. In the plainest terms, now, what have you heard?’
She answered him with a woman’s desperate disregard of consequences, when she is driven to bay – she answered him instantly:
‘I have heard you are a Rogue.’
‘Have you, indeed?’ said the impenetrable Wragge. ‘A Rogue? Well! I waive my privilege of setting you right on that point for a fitter time. For the sake of argument, let us say I am a Rogue. What is Mr Huxtable?’
‘A respectable man, or I should not have seen him in the house where we first met.’
‘Very good. Now observe! You talked of writing to Mr Huxtable, a minute ago. What do you think a respectable man is likely to do with a young lady, who openly acknowledges that she has run away from her home and her friends to go on the stage? My dear girl, on your own showing, it’s not a respectable man you want in your present predicament. It’s a Rogue – like me.’
Magdalen laughed bitterly.
‘There is some truth in that,’ she said. ‘Thank you for recalling me to myself and my circumstances. I have my end to gain — and who am I, to pick and choose the way of getting to it? It is my turn to beg pardon now. I have been talking as if I was a young lady of family and position. Absurd! We know better than that, don’t we, Captain Wragge? You are quite right. Nobody’s child must sleep under Somebody’s roof – and why not yours?’
‘This way,’ said the captain, dexterously profiting by the sudden change in her humour, and cunningly refraining from exasperating it by saying more himself. ‘This way.’
She followed him a few steps, and suddenly stopped.
‘Supposed I am discovered?’ she broke out abruptly. ‘Who has any authority over me? Who can take me back, if I don’t choose to go? If they all find me to-morrow, what then? Can’t I say No, to Mr Pendril? Can’t I trust my own courage with Miss Garth?’
‘Can you trust your courage with your sister?’ whispered the captain, who had not forgotten the references to Norah which had twice escaped her already.
Her head drooped. She shivered, as if the cold night air had struck her, and leaned back wearily against the parapet of the wall.
‘Not with Norah,’ she said, sadly. ‘I could trust myself with the others. Not with Norah.’
‘This way,’ repeated Captain Wragge. She roused herself; looked up at the darkening heaven, looked round at the darkening view. ‘What must be, must,’ she said – and followed him.
The Minster clock struck the quarter to eight as they left the Walk on the Wall, and descended the steps into Rosemary Lane. Almost at the same moment, the lawyer’s clerk from London gave the last instructions to his subordinates, and took up his own position, on the opposite side of the river, within easy view of Mr Huxtable’s door.
Chapter Two
Captain Wragge stopped nearly midway in the one little row of houses composing Rosemary Lane, and let himself and his guest in at the door of his lodgings, with his own key. As they entered the passage, a careworn woman, in a widow’s cap, made her appearance with a candle. ‘My niece,’ said the captain, presenting Magdalen; ‘my niece on a visit to York. She has kindly consented to occupy your empty bedroom. Consider it let, if you please, to my niece – and be very particular in airing the sheets? Is Mrs Wragge upstairs? Very good. You may lend me your candle. My dear girl, Mrs Wragge’s boudoir is on the first floor; Mrs Wragge is visible. Allow me to show you the way up.’
As he ascended the stairs first, the care-worn widow whispered piteously to Magdalen: ‘I hope you’ll pay me, miss. Your uncle doesn’t.’
The captain threw open the door of the front room on the first floor; and disclosed a female figure, arrayed in a gown of tarnished amber-coloured satin, seated solitary on a small chair, with dingy old gloves on its hands, with a tattered old book on its knees, and with one little bedroom candle by its side. The figure terminated at its upper extremity, in a large, smooth, white round face – like a moon – encircled by a cap and green ribbons; and dimly irradiated by eyes of mild and faded blue, which looked straightforward into vacancy, and took not the smallest notice of Magdalen’s appearance, on the opening of the door.
‘Mrs Wragge!’ cried the captain, shouting at her, as if she was fast asleep. ‘Mrs Wragge!’
The lady of the faded blue eyes slowly rose, to an apparently interminable height. When she had at last attained an upright position, she towered to a stature of two or three inches over six feet. Giants of both sexes are, by a wise dispensation of Providence, created for the most part gentle. If Mrs Wragge and a lamb had been placed side by side – comparison, under those circumstances, would have exposed the lamb as a rank impostor.
‘Tea, captain?’ inquired Mrs Wragge, looking submissively down at her husband, whose head when he stood on tiptoe barely reached her shoulder.
‘Miss Vanstone, the younger,’ said the captain, presenting Magdalen. ‘Our fair relative, whom I have met by a fortunate accident. Our guest for the night. Our guest!’ reiterated the captain, shouting once more, as if the tall lady was still fast asleep, in spite of the plain testimony of her own eyes to the contrary.
A smile expressed itself (in faint outline) on the large vacant space of Mrs Wragge’s countenance. ‘Oh?’ she said, interrogatively. ‘Oh, indeed? Please, miss, will you sit down? I’m sorry – no, I don’t mean I’m sorry; I mean I’m glad – ’ She stopped, and consulted her husband by a helpless look.
‘Glad, of course!’ shouted the captain.
‘Glad, of course,’ echoed the giantess of the amber satin, more meekly than ever.
‘Mrs Wragge is not deaf,’ explained the captain. ‘She’s only a little slow. Constitutionally torpid – if I may use the expression. I am merely loud with her (and I beg you will honour me by being loud, too) as a necessary stimulant to her ideas. Shout at her – and her mind comes up to time. Speak to her – and she drifts miles away from you directly. Mrs Wragge!’
Mrs Wragge instantly acknowledged the stimulant. ‘Tea, captain?’ she inquired, for the second time.
‘Put your cap straight!’ shouted her husband. ‘I beg ten thousand pardons,’ he resumed, again addressing himself to Magdalen. ‘The sad truth is, I am a martyr to my own sense of order. All untidiness, all want of system and regularity, causes me the acutest irritation. My attention is distracted, my composure is upset; I can’t rest till things are set straight again. Externally speaking, Mrs Wragge is, to my infinite regret, the crookedest woman I ever met with. More to the right!’ shouted the captain, as Mrs Wragge, like a well-trained child, presented herself with her revised head-dress for her husband’s inspection.
Mrs Wragge immediately pulled the cap to the left. Madgalen rose, and set it right for her. The moon-face of the giantess brightened for the first time. She looked admiringly at Magdalen’s cloak and bonnet. ‘Do you like dress, Miss?’ she asked suddenly, in a confidential whisper. ‘I do.’
‘Show Miss Vanstone her room,’ said the captain, looking as if the whole house belonged to him. ‘The spare-room, the landlady’s spare-room, on the third floor front. Offer Miss Vanstone all articles connected with the toilet of which she may stand in need. She has no luggage with her. Supply the deficiency; and then come back and make tea.’
Mrs Wragge acknowledged the receipt of these lofty directions by a look of placid bewilderment, and led the way out of the room; Magdalen following her, with a candle presented by the attentive captain. As soon as they were alone on the landing outside, Mrs Wragge raised the tattered old book which she had been reading when Magdalen was first presented to her, and which she had never let out of her hand since; and slowly tapped
herself on the forehead with it. ‘Oh, my poor head,’ said the tall lady, in meek soliloquy; ‘it’s Buzzing again worse than ever!’
‘Buzzing?’ repeated Magdalen, in the utmost astonishment.
Mrs Wragge ascended the stairs, without offering any explanation; stopped at one of the rooms on the second floor and led the way in.
‘This is not the third floor,’ said Magdalen. ‘This is not my room, surely?’
‘Wait a bit,’ pleaded Mrs Wragge. ‘Wait a bit, Miss, before we go up any higher. I’ve got the Buzzing in my head worse than ever. Please wait for me till I’m a little better again.’
‘Shall I ask for help?’ inquired Magdalen. ‘Shall I call the landlady?’
‘Help?’ echoed Mrs Wragge. ‘Bless you, I don’t want help! I’m used to it. I’ve had the Buzzing in my head, off and on – how many years?’ She stopped, reflected, lost herself, and suddenly tried a question in despair. ‘Have you ever been at Darch’s Dining-Rooms in London?’ she asked, with an appearance of the deepest interest.
‘No,’ replied Magdalen, wondering at the strange inquiry.
‘That’s where the Buzzing in my head first began,’ said Mrs Wragge, following the new clue, with the deepest attention and anxiety. ‘I was employed to wait on the gentlemen at Darch’s Dining-Rooms – I was. The gentlemen all came together; the gentlemen were all hungry together; the gentlemen all gave their orders together – ’ She stopped, and tapped her head again despondently, with the tattered old book.
‘And you had to keep all their orders in your memory, separate one from the other?’ suggested Magdalen, helping her out. ‘And the trying to do that, confused you?’
‘That’s it!’ said Mrs Wragge, becoming violently excited in a moment. ‘Boiled pork and greens and peas-pudding, for Number One. Stewed beef and carrots and gooseberry tart, for Number Two. Cut of mutton, and quick about it, well done, and plenty of fat, for Number Three. Codfish and parsnips, two chops to follow, hot-and-hot, or I’ll be the death of you, for Number Four. Five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Carrots and gooseberry tart – peas-pudding and plenty of fat – pork and beef and mutton, and cut ‘em all, and quick about it – stout for one, and ale for t’other – and stale bread here, and new bread there -and this gentleman likes cheese, and that gentleman doesn’t – Matilda, Tilda, Tilda, Tilda, fifty times over, till I didn’t know my own name again – oh lord! oh lord!! oh lord!!! all together, all at the same time, all out of temper, all buzzing in my poor head like forty thousand million bees – don’t tell the captain! don’t tell the captain!’ The unfortunate creature dropped the tattered old book, and beat both her hands on her head, with a look of blank terror fixed on the door.